I don’t think we’re saying the same thing.

It seems to me that the logical conclusion is that Exurbia cannot continue to expand unless there is some form of disruptive technology… for the very reasons that we are moving to an era in the US of increasing information workers and away from human-worker-based manufacturing in our race to the bottom.

My apologies if I misunderstood your post.

John

We aren’t running out of developable land, energy or resources. The exurban diaspora is nearing 100 years with nothing more than sporadic blips in the rate of exurbanization. All but two of the 50 largest cities OPAC/rustbelt cities have lower populations than 1950. If you want to talk supercycles then you appear to be missing the largest supercycle of them all.

The hydrogen-at-home thing, with today’s technology, is unworkable. If Nanosolar really does deliver as promised, we’ll have something to be very excited about.

Keep in mind that the American public is happy to see the entire floor fall out beneath the futures market for oil. Why? It is the seduction of instant gratification. What you mention about technology improving lives in your article is a double-edged sword at best; when we think technology can streamline our life does it? Now with a Blackberry many folks are reachable 24/7 – not sure if that is my idea of efficiency having a virtual leash around you all the time. But back to peak oil, the shorts in the market are having a field day because unnaturally warm fall/winter temperatures in the North East have affected the supply. In addition, we had a relatively weak hurricane season so that had another impact on the market. Couple this with the OPEC announcement and you have your $50 oil. But the real question is supply and oil as usual is not a renewable source of energy. The four biggest oil fields are now in decline:

1. The Cantareel field of Mexico
2. The Burgan field of Kuwait
3. Daqing field of China
4. Chawar in Saudi Arabia

In regards to Cantarell Pemex there is a projected 40 percent annual decline. Pemex is nearly a monopoly in the field and corruption runs rampant in the Mexican oil industry. Again not stability and oil markets love this don’t they? Second, Burgan is also in a decline as Kuwaitis have announced in 2006 and Daqing is primarily concerned at fueling the interest of its domestic market in China. In regards to Ghawar there is a cloak of mystery here and independent audits are nearly impossible to have. But considering the field is nearly half a millennia old I would venture to say that it is also in decline. In addition, how much can we count on this field considering the geo-politics of the region and our highly popular Iraq war? Point being, peak-oil is still on the march but only for a temporary blip on the map.

How does someone reconcile high oil with high housing? Again this instant gratification. The housing market is on its third leg and we are starting to see cracks. How can California be up year-on-year while inventory jumps and foreclosures rise? Well, we need only look at the explosion of sub-prime loans in 2005 and 2006. Loan originations in the sub-prime market accounted for 25% of the mortgage market. A large number indeed. In addition, we are seeing halo cities benefiting from branded areas such as the LA effect and the OC effect. Many of these other cities will be hit the hardest because the lending industry is pushing essentially what is tantamount to suicide loans on the folks who can least afford it. As a sample study conducted by the L.A. Times last year showed 60 percent of all no-doc loans had false information; not only that but folks over-stated their income by 50%. So how does peak oil and high housing go together? By fudging the numbers and trying to keep the pied piper at bay for as long as possible.

Dr. Housing Bubble
http://drhousingbubble.blogspot.com

I’m all for clean fuel. Whether we’re at peak oil for me is irrelevant. We will always need fossil fuels for lots of different applications, but I personally don’t feel like we should be sponsoring the middle east with its myriad of social problems that are reinforced by high oil prices.

I’ve never revealed my political standings, and I believe that given the chance, it’s not about politics, every American (if not especially the current and future presidents) would love for the middle east to fix its own problems. While my understanding of the problem is limited, it has been reported that some have the mistaken impression that we are “stealing” their “wealth” by buying oil. I say let them cook in their own wealth. Anything that gets me off of gasoline is great.

I have mentioned before on Nanosolar’s technology. If it happens as it is supposed to, you will be able to outfit your roof to produce nearly free electricity. While there are currently a number of difficulties with electric cars (namely driving distance and time to refuel), those same don’t apply to hydrogen fuel cell. Producing hydrogen at home requires water and electricity and can be stored and refueled nearly as quickly as gasoline. Wouldn’t the world be a better place with that kind of a solution?

1st anonymous’ comment about gas prices being disconnected from electrical power generation is certainly true, but when you can produce ‘free’ electricity, the shift to electric-only cars could give relevance to oil prices vs. power generation vs. commuting.

I agree that $3/gal (and up) gasoline is quite bearish for suburban RE. The “problem” is that fuel hasn’t been expensive enough for long enough to have any real effect on suburban housing demand. These things take time.

Oh, and for the record, I don’t know if we’re at peak oil but I do think it’s time that the we as a nation start thinking really hard about what to do when the stuff gets scarce.

Just a note about your assertion on energy prices and shifts. Gasoline prices are completely disconnected from electrical power generation. If you go to the link you can see that the majority of our power comes from coal, nukes and natural gas. Oil is a very small part. So a shift in technolgy will take a decade to impact since so many gas only vehicles are on the road.

The graph that you show is perhaps correct but I think if you look at the housing trend its pretty clear we saw exponential price growth causing a shift. A lot of that was due to low interest rates much of which comes from the China effect on our currency.

Perhaps a graph showing first and second derivatives on price would be more usefull.

It is possible is a scarcity of land developing from an economic standpoint. The factors causing this are peak oil (a driving factor that causes you to drive less) along with a shortage in refinery space. We could also be seeing a shift from large scale manufacturing in suburban/rural locations tword in city structures.

Additional problems come from the inabilty toi further spread out. Freeways look to be at maximum capacity and it is too expensive to expand them. I guess we could look at a cost benifit analysis but how much further could people practically drive.

Its hard for high tech companies to gather a work force in rural areas vs manufacturing who can hire any yahoo.

There was also a substantial shift considering changes in tax laws.

So a lot of stuff is going on.

Thanks for the great work on this blog.

LAEF2