dingoboy

What do you think I should invest in?

My argument is not to make a buck while the getting is good. My argument is that if people like me invest we can influence the corporations from within as stock holders. (I also own stock in Alcan where investers were asked to decide whether to sell Alcan shares to Alcoa. But I am new to this)

And another part of my argument is that the world could be on the edge of a serious war that will stop oil flow. If that happens then the nations that have any source of oil (tar sands) will be very important to the world economy.

It seems very easy to not use oil, until you look at what that means for the economy. There is now no substitute for transportation.

You did not comment on my proposal to increase government taxes on oil and use that money to repair the damage done to the environment.

Gas should be expensive. What say you to that?

Would you be willing to pay $10 a liter for gas if it meant the tar sands would be repaired?

Yeaaaaaaaaa!!!!!

The likelihood of renewable energy sources providing enough energy to even account for projected increases in demand, let alone substituting for existing conventional energy consumption, is not "slim," it is nil for many years to come. It simply won't scale fast enough to amount to much for decades. Wind and solar account for less than 0.1% of the world's energy use today--and that energy use is projected to grow by several whole percentage points each year, if there is sufficient energy to meet the demand. Even if the renewable energy industries could double energy production capacity every year for years on end, which they can't even with all the grants, subsidies, and increasingly favorable laws that are encouraging the building of new factories and production lines as fast as they can establish them, renewable energy won't account for diddly squat relative to the quantity of energy the world is relaying upon to merely maintain the per capita status quo of economic activity, let alone account for growth in the developing world. (Note that I am leaving hydro out of this discussion of increased capacity, because, due to climate destabilization and the fixed life of dams, which are very energy intensive to build, hydro is set to be an industry in decline, not a source of sustainable growth.)

Renewable energy may be important someday, but for the next couple of decades it will remain an investors dream come true: rapid and sustained growth and demand outstripping supply. That is why we will continue to be inundated with advertising and lobbying encouraging us to support and pin our hopes on "clean" and "renewable" energy, when the only thing that will really help us get through the first part of the peak oil decline, and the thing that is about 7 times more cost effective than developing new energy sources, is conservation. Simply put, saving a mere 0.5% of energy use worldwide will do more to address the squeeze on energy, and the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, than all the wind and solar installations that will come online through the end of this decade. And it would be dirt cheap in comparison.

But, more realistically, we need to be reducing energy use by about 5% per year to meet GHG reduction targets in 2050, as well as to not end up in endless cycles of economic destabilization due to inadequate energy supplies relative to demand, followed by recessions (or worse) that take the heat off energy for a bit, followed by more booms and busts. We can do that with existing technology and no lifestyle changes over the next decade, but thereafter, we will probably need to start getting a little smarter about how and where we live and what that means in a world with ever more expensive and precious energy supplies.

As for using conventional energy to fill the gap, it has the same problem of finite supplies that are increasingly difficult and expensive to recover, it is poisonous in many ways, and we don't have a good way to deal with the toxic waste, whether it is radioactive, GHG, toxic fumes, or water contaminants. Do we really want more of that when we can choose to have less? And, of course, as with oil--or beer--the more we rely on it now, the faster it disappears.

Yet another sky is falling story about oil shortage that completely misses the point. Oil supply isn't the issue, but oil control is. Our entire Mid-East misadventure has been designed to keep oil in the ground, thus spiking oil prices and oil industry profits. it's working like a charm.

Yes, eventually we will run out of oil, but not anytime soon and certainly not before we all bake to death with the consequences of global warming.

By the way, Hubbels' famous "curve" applies to any fixed supply resource with constant or increasing demand. not exactly rocket science, but it did fit nicely with his company's move into the nuclear field, acting as it was intended... as a propganda piece. First create a problem and then offer the solution. Damn, we're running out of oil, thank goodness Shell is doing a lot of nuclear power engineering to save us from this calamity.

Well, In 4 or 5 years it sound like crude oil is going to get real expensive.

Renewables won't meet the demand, so what do we do? Conserve?

Are we going to procrastinate until the last minute? You Bet!

