[Triumf-seminars] TRIUMF Colloquium today at 14:00

postmaster at admin.triumf.ca postmaster at admin.triumf.ca
Fri Jan 15 08:49:16 PST 2010


Date/Time: Fri 2010-01-15 at 14:00

Location:  Auditorium          

Speaker:   James Murray (School of Oceanography, University of Washington, Seattle)

Title:     Peak Oil/Coal and Climate Change

Abstract: The argument of Peak Oil is that production of oil, a finite non-renewable geological resource, will ultimately reach a maximum and then decline. There is no debate that this will happen, but there is disagreement about when it will occur. Peak Oil does not mean “running out of oil” but when the peak has been reached, about 50% of the oil that will be ultimately extracted will have been used. The production and resources of coal can be assessed with similar tools and several groups have recently assessed the ultimate resources of coal available both regionally and globally. Peak Coal is projected to be as early as 2025. There are both short term and long range issues. We see the manifestation of the imbalance between supply and demand in the steady increase in the price of oil since 1999. The most significant long term impacts relate to the IPCC scenarios predicting CO2 production from now to 2100. Energy may pass climate change as the “hot button” issue. We need to solve the energy issue in order to move forward on climate. The solutions are the same – burn less oil and coal: producing less CO2. The issues of Peak Oil and resource limitation have not been given serious consideration by the climate change community and the impacts could be profound. For this reason it is important to have an open discussion of the data and the issues.


Stimulants available 15 minutes before the talk.

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