[p2p-research] [Open Manufacturing] Addressing Post-Scarcity Pitfalls

[Ryan Lanham]

I agree with Stan's research in principle.  I would say that the single
greatest action humans could take to reduce power use is probably in the
area of insulation.

The Jevons paradox, I think, can be overcome by public policy given
sufficient education.  People can choose to use less natural resources even
though they have more transportation technology, for instance, because they
understand the moral value of reallocation. Of course pressures to drill
drill drill notwithstanding.

I've never much believed in economic "laws."  People can decide their fate
and change their patterns--Jared Diamond's depressing research
notwithstanding.  If they cannot, discussions are pointless.

I otherwise agree.

Ryan


On Wed, Jun 24, 2009 at 5:10 PM, Stan Rhodes <stanleyrhodes at gmail.com>wrote:

> Eugen, three points:
>
> 1) Negawatts are effectively nonsense because of the Jevons paradox.
> Bradish challenged Lovins to offer evidence against the Jevons paradox for
> power use, and it's never appeared.  The same challenge goes for anyone
> mentioning negawatts.  Increasing efficiency lowers relative cost but tends
> to increase consumption (rebound effect).  It happens with coal, gasoline,
> and electricity, to name a few.
>
> 2) Your claims of current PV viability "across the scale" included no
> supporting data, and, having looked at the data for solar, I do not believe
> them.  Solar cannot be used for baseload power, generally stated to be
> 30-40% of consumption over the year.  Seems reasonable given use graphs I've
> seen.  Solar generates very little power per sq km, and efficiency gains in
> the technology cannot make up for variable weather, which is a ceiling the
> technology can never break.  Storage options attempt to get around this, but
> are incredibly expensive.  The same applies to wind, although wind can
> produce more power per footprint (carbon or land) than solar.
>
> 3) Kevin's point on industry power stands.  Industry power needs are
> everyone's problem.  They're a part of the global socioeconomic system, and
> I see no evidence suggesting that will change in the years ahead.
>
> Kevin:
>
> Reduced demand cannot be achieved through efficiency.  See above regarding
> negawatts.  Crunch the numbers, look at the literature, particularly more
> recent discussions of the Khazzoom-Brookes postulate.  Energy economists are
> trying to figure out what the hell to do without having efforts politically
> hamstrung.
>
> Lately you've made increasingly extraordinary claims, which require
> extraordinary evidence.  Where are the data supporting efficiency gains of
> 80%?  Surely you can understand my skepticism, particularly when the
> statement is so general.  Renovating cities isn't free: consider the power
> cost to do so in diesel alone.  Even if the Jevons paradox somehow didn't
> apply, how much energy would be required to renovate US infrastructure to
> reduce consumption by 80%?  Now consider material and labor costs.  Now
> consider transaction costs of renegotiating property laws and rights,
> municipality by municipality.
>
> The only solution direction I see is an increasing transition to taxing
> resource use, built into the socioeconomic system, and thus most of my
> research since mid-2008 has focused on mapping that concept space with the
> insights of behavioral economics.  Governance structures must include
> mechanisms to adjust for these externalities, but when they do, they're
> likely to be out-competed by entities that ignore those mechanisms.
>
> -- Stan
>
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