Sagedraggon, there is no famous "Hubbel's" curve, and M. King Hubbert was opposed by most of the powers that be at Shell, and roundly ridiculed by the oil industry as a whole when he published his reasons for expecting peak oil to arrive in the U.S. within most of their lifetimes. Greg Palast is the one who put out uninformed propaganda about Hubbert being some sort of shill for the oil industry. He was not at all. As a matter of fact, he was a socialist who thought the way the oil industry, as well as the economy as a whole, was being run was dangerous and wrong, given that there were sensible, less greedy ways of managing resources and needs to avoid the fix we are in now. I know this to be true from reading industry publications that responded to Hubbert's assertion and having spoken to Hubbert's relatives, looking over some of his old papers, talking to others who knew him, and, anecdotally, taking note that he named his cat "Wobbly" after his pals in the IWW.

Would anyone care to comment on the extent to which oil derived from tar sands and oil shale is a potential panacea? What is the state of the technology for extracting such oil today? In the forseeable future?

Steljefstar, here is a background article on oil shale:
http://www.aspencore.org/images/pdf/OilShale.pdf

In general, it is expensive, causes all sorts of environmental damage, uses loads of energy and water to extract, and does nothing to relieve our dependence on a few, large companies with monopoly power or reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Other than that, I'd say it's the obvious answer and only a matter of time until it saves us from having to take responsibility for our energy and environmental future. LOL.

It's good to see our government is hard at work making sure this crisis will be as painful and destructive as possible the further along we get. Buy your bike now before we run out of those, too!

wise leaders like Bush/cheney/blair et al have already reserved a space for themselves on the rocket ship "new world" taking off in 4 years

It is true that "peakists" perpetual cry wolf. Some claim to have heard the wolf howl and some to have seen the wolf in vision. The villagers may be pretty tired of it but in the end the wolf will come and it would have been better to prepare despite the uncertainty of the timing.

They always seem to miss out Geothermal energy,

"A 2006 report by MIT that took into account the use of Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) concluded that it would be affordable to generate 100 GWe (gigawatts of electricity) or more by 2050 in the United States alone, for a maximum investment of 1 billion US dollars in research and development over 15 years.[1]

The MIT report calculated the world's total EGS resources to be over 13,000 ZJ, of which over 200 ZJ would be extractable, with the potential to increase this to over 2,000 ZJ with technology improvements - sufficient to provide all the world's energy needs for several millennia.[1]" Wiki

If every building had Solor Panels on the roof and a windmill in the back yard, there would be plenty of energy to go around. Throw in an electric car and Bam! we are independent.

Rune said of oil shale: ...it is expensive, causes all sorts of environmental damage, uses loads of energy and water to extract, and does nothing to relieve our dependence on a few, large companies...

When oil hits $100/barrel, oil shale starts to look very affordable.

I tend to agree with the above, that this is another Chicken Little scare. Oil will always be available, because there will always be a demand. As the cost of oil increases, reservoirs that are currently too expensive to exploit will become affordable, and so it goes. We just have to drill a little deeper into more marginal reserves. The question will be who will be able to afford the market price.

colleen, I'm sorry but as a Canadian environmentalist, I cannot applaud your investment in the Alberta tarsands. I have seen
quite a bit of third world poverty and agree that we are all rich here and Canada is about on par with America. But, why not
invest in something more ethical? I think that is what Idavin was trying to say as well. You don't have to invest in the energy
sector, just because you know there is money to be made there. There are many other things to invest in that don't involve the
rape and pillage of the Canadian landscape. And I know, there are countless others who will invest in your place, but why be part
of the problem?
On a more personal note, I am doing everything I can to change my lifestyle and conserve. And I agree that car companies need to
get in line (although more and more, I ride my excellent bike) but really, defending your right to make a buck while the getting
is good, does not help your argument.

