I go to a Russian church and I notice that all of the men date only Russian woman. I am constantly talked to about available guys and I’m even told of guys who like me. I’m confused, do Russian men like black women or what?
Every person has their preference, if you know they like you approach them! I mean it is not like there are just black women walking around Russia like here in the US. Just go for it before they are taken.
PS- I have gone to predominantly black Church’s and a lot of the congregation are same race couples, but that does not mean blacks only date blacks. Good luck and remember Russian is sexy.
Have you been hearing a lot of good stories about black christian singles online that are willing to start a friendship and even a relationship through its dating service? Are you interested about it because you feel you might find the right one that you’ve been looking for a long time now? There are actually a lot of amazing black christian who are single online. If you are wondering how can you start a friendship or build a relationship through black christian dating service, then try to follow these tips and you will surely enjoy your time making friends and dating amazing people on the internet.
Click Here For Black Faith Love Limited Free Trial!
Tip # 1: Start a Good Conversation
If you are already about to start a small talk with someone you meet online through chat, then you need to remember that starting a good conversation is really important. If you start a good conversation, the person you’re speaking with will never ever forget you because yo have made a good impression already.
Tip # 2: Don’t be Rude, Instead Be Nice
If you are already excited about meeting a lot of people through black christian dating service, then you need to make sure first that you would never ever do something stupid that can put your name on shame. Remember that you are here to meet friends and not enemies. Try to respect other people’s view and try your best to be friendly and nice as much as possible.
Tip # 3: Be Funny
Are you scared that you may not get the attention of someone you are chatting or talking to online because you think you are quite uninteresting and boring? Don’t be afraid to show the funny of yours and give out jokes. This will make the conversation feel more comfortable for the both of you. Just keep in mind that you know what kind of jokes are you giving out because it might offend her or him.
Through black christian dating service you would certainly be able to find the one that you’ve been looking for, it might be a friend or your one true love. Just try to remember these tips and you are guaranteed to have a good time meeting and talking with different types of person on the internet. Have fun and good luck!
Click Here For Black Faith Love Limited Free Trial!
About the Author
This author writes about Beautiful Black christian singles at Black Christian Dating Service
Pastor Jackson Teaches Black Christian Single Pt.3
Ambinergia 2009 – Our participation – The peak of oil production
Our dependence on fossil fuels
Our societies are totally dependent on commercial energy. A cut in the electricity supply of a city would stop all electric public transports, lifts, traffic and street lights, residential and commercial lighting, most of the refrigeration and heating systems, cooking devices, communication devices (from TV to fixed or cellular phones), most of the equipment of hospitals, shopping malls, etc.. A lack of availability of liquid fossil fuels (mainly crude oil, coal and natural gas) would particularly affect the transportation systems. It would stop the cars, buses, trucks (both for long distance transportation and local distribution), airplanes, diesel trains and ships. As a very important side effect, in most countries, lack of fossil energy would also severely reduce electricity production. Naturally, the industrial activity, and even the modern agricultural production, is based on machinery powered by commercial energy, and mainly by fossil fuels.
To quantify our present dependency on commercial energy, we can consult the most recent yearly statistical data from OECD/IEA [1]. These data indicates that the proportion of fossil energy in the total commercial energy consumed in the world is 80.9%, and crude oil alone represents 34.2% of this total energy. The non-fossil sources of energy are nuclear (6.2%), hydro (2.2%), geothermal & solar (0.6%) and renewables & waste (10.0%)[1]. These percentages show that the combined alternatives to fossil energy represent, at present, a very small proportion of the total consumed energy.
When we look at the transport sector in isolation, the direct fossil fuels weight is even greater, reaching 97.9%. Crude oil clearly dominates, representing by itself 94.5% of the energy used in this sector, and reaching 100% in some specific transportation systems like airplanes.
These statistics illustrate quite well the present day vital importance of the fossil fuels in general and of crude oil in particular.
The Peak Oil concept
Although mankind has been using fossil fuels (and coal in particular) for millennia, human exploration of fossil fuels increased significantly some 250 years ago, with heavy coal use in the Industrial Revolution. However, liquid fossil fuels (mainly crude oil) ended up proving more convenient. So, during the last 150 years, mankind has consistently developed the exploration and extraction of crude oil, turning it into the most important single energy source. During this period, its production has been consistently raised to match the growing demand generated by global population increase and economic development. The high efficiency and convenience of fossil oil can be gauged by the fact that the very significant technological developments that occurred over this period have consistently increased our dependency in this energy source, instead of creating effective alternatives.
Unfortunately, from a human perspective, the formation of the fossil fuels is extremely slow and so they may be regarded as non-renewable resources. At present, in the end of the first decade of the 21st century, the world crude oil production is very close to the maximum that it will ever reach, and afterwards availability constraints will force it to decline.
The analysis of the world oil production in the region of this maximum and also the study of the mitigation possibilities and of the consequences of the subsequent period of increasing oil scarcity, are the object of the new research area known as “Peak Oil” (PO).
It should be noted that, when talking about the “PO problem”, the main concern is not the end of oil as an important energy source but only the peak of its production and the resulting reduced availability, price increases, and associated economic and social effects.
Peak Oil: A short history
The problem of the peak of oil production (PO) was introduced by M. K. Hubbert in 1949 [2]. Before that, several persons expressed concerns about the future availability of crude oil, but those concerns were not scientifically formulated and in most cases were based on unrealistic early predictions of crude oil exhaustion. After that first presentation of the problem, Hubbert went on studying the subject and (in 1956) published a very important paper [3] in which he accurately predicted that the date for the peak of oil production in the continental USA (except Alaska) would be around 1970. This paper also presented the classical approach to the prediction of the natural (unconstrained) production profile for a sufficiently vast region (or for the world), and explained that the production should follow a bell-shaped curve. At first, this paper generated great discussion, since the USA was by then the biggest producer of crude in the world, and its production was rising without apparent problems (in fact, it had to be limited by regulator bodies, like the “Railroad Commission of Texas”, to prevent the “flooding” of the markets). Eventually, however, that prediction proved correct, and that established Hubbert’s prediction procedure. In 1971 Hubbert published a work in which he predicted that if the production and demand patterns were maintained, the world conventional crude production would peak around 2000 [4]. Considering the extraneous delaying effects of the political production constrains of the 1970’s and 1980’s, that prediction again seems pretty close to be correct.
Hubbert can rightly be considered the father of the research field concerned with the sustainability of the production of natural resources, and of the PO “theory”. His prediction technique, based on the fitting of a bell-shaped curve to the historical production and to the Ultimately Recoverable Reserves (URR), remains the most common approach to predict future production of non-renewable natural resources and, in particular, of fossil resources.
Mainly using Hubbert’s approach, in 1998, Campbell and Laherrère presented a very influential paper [5] discussing the near term expected peak of oil production, and predicting it to occur “before 2010”. This paper influenced the “modern” discussion of the PO problem, and its global impact lead Campbell and some others to create the ASPO[2], the first and, at present, the most relevant international organization dedicated to the study of the PO problem.
PO date forecasts
Although considerably contested when first presented, the general idea of a future peak of oil production is now well accepted. The time frame for that peak, however, is still contested. Table 1 shows the distribution of the date predictions for peak production of total fossil liquids[3] from a number of specialized institutions and individual experts. This distribution is a summarization of the list of predictions, made in 2000 or later, that is presented in [6].
This table shows that most predictions point to a PO date around the end of the present decade. This constitutes a strong indication that the effective PO date must be very close. Like the researchers whose predictions show in the first half of table 1, we are also convicted of a near proximity of the peak of production of the liquid fossil fuels. Our own predictions – the first one presented in the ASPO 2005 conference [7] and the last one appearing in [6] – also point to the 2008-2012 interval, precisely where table 1 shows a greater concentration of predictions.
Regarding the significant number of predictions listed in table 1 for 2023 or later, we should note that, until recently, a limited number of analysts and institutions used to defend the theory that the peak of oil production is so far in time as to be irrelevant. Some of their predictions show up in table 1 in the interval “2023 or later”. However, these predictions were based on discredited models. As an example, two of the predictions listed for 2023 or later come from the IEA (International Energy Agency), an organization that recently recognized that its predictions for production were simply based on estimating demand and assuming that production would always be able to match it.
Energy alternatives
As discussed above, we are probably very close to the world historical maximum for the production of liquid fossil fuels. As such, our societies will have to adapt to a new paradigm: Instead of the comfortable situation of last century in which we have relied on a petroleum production able to grow without significant constraints to match the gradually increasing demand, we will have to adjust to a progressively decreasing production. This new reality will have an important impact in the availability and prices of the commercial energy used in every activity sector.
Excluding the transport sector, the dependence on liquid fuels is more limited and, although with inevitable transition difficulties, our societies will probably be able to mitigate the ensuing problems, for example relying in a greater use of renewable technologies for electricity production (such as wind farms, hydroelectric dams, geothermic plants, solar energy conversion, etc.).
However, in the transport sector, the dependence on crude oil is so overwhelming that it is difficult to imagine a relatively painless transition. Naturally, electricity use can be intensified, and that can help solve environmental and sustainability problems in several classes of transports. For instance, modern electrical train-like mass transportation systems can be very efficient and attractive to the users both in intercity travel and in city transportation networks. Also, most of the uses of today’s cars (e.g., daily commuting to work) could also be performed by electrical vehicles. However, there are classes of transports that can’t realistically convert to that solution, such as airplanes, long distance cargo trucks and ships. For these classes, liquid fuels are by far more convenient than any other available alternative, although it can be argued that liquefied gaseous fuels, or even coal in case of ships, can be used if the need arises.
In the last few years, hydrogen has been the most discussed gaseous solution to replace liquid fossil fuels. However, hydrogen is only an energy carrier, not an energy source like crude oil. Besides, the path to the much touted “hydrogen economy” is blocked by several very important technologic and economic problems, and it even presents long-term sustainability problems since it would aggravate the continuing “hydrogen loss” from our planet.
Other gaseous fuels alternatives presently under consideration are mainly based on Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) or in Natural Gas (NG). For many applications, these gaseous fuels can be a fairly convenient short term alternative to the conventional petroleum derivatives, but they are not a long term solution since they are also non-renewable.
In regard to liquid fuels, besides those of fossil origin, there is a significant possibility of using renewable biologic fuels. Presently, those “biofuels” represent only about 1.1% of the energy used in the transport sector (IEA, 2008). Ethanol produced from sugar cane in semi-tropical climates, for example in Brazil, is already close to be price competitive with conventional fossil fuels, although this is far from true in the case of ethanol production from corn, beet, and other agricultural products used on temperate climates. However, due to direct constraints in soil availability, biofuel productions based on present technologies will always be severely limited.
It is possible to produce liquid fuels through the industrial transformation of gaseous (e.g., natural gas) or solid (e.g., coal) fossil energy sources, although those transformations present some economic and ecological problems. However these alternatives to conventional petroleum have similar future availability problems, since they are also based on the consumption of limited, virtually irreplaceable, fossil resources. During the last century, conventional crude oil proved to be the most precious and convenient of the fossil fuels, and so it was the most actively extracted and consumed, and so it is now in a more advanced state of depletion. However, several authors are already expressing serious concerns about a relatively near-term “peak gas” [8] and about a somewhat more distant “peak coal” [9].
Effects of the Peak Oil
Since the beginning of the 20th century, the swift development of our civilization (in terms of number of inhabitants, standard of living, technological progress, ability to travel and to transport goods to long distances, etc.) has depended on a relatively unconstrained supply of cheap energy. Crude oil has indubitably been the greater component of this ever growing supply of convenient energy. Excluding limited periods during the politically-based energy crisis of the seventies and eighties, until recently (arguably until 2004) our societies only had to spend a very limited proportion of their resources to pay for this absolutely vital energy supply. In fact, in spite of much higher demand, the technical progress in the exploration of the existing fossil resources allowed the relative cost of energy to drop significantly during the last centuries. Those fossil resources are a precious gift from nature. They required hundreds of millions of years to create, but we are now consuming them fast – they will basically exhausted in some 4 centuries (2 centuries for crude oil), a short time frame even in the context of the history of mankind. At present, we are meeting their first significant global signs of exhaustion, but we are still at peak levels of consumption, and close to the lowest historic prices (when evaluated in terms of the energy cost in proportion of world Gross “Domestic” Product). The unbalanced relation between the extreme usefulness and convenience of the liquid fossil fuels and their low price, created a situation in which our societies are able and willing to accept significant price increases to maintain the present consumption patterns. This results in demand having a very low price elasticity.
Figure 1 is a non-quantitative sketch that illustrates the “natural” production curve of crude oil (constrained only by resource availability); the tendency of demand in absence of resource exhaustion or economic recession (i.e., constrained only by ordinary historic prices, technologic evolution and less-than-exponential economic growth); and the behavior of the demand affected by the present economic recession but in absence of PO future constraints.
The contradiction between the “natural” evolution of the demand of liquid fossil fuels in a “non-constrained” supply scenario and of the actual production curve in the region of the peak must be resolved since consumption cannot surpass production. In the last few years production could no longer grow as usual in the past, and so the desired consumption levels had to be lowered to match the production curve. As figure 1 illustrates, this occurred even before the date of the absolute peak of production. Given the low elasticity of demand versus price, this forced demand compression could only be achieved by a very significant price increase.
