Peak Oil will soon generate problems for individuals and families around the globe: unemployment; bankruptcy; inability to pay for heating oil, higher education, mortgage, and rent etc; the need for family members to share residences and expenses; violent street crime even in previously safe neighborhoods; the separation of family members (due to high airfares, the high cost of gasoline, or gasoline rationing); and anxiety and depression.
Families that have a common understanding of Peak Oil problems can provide mutual support and group problem-solving, and they are more likely enjoy life and survive the Peak Oil catastrophe. Young people who understand Peak Oil are more likely to study what makes sense for the future. Informed people who are unemployed can work collectively for their future and use their resources for contingency planning, instead of looking to panaceas and technological fixes.
Educating family, loved ones, and friends about Peak Oil and its impacts is a formidable challenge. Most people believe strongly that a national commitment and technology will solve energy problems and support a stable economy. Denial concerning Peak Oil is pervasive at all levels of society. Frustration in educating family members about Peak Oil is common, as revealed on the Peak Oil Blues website.
It helps to remember that people avoid the reality of Peak Oil from weakness, not strength. Peak Oil is personally frightening and many fear for family and friends. Educating about Peak Oil is the right thing to do, so be patient. It sometimes takes weeks, months, or years to get through to people. Learn from the experiences of others on the Peak Oil Blues website. Here are some ideas to consider in educating family, love ones, and friends.
Studies by major independent government agencies and scientific organizations are the most credible sources for convincing many people that Peak Oil is real and will have serious impacts soon. I wrote a 48 page Peak Oil Impacts Report based on such sources, and the sources can be referenced directly from the report (which can be downloaded, website posted, distributed, and emailed). It is hard to deny studies by the National Academy of Sciences, U.S. General Accountability Office, U.S, Congressional Research Service, and major scientific institutions. Many governments have sponsored Peak Oil studies. Use these authority symbols to your advantage.
You can tell your family or friends that Peak Oil is a serious issue that you personally need to discuss with them, and that you want them to read the report for factual information in order to have a well-informed conversation.
The report was written by a recently retired professor of Political Science at the University of New Hampshire, where he was director of the Master of Public Administration program for many years. In that capacity he worked with hundreds of local, state, and federal officials on government planning. Based on this report, he gave a Peak Oil presentation to the New Hampshire Town Managers Association last January and a variety of audiences in Albany, NY in June.
If they read short convincing articles, you may then convince them to read the 48 page report. You can also ask them to read the first page summary of the report and the summaries of the report by the U.S. General Accountability Office, which is covered in my report.
The September 2008 ASPO-USA Peak Oil Conference included a very credible group of speakers, including Neil King Jr., the international energy reporter for “The Wall Street Journal.”
An Internet search of the term “peak oil” yields some 4,400,000 hits.
“Energy Bulletin” provides much scientific information and a Peak Oil primer.
The “Transition Movement” and Portland (Oregon) Peak Oil Task (and other cities’ efforts) show that some towns and cities are planning to prepare for Peak Oil.
There are many videos on Peak Oil on Google or Yahoo.
If anyone asks why more people don’t know about Peak Oil, the following explains this conspiracy of silence. Both private and national oil company executives and their allies in business and government have lied to the media and public about oil reserves in order to create an image of corporate financial growth. This has increased their salaries, stock investments, stock options for retirement, and large consulting fees to produce phony research. The media and government officials have believed the lies and have conveniently avoided giving the public bad news about future. And most leaders and people across the globe believe that there must a new energy source for continued prosperity and economic development, so why worry about Peak Oil?
Patience is a virtue.. It takes time for people to think about how vital oil is for the economy and what life will be like without oil in the future. Patience -- even many who are aware of Peak Oil are in denial about the future. They accept Peak Oil, but not its impacts. Patience -- belief systems that were developed over a lifetime are difficult to change. Patience.
In the comments option, please offer additional ideas for educating family, loved ones, and friends about Peak Oil.