People have the mistaken impression that solar energy is "clean" energy. In fact, the production of solar panels is very dirty and includes the consumption of enormous amounts of conventional energy. More importantly, solar panels are made with silicon, which can only be manufactured in a cost-effective manner by burning coal with silica (sand) at very high temperatures, producing huge quantities of greenhouses gases. There is a real question whether the amount of energy (which is relatively small) produced over the life of a solar panel exceeds the amount of energy used to manufacture it. New technologies such as solar energy generating films and paints show promise, but we still have a long way to go, in making solar both environmentally and economically affordable. Part of the problem is that just when solar technologies were being developed, NASA was given the lion's share of R&D money, and they had no incentive to develop technologies that were economically or environmentally efficient. Passive solar design of buildings, on the other hand, has been known about since ancient times and is much more efficient than solar technology for generating electricity, for the reasons explained above. All new buildings should be required to incorporate passive solar technology, which saves on the consumption of energy required for both lighting and heating.

You don't have to be a genius to see that our fleet of cars and trucks in this country are a disgrace mileage wise. If we had any leadership at all in government huge improvements could be made. On the other hand we have the military which is another huge user of oil resources. We don't need bases in 130 countries. Huge improvements could be made. I personally believe the problem of peak oil is very real, hense the fiasco we have going on in the middle east. Our first efforts for renewable resources should be aimed at places that are using coal to generate electricity.

In 1975, during the oil crisis, scientific studies "proved" that the world would run out of oil in the mid 90's. It also ignores alternative fuels like nuclear, wind, geothermal, and solar. The world will not run out of oil; the world will move on to something else. The ice age did not end with no ice, and the oil age will not end with no oil.

Kudos on a fabulous thread here. Great info. Great rebuttals. Great ideas. And great civility. Why isn't THIS the kind of discussion happening in Congress?

One of the problems we who care face is that most studies on energy are payed for by an organization or company with an ax to
to grind. Studies more often than not come to the conclusion that is desired by those who pay the piper. I doubt that anyone knows the real situation with oil because there are no, or few studies done by a neutral source with access to the facts.

No Problem....Bush's God will just bury some more dinosaurs, and presto!! More oil!!

Shane, even at $100 a barrel, tar sands are not going to be an attractive option. It's the worst of all options, actually. The basic problem is that the cost of inputs (natural gas, electricity, and water) and the cost of resulting damages (GHG, despoiled land, water contamination, devaluation of surrounding property, and the health effects of toxic fumes) are going up faster than the value of the energy produced as scale is increased.

Tar sands release about three times as much GHG as conventional petroleum supplies. It involves something akin to massive strip mining of an area. Enormous amounts of ever more precious water are involved, and even if those doing the mining are eventually able to recover all and clean up all but one gallon of water for every gallon of oil, they have yet to show that they can really keep surrounding water supplies from being contaminated, and every recovery effort uses that much more energy. The bulk of the large amounts of energy used to transform tar sands into something useful comes from natural gas, which is itself becoming ever more rare and expensive and is expected to decline much faster than oil when North American supplies peak in a couple of decades.

Then, when the project eventually fails, someone has to pay to clean up the enormous mess left behind. In theory, the mining companies are supposed to do that, but then, in theory, the utility companies, not the public, is supposed to pay the full cost of decommissioning nukes--not that it really works out that way.

When you add it all up, it doesn't make environmental sense, it doesn't make natural resource sense, it doesn't make public health sense, and without government subsidies and protection from liability, it doesn't make economic sense: http://www.canada.com/components/print.aspx?id=2c4d8836-34be-4f6c-9e0f-b8b6953a18ad

In other words, it's an irresistible opportunity for all those who believe the market will magically cure or ignore all known problems while investors make a bundle and consumers keep going into debt consuming things that cause more problems than they solve.

Well, well, well. I was in college back in the seventies and they were saying that the shit would last forever. Boy, forever is getting shorter ever day!
Whose nuts are in the vice here, people? Can I get a big old 'Hoo HaH!' for the U.S.A.?
Now, the question at issue is...Will we fold like a junkie with no heron or will we rise up like the nation that put a man on the moon? Personally, for my money, this nation will NOT be able to come back from years of recessive foreign policy aimed more at
breaking down Democracies instead of supporting them. While the American people have slept and dreamed dreams of a '57 Chevy' with gas at 29 cents a gallon, reality, that haggard old bitch, has crept in and taken away their dreams. And, in a few years, the images we used to get from China of people riding bicycles everywhere will be OUR reality. The wheel turns around. The stupid get stuck in the gears.

too many people........too many people. i chose no children, since my 5 brothers produced 10. whew!! it's a life choice that more need to consider, and religious institutions need to promote smaller families.......sorry, but we'll "overgraze" ourselves to extinction....

