Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
In May 2006, Portland City Council created a Peak Oil Task Force to develop recommendations on appropriate responses to uncertainties in the supply and affordability of oil. City staff developed this 94-page set of background materials intended to provide an overview of the peak oil issue.
Stan Goff on Encroachment (failure in Iraq and the prospect of fascism) /
An imperial defeatist– and proud of it /
The geopolitics of oil gains a new constituency: women and oil wars
On July 19, the Bloomington, Indiana City Council passed a resolution acknowledging
That the global peak of petroleum production is “an unprecedented challenge” for society, and recognizes that the city must prepare for its inevitability.
Anyone concerned about the burning of fossil fuels and resultant climate change is scared beyond words because of the prospect of coal usage growing or continuing. (Also: a discussion of Earth First! and its anti-coal protests.)
Plenty of opinions about energy (peak oil books) / Black Gold (book review) / Peak oil and energy resources (anarchist view) / Whipple: Independence Day 2006 – America’s last fling? /
Clinton gets peak oil and global warming
Energy security yes, but climate security too / G8 Call for more oil output won’t help poor: report / McKillop: Towards the international energy transition plan / The mother of all battles: for oil / In energy, we’re all connected / Energy should not be political tool – Chirac / BBC poll:
‘global fear’ over energy plans
“To the best of my knowledge I never had a security briefing which said what some of these very serious but conservative petroleum geologists say, which is that they think that either now or before the decade is out that we’ll reach peak oil production globally … This needs much more serious debate. It’s almost not discussed at all in the mainstream media.” [Clinton also comments on climate change and how to present the issues.]
Revealed: G8 plan for global nuclear expansion /
Nuclear to power ahead of renewables in UK plan / Germany’s new power (renewables) / A dated carbon approach / EU may introduce carbon tax on airplanes / So we drive on
If you really want to understand the danger that Peak Oil represents, don’t think about your investment portfolio. Think about what happens when these millions of flat broke, disenfranchised, exhausted fellow citizens finally catch on that the dream has become a lie and an absurdity.
‘Green chemistry’ pays off / Think globally? Act domestically. / ‘How green Is my conscience?’ / Vancouver to Halifax on a gallon of gas – 3,145 mpg / A slow-road movement? / A waste of energy (NYT on Congress inaction)
The federal government has stopped work on more than a dozen wind farms planned across the Midwest, saying research is needed on whether the giant turbines could interfere with military radar. But backers of wind power say the action has little to do with national security. The real issue, they say, is a group of wealthy vacationers who think a proposed wind farm off the coast of Cape Cod would spoil the view at their summer homes. (Several articles)
Last month, oil “peaksters” seemed to break out of their policy doldrums when they journeyed to the banks of the Potomac for what may have been their first mainstream conference in the nation’s capital.