Cliff Wirth is a policy analyst who writes and speaks about Peak Oil impacts, alternatives, survival, preparations, and relocation. He holds a Ph.D. in Policy Analysis and a Master's degree in Public Administration and taught policy analysis, energy policy, public administration, global urban politics, and Mexican politics at the University of New Hampshire for 27 years.
Let me cut to the chase. The biggest robbery in the history of this country is taking place as you read this. Though no guns are being used, 300 million hostages are being taken. Make no mistake about it: After stealing a half trillion dollars to line the pockets of their war-profiteering backers for the past five years, after lining the pockets of their fellow oilmen to the tune of over a hundred billion dollars in just the last two years, Bush and his cronies -- who must soon vacate the White House -- are looting the U.S. Treasury of every dollar they can grab. They are swiping as much of the silverware as they can on their way out the door.
No matter what they say, no matter how many scare words they use, they are up to their old tricks of creating fear and confusion in order to make and keep themselves and the upper one percent filthy rich. Just read the first four paragraphs of the lead story in last Monday's New York Times and you can see what the real deal is:
"Even as policy makers worked on details of a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry, Wall Street began looking for ways to profit from it.
"Financial firms were lobbying to have all manner of troubled investments covered, not just those related to mortgages.
"At the same time, investment firms were jockeying to oversee all the assets that Treasury plans to take off the books of financial institutions, a role that could earn them hundreds of millions of dollars a year in fees.
"Nobody wants to be left out of Treasury's proposal to buy up bad assets of financial institutions."
Unbelievable. Wall Street and its backers created this mess and now they are going to clean up like bandits. Even Rudy Giuliani is lobbying for his firm to be hired (and paid) to "consult" in the bailout.
The problem is, nobody truly knows what this "collapse" is all about. Even Treasury Secretary Paulson admitted he doesn't know the exact amount that is needed (he just picked the $700 billion number out of his head!). The head of the congressional budget office said he can't figure it out nor can he explain it to anyone.
And yet, they are screeching about how the end is near! Panic! Recession! The Great Depression! Y2K! Bird flu! Killer bees! We must pass the bailout bill today!! The sky is falling! The sky is falling!
Falling for whom? NOTHING in this "bailout" package will lower the price of the gas you have to put in your car to get to work.
NOTHING in this bill will protect you from losing your home. NOTHING in this bill will give you health insurance.
Health insurance? Mike, why are you bringing this up? What's this got to do with the Wall Street collapse?
It has everything to do with it. This so-called "collapse" was triggered by the massive defaulting and foreclosures going on with people's home mortgages. Do you know why so many Americans are losing their homes? To hear the Republicans describe it, it's because too many working class idiots were given mortgages that they really couldn't afford. Here's the truth: The number one cause of people declaring bankruptcy is because of medical bills. Let me state this simply: If we had had universal health coverage, this mortgage "crisis" may never have happened.
This bailout's mission is to protect the obscene amount of wealth that has been accumulated in the last eight years. It's to protect the top shareholders who own and control corporate America. It's to make sure their yachts and mansions and "way of life" go uninterrupted while the rest of America suffers and struggles to pay the bills. Let the rich suffer for once. Let them pay for the bailout. We are spending 400 million dollars a day on the war in Iraq. Let them end the war immediately and save us all another half-trillion dollars! I have to stop writing this and you have to stop reading it. They are staging a financial coup this morning in our country. They are hoping Congress will act fast before they stop to think, before we have a chance to stop them ourselves. So stop reading this and do something
-- NOW! Here's what you can do immediately:
1. Call or e-mail Senator Obama. Tell him he does not need to be sitting there trying to help prop up Bush and Cheney and the mess they've made. Tell him we know he has the smarts to slow this thing down and figure out what's the best route to take. Tell him the rich have to pay for whatever help is offered. Use the leverage we have now to insist on a moratorium on home foreclosures, to insist on a move to universal health coverage, and tell him that we the people need to be in charge of the economic decisions that affect our lives, not the barons of Wall Street.