Dear Folks,

On the concept and phenomenon of peak oil, I take the liberty of recommending the excellent documentary:

A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash, by the journalists Basil Gelpke and Ray McCormack (Lava Productions AG, Zurich, Switzerland).

A preview and description of the film are available at wwww.crudeawakening.org.

In that documentary, you will see and hear, among other commentators, Dr David Goodstein, Professor of Physics and Applied Physics at the California Institute of Technology, give what is probably one of the most systematic presentations of the energetic basis of industrial society, its contemporary predicament, and its coming decline and its dire, if not catastrophic, consequences.

See also David Goodstein's book Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil (W.W. Norton, 2004),

or his paper "The End of the Age of Oil," athttp://pr.caltech.edu/periodicals/CaltechNews/articles/v38/oil.html.

James Kunstler's The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-first Century (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2005) not only discusses peak oil and global warming (and its consequences, epidemic disease, water scarcity, habitat desctruction, etc), but gives a very graphic description of their future impact on the United States.

PS: Or see the article by Prof. David Goodstein, "The End of the Age of Oil," at

http://pr.caltech.edu/periodicals/CaltechNews/articles/v38/oil.html

Please check out http://www.theoildrum.com/ If you want to understand what's going on. They cover all of this and YES we are up the creek with our energy future. Basically we have squandered a one shot deal - ancient sunlight that has been fossilized. The low hanging fruit has been picked and now we have an uphill climb just to maintain our current pace.

Reverse globalization, do everything local.

Yeah, 6 billion people doing everything local. That'll work real well in Japan, for example, which HAS to import food.

"Hickory Dickory Dock...
The mouse ran up the clock..."

"Peak Oil hits in 4...
When the Baby Boomers exit the door..."

Is there a limit to how many links you can post on commondreams.org ... because I'm trying to refute the claims that wind and solar can't power 100% of the U.S. right now, but can't post links. Oh well.

Yes, and these same government "Scientists" are carping about "global warming". Eon's ago the glaciers melted ending the ice age and there were no people burning fossil fuels. All they have on that too, is "theory"
The best way to control people is with fear and that is the one thing they spread plenty of.......

Strange, but nobody ever included nuclear fusion on the list of almost unlimited source of energy. Well, the Princetone Plasma Lab, which was to built semi-inductrial TOKOMAK for mere $10 Billion, was dismantled soon after the Republican Revolution. It was a little exodus of "human capital", who moved back to Mother Europe, from where all American short love afair with science came after the rise of Nazi.

Now our own Nazi has finished up this particulat venue to please their oily paymasters.

Amory Lovins wrote "Soft Energy Paths" in 1979. In it he spoke of the fossil fuel bridge that we must use to take us to a renewable energy future. He predicted that if we squander this energy bridge we will be in trouble in the future. Well, welcome to the future.

We will never run out of oil. It will just be more expensive to drill the holes than the oil in the holes is worth. If you compare the number of drilling rigs in operation to the actual consumption the number of wells drilled is skyrocketing per unit of oil produced.

A very large number of these new wells are being drilled in the U.S. where it extremely unlikely that significant oil deposits will be found. We the taxpayers are subsidizing this stupidity through the most creative form of legal larceny ever devised; the federal tax code.

I made a nice return in several oil drilling stocks this year. Unfortunately, the game was rigged and the really big players got both the stock gains and the tax breaks.

It can't run out fast enough for me.

Observer,

I offer the following on the issue of FUSION.

During the summer of 2005, France was chosen by an international consortium, consisting of six of the main industrial (and thus scientific) powers in the world, as the place where an International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor is to be built. The site will be in Cadarache and construction is to begin in 2008.

