"Peak Oil" has been on my mind lately,meaning the point at which the world's known petroleum fields will attain their
highest sustainable yield and commence a long, irreversible decline.
When one thinks about the impact on our culture, it's profound. So profound that many believe it may be one of
the most significant, if not the most significant turning point in the history of our species. When one thinks of the
potential impact on the human population and our mode of living, this viewpoint seems reasonable.
Everything in our society is propped up by cheap oil. Food and food packaging, personal computers, household
products and nearly everything you come in contact with during a routine day. The exploding world population is
propped up by cheap oil in the form of fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides. What happens when the world
cannot produce the crops needed to feed the burgeoning population? Is a massive die-off looming in our future?
In ten years or so, certainly no more than twenty, demand will exceed production, yet the global economy continues to
move in the direction of dependence on cheap oil. As usual, the federal government isn't doing anything about it, but
should we be looking to Washington for answers in the first place? Of course not, but something has to give.
What can we do? The first thing is educate ourselves and others. Secondly and simultaneously, we need to make
some changes in our life styles. Drive less or better yet, don't drive at all. Certainly don't buy new cars, even
hybrids, which are really just band-aid technologies. Honda and Toyota executives admit it!
If you're interested in ending the car culture, quit buying cars.
Buy locally produced goods that require less fossil fuel to ship, especially locally grown, organic food. Walking and
cycling and eating well will make you healthier and therefore reduce the need for expensive drugs that are made available
by fossil fuels.
There is no replacement for oil. Nothing we can economically produce into a usable product is as dense as oil. Not tar sands,
hydrogen or coal. It's certainly possible to squeeze oil out of coal, but it takes a lot of energy to do it, meaning you get less net
energy per unit volume than if you just burn the coal. But coal is too expensive to transport, and a single coal-fired station
can produce a million tons of solid waste each year. If coal use is expanded enough to cover the shortfall in energy supply
brought on by Peak Oil, we can expect global warming effects so severe the Earth would become inhospitable to human life.
According to the chart below, to get the same amount of energy produced by a a cubic mile of oil, you'd need 91,250,000
solar panels running for 50 years. Source: Joules, BTUs, Quads—Let's Call the Whole Thing Off
Hydrogen is a chimera. The biggest problems with hydrogen are where to get the energy to make the H2 and how to make
fuel cells cheaply. Proponents of the hydrogen economy do not properly consider the energy conservation principle, one of the
fundamental laws of physics. Hydrogen is not a new energy, but only an artificial synthetic energy carrier. It has to be made from
high grade energy like electricity or natural gas. Before the technology of a hydrogen economy is developed or put in place, the
fundamental questions need to be addressed.
Some folks believe nuclear is a strong option for alternative energy, but careful research will show this is simply not the case. If you
assume a 2% growth in our energy requirement per year in the United States, we'd need between 100 and 250 plants per year to meet
our energy needs. The world just doesn't have enough qualified engineers, technicians and people trained in the construction of nuclear
plants, and you're looking at minimum costs of $500 billion a year to embark on such a program. And until the nuclear power advocates
produce a solution to the problem of waste disposal and internment for the eons,it is simply not a viable option.
The only reasonable option is for people to relearn how to live within geophysical and biological limits. How to live in balance with
nature and in harmony with all living things.
back