2. Take to the streets. Participate in one of the hundreds of quickly-called demonstrations that are taking place all over the country (especially those near Wall Street and DC).
3. Call your Representative in Congress and your Senators. (click here to find their phone numbers). Tell them what you told Senator Obama.
When you screw up in life, there is hell to pay. Each and every one of you reading this knows that basic lesson and has paid the consequences of your actions at some point. In this great democracy, we cannot let there be one set of rules for the vast majority of hard-working citizens, and another set of rules for the elite, who, when they screw up, are handed one more gift on a silver platter. No more! Not again!
Yours,
Michael Moore MMFlint@aol.com MichaelMoore.com
P.S. Having read further the details of this bailout bill, you need to know you are being lied to. They talk about how they will prevent golden parachutes. It says NOTHING about what these executives and fat cats will make in SALARY. According to Rep. Brad Sherman of California, these top managers will continue to receive million-dollar-a-month paychecks under this new bill. There is no direct ownership given to the American people for the money being handed over. Foreign banks and investors will be allowed to receive billion-dollar handouts. A large chunk of this $700 billion is going to be given directly to Chinese and Middle Eastern banks. There is NO guarantee of ever seeing that money again.
P.P.S. From talking to people I know in DC, they say the reason so many Dems are behind this is because Wall Street this weekend put a gun to their heads and said either turn over the $700 billion or the first thing we'll start blowing up are the pension funds and 401(k)s of your middle class constituents. The Dems are scared they may make good on their threat. But this is not the time to back down or act like the typical Democrat we have witnessed for the last eight years. The Dems handed a stolen election over to Bush. The Dems gave Bush the votes he needed to invade a sovereign country. Once they took over Congress in 2007, they refused to pull the plug on the war. And now they have been cowered into being accomplices in the crime of the century. You have to call them now and say "NO!" If we let them do this, just imagine how hard it will be to get anything good done when President Obama is in the White House. THESE DEMOCRATS ARE ONLY AS STRONG AS THE BACKBONE WE GIVE THEM. CALL CONGRESS NOW.
The idea here is generally that we need to accept that peak oil is real, our lives will be different when we use less oil, and that a transition period is needed to move from oil dependency to being less dependent.
The movement started in England a few years ago and many towns there, in Australia and a few in the US have adopted some of their ideas.
What is a TransitionTown (or village / city / forest / island)?
It all starts off when a small collection of motivated individuals within a community come together with a shared concern: how can our community respond to the challenges, and opportunities, of Peak Oil and Climate Change?
They begin by forming an initiating group and then adopt the Transition Model (explained here at length, and in bits here and here) with the intention of engaging a significant proportion of the people in their community to kick off a Transition Initiative.
A Transition Initiative is a community, town, or city working together to look Peak Oil and Climate Change squarely in the eye and address this BIG question:
"for all those aspects of life that this community needs in order to sustain itself and thrive, how do we significantly increase resilience (to mitigate the effects of Peak Oil) and drastically reduce carbon emissions (to mitigate the effects of Climate Change)?"
After going through a comprehensive and creative process of:
awareness raising around peak oil, climate change and the need to undertake a community lead process to rebuild resilience and reduce carbon
connecting with existing groups in the community
building bridges to local government
connecting with other transition initiatives
forming groups to look at all the key areas of life (food, energy, transport, health, heart & soul, economics & livelihoods, etc)
kicking off projects aimed at building people's understanding of resilience and carbon issues and community engagement
eventually launching a community defined, community implemented "Energy
Descent Action Plan" over a 15 to 20 year timescale
12 Key Steps to embarking on your transition journey
To begin with, it is important to note that although the term “TransitionTown” has stuck, what we are talking about are Transition Cities, TransitionIslands, Transition Hamlets, TransitionValleys, Transition Anywhere-You-Find-People.