The reactor is to realize the first nuclear fusion on Earth. The cost of construction is presently estimated at 5 billion dollars. The reactor is estimated to go into operation in 2016. The cost of operation and maintenance over twenty years is estimated at another 5 billion dollars.

We know, however, from experience, that none of these estimates will turn out to be accurate, and that it will cost much more and take much longer to carry out this project. One need only consider the construction of the tunnel under the Channel (between Britain and France) to get an idea of the reliability of these sorts of estimates.

The construction of the reactor will require the making of very expensive and highly technical components, and many countries will be called upon to produce them (incidentally, such a machine can only be made by the cooperation of several countries). Clearly, the causes for delay in an endeavor of such magnitude, complexity, and cost will be multiple. Yet we are dealing with a race against time here.

More important, however, as regards time and cost, is the fact that this reactor, if construction and operation are successful (big assumptions, given the great difficulty of the entreprise), is only meant to demonstrate that fusion can be harnessed as an economically viable source of energy.

In other words, it is merely a demonstration reactor! A second reactor will then have to be built to serve as a prototype for the commercial production of power. Assuming that it takes about eight years to construct a reactor, and assuming that all else goes as assumed (big assumptions, as I pointed out above) – in particular, that the funds are there and that there is enough oil left to do all the building and shipping required by this huge project! – we would thus see the first commercial use of fusion in 2024. But that is only one reactor.

Another very important assumption: it is assumed that there will be sufficient international peace for cooperation between the nations involved to proceed without obstruction. There are good reasons for doubting that such will be the case; the more likely situation at that point will be one of international warfare (including very nasty guerrila wars) for natural ressources of all kinds.

Even if we assume 1) that the first fusion reactor is successful and that it is completed without delays, 2) that there are no resource wars, and 3) that there is still enough oil left to construct more reactors after the first reactor is completed, how many reactors will have to be built to produce the kind of energy needed to keep all the industrial societies at their present level of operation, and what will be the cost of such an enormous construction effort, and how long will it take to complete all the required reactors?

At any rate, it is clear, I think, that even if the first test of fusion is technically successful, the likelihood that fusion will replace fossil fuels as a source of energy is, well, dismally low, indeed.

Jesus. This article was doing fine until the end.

*Coal - There are still an estimated 909 billion tonnes of proven coal reserves worldwide, enough to last at least 155 years. But coal is a fossil fuel and a dirty energy source that will only add to global warming.

Well, duh. Yes coal is a greenhouse gas source, but this article was not about greenhouse gas, but simply the availabilty of energy. The issue with coal is that although there's a lot of it, it takes energy to convert it into a usable form, so the yield is less than it appears. However, our civilisation could bumble along for quite a few years yet on coal once the oil runs out, and lets face it, brobably will.

* Natural gas - The natural gas fields in Siberia, Alaska and the Middle East should last 20 years longer than the world's oil reserves but, although cleaner than oil, natural gas is still a fossil fuel that emits pollutants. It is also expensive to extract and transport as it has to be liquefied.

Same comments as above. Why introduce the issue of polutants now? Because the fact that there's a lot of coal an natural gas seems to weaken his point.

* Hydrogen fuel cells - Hydrogen fuel cells would provide us with a permanent, renewable, clean energy source as they combine hydrogen and oxygen chemically to produce electricity, water and heat. The difficulty, however, is that there isn't enough hydrogen to go round and the few clean ways of producing it are expensive.

Jesus. Where do you start? "Not enough to go around" doesn't begin to cover it. There is just about *no* atomic hydrogen gas to go around - it is almost all in the form of hydrogen ash, aka water. Hydrogen is simply not an energy source. It is a mirage.

* Biofuels - Ethanol from corn and maize has become a popular alternative to oil. However, studies suggest ethanol production has a negative effect on energy investment and the environment because of the space required to grow what we need.

"Negative effect on energy investment". Why on earth put it like this? IOW: Biofuels take more energy to grow than they produce, in the form of agricultural fuel, and in the form of synthetic fertilisers which are made from oil.

