finite world/resource depletion

["Gregoire de Nowell (ci-devant)" <GN842@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

As Morris Adelman observes the finite resource argument
is so obvious that it scarcely elicits any challenge.  In the
long run prices of non-renewable goods ought to rise.

Adelman points out however that a whole spectrum of finite
goods have been declining in price for fifty years, and many
of them have been declining in spite of efforts to use
stockpiles and other policies to keep them up.  It may be the
case, he suggests, that finite resource arguments do not
seem to describe accurately how in fact resources are
developed and priced.  He concentrates his argument on
the increasing technological efficiency with which
formerly non-profitable resources can be developed.  I
always add to that (his is an oil-specific view) that
inter-commodity substitution seems to increase exponentially
as technologiy developes.


While Club-of-Rome style analyses are indeed sobering and
frightening, there is another side to this story.  One
can hardly read Jevon's mid-19th century stories of
imminent exhaustion of coal resources and the calamity
this will be for civilization without realizing that one
could substitute "oil" for coal in his study and essentially
duplicate the 1970s-1990s oil resource depletion literature.
But in fact inter-commodity substitition will probably make
the oil question irrelevant.  The transportation fuel of
the future may be fuel cells or natural gas.  Science
News has reported earlier this year vast quantities of
ocean bed methane (sorry I forget the technical name)
in crystallized form.

It is in my view likely that as with coal the oil
question will become technologically irrelevant long before economically
exploitable resources will be exhausted.  In my view this
is unfortunate, because I have been involved in teh professional
advocacy of alternative fuel strategies and the resource
depletion argument, so prima facie logical, is tough to
let go of.  And indeed many alternative fuel advocates
continue to hang onto it.

The more relevant issue in my mind is carrying capacity
in terms of wastes.  Here too, however, some caution is
needed.  If the automotive technology of the 1950s
were still in use today, California would have long
ago exhausted its human carrying capacity.  The catalytic
converter extended that carrying capacity (sticking
with the air dimension) by many decades and several
tens of millions of people.  When it was thought that
this technical potential had been exhausted, it was
found that gasoline could be reformulated to get
yet another decade or two and additional carrying
capacity (thought compelling arguments remain for
moving away from petroleum fuels).  But as we sit
here today the fact remains that California with
nearly 30 million people is from an air quality
point of view much better than it was in my
childhood (1960s) with 12-15 million people.  I do
think, however, that other kinds of carrying limits
may be reached.  The strain on parks in california
from sheer use is enormous.

And needless to say it is hard to epanxpand the supply
of parks, though the 1993 Condor range and river act did
exactly that.

As for food depletion, I fault bad policy more than
I fault finite-world arguments.  The depletion of the
Georges Bank and other fisheries is a crime but a
preventable one.  It is in fact staggering how many
resrouces are sacrificed--water, vegetaable and
animal proteins alike--to beef production.  Much of
the devastation of fisheries is industrial harvest
of "biomass" for beef feed, into which also goes a great
deal of soy and other perfectly usable food.  And
it take 10lbs of food to make 1 lb. of beef.  Demand
for beef however is increasing worldwide, even
though perfectly acceptable animal and vegetable
proteins are available.  Out of disgust with the
E. coli affair I have expeiemented with a number
of vegetarian "burgers" and found all of them to
offer the same ease and convenicence of the beef burger
in terms of cooking.  The process of grinding up
nuts and soy beans is considerably less disgusting
than the process of making a burger.  But even
staying within the realm of animal proteins,
rabbit and ostrich meats (which are delicious)
could be produced with considerably less resource
depletion per pound.  And the paradox of it is
that beef abstention is an even more effective
way of diminishing one's impact on the world's
fisheries than abtaining from fish is, because
several pounds of marine biomass are needed to
make one pound of beef, whereas when you eat
fish directly you more efficiently consume the
"marine biomass."

To conclude, I am unimpressed with finite
world/resource depletion arguments.  I am much
more concerned with carrying capacity arguments
especially with regard to pollutants, but I
find that there is a mixed bag here due to
the fact that changing technologies impact
differently and change carrying capacity.  I
am not, however, one to engage in a resource-by-
resource discussion of the world's situation.
I have simply adduced several important examples.
Finally, I would point out that the world
fishery problem which I think is critical is
not one so much of carrying capacity as it is
of intelligent use and consieration of what it
is we are after.  Beef is seriously underpriced
relative to its ecological impact, and cutting
it out of the human food chain would liberate
significant resources for human consumption
in terms of soy, fish, etc.  In other words
intercommodity substiution of food products
would have a major environmental plus, and it
is worth considering what cultural or economic
incentives keep us riveted to destructive
consumption patterns.  On the whole I tend
to favor aggresive action to alter consumption
problems and to regulate, reduce, or eliminate
pollution, and I would rather save an owl and
a forest than have a wooden chair where a plastic
one will do.  However, I am not at this point
of the belief that "finite world" resource
arguments are the most productive intellectual
basis on which to proceed with arguments about
how to lessen mankind's destructive tendencies.

greg nowell