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Crushed on the road to oil armageddon
Selwyn Parker, Sunday Herald (Scotland)
Record oil prices have pushed the UK’s road haulage industry close to meltdown, with unions warning that tax relief is all that can save many smaller companies
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… As the cost of crude keeps spiralling upwards the haulage and other fuel-guzzling industries wonder where it will all end. Some believers in “peak oil” theory – those who believe that the transformed supply-demand relationship spells permanently high prices – are predicting $200 a barrel by 2010, Armageddon for the entire economy, let alone the distribution industry.
Certainly, nobody expects prices to stop at $110 for long – the road transport industry’s own forecasters expect $115 by mid-summer.
Exactly why this is happening is unclear. The Opec oil-producing cartel insists there is nothing it can do to boost production, the energy companies say they are doing all they can to develop new oil fields in ever-deeper and more difficult waters, and the Jeremiahs say the oil is running out and the level of recoverable reserves bodes ill for the future. According to MP John Hemming, chairman of the government’s all-party parliamentary group on peak oil which met in December: “If the government fails to act, the economic, social and environmental consequences are likely to be dire.”
A vast swathe of the transport economy is hit by record oil prices.
(12 April 2008)
The new age of the train
Jerome Taylor, UK Independent
A historic boom on the railways – but can network take the strain?
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Britain is witnessing the dawn of a new era of rail travel as an unprecedented demand for environmentally friendly transport encourages people to take more train journeys than at any time since the Second World War.
Figures released yesterday revealed that the number of miles travelled on the rail network reached a record-breaking peacetime high of 30.1 billion during 2007, capping a huge rise in popularity in which passenger numbers have increased every year for the past 13 years.
The rise in passenger miles, documented by the Association of Train Operating Companies (Atoc), indicates a boom in demand for rail transport at a time when the threat of climate change is encouraging more people to find greener ways of moving around.
(11 April 2008)
Grounded aircraft to be converted into trains
Julian Darley, Post Carbon Institute
In a startling and some say brilliant dash of technological ingenuity, major airlines are discussing converting aircraft – which they can no longer afford to fly thanks to peak oil and unfair safety checks – into railway trains. Trains, they note after careful analysis, don’t have to worry about taking off and landing, and crucially, can have a buffet car in the middle which passengers walk to on their own legs, which results in labour saving efficiency gains, and helps passengers stay fitter by exercising. Richard Branson applauds the move, and has offered to buy and convert some of the planes that failed carriers like Oasis, Aloha, ATA, Skybus, Champion, Southwest, American and Alitalia won’t be needing any more.
British train operators plan to run the sleek and fashionable ‘airtrains’ on fermented apple juice and cow manure, acknowledging that industrial biofuels have been ill conceived and caused untold environmental harm. American companies are considering following the British example but are having trouble finding enough Chinese steel to make new railroads to replace the ones they ripped up after the Second World War in order to save the public the bother of having a choice of transport options.
And now back to Planet Earth. Anyone who has caught more than two minutes of news in the last ten days one might think that it is obvious that airlines are not having a very good time – half a dozen carriers have ceased existence in that time, and more than a thousand planes have been grounded amid safety fears. It is possible that the increasing number of safety scandals are a result of falling staffing levels, as well as desperation to avoid any extra costs – such as maintenance. But astonishingly enough, some Canadian analysts sound as if they are about to embark on a new dot com boom:
“Despite the demise of Oasis Hong Kong Airlines Ltd. this week, the air transportation industry is flying into rosier skies, the Conference Board of Canada states in a report released Thursday”.
It gushes on to say
“After several years of strong demand growth, record load factors, and a largely modern fleet of aircraft, it should be boom times for the Canadian airline industry,” the report said.
All those who wonder what level of carbon dioxide or what price of oil it will take to shake off the euphoria that grips mainstream thinking will have to go on waiting to find out it would seem. We have had $100 oil and we are told that we already over 30 parts per million past a safe-ish level of carbon dioxide.
We apparently do not respond to these relatively slowly changing factors. We took notice of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, at least for a while. And they are still are in Louisiana. Will we wait for the next round of Katrinas or is there some other way we can begin systemic change?
In an area of California just north of San Francisco, where Post Carbon Institute is based, some residents rejected a modest proposal in 2006 to build a short railway to divert some of the traffic on Highway 101. The old railroad that used to run up much of the near coast in picturesque Marin, Sonoma and Mendocino counties lies rusting and useless even as the freeway just yards away is immobilised by traffic and fumes.
In every country we need to be deciding to spend our oil and money in ways that will build a society that can run reasonably well without oil, but there are not enough signs that is happening yet. One thing appears increasingly obvious – at least some citizens, some non-governmental groups, some politicians, and some important sectors of the economy will need to work together to begin to achieve systemic change. That’s quite hard to imagine at times, but it is easier to imagine than calling for all sectors to collaborate. And at least that offers us the possibility of finding those that do want to begin the process of rethinking, rebuilding and relocalizing the supply chains that bring so much of what we need or at least think we need.
(10 April 2008)
Julian Darley is a writer, researcher and founder and director of Post Carbon Institute and Global Public Media.
The first two paragraphs are satire, for anyone who is still wondering.
-BA
When Cheap Housing Isn’t: How Transportation Changes the Equation
Keith Johnson, Environmental Capital, Wall Street Journal
Ana Campoy reports::
Ballooning gasoline prices aren’t just changing how people drive-they may soon change where people live. With gas stuck above $3.00 a gallon, those cheaper houses in the suburbs can be a money-losing proposition in the end.
That’s one of the takeaways from the Housing and Transportation Affordability Index, a new web tool created by the Chicago-based Center for Neighborhood Technology together with The Brookings Institution. The map tool shows how much housing costs in neighborhoods in 52 U.S. metropolitan areas-and how much the total bill comes to when transportation costs are included.
Take Wilmer, Texas, a town about 16 miles south of downtown Dallas. Housing is cheap indeed: less than 20% of the area’s median income. But add in transportation costs and the bill skyrockets to just over 60% of median income. A neighborhood just north of downtown costs more in housing-34% of area income-but being near a light-rail line helps cut transportation costs to 12%. That makes the total monthly bill less than the suburbs.
(11 April 2008)