* Renewable energy - Oil-dependent nations are turning to renewable energy sources such as hydroelectric, solar and wind power to provide an alternative to oil but the likelihood of renewable sources providing enough energy is slim.

Depend on what you men by "enough". Enuough for hummers and commuting 50 miles to work in individual motor vehicles? No. Enough for a decent, healthy, sustainable lifestyle for everyone? Quite possibly.

*Nuclear - Fears of the world's uranium supply running out have been allayed by improved reactors and the possibility of using thorium as a nuclear fuel. But an increase in the number of reactors across the globe would increase the chance of a disaster and the risk of dangerous substances getting into the hands of terrorists.

Nuclear fusion has all the problems of fossil fuels, times 100. Firstly: there's only just so much fuel to be mined and then it's gone; and secondly it pollutes.

No mention of geothermal, which is a very exciting technology. No mention of small-scale renewable (a solar panel and a wind turbine on every roof). No mention of nuclear fusion, which is the great hope of humanity even if they haven't quite got it to work yet.

I've invested in the tar sands in Canada with petro canada and suncor. These stocks are increasing in value over a 5 year period but look somewhat volatile over the short term. Still Petro canada has gone from C$42 to C$54 in the last 3 months. Suncor was selling at about C$80 March 07 and now is at C$96. And the canadian dollar has gone up in value too, if you buy the stocks on the canadian stock market. The canadian dollar has gone from .85 to about .93 in 3 months.

From what I have heard it is very difficult to make the oil useable. It costs much more to drill in Canada than to drill for the oil in Saudi Arabia, which is in sand. But when oil goes above $60 a barell the oil sands become a cost effective way to get oil.

The world economies are dependent upon oil, but its a dirty business that is increasing the problem with global warming.

I really don't know what the solution to all this is. We need to conserve but that isn't happening. I don't understand why the car companies are trying to lower miles per gallon and they are lobbying our corrupt government to keep the miles per gallon low. I would nationalize those car companies because they have been badly run and are essential to the nation. They have been incompetently run imo.

Perhaps watching the rise in the price of these stocks in the tar sands is an indicator of the political situation and the widening war(s) in the ME.

Today Petro canada went up 1.99% and suncor went up 3.73% on the TSX (Canda's stock exchange)

Check - http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/energyrevolution-250107 - "The Energy [RE]volution" -

A Greenpeace publication - "The Energy Revolution scenario comes as the world is crying out for a road map for tackling the dilemma of how to provide the power we all need, without fuelling climate change. "Renewable energies are competitive, if government's phase-out subsidies for fossil and nuclear fuels and introduce the `polluter-pays principle`. We urge politicians to ban those subsidies by 2010."
The plan also details how large developing countries like India, China and Brazil can develop and grow using renewable energy to avoid the mistakes of old climate-changing energy economies of developed countries.

The Energy Revolution was written with the European Renewable Energy Council (EREC) and in conjunction with specialists from the German Space Agency and more than 30 scientists and engineers from universities, institutes and the renewable energy industry around the world.

Foamweapons sez: "I'm trying to refute the claims that wind and solar can't power 100% of the U.S. right now, but can't post links."

I can help you clarify the situation, but I don't think there is any way to make your case. First of all, this article is about a decline in oil, most of which is used for transportation fuels and all sorts of plastic and chemical products, so there are some other technologies to work out before wind and solar electric power can act as substitutes for oil. That is not a show stopper, but it is worth noting.

Second, my comments were about worldwide energy production and demand, but the domestic situation is more or less the same, just move the decimal point for the total percentage of energy we are getting from wind and solar. It is still next to nothing in terms of the total amount of energy used on either the global or domestic basis. But you are interested only in electrical energy in the U.S. Fine.