#1. Set up a steering group and design its demise from the outset
This stage puts a core team in place to drive the project forward during the initial phases. We recommend that you form your Steering Group with the aim of getting through stages 2 – 5, and agree that once a minimum of four sub-groups (see #5) are formed, the Steering Group disbands and reforms with a person from each of those groups. This requires a degree of humility, but is very important in order to put the success of the project above the individuals involved. Ultimately your Steering Group should become made up of 1 representative from each sub-group.
#2. Awareness raising
This stage will identify your key allies, build crucial networks and prepare the community in general for the launch of your Transition initiative.
For an effective Energy Descent Action plan to evolve, its participants have to understand the potential effects of both Peak Oil and Climate Change – the former demanding a drive to increase community resilience, the later a reduction in carbon footprint.
Screenings of key movies (Inconvenient Truth, End of Suburbia, Crude Awakening, Power of Community) along with panels of “experts” to answer questions at the end of each, are very effective. (See Transition Initiatives Primer (1MB pdf) for the lowdown on all the movies – where to get them, trailers, what the licencing regulations are, doomster rating vs solution rating)
Talks by experts in their field of climate change, peak oil and community solutions can be very inspiring. Articles in local papers, interviews on local radio, presentations to existing groups, including schools, are also part of the toolkit to get people aware of the issues and ready to start thinking of solutions.
#3. Lay the foundations
This stage is about networking with existing groups and activists, making clear to them that the TransitionTown initiative is designed to incorporate their previous efforts and future inputs by looking at the future in a new way. Acknowledge and honour the work they do, and stress that they have a vital role to play.
Give them a concise and accessible overview of peak oil, what it means, how it relates to climate change, how it might affect the community in question, and the key challenges it presents. Set out your thinking about how a TransitionTown process might be able to act as a catalyst for getting the community to explore solutions and to begin thinking about grassroots mitigation strategies.
#4. Organise a Great Unleashing
This stage creates a memorable milestone to mark the project’s “coming of age”, moves it right into the community at large, builds a momentum to propel your initiative forward for the next period of its work and celebrates your community’s desire to take action.
In terms of timing, we estimate that 6 months to a year after your first “awareness raising” movie screening is about right.
The Official Unleashing of Transition Town Totnes was held in September 2006, preceded by about 10 months of talks, film screenings and events.
Regarding contents, it’ll need to bring people up to speed on Peak Oil and Climate Change, but in a spirit of “we can do something about this” rather than doom and gloom.
One item of content that we’ve seen work very well is a presentation on the practical and psychological barriers to personal change – after all, this is all about what we do as individuals.
It needn’t be just talks, it could include music, food, opera, break dancing, whatever you feel best reflects your community’s intention to embark on this collective adventure.
#5. Form sub groups
Part of the process of developing an Energy Descent Action Plan is tapping into the collective genius of the community. Crucial for this is to set up a number of smaller groups to focus on specific aspects of the process. Each of these groups will develop their own ways of working and their own activities, but will all fall under the umbrella of the project as a whole.
Ideally, sub groups are needed for all aspects of life that are required by your community to sustain itself and thrive. Examples of these are: food, waste, energy, education, youth, economics, transport, water, local government.
Each of these sub groups is looking at their area and trying to determine the best ways of building community resilience and reducing the carbon footprint. Their solutions will form the backbone of the Energy Descent Action Plan.
#6. Use Open Space
We’ve found Open Space Technology to be a highly effective approach to running meetings for TransitionTown initiatives.
In theory it ought not to work. A large group of people comes together to explore a particular topic or issue, with no agenda, no timetable, no obvious coordinator and no minute takers.
However, we have run separate Open Spaces for Food, Energy, Housing, Economics and the Psychology of Change. By the end of each meeting, everyone has said what they needed to, extensive notes had been taken and typed up, lots of networking has had taken place, and a huge number of ideas had been identified and visions set out.
The essential reading on Open Space is Harrison Owen’s Open Space Technology: A User’s Guide, and you will also find Peggy Holman and Tom Devane’s The Change Handbook: Group Methods for Shaping the Future an invaluable reference on the wider range of such tools.
