Oil

Peak oil, the web of debt, & our local future

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A new set of high definition videos are now online: Richard Heinberg on peak oil, Thaddeus Owen on permaculture, Ellen Brown on financial collapse, Tim Husdon on the four futures, and Kim Hill on the auto industry crisis, and more.

Lightering our way to abundance

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One promising sign of a bottom to oil prices is the move by oil companies and Wall Street firms to secure tankers in which to store oil in order to play the contango in the oil market. By leasing a tanker and filling it with oil purchased at the current low price while simultaneously selling it on the futures market for delivery later this year at a significantly higher price, they can generate considerable profit–enough to pay for the costs of storage on the high seas and take home handsome paychecks to boot.

Sustainability and Resource Depletion: Survival Challenge for the 21st Century (video presentation)

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Richard Heinberg identifies the essential axioms of sustainability and ties them to current economic trends such as the high and volatile prices of oil and other commodities. Species survival will require more than “Sustainability Lite,” a vague commitment to more environmentally benign practices, but instead an all-encompassing effort to live within the ultimate resource limits of the planet.

Peak Moment 130: Oil and Gas — The Next Meltdown?

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Drawing parallels with the current financial meltdown, Matthew Simmons, the CEO of Simmons & Company International, expresses his alarm about gasoline stocks being the lowest in several decades and refinery production down following recent hurricanes. He warns that if there were a run on the “energy bank” by everyone topping off their gasoline tanks, the U.S. would be out of fuel in three days, and grocery shelves largely emptied in a week.