Category Archives: Transportation

97% of vehicles and trains run on oil which peaked in world-wide production in 2005 — the tractors to plant and harvest, the trucks to deliver food all depend on combustion engines that burn oil

The latest monster ships could be a disaster

Posted on December 1, 2021 by

Preface.  The article below makes the case for the hazards of one of these enormous ships running aground or sinking, blocking a major shipping line, leaking oil, and possibly impossible to salvage. In 2020, the largest container ship is the … Continue reading →

Posted in Ships and Barges | Tagged , , | 7 Comments

Diesel is finite. Trucks are the bedrock of civilization. So where are the battery electric trucks?

Posted on August 17, 2021 by

Last updated: 2023-1-21 Preface. Heavy-duty diesel-engine trucks (agricultural, mining, logging, construction, garbage, cement, 18-wheelers, and more) are essential for doing the actual work of our fossil-fueled civilization. Without them, no goods would be delivered, no food grown, nothing manufactured, no … Continue reading →

Posted in Batteries, Electric & Hydrogen trucks impossible, Trucks: Electric | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 11 Comments

Trucks running on CNG or LNG

Posted on July 23, 2021 by

Preface. My books “When Trucks stop running” and “Life After Fossil Fuels” explain why trucks can’t run on electricity — batteries simply don’t scale up, they are too heavy leaving little if any room for cargo. A catenary system has … Continue reading →

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Australian Senate hearings on Peak Oil & Transportation 2006

Posted on April 14, 2021 by

Preface.  This post has a summary of two of the nine senate hearings on Peak Oil in Australia in 2006. Someday historians may want to know which politicians knew about the energy crisis and when they knew it, probably to … Continue reading →

Posted in Energy Policy & Politicians, GOVERNMENT, Transportation | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Lifespan of infrastructure, transportation, and buildings

Posted on February 27, 2021 by

Preface. What follows is from the International Energy Agency 2020 report “Energy technology perspectives” on how to transition to net zero emissions by 2050. This might require the replacement of just about everything, since power plants, steel blast furnaces, cement … Continue reading →

Posted in Airplanes, Automobiles, Concrete, Dams, Electricity Infrastructure, Energy Infrastructure, Limits To Growth, Manufacturing & Industrial Heat, Oil & Gas, Transportation Infrastructure, Trucks | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Autos need finite rare earth, critical, & precious metals

Posted on February 3, 2021 by

An electric car uses five times as many minerals as a conventional car (IEA 2020): IEA, Minerals used in selected power generation technologies, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/minerals-used-in-selected-power-generation-technologies There are 17 rare earth elements (REE) that China controls up to 97% of … Continue reading →

Posted in Automobiles, Peak Rare Earth Elements | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Electrify ships with batteries?

Posted on December 17, 2020 by

Preface. You’d need 100,000 metric tons of batteries taking 40% of cargo space to go from Asia to Europe in 31 days on an 18,000 TEU container ship, and it is hard to imagine how or how long it would … Continue reading →

Posted in Ships and Barges, Transportation What To Do | Tagged , , , , , | 6 Comments

What can California do about sea level rise?

Posted on November 11, 2020 by

Projected sea level rise from one meter (dark red) to six meters (light orange) in California’s Bay Area. (Weiss and Overpeck 2011) Preface. Nearly all, if not all, possible solutions to rising sea levels along all the coasts in the … Continue reading →

Posted in Energy Infrastructure, Infrastructure & Collapse, Rail, Roads, Sea Level Rise, Transportation | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on What can California do about sea level rise?

EV cars and utility scale energy storage batteries are not likely to materialize

Posted on September 21, 2020 by

Preface.  Clearly there’s not enough minerals and metals to shift from fossil fuels to electric vehicles and utility scale battery storage, due to peak critical elements, peak platinum group elements, peak precious elements, peak rare earth elements, and peak everything … Continue reading →

Posted in Automobiles, Batteries, Battery - Utility Scale, Peak Lithium | Tagged , , , | 13 Comments

Heavy-duty hydrogen fuel cell trucks a waste of energy and money

Posted on July 30, 2020 by

Preface. There are 3 articles that I summarize below: ARB. November 2015. Medium- and heavy-duty fuel cell electric vehicles. Air Resources Board, California Environmental Protection Agency. NRC. 2003. Energy and Transportation: Challenges for the Chemical Sciences in the 21st Century. … Continue reading →

Posted in Batteries, Electric & Hydrogen trucks impossible, Hydrogen, Trucks: Electric | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments