In my previous two articles I wrote about the double-flanked onslaught that challenge the stranglehold that crude-oil-based fuels exercise over the transport industry. The challenges come from shale oil and from the widely perceived culpability of fossil fuel burning, in runaway global warming.
But, is a rapid shift away from the ICE really possible with 1.2 billion cars and one third of a million gas stations, around the world? Can such revolutionary change really happen seamlessly enough not to threaten global stability?
It certainly can. The face of our world has dramatically and quite rapidly been transformed numerous times in history.
In the mid-1800s you would have been laughed out of town if you had suggested that a day would come when a toilet flushed by running water, water closets, would become standard architecture inside buildings. Totally unimaginable then, but look around now.
In the mid-1880s who would have believed that strange gasoline-guzzling, human-driven heavy metal contraptions provisioned with ICEs, would spread globally like wildfire and dominate the transport world by the mid-1920s? Following up on this thought, how many people in the 1900s would have imagined a world crisscrossed by millions of kilometers of asphalt roads, so much so, that asphalt roads would become a natural part of our background scenery, as if they have been the norm for centuries. When humankind thought that asphalt roads were a good and useful idea to the mobile vehicle industry, almost 20 million kilometers of roads were paved in less than 100 years. Moreover, the new motor vehicle culture necessitated a global infrastructure that included hundreds of thousands of fuel stations wherever they could be built, and a gigantic transcontinental/transnational supply chain system from refinery to fuel station. Human entrepreneurship and creativity have demonstrated that humankind can switch direction, adapt and move fast when it is motivated to do so.
Change can and will come fast. I was an IBM® mainframe computer operator from 1971 to 1975. In the late 1970s I scoffed at a suggestion made by a colleague that a time would come when there would be a powerful computer in every house. By 1986 I had the sole use of a desktop in my office at the oil company where I worked and a second one in my apartment. Either of them was as powerful as the mainframes that I knew so well.
Then of course there was the telephone transformation from a single purpose finger-dialing contraption to the smart phones of today in less than 40 years. How many people in the 1970s would have imagined the magnitude of this transformation?
A revolutionary transport transformation system to replace the standard ICE system can be up and running in less than a decade. Automobiles have an average longevity that lies between 8 to 12 years. The estimated 1.2 billion vehicles plying our roads today, can be phased out inside of a decade if the alternative is available and ready to roll.
The global petroleum and transport industries cannot be complacent about future change that can undermine their market. When the change arrives, it will most likely come fast and will impact all facets and branches of the global oil and gas industry which is valued at 80 trillion-dollar; and its chief customer, the 8 trillion-dollar global transport industry. Collectively these two sectors comprise nearly 14 percent of the global economy.
There are only two ways to prepare for the revolutionary transformation that looms upon us and prepares to pounce upon these two industries. The first, is to surrender to the “inevitable”. The second, is to seek out a solution that will maintain status quo to a very reasonable degree for another 100 years or more. A status quo that will save the day for the ICE and its favorite crude oil-derived fuels, for the petroleum industry, and for oil-rich countries. A status quo solution with a twist. A status quo solution that does not emit CO2 into the atmosphere. It sounds so paradoxical. How is it even remotely possible?
I propose that both options be taken very seriously. Both options can be dealt with in parallel. Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 already deals with the first option. In my next article I will elaborate on the second option and argue why it should be taken much more seriously than it currently is. Time is running out as both options are challenged by the global warming tipping point that some researchers claim may be upon us by as early as 2040.
But, is a rapid shift away from the ICE really possible with 1.2 billion cars and one third of a million gas stations, around the world? Can such revolutionary change really happen seamlessly enough not to threaten global stability?
It certainly can. The face of our world has dramatically and quite rapidly been transformed numerous times in history.
In the mid-1800s you would have been laughed out of town if you had suggested that a day would come when a toilet flushed by running water, water closets, would become standard architecture inside buildings. Totally unimaginable then, but look around now.
In the mid-1880s who would have believed that strange gasoline-guzzling, human-driven heavy metal contraptions provisioned with ICEs, would spread globally like wildfire and dominate the transport world by the mid-1920s? Following up on this thought, how many people in the 1900s would have imagined a world crisscrossed by millions of kilometers of asphalt roads, so much so, that asphalt roads would become a natural part of our background scenery, as if they have been the norm for centuries. When humankind thought that asphalt roads were a good and useful idea to the mobile vehicle industry, almost 20 million kilometers of roads were paved in less than 100 years. Moreover, the new motor vehicle culture necessitated a global infrastructure that included hundreds of thousands of fuel stations wherever they could be built, and a gigantic transcontinental/transnational supply chain system from refinery to fuel station. Human entrepreneurship and creativity have demonstrated that humankind can switch direction, adapt and move fast when it is motivated to do so.
Change can and will come fast. I was an IBM® mainframe computer operator from 1971 to 1975. In the late 1970s I scoffed at a suggestion made by a colleague that a time would come when there would be a powerful computer in every house. By 1986 I had the sole use of a desktop in my office at the oil company where I worked and a second one in my apartment. Either of them was as powerful as the mainframes that I knew so well.
Then of course there was the telephone transformation from a single purpose finger-dialing contraption to the smart phones of today in less than 40 years. How many people in the 1970s would have imagined the magnitude of this transformation?
A revolutionary transport transformation system to replace the standard ICE system can be up and running in less than a decade. Automobiles have an average longevity that lies between 8 to 12 years. The estimated 1.2 billion vehicles plying our roads today, can be phased out inside of a decade if the alternative is available and ready to roll.
The global petroleum and transport industries cannot be complacent about future change that can undermine their market. When the change arrives, it will most likely come fast and will impact all facets and branches of the global oil and gas industry which is valued at 80 trillion-dollar; and its chief customer, the 8 trillion-dollar global transport industry. Collectively these two sectors comprise nearly 14 percent of the global economy.
There are only two ways to prepare for the revolutionary transformation that looms upon us and prepares to pounce upon these two industries. The first, is to surrender to the “inevitable”. The second, is to seek out a solution that will maintain status quo to a very reasonable degree for another 100 years or more. A status quo that will save the day for the ICE and its favorite crude oil-derived fuels, for the petroleum industry, and for oil-rich countries. A status quo solution with a twist. A status quo solution that does not emit CO2 into the atmosphere. It sounds so paradoxical. How is it even remotely possible?
I propose that both options be taken very seriously. Both options can be dealt with in parallel. Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 already deals with the first option. In my next article I will elaborate on the second option and argue why it should be taken much more seriously than it currently is. Time is running out as both options are challenged by the global warming tipping point that some researchers claim may be upon us by as early as 2040.
Rami Kamal is a geologist and veteran of Saudi Aramco, with over 40 years of experience in the oil industry.