In 2005 the U.S. cranked out a little over 4 billion megawatts of juice. That amount has been growing at about 2% per year, so we are probably looking at about another 160 million megawatts added to the total for this year. (See: http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/epa/epa_sum.html)

Last year, the total production of all PV solar panels were capable of producing 2,204 megawatts of power for hour. If the U.S. could have captured the entire supply of the world's new solar panels and installed them in a more or less favorable conditions, they would have produced an average of five hours of peak output per day, averaged over 365 days per year, which gives you an annual production of (2,204 X 5 X 365) = 36,872 megawatts. Now, remember, we are looking at about 80,000,000 megawatts of ANNUAL GROWTH in electric consumption (half of 160 million just for ease of example) in this period, so all the world's solar output doesn't even come close to putting a dent in new demand, and, of course, does nothing at all to touch the 4 billion megawatts that we were sucking down back in 2005 and every year since.

Now back to reality. We only installed 202 megawatts of new solar panels last year, up 40% over the previous year's new installations. (See http://www.solarbuzz.com/Marketbuzz2007-intro.htm). That's basically a gnat fart in a stiff wind for all the good it is doing us these days.

I am all for steady growth in clean renewables, but lets not kid ourselves. It is going to be decades before they amount to anything to speak of other than a killer investment opportunity if you happen to buy into the right technology at the right time, given rapid changes on that front.

"We will never run out of oil."

Chortle. Reminds me of a Will Rogers quote: "They're makin' more people every day, but they ain't makin' more dirt."

We will never run out of oil... Sweet Jesus that's the stupidest fucking thing I've ever read. Goes against the laws of physics as we know them. Only our culture, in its pure arrogance, would believe that we live in a world of infinite resources and infinite capacity to beat the odds.

I am lucky. I am 59 years old with a heart condition. I have lived through the golden years of economic boom for the developed world from which I have enjoyed all of the benefits. Though I am not wealthy, I have had access to every modern delight that the wealthy enjoy.

In the early 80's I became a fan of the eco/conservation movement because it "just makes sense."

Well, humankind has blown it. But, I have lived through the best of times, and will be dead before the worst of times coming "just around the corner."

Bye/ bye suckers. You have had your opportunity, it is gone, now.

For those who day alternative energy is not possible, consider the following. If solar panels were deployed over an area the size of Nevada (ca 110,000 square miles) the peak power produced is sufficient to meet the energy requirements of the entire planet. Of course, the main issue is, How to store this energy? Two ways come to mind if we have excess power: (1) electrolysis of water, and (2) use of large existing hydrodams to pump waters up into the reservoirs. Note also that thin-film silicon technology is very near to commercial production. This technology does require raw materials and power, but in amounts that are relatively small compared to other major industries. Others here have mentioned geothermal, which can produce a steady stream of power, and there is wind, which now produces 20% of the entire electric power consumption of the country of Denmark. So to dismiss alternate energy out of hand as a solution not for the present understates the technology. The new thin-film technology is specifically designed for very rapidly upward-expandable production, on the order 1 GWatt/year, the plants to make this stuff being lowtech relatively speaking and deployable anyplace in the world. So those here concerned: get to pounding every rep you have at every level of government to push for the kind of energy production that adds relatively little (not no) heat into the environment.

Hope is on the way... In the nick of time technology stumbles upon an answer. It will take about 5-10 years before it significantly changes our lives.

July 2007 London.

"Then as now we were wondering what it would take to get people to listen."

Sadly, what we need is a movie. Maybe Micheal Moore's next movie will be, "Dude, where's my oil?", and people will accept that the end of oil is nigh.

Eventually lots of oil should be coming from Iraq.
I enjoy zipping from state to state in my car.
I have no use for the cheap junk produced overseas. Soon most people will have no money for it.
It was conter productive to produce junk overseas just to save a few pennies on labor. It will blow up in the corporations and politicans faces. No buyers-gas problem solved.

Maturin42, thanks for sharing the link to the History of Oil. Excellent! I'll be sharing it with others.

Provocative, informative, little known book:

Crossing the Rubicon/Mike Ruppert.

Worth a look.

War Hater:

I too have a heart condition-diagnosed 20 years ago-probably dormant for another 15. Am 65 now. Remember the Hyman Roth character in the Godfather? He was "dying from the same heart attack for XXX years." Against the odds I'd like to stick around for another 15 to see if my grandkid's generation can do better with all these problems. Written with affection and hopefully a dash of humor. See you in 15 or 20?"