Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Nearly everyone would agree that we live in uncertain, challenging times. It seems that so much is happening so fast that it’s almost impossible to make sense of it all. We’re clearly on some kind of trajectory, but a trajectory toward what?
A government of Alberta cabinet briefing note dated Aug. 3, 2011 says, “Shale gas environmental concerns in the media and in the public in other jurisdictions are potentially problematic for energy development and environmental management in Alberta.” The note also reveals that one of Canada’s most powerful lobby group, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, has approached the Alberta government about shale gas issues in order “to enhance public communication.”
-After Tripoli, what is a petro-ruler to do? And what is China to do?
-Libya Must Shape its Own Future
-After Uprising, Rebels Face a Struggle for Unity
Transition Voice’s review of Richard Heinberg’s latest book, The End of Growth: Adapting to Our New Economic Reality.
We speak with engineer, author and speaker Mat Stein about his books, When Technology Fails and the upcoming, When Disaster Strikes. Mat explains how our illusion of abundance and order can be easily shattered through solar flares, EMP strikes and peak oil.
A weekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Oil and the global economy
-The Middle East
-Global power shortages
-Quote of the week
-Briefs
-Tar Sands and the Carbon Numbers
-A Debate: Should the U.S. Approve TransCanada’s Massive Keystone XL Tar Sands Oil Pipeline?
-Interview: James Hansen on the Tar Sands Pipeline Protest, the Obama Administration and Intergenerational Justice
-Dozens Arrested in Pipeline Protest
-Tar Sands Pipeline Protests Continue
Markets plunged again on Thursday as warnings of a double dip recession grow louder. Morgan Stanley described the eurozone and the US as “dangerously close to a recession”. Yet oil prices have softened only slightly, and Brent crude remains above $105/barrel…
Colin Campbell is the originator of the concept of “peak oil” with the article that he wrote in 1998 in “Scientific American”, together with Jean Laherrere. He is also the founder and honorary chairman of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil (ASPO). He lives in Ireland, in the village of Ballydehob with his wife, Bobbins. Last month, he wrote me a letter that contains several interesting observations on embedded energy and on people’s life. With his permission, I am reprinting it – slightly edited – together with my answer.
The United States Energy Information Administration (EIA) remains optimistic about the future of global oil supply and maintains that global peak oil will not likely occur before 2030. How does the EIA remain optimistic given the growing trend throughout the world towards energy pessimism? This post will explain the methodology that underlies the EIA’s optimistic oil supply vision, and will point out two important flaws in this methodology that call their results into question. … a corrected application of EIA’s approach agrees well with many reports suggesting the likelihood of a near-term or historical peak in global conventional oil.
The key to the future of shale gas is its EROI. I’ve been unable to find estimates of the EROI of shale gas in the literature. However, I’ve made a preliminary first-order estimate that the EROI of shale gas is in the range of 70 to greater than 100. This is probably significantly better than most other energy sources available today.
In the newly revised version of “Reinventing Collapse,” first published in 2008 before the financial crisis began later that year, Dmitry Orlov expands on his attempt to convince you that the U.S. is much less prepared for collapse than the Soviet Union ever was. Many of Orlov’s forecasts from the previous edition have proven accurate. Orlov’s America is a system barely able to sustain itself, ruined by a population bent on a hardened mythology: an iron triangle of home, car and job that is out of touch with the reality of rapidly depleting cheap energy, which made vehicle ownership and suburban home life a gateway to the goal of being middle class. [book review from Canada]