#7 Develop visible practical manifestations of the project
It is essential that you avoid any sense that your project is just a talking shop where people sit around and draw up wish lists. Your project needs, from an early stage, to begin to create practical, high visibility manifestations in your community. These will significantly enhance people’s perceptions of the project and also their willingness to participate.
There’s a difficult balance to achieve here during these early stages. You need to demonstrate visible progress, without embarking on projects that will ultimately have no place on the Energy Descent Action Plan. In Transition Town Totnes, the Food group launched a project called ‘Totnes- the Nut Capital of Britain’ which aims to get as much infrastructure of edible nut bearing trees into the town as possible. With the help of the Mayor, we recently planted some trees in the centre of town, and made it a high profile event (see left).
#8. Facilitate the Great Reskilling
If we are to respond to peak oil and climate change by moving to a lower energy future and relocalising our communities, then we’ll need many of the skills that our grandparents took for granted. One of the most useful things a Transition Town project can do is to reverse the “great deskilling” of the last 40 years by offering training in a range of some of these skills.
Research among the older members of our communities is instructive – after all, they lived before the throwaway society took hold and they understand what a lower energy society might look like. Some examples of courses are: repairing, cooking, cycle maintenance, natural building, loft insulation, dyeing, herbal walks, gardening, basic home energy efficiency, making sour doughs, practical food growing (the list is endless).
Your Great Reskilling programme will give people a powerful realisation of their own ability to solve problems, to achieve practical results and to work cooperatively alongside other people. They’ll also appreciate that learning can truly be fun.
#9 Build a bridge to Local Government
Whatever the degree of groundswell your TransitionTown initiative manages to generate, however many practical projects you’ve initiated and however wonderful your Energy Descent Plan is, you will not progress too far unless you have cultivated a positive and productive relationship with your local authority. Whether it is planning issues, funding issues or providing connections, you need them on board. Contrary to your expectations, you may well find that you are pushing against an open door.
We are exploring how we might draft up an Energy Descent Action Plan for Totnes in a format similar to the current Community Development Plan. Perhaps, one day, council planners will be sitting at a table with two documents in front of them – a conventional Community Plan and a beautifully presented Energy Descent Action Plan. It’s sometime in 2008 on the day when oil prices first break the $100 a barrel ceiling. The planners look from one document to the other and conclude that only the Energy Descent Action Plan actually addresses the challenges facing them. And as that document moves centre stage, the community plan slides gently into the bin (we can dream!).
#10 Honour the elders
For those of us born in the 1960s when the cheap oil party was in full swing, it is very hard to picture a life with less oil. Every year of my life (the oil crises of the 70s excepted) has been underpinned by more energy than the previous years.
In order to rebuild that picture of a lower energy society, we have to engage with those who directly remember the transition to the age of Cheap Oil, especially the period between 1930 and 1960.
While you clearly want to avoid any sense that what you are advocating is ‘going back’ or ‘returning’ to some dim distant past, there is much to be learnt from how things were done, what the invisible connections between the different elements of society were and how daily life was supported. Finding out all of this can be deeply illuminating, and can lead to our feeling much more connected to the place we are developing our TransitionTown projects.
#11 Let it go where it wants to go…
Although you may start out developing your TransitionTown process with a clear idea of where it will go, it will inevitably go elsewhere. If you try and hold onto a rigid vision, it will begin to s ap your energy and appear to stall. Your role is not to come up with all the answers, but to act as a catalyst for the community to design their own transition.
If you keep your focus on the key design criteria – building community resilience and reducing the carbon footprint – you’ll watch as the collective genius of the community enables a feasible, practicable and highly inventive solution to emerge.
#12 Create an Energy Descent Plan
Each subgroup will have been focusing on practical actions to increase community resilience and reduce the carbon footprint.
Combined, these actions form the Energy Descent Action Plan. That’s where the collective genius of the community has designed its own future to take account of the potential threats from Peak Oil and Climate Change.
