Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
“Everybody’s got a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” — Mike Tyson
“That’s a pithy way of saying where our country, perhaps the developed world, is at right now,” notes author James Howard Kunstler. We’ve blown past the mileposts for global peak oil, says Kunstler in his new book, Too Much Magic: Wishful Thinking, Technology and the Fate of the Nation, and we expect technology to save us.
What a privilege it is to be alive in these times, in such a significant period in human history. It’s not always easy to see moments of great historical importance when you’re in the middle of them. Sometimes they’re dramatic, like the fall of the Berlin Wall or the landing on the moon. But more often the really big ones appear, from within them, to be unfolding in slow motion. Their actual drama and speed then only becomes clear in hindsight.
That’s how it will be with this. But in the end we’ll look back at this moment and say, yes, that’s when it was clear, that’s when the end game began. The end game of the industrial revolution.
Few would argue with the proposition that within the next 20 or 30 years our current sources of fossil fuels and other somewhat substitutable liquids will be only a fraction of the 90 or so million barrels a day (b/d) that we are current consuming. Long before then however, fossil fuels are likely to become so expensive that major changes in how we power our civilization are likely to have occurred.
In Extraenvironmentalist #44 we discuss the archeology of innovation with Sander van der Leeuw to learn how our complex societies have shifted short-term risks to long-term risks through the application of technologies.
For anyone watching peak oil this has been a busy week. The Harvard report by Leonardo Maugeri, covered in last week’s newsletter, has been seized upon by those waiting for a chance to consign peak oil to the dustbin of history. In Britain, columnist George Monbiot fell for it hook line and sinker, presenting the report as conclusive proof that peak oil is bunk – evidently without a moment’s critical appraisal…read on for exclusive analysis…
I promised not to use his name because I wanted him to speak freely which is not easy to do these days when society is in such conflict. He is a fortyish farmer, articulate, engaging, a delight to talk to…The first time I met him, several years go, I remembered him saying that a farmer needed to spend two hours a day on the computer, hedging and marketing his grain.
-Storytelling our energy future – Chris Nelder
-The Peak Oil Crisis: The Edisonian Approach – Tom Whipple
-Efficiency and Conservation Not Enough to Achieve Energy Security
-Americans would pay more for green energy
-Carbon capture leak simulated in sea off Scotland
-US claims ‘unprecedented’ success in test for new fuel source
The shale gas ‘revolution’ suffered another blow this week as the US Securities and Exchange Commission announced an investigation into dealings between industry leader Chesapeake Energy and its chief executive Aubrey McClendon. It emerged recently that McClendon had been taking a private stake in each well the company drills and, unbeknownst to shareholders, borrowed over $1 billion against them…
I’ve been giving lectures on Peak Oil for over a decade now, and always look forward to the question period after the main show. It’s an opportunity to interact with the audience and take questions…Here are the top 11, along with brief sample replies and some resources for further reading.
Approval of hydraulic fracturing for gas in the UK moved a step closer this week as a DECC commissioned report on the seismic impact of drilling at Cuadrilla’s Lancashire operation advised ministers to proceed. The report recommended a tightening of procedures around drilling, including a pre-injection diagnostic phase, and a traffic light warning system halting operations should an earthquake over 0.5 magnitude occur…
From World War II until just a few years ago, the number of miles driven annually on America’s roads steadily increased. Then, at the turn of the century, something changed: Americans began driving less. By 2011, the average American was driving 6 percent fewer miles per year than in 2004. The trend away from driving has been led by young people.
