Time to clean up the mess we’ve left

…at a national energy conference Thursday on the campus of Case Western Reserve University, Ohio Gov. Bob Taft and other attendees acknowledged the world has little time left to counter the consequences of widespread fossil fuel use before dramatic and expensive action is inescapable.

Has oil production peaked?

The post-peak oil world will look a lot like the bleak 1970s. But much worse.

A recession will grip the globe because the price of oil, and everything tied to it, will skyrocket.

Starvation will abound because oil-based fertilizers we’ve grown to depend on will be in short supply. Energy wars could erupt to control the remaining oil fields.

Rockefeller and Co. turned oil into local gold

Oil is the world’s biggest business and one of its most combustible. It has drawn all sorts of eccentrics, from H.L. “Boy” Hunt, gambling host and bigamist, to Armand Hammer, Kremlin confidante and bull semen salesman. It has fueled inflation, recession, pollution, scandal and war.

Early on, oil made modern Cleveland.

Where Is the Hirsch Report?

Here, then, is a significant report produced by an independent research company for the US Department of Energy, warning of a global problem of “unprecedented” proportions with economic, social, and political impacts that are likely to be extremely severe. The authors forecast “protracted economic hardship” for the United States and the rest of the world. It is a problem that deserves “immediate, serious attention.” Yet, half a year after release, discussion of the Hirsch report is conspicuously absent from the press and the halls of Congress. [updated version late 7/31]

US Energy Bill – 30 July, 2005

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