So far, we have taken many practical actions in Totnes. However, they add up to just a mere fraction of the final range and scope of initiatives that are currently being devised by our community.
Regarding specific timescales for Energy Descent Action Plans, here’s part of a presentation made to Glastonbury at their inaugural “Shall we become a TransitionTown meeting?” in April 2007.
“You may be wondering about timescales for Energy Descent Action Plans. There are no rules - each community will embark on a plan that’s right for them in terms of timing. Kinsale took a window of 15 years, Lewes is looking at 20.
If you're looking for greater precision and specified dates, here's my response:
When I recognise the effort that's gone into setting today's meeting up and the effort that each of us has made in getting here and devoting most of our Saturday to these pressing issues, when I think of all the wonderful efforts of pre-existing groups in Glastonbury that hopefully will be incorporated into, and reenergised by, a wider "transitioning" initiative, I say that the work has already started.
And if I look at what we need to do to create the communities that we're happy for our grandchildren and their grandchildren to grow up in, then that work certainly won’t finish in our lifetimes…"
Incidentally, the embryonic steering group at Glastonbury decided at the end of that day to indeed adopt the TransitionTown model for designing their lower energy and more resilient future.
Criteria for becoming an official Transition Initiative
We’ve established a draft set of criteria that tells us how ready a community is to embark on this journey to a lower energy future. If you’re thinking of adopting the Transition Towns model for your community, take a look at this list and make an honest appraisal of where you are on these points. If there are any gaps, it should give you something to focus on while you build the initial energy and contacts around this initiative.
Use this form when you're ready - and this isn't something you can rush - to tell us about your initiative, your core team and your response to the criteria.
We've introduced this slightly more formal approach to registering Transition Towns/villages for a couple of key reasons:
Our trustees and funders want to make sure that while we actively nurture embrionic projects, we only promote to "official" status those communities we feel are ready to move into the awareness raising stage. This status confers additional levels of support such as speakers, trainings, wiki and forums that we're currently rolling out
In order to establish coordinated programmes (such as combined funding bids to the National Lottery) we need a formally established category of Transition Initiatives that we're fully confident can support and deliver against such programmes.
We've seen at least one community stall because they didn't have the right mindset or a suitable group of people, and didn't really understand what they were letting themselves in for.
These criteria are developing all the time, and certainly aren’t written in stone.
an understanding of peak oil and climate change as twin drivers (to be written into constitution or governing documents)
a group of 4-5 people willing to step into leadership roles (not just the boundless enthusiasm of a single person)
at least two people from the core team willing to attend an initial two day training course. Initially these will be in Totnes and over time we'll roll them out to other areas as well, including internationally. Transition Training is just UK based right now, but that's going to have to change – we're working on it.
a potentially strong connection to the local council
an initial understanding of the 12 steps to becoming a TT
a commitment to ask for help when needed
a commitment to regularly update your Transition Initiative web presence - either the wiki (collaborative workspace on the web that we'll make available to you), or your own website
a commitment to make periodic contributions to the Transition Towns blog (the world will be watching)
a commitment, once you're into the Transition, for your group to give at least two presentations to other communities (in the vicinity) that are considering embarking on this journey – a sort of “here’s what we did” or #here's how it was for us" talk
a commitment to network with other TTs
a commitment to work cooperatively with neighbouring TTs
minimal conflicts of interests in the core team
a commitment to work with the Transition Network re grant applications for funding from national grant giving bodies. Your own local trusts are yours to deal with as appropriate.
a commitment to strive for inclusivity across your entire initiative. We're aware that we need to strengthen this point in response to concerns about extreme political groups becoming involved in transition initiatives. One way of doing this is for your core group to explicitly state their support the UN Declaration of Human Rights (General Assembly resolution 217 A (III) of 10 December 1948). You could add this to your constitution (when finalised) so that extreme political groups that have discrimination as a key value cannot participate in the decision-making bodies within your transition initiative. There may be more elegant ways of handling this requirement, and there's a group within the network looking at how that might be done.
a recognition that although your entire county or district may need to go through transition, the first place for you to start is in your local community. It may be that eventually the number of transitioning communities in your area warrant some central group to help provide local support, but this will emerge over time, rather than be imposed. (This point was inserted in response to the several instances of people rushing off to transition their entire county/region rather than their local community.) Further criteria apply to initiating/coordinating hubs – these can be discussed person to person.
and finally, we recommend that at least one person on the core team should have attended a permaculture design course... it really does seem to make a difference.
