Year: 2011

Monday Mayhem: Local, Organic Government

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In an ongoing series called “Monday Mayhem,” radio host with a pragmatic view of tackling the challenges of energy, food, and the local economy at the end of the age of oil goes head-to-head with a radio host who promotes free-market solutions. In this edition, Carl Etnier and Rob Roper discuss what it looks like to apply the principles of local, organic food to the functions of government.

Your renewable energy path

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Get energy independence (and help the climate too!) Two interviews with off-grid authors who have walked the walk, living outside the power grid, with a minimum of fossil fuels. Where to start with solar, heat pumps, hot water heat, wind or wood. Cam Mather from aztext.com, living in comfort – off grid 14 years. From the UK, Nick Rosen author of “Off the Grid” at off-grid.net.

The holistic flower

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I’ve found a wonderful flower; I discovered it not long ago. Still, it’s not so much what I know about it that touches me, I’m just drawn to its colors. This flower is unique, it thrives in every country and climate, and adapts very well to the specific conditions of culture and place. Its colors, smell and form is therefore of unlimited variety and complexity, yet it is the same flower. It is the permaculture flower.

Review of Bundeswehr Report on peak oil: Section 2.2. Tipping Point (Nov. 2010)

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Oil is often described as ‘the life-blood’ of modern society. It is as vital to our globalized economy as water is to the human body. A reduction in supply of only a few percentages could create difficulties throughout the entire system. Further reductions could lead to a complete failure of critical systems.

Simple Homemade Toys

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The toys most of us really remember playing with as children weren’t really toys but things we turned into toys. My earliest recollection is a matchbox of multicolored and multisize rubberbands I played with by the hour when I was about two. I don’t know why they fascinated me only that they did. Even the matchbox was a wonder — the way it slid so neatly open and closed.

New UNCTAD study charts impact of financial investors on commodity prices

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The “financialization” of commodity markets has changed trading behaviour and significantly affects the prices of such basic goods as staple foods, a new UNCTAD study says. The study focuses on how financial investors in commodity markets rely on information related to just a few commonly observable events or on mathematical models, rather than on the physical realities of supply and demand.

Retired Marine opens ninth Peak Oil Boot Camp (humor)

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Jan. 1, 2013 — Somewhere, Texas —

Retired Marine Master Sergeant Jasper Sweet today announced the opening of his ninth Peak Oil Boot Camp – this one in Somewhere, Texas. During the opening ceremony, Master Sergeant Sweet spoke about his calling to open the Camps. “After thirty-two years serving my country, I realized America needed people every bit as tough as soldiers – she needed farmers. And by God, I’m going to give them to her, even if I have to wipe the snot off the nose of every last pansy-a$$ juvenile delinquent in Texas.”

Saudi Arabia to produce 10mbd in July?

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When the Saudi oil minister speaks to the world’s business reporters, one cannot rely that his words will later match the kingdom’s official reports to international statistical agencies. Whether through sloppiness or otherwise, at least one of Mr al-Naimi’s statement and the Saudi report were in error to the tune of almost half a million barrels a day — more than five percent of production — at a time when oil markets are critically seeking signals of Saudi intentions and capabilities.