Posted by Robert Rapier on May 26, - pm. I am very fond of thought experiments. I like to ask "What If? For instance, if I wonder how much land it would take for solar panels to produce enough electricity to supply the U.
It isn't that I think we are going to build a solar grid that is 50 by 50 miles of nothing but solar panels, nor that I am oblivious to energy storage issues. Rather, it can help frame for me whether the idea is daft from conception, or whether there is a nugget of potential embedded within.
Lately I have been thinking of another thought experiment. Now that may seem silly. But that misses the point of the thought experiment. When I ask people at what price point gasoline is going to have a major impact on their lifestyle, that seems to be a moving target. Oh, they might buy a smaller car, but they aren't going to start walking 3 miles to the store. A friend who drives a Suburban recently told me that he doesn't care about gas prices; that he is going to keep driving at the same rate regardless.
The thought experiment is mainly designed to flesh out how people might cope as gasoline becomes more expensive and as we go down the depletion curve.
Because many of our energy sources are interchangeable, let's assume that other fossil fuel sources coal, gas, etc. Alternative non-fossil fuel energy sources, such as solar and nuclear, would also follow this trend, but not at the same rate since they are less dependent on fossil fuel inputs. So the idea is really, with respect to fossil fuels, "How low can you realistically go?