Once you can demonstrate to us at Transition Network that you're on board with these, you open the door to all sorts of wonderful support, guidance, materials, webspace, training and networking opportunities - not all ready right now, but we're working on it.....
Jan Lundberg- Culture Change- we need to take action without government- we will move towards insignificant state and local government
Liz Warren- UC Davis thesis- Why are peak oil and other stories not covered in the media?
I = PAT – Environmental Impact = Population * Affluence * Technology
Rob Collier- UCB
“Nothing happening now, but after Jan 21 there is hope”
Rob and Kunstler debate the LA’ing of China- Rob says it is happening and will continue, Jim responds with it is not possible, Rob says that China can afford and will buy the oil to continue.
Prosperity can be something that is not consumption.
Lisa Margonelli- “Oil on the Brain”
There’s no such thing as cheap gas.Americans believe the right to drive is theirs.No calculation of external costs.
Peak vs. fluctuating plateau vs onset of decline- begins 2010 to 2013
20 years minimum to mitigate-
Date of peak irrelevant- planning is of utmost importance.
Where is your money?
Consider alternate business scenarios
When peak oil is realized on Wall Street, the effects will be worse and longer than this past week.
There is no easy fix- please consider your investments
Panic is needed for real action.
People and policy makers are too busy with other things until peak oil is forced upon them
Higher fuel costs and lower tax revenue will cripple state and local governments
Barriers to spreading the word:
Other concerns
War
Denial
Faith in technology
Faith in government, or at least the desire to have faith in our government
Oil imports is the biggest wealth transfer in history- this will hurt us in the end
This is a liquids fuels problem
If our fleets of cars, trucks and planes stop running there will be total anarchy
New world will be more sustainable in the end
Remember, transitions will be made in tough times; hopefully we won’t trash the planet.
Globalization was allowed by cheap oil
Pragmatism and comprises must be made
Rising above the past is essential
Non partisan issue
James Kunstler, Dennis Hayes, Randy Udall-
We are really good at measuring things and convincing ourselves we can control what we measure- JHK
Syndrome of technotriumphialism- indicative of our need to believe in a smooth transition--JHK
Are we at ‘peak stupidity’?How can we be so close to peak and doing so little about it?
Until we realize out debt to energy (nukes, coal, oil, food) we will not progress.Our future energy use will flow rather than be from stored energy. RU
Dealing with population is very hard in a democracy(large democracy)
Trees have had solar panels for 40 million years and we are just figuring it out.
In a Zen world we would see that this is the world we want to live in
Smiley Oil- online videos (at you tube) and teaching tools relating to energy, fuel and other good stuff.
Tuesday September 23
COAL
Message- we are running out of oil- what are we going to do about it?
David Hughes- Canadian Geological Survey
1972 – half of coal burned has been used since then
North American way of life cannot be propagated
We cannot replace hydrocarbons with renewables- consumption must be cut
First we used wood, the added coal, then added oil, gas, and nukes- we have not phased out any form of energy, only added new ones.
33% growth in coal use since 1992
Conserve hydrocarbons by every means possible- leave them in the ground.
Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either mad or an economist.
The term ‘sustainable growth’ is an oxymoron.
Andy Weissman- Editor In Chief & Publisher, Energy Business Watch
The demand for LNG will surpass supply about 2012.
Shortages of electricity will follow, along with high prices to cut demand.
Jeff Sacks-“What is going on is immoral- the increases in coal use are disastrous- (mercury, CO2, NOx, SOx)
In a world short on oil, we will use coal.
