peak oil

With apologies to Harlan Ellison, I shall begin this post by stating that what follows is very much speculation. The future is not set in stone.
Collisons can be very scary, and so are those moments just prior to the crunch of metal, moments when tires squeal, brakes burn and stomachs lurch. A collision is coming, and I just might know when.

Cross posted from Sustainable Futures

Do we only have fourteen days to seal history's judgment on this generation, as the Guardian and 56 other newspapers are proclaiming today?

In an unprecedented joint effort, an editorial calling for decisive action in Copenhagen will be published tomorrow by 56 newspapers around the world in 20 languages including Chinese, Arabic and Russian. Most of the newspapers have taken the unusual step of featuring the editorial on their front page.

All the discussion this week about peak oil, energy subsidies, Exxon profits and more has drawn me to one of my favorite meta-theories. Revenge effects. The concept, which is brilliantly articulated in Edward Tenner's Why Things Bite Back, underscores my conviction that human beings are not nearly smart enough to anticipate the mid- and long-term consequences of their actions.

This will come as no surprise to those of you reading this, unless you're three years old and playing around with mommy and/or daddy's computer, in which case you need to a) stop leaning on the keyboard because it's expensive, b) get down from the chair before it rolls back and you bang your head on something, and c) move out smartly because you're about to get caught doing something you know you're not supposed to.

Back to the big people reading this: we are smack in the middle of an Energy Crisis, but most of us don't really understand why. We think we do, because we've been conditioned over the years to respond to rhetoric, but that needs to change.

Today's N&R reports that NC revenues are off $71 million for the ending fiscal year.

Another story relates how due to high gas prices and credit card fees, a Roseboro store will stop pumping gas. I heard on the radio that vendors are demanding cash for the same reason.

It is only a matter of time before we begin to see stories about outlying areas losing distribution of beer and cigarettes. God forbid they should stop delivering groceries.

As if we needed another facet to the global climate change and energy demand debates, we can now add the following: evidence is mounting that our insatiable consumption of petroleum has finally (and inevitably) brought us to the cusp of Peak Oil. More hard decisions are going to be required in the near future, and it is critical that we avoid succumbing to our natural inclination towards easy fixes.

Crossposted from Left Toon Lane, Bilerico Project & My Left Wing


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