Housing & urban design – August 22
Trading Places – The demographic inversion of the American city
San Francisco ponders: Could bike lanes cause pollution?
Transition initiatives in North America
Oil
Peak oil – Aug 22
Geologist Jeffrey Brown: the oil peak is past
Russian oil exports: dropping, but why?
Q: Will we see $3 gasoline before we see $5?
Are oil prices rigged?
Wikipedia megaproject update
United States – August 21
Oil’s Washington juggernaut
Pump primed for fall fight on energy
Is T. Boone Pickens right?
There will be Boone
Peak Oil Notes – August 21
A mid-week update on peak oil, including:
– Prices and consumption
– Georgia and the BTC pipeline
Peak oil, prices, supplies – Aug 21
Jad Mouawad: As oil giants lose influence, supply drops
A few speculators dominate vast market for oil trading
The future is now; the end of cheap oil
Russia sees oil output stalling
Raymond James: State of Russian oil ‘much worse than we would have imagined 6 months ago’
The Long Descent (excerpts from new book)
The Stories We Tell Ourselves: “One of the things that makes our culture’s reliance on the utopian myths of progress and apocalypse so problematic as we approach the end of the age of cheap energy is that both narratives claim to explain the entire universe.”
Tools for the Transition: “One of the most hopeful features of this side of our predicament is that the revitalization of old technologies can be done successfully by individuals working on their own. It’s precisely those technologies that can be built, maintained, and used by individuals that formed the mainstay of the economy in the days before cheap, abundant energy…” (paean to the slide rule)
“The Long Descent” by John Michael Greer (review)
I’ve been reading John Michael Greer’s Archdruid Report for a few months now and I thought his book would be pretty esoteric, but it’s actually brilliant in its simplicity and a much-needed wise and reasonable voice for the peak oil community
United States – August 20
Anti-regulation aide to Cheney is up for energy post
Why oil prices continue to fluctuate
Petrol pump pilgrims keep faith
Renewed push for uranium mining in West
Transport – August 20
Drive 55 campaign gaining speed
Tall ship Belem delivers wine by sail and saves carbon
The handmade commuter bike
Oil demand destruction & brittle systems
People think we can insulate ourselves from supply disruptions, from our dependence on potentially unreliable foreign sources of oil, by improving our efficiency and eliminating “unnecessary” oil consumption. In my opinion, this is backward. I will argue that, because the demand that is destroyed first in a free market is the demand that is easiest to eliminate, the resulting consumptive system is more inelastic, more brittle, and more susceptible to systemic shock from supply disruption.
Russia: There is life after peak oil
Several years ago, at what seemed to be one of the darkest moments of the Russian collapse, I was walking in one of the avenues of Moscow. I noticed a series of large signs hanging from lampposts, showing traditional Russian buildings and landscapes. One of my Russian colleagues translated the text of the signs for me as saying, “Nobody will help Russia, so Russia will have to help herself”. Government propaganda? Sure, but that is what the Russians did. Never underestimate a country that has survived peak oil.
US oil companies finding more oil in old fields
If the peak theory proves true, the intersection between rising worldwide demand and a decline in world production would likely drive prices much higher, giving drillers even more incentive to go after every last drop of oil they can find in old fields as well as new ones. (Texas oil man Jim Baldauf, co-founder of ASPO-USA, is interviewed.)
