1.5:1 to 4:1
Nuclear
1.1:1 to 15:1
2 to 9
Biodiesel
1.9:1 to 9:1
Solar thermal
1.6:1
6 to 15
Ethanol
0.5:1 to 8:1
Source: http://www.azimuthproject.org/azimuth/show/Energy+return+on+energy+invested
Industrial civilization was built for an EROEI of around
100:1. Energy in equals production of goods and services out. We are now at
about 10:1 and declining. This must have fateful consequences for us all. As
the old, high EROEI stuff gets used up, it is replaced with lower EROEI substitutes.
However, as production of goods becomes ever more "expensive" in net-energy
terms, the economy responds with job outsourcing. Essentially this is labor
arbitrage wherein cheap transportation costs allow for cheap labor in Third World
nations to be substituted for more expensive labor in the Developed World. High-paying industrial-sector jobs are lost as a consequence. As the EROEI-diminishment continues, financialization of the economy occurs. Basically, the
banksters on Wall Street, in their relentless, utterly amoral, search for the
greatest return on capital in the shortest time, stop investing in real-world "bricks
and mortar" projects in favor of the enormous yields obtained from financial
masturbation. Risk is not a factor as they have not only been declared "too big
to fail" under the W. Bush Administration, but actually "too big to jail" under
the Obama Administration.
Any profits made by the banksters are theirs; any losses are
"socialized" via government bailout to the taxpayers. Since net EROEI will
continue its relentless downward trajectory, and since the banksters own
Washington, the Republican Party, the Democratic Party, the media, etc., the near-term future becomes fairly obvious.
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