This was clearly happening until, in the middle of 2008, additional factors (hurricanes in the GOM and the international economic crisis) created alternate demand compression mechanisms. In this new lower demand situation, the low elasticity between demand and price now required a very significant price decrease to again match production and demand (this time, by adjusting a temporary excess of production in relation to demand). It is interesting to note that this new adjustment is not being made just on the production side (through voluntary OPEC production cuts) but also in the demand side. In the last few months, in spite of a clear deepening of the ongoing economic recession, the present “low” fuel prices have lead to a progressive return of the previous consumption behaviors. This is most notable in the USA, where, even in a situation of relative economic hardship, the high average income and relatively low fuel prices allow the citizens to accommodate the fuel expenses linked to the “ordinary” driving habits (typical of old fuel prices and of pre-economic crisis). In fact, the most recent demand data from the USA points to a very significant consumption recovery. From extremely depressed year-on-year demand levels in October 2008, one can notice a consistent recovery up to the last available values (according to the EIA “Weekly Petroleum Status Report”, year-on-year demand recovered from a drop of about 8% in October 2008 to a drop of only 0.1% in mid-February 2009).
An interesting side effect of the present economic crisis is that it may have anticipated by a couple of years the “natural” Peak Oil date. As figure 1 illustrates, the economic recession depressed the demand and production around the peak date, and it seems doubtful that when the world economic situation recovers the production of liquid fossil fuels might still surpass the values of 2007 and 2008.
Conclusions
With the present lower fuel prices and the overwhelming concerns about the ongoing economic recession, the mainstream media has totally forgotten the worries related to a near term PO that had beginning to surface with the high fuel prices of early 2008. However, as sketched in Figure 1, in a near future the desired consumption will again tend to exceed the world production capacity. Due to the predictable absence of effective large-scale alternative energy solutions, this will result in a renewed strong price increase for crude oil, and for its refined products. Moreover, after the moment when the crisis-depressed demand hits the post-PO production capacity, everything points to an irreversible situation of progressively reduced world production. That new situation, with lower production year after year, will inevitably be more difficult to our addicted societies than the relative benign pre-peak tightening of 2004-2008.
For the crude oil industry, these are trying times. The present relatively low oil prices, compounded by credit tightening, are resulting in widespread delaying of projects and even in some companies going into receivership or bankruptcy. However, we all know that a renewed oil price increase is inevitable – only the timing is uncertain. Besides, until more cost-effective energy alternatives show up, the best PO mitigation our societies can count on must rely on an effort to increase exploration and development of new oilfields, and in efforts to limit the downward slope of production in post-peak fields. As such, our societies will be increasingly dependent on an industry that is being particularly affected by the present economic crisis. In this particular situation, the best hope for a medium-term mitigation of the worst effects of the Peak Oil seems to rest in the ability of OPEC to force the crude oil prices into a short term reasonable interval – low enough not to compromise too much the economic recovery, but high enough to allow for continued investment in the petroleum industry.
References
[1] IEA, 2006 Energy Balances for World. International Energy Agency, Paris, 2008.
[2] Hubbert, M.K., Energy from fossil fuels. Science, vol. 109, pp. 103-109, 1949.
[3] Hubbert, M.K., Nuclear energy and fossil fuels, in Drilling and Production Practice, American Petroleum Institute, 1956.
[4] Hubbert, M.K., The energy resources in the Earth, in Energy and Power, Scientific American Book, chap. 3, pp. 30-40, 1971.
[5] Campbell, C. and Laherrère, J., The end of cheap oil, Scientific American, March 1998.
[6] Almeida, P., Silva, P., The peak of oil production – Timings and market recognition, Energy Policy 37 (4), 1267-1276, 2009.
[7] Almeida, P. and Silva, P., Peak oil and the Nymex futures market: do investors believe in physical realities?, In Proceedings of the IV International Workshop On Oil and Gas Depletion, Lisboa, Portugal, pp. 70-71, 2005.
[8] Simmons, M.R., Is the world supply of oil & gas peaking, International Petroleum Week, London, February 13, 2007.
[9] Zittel, W., Schindler, J., Coal: Resources and Future Production, EWG-Series No 1/2007, Energy Watch Group, March 2007.
- It should be noted that electricity is not an energy source – electricity production is based on the previously referenced sources with prominence of the fossil fuels.
- ASPO – Association for the Study of Peak Oil and gas
- To simplify, the aggregate of all fossil liquids can be called petroleum. It includes crude oil, condensates, natural gas liquids, and also intermediate forms of fossil semi-liquid energy sources (e.g., bitumen or oil sands).
Authors:
Pedro de Almeida1? and Pedro D. Silva2
1Computer Science Dep., University of Beira Interior, Covilhã, Portugal
2 Electromechanical Dep., University of Beira Interior, Covilhã, Portugal
