Author: George Mobus

Website: http://questioneverything.typepad.com/

Profile:

I teach computer science to undergraduate and graduate students as my day job. But my background is quite a bit broader. I have a PhD in CS, an MBA in Decision Science, and a baccalaureate in Zoology (with substantial coursework in math, chemistry, and oceanography) from the Seattle campus of UW. For a time, in a prior life (pre-PhD) I managed a medium-sized electronics design and manufacturing company in Southern California, so I have some real-world management experience (successful if I do say so myself). My first real love in the world of academics is actually biology and specifically evolutionary, cognitive, neuro-psychology! In other words I wonder how the brain works to produce the mind and how did it come about through evolution. I have dabbled in computer models of brain-like systems to control robots. See my academic website for more information.

Posts by George Mobus:

Anticipated vs. Predicted Futures (Strategic Thinking — Looking into the Future)

Posted on 24. May, 2011 by .

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Two Scenarios

Strategic Thinking — Looking into the Future

This blog will attempt to take a look into the future in a more holistic way than I have done in the past. I will take the strategic perspective of possible futures as opposed to attempts to prognosticate specific events or states of the world at some specific time in the future. The strategic approach is to generate several possible scenarios that include anticipated futures (given certain starting conditions) and possible interventions or responses that put us in the best possible position as the actual future unrolls. The point is to be proactive rather than merely reactive.

First we need a reasonably solid assessment of the state of the world now. In particular we need to grasp the major and most important factors and their mutually interactive dynamics. We need to assess the threats and opportunities, just as a business strategic planning process would. We also need to understand our strengths and weaknesses in moving into that future in the context of those dynamics. In particular we need to ask if there are actions we should be undertaking now or in the near future to leverage on strengths and mitigate our weaknesses.

All of our tactical, logistical, and operational plans should follow from what we see happening in this strategic view. These have to be flexible and adaptive as the future actually unfolds since we have no certainty that any specific scenario will follow through. Indeed there is always the possibility that some scenarios will blend, as it were, or the world could flip from one scenario to another on some tipping point not accounted for. The key is to have several scenarios worked out as you play ‘What-If’ with the future of the world.

Please recognize that developing scenarios for what will happen in the future is not the same as making predictions. The former are meant to give somewhat holistic visions of the kinds of major things that could happen. The process attempts to use a systems approach, recognizing the interactions between major forces/factors, to anticipate how things are going to evolve over time. Predictions, on the other hand, tend to be very low dimensional projections of what will happen. Frequently they do (more…)

A Tutorial on Net Energy and Its Relation to the Economy

Posted on 09. May, 2011 by .

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This is the tutorial I presented in Syracuse NY at SUNY-ESF in April. You can download the slides here. The pdf file has much better resolution than you’ll find here. What I will do here is provide some more commentary on the subject with each slide.

 

 

 

NetEnergy1

Figure 1.

 

And now, a man who needs no introduction…

The purpose of this tutorial was to provide people who were relatively new to the concepts of Biophysical Economics (which is almost everyone!) what the role of net energy is in economic activity. What I present here will be nothing new to long time readers. So you can browse through it quickly. New readers who have not spent any time reading my prior posts about BPE and net energy might find some of this instructive.

 

 

 

NetEnergy2

Figure 2.

 

This overview slide pretty much sums up what I planned to talk about.

 

 

 

NetEnergy3

Figure 3.

 

Everyone at the conference was familiar with peak oil and energy return on energy investment (EROI). But the issues of what net energy means to the productive/consumptive economy are much less well understood. In general most people have an intuitive, if not formal understanding of what net energy means. But it is still the case that many people have not really linked up the flow of net energy with the work that gets done in the economy. Hence I choose to focus on Net Energy. The most important points regarding net energy versus gross energy (i.e. the number of barrels of oil per unit time produced) are that: a) net energy available declines at a faster rate than oil production declines; and b) the peak of net energy flow has already passed us by and we are in serious decline already — much before the peak and decline of gross energy.

 

 

 

NetEnergy4

Figure 4.

 

It is somewhat surprising that many people do realize that net energy available to do useful (read economic) work is less than the gross energy available at the well head, yet they do not really spend much time thinking through how this net energy turns into useful work in economic activity. They have a vague notion of, say, manufacturing production driven by machines and those using up energy. But the nature of the connections and transformations is not as solid.

In this slide I tried to make the connection more solid in people’s minds. Energy in specific forms (e.g. gasoline or electricity) are direct inputs to the machines that accomplish our economic work. Society and the markets may put a value on the end product of work, e.g. doing work to make a hamburger may be just as valued as doing work to make a screwdriver (the tool, not the drink). And they are priced accordingly. But the screwdriver will save energy resources in the future if it is used. Once the hamburger’s calories are used up, that is the end of it. The only possible future economic value in a hamburger might be if it fed a person who used those calories to make a screwdriver!

 

 

 

NetEnergy5

Figure 5.

 

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