Rob Rapier- Accsys Technology PLC
Ethanol is no good.
All US ethanol production is less than one large oil refinery
An ethanol subsidization is like a subsidization on fossil fuels
Cellulosic ethanol will never ramp up.Rob expressed this firmly.
Politicians and reporters and scientists need to be honest, tell the public what is going to happen
Increase taxes on carbon
Stop fighting the oil companies- they are the ones who have been providing us with power, lots of it, for years.They are the only ones who will be able to do so at scale.
Michael Webber- U Texas, Austin
Air quality regulations only has us switch which coal we used to low sulfur surface coal from Wyoming and mountaintop removal from Appalachia
CCS(carbon capture and storage) is like CPR for the coal industry
4 million Chinese went into the coal mines today. Compare that to the 160,000 troops we have in Iraq.
½ of all fossil fuels consumed has been since 1980.
Americans consume their body weight in petroleum weekly.
Plentiful fuels(coal) mean that the problem will not go away on its own.We can burn for a long time.
Wyoming and China’s coal output = 800 mile long coal train every day.
Earth first.We’ll drill other planets later.
Peak Oil is a gift to climate change- it may be the only thing that slows down the burn.
Peak oil will arrive with the subtly of the neutron bomb
1975- 80 % of Americans had never flown- we have lived ad ream for the past 30 years.
Heinberg- big burps of methane from Siberian melting permafrost are signs of a doomsday scenario- 6-8 degree C temp rises.- said at lunch table
Coal Train Car- about 70 feet, 70 tons full.
Turkey forecasts are pretty good the week before Thanksgiving.
US miles travelled per car- 1980- 10,000.Then in 2005- 15,000.
US Electric Use for 1 year- 4000 TWH, 2850 TWH from fossil fuels.
1-2MW turbine produces 4000 MWH/ yr
1 MW installed capacity = 2 GWH/ yr
US needs 2,000,000 MW to cover all electric, currently at 15,000 MW.
Wind can never be 100% of the grid, though it can power cars.
Financial crisis we are in is just a taste of things to come.
“Aramco will guarantee oil to be delivered to the new oil refineries coming on in China.You as Americans must not forget that there is 95% of the world that wants the oil you are using.” Kjell(Shell) Alekett- ASPO International
Talk about economic impact and how legislators are responsible to the people- get them to understand that peak oil is a threat to GDP, employment, taxes, etc.- Rep. Terry Backer- CT.
Notes from the train ride home-
What a great conference.Thanks to Phil J. for helping me get there.There were so many positive folks in the light of such sobering news.
I am not entirely sure how to prepare, and so I will continue to educate myself and hopefully some of the people I interact with, try to live my life aware of my dependence on fuels that will not dominate our culture in the future as they do now.I will try to be humble in sharing what I know and help as best I can in developing this awareness in others.I will not be fooled by headlines and promises of solutions.Those of us left in 50 years are going to have some stories to tell, we will be living more sustainably, that’s for sure.It is time for many of us to rise to the challenge that is before us- to work towards the transition away form fossil fuels.Towards living a more local lifestyle, to treating other humans and species as equals, as the world is not ours, or anyone else’s to exploit.
I feel that the most basic energy form is food.As society begins to crumble and change, disruptions in food distribution is likely.We all need to eat.To ease the despair, denial and hopelessness that often follows learning about peak oil I very much enjoy planting and growing food.Even though what I grow is barely what wind is to our electric grid, I feel a bit more empowered, and I appreciate the effort it takes to get just the daily calories I need for my body to survive, not even counting lights, computer, fridge, and more.
I continue to discuss the issue with anyone who will listen, and hopefully offer their views as well.I pay attention.I live life and enjoy sunrises, sunsets, swimming, and eating- as peak oil will not prevent me from appreciating the beauty that surrounds us all every day.
The train is pulling into Berkeley in a few minutes.It is now time to go a few hours without consciously thinking about peak oil.Thank you for reading.
