Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
How will we feed ourselves with dwindling oil supplies and a changed climate? Wes Jackson pioneered perennial grains, described in this speech to ASPO 2011 in Washington. Plus assessment by Australian carbon scientist Dr. Michael Raupach.
Where will computing go in the coming years? I thought I should find out, so I watched a roundtable and other talks and interviews on the subject (warning: it’s pretty dry stuff). I came away underwhelmed. I struggled to figure out what these guys were seeing that I wasn’t. I’m not sure I’ve figured it out. Eventually I came back to the one key issue that’s missing from their roundtable conversation—and that of most conversations among engineers in the computing world—limits, both ecological and material.
As long as we allow proponents of unconventional oil and gas to claim a false choice between energy and economic security and the environment, and as long as we allow them to vilify opponents as being somehow unpatriotic or radical, we run the very real risk of losing a battle where the future of our planet and species is at stake. Ok, so maybe I am being a little bombastic. But am I wrong?
All of a sudden, the Strait of Hormuz has become the most combustible spot on the planet, the most likely place to witness a major conflict between well-armed adversaries. Why, of all locales, has it become so explosive?
Oil, of course, is a major part of the answer, but — and this may surprise you — only a part.
-A circular economy tackles the root problems of overconsumption [report]
-The End of Elastic Oil
-When you are betting on shale gas, watch the dealer’s eyes
In a recent post, I talked about why we may be reaching Limits to Growth of the type foretold in the 1972 book Limits to Growth. I would like to explain some additional reasons now.
And, as we’re always saying here at Transition Voice, however compelling evidence may be in a white paper, chart, graph, or long lecture, if it doesn’t succeed in communicating the problem and possible solutions to the problem in a way that engages people, it can end up being of little use except in obscure research or as a footnote somewhere. That’s why we were excited to review a new documentary out of the UK, The Crisis of Civilization, by filmmaker Dean Puckett. In the trailer it looked like the newest, most accessible peak oil film since The End of Suburbia. And once we watched the film, we weren’t disappointed.
– Solar Panels in China: An Emerging U.S.-China Trade Dispute?
– ‘Bicycle pump’ to turn wave power into clean energy
– El panorama energético actual (Argentina)
A weekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Oil and the global economy
-the Iranian confrontation
-The Euro crisis
-Refining petroleum
-Quote of the week
-Briefs
The director of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) will be delivering a lecture titled “U.S. Energy Outlook: Whatever Happened to ‘Peak Oil'” at Indiana University on February 6. The description of the lecture provides some background: “Not long ago, the public heard much concern that the nation and the globe had reached or was about to reach the point of peak oil production and would be on a downward trajectory due to declining resources. Despite growing demand for energy, however, fossil fuel resources have never been higher.”
President Obama exuberantly embraced America’s new oil and gas frontier this week in his State of the Union address. Clearly aiming to steal some Republican election thunder, he pledged to open 75% of potential oil and gas resources, and repeated claims that the US is sitting on enough natural gas to last for 100 years (see insightful commentary on the numbers behind this from Chris Nelder, and more on gas prospects from David Strahan.
This chapter explores details behind the phenomenal increase in global crude oil production over the last century and a half and the implications if that trend should be reversed. I document that a key feature of the growth in production has been exploitation of new geographic areas rather than application of better technology to existing sources, and suggest that the end of that era could come soon. The economic dislocations that historically followed temporary oil supply disruptions are reviewed, and the possible implications of that experience for what the transition era could look like are explored.
