25 May, 2010

How The Global Oil Watchdog Failed Its Mission             www.google.com
By Lionel Badal

Peak Oil researcher Lionel Badal reveals how the IEA team working on the World Energy Outlook discovered that Peak Oil was a real threat, 12 years ago, how the team issued a “coded warning” in the 1998 World Energy Outlook Report , how the message was uncovered in a 1999 article published in Prospect magazine, how the IEA team who made the discovery was “knocked down” under pressures from the US, which didn’t like the message the 1998 WEO contained. and how Dr. Fatih Birol, the current Chief-Economist of the IEA, secretly confirmed in 1999 that global oil production would start to decline around 2014 (in other words, Peak Oil)

22 May, 2010

The B.S. Factor In Post-Industrial Society
By Peter Goodchild

The b.s. that I’ve heard over the last couple of years is immeasurable. If I point out that the world’s nearly seven billion humans will have to be reduced to less than a billion in a few decades, what I generally face is a torrent of ad-hominem arguments to the effect that I am a heartless Nazi butcher and murderer

13 May, 2010

After Money
By John Michael Greer

Most people won’t have the option of separating themselves completely from the money economy for many years to come; as long as today’s governments continue to function, they will demand money for taxes, and money will continue to be the gateway resource for many goods and services, including some that will be very difficult to do without. Still, there’s no reason why distancing oneself from the tertiary economy has to be an all-or-nothing thing

Peak Soil: It's Like Peak Oil, Only Worse
By Matthew Wild

The world is facing a hydrocarbons peak, right as we are beginning to struggle with soil, the nutrients required for large scale agriculture, environmental change and availability of water. When you put the disparate elements together, it begins to look like a perfect storm

11 May, 2010

It's Worse Than You Think:
Plotting Global Hydrocarbon Collapse
By Matthew Wild

When oil peaks, and the price rises, it may well cause our fragile, debt-ridden economies to collapse. But the worst will be yet to come. When other energy sources subsequently peak, we will be left with no affordable “bridge fuel” to carry us to a sustainable, renewable future. In addition, whereas oil is mainly used in transportation, natural gas and coal together account for the generation of 60 per cent of our electricity, according to EIA figures. If the grid goes down, modern life is over

10 May, 2010

The Century Of Famine
By Peter Goodchild

Famine caused by petroleum supply failure alone will result in about 2.5 billion above-normal deaths before the year 2050; lost and averted births will amount to roughly an equal number

09 May, 2010

The Imminent Collapse Of Industrial Society
By Peter Goodchild

What seems the best general concept of human society later in this century is not easy to formulate. People with the information and skills required for supplying themselves and their community with food and shelter can certainly be called survivalists, even if there should be a better label

Don't Wait Until The $#!+ Hits The fan
By Mickey Foley

It's hard to convince people we're in the early stages of collapse when things are still pretty good. Only when we have trouble meeting our basic needs will we begin to seriously question and fundamentally reform our society. And I believe, passionately, that we need to begin this process ASAP, while there are still enough fossil fuels, water and other natural resources to support 6.8 billion people. So my message is this: Don't wait until the $#!+ hits the fan, because by then it could be too late

Another Wake-Up Call For The World’s
Biggest Oil Junkie
By Chris Nelder

The explosion and destruction of the Horizon deepwater rig and the subsequent oil spill disaster are only the latest in a series of wake-up calls you’ve received. Are you listening now?

Will Peak Oil Turn Flying Into Something
Only Rich People Can Afford?
By Sam Kornell

Expert physicist: 'At $150 dollars a barrel, the air industry is barely viable. At $200 a barrel, it’s going to [be] something that only rich people do.'

06 May, 2010

Peak Oil: Let The Hollow Media Optimism
Sound A Warning
By Matthew Wild

Perhaps I’m spending too long refuting this silly piece of journalism. I know it’s a politically motivated column in a paper with its own agenda. But it’s not a one-off. And if nothing else, the fact that these clearly biased pieces keep coming out, telling us that we have nothing to fear, actually makes me alarmed. After all, there’s nothing like being told there’s no cause for panic to make you start to wonder if the shit isn’t about to hit the fan, big time

05 May, 2010

Industry Leaders Seem To Be Showing
More Openness To Energy Descent Issues
By George Mobus

I introduced ideas relating to peak net energy, and the possibility of major changes in the years ahead. I found industry leaders much more open than I had expected to listening to and understanding our energy predicament, and talking about what may be ahead

Worse Than 1789?
By James Howard Kunstler

The France of 1789 and the USA of today have a few important elements in common: a striking inability to sort out any national problems, an arrogant, depraved ruling elite resistant to reform, and an intellectual underclass motivated by blind fury. Some signal differences: most of our even theoretically best-intentioned "leaders" -- i.e. elected officials, business, education, and media figures -- are unable to articulate the problems we face. Paul Krugman and David Brooks have no more of a clue about the implications of Peak Oil than Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin

04 May, 2010

Why Do Peak Oilers And Climate Changers
Not Get Along Better?
By David Roberts

I just find the sociocultural (and academic) interaction between peak oilers and climate types fascinating. You'd think it would be a natural alliance, but in practice it seems to tend more toward mutual disinterest or even hostility. What's up with that?

Peak Oil And The Catastrophe
In The Gulf Of Mexico
By Kjell Aleklett

he discussion is continuing around the world, (a search for “peak oil” just now gave 1,470,000 hits), but there are very few political initiatives and we can justifiably say that the politicians are not accepting their responsibility. The question is whether the opportunity now exists to make Peak Oil a global political question?

Optimism Versus Reality In Peak Oil Media Battle
By Matthew Wild

The optimists may have long been winning the peak oil media battle – as Matt Simmons observes – but we are beginning to see information coming out on the business pages that allows us to piece together a more balanced story

03 May, 2010

The Peak Of Oil Production Is Passed
By Dr Michael Lardelli

Dr Michael Lardelli from the University of Adelaide looks at how the bulk of the world's oil production comes from a relatively small number of very large fields discovered decades ago. The rate of world oil production has been maintained at current levels only by finding and bringing on line an increasing number of smaller fields, but the financial cost and the energy required to find and develop these new fields is constantly increasing. According to Dr Lardelli the so-called peak of oil production was actually in 2008

30 April, 2010

Why Would Big Oil Ignore Its Own Demise?
By John James

Denial that there is a problem until the last moment ensures that a few corporations will exercise long-term political and financial control over the globe and everyone on it. Its not about money, its about hegemony and power!

26 April, 2010

What Works, Maybe: Individual Options
By Guy R. McPherson

What’s an individual to do, in light of the imminent collapse of western civilization? In addition to hastening the collapse, some tools for which I’ve listed before, I describe four points along a continuum for your own, individual, post-carbon future: (1) transition towns, (2) agricultural anarchy, (3) hunting and gathering, and (4) traveling. I will describe each approach, briefly, as a means of generating thought, action, and perhaps even discussion

23 April, 2010

The Imminent Crash Of Oil Supply:
Be Afraid, Very Afraid
By Nicholas C. Arguimbau

A graph drawn by the United States Department of Energy, and the United States military's Joint Forces Command indicates that world oil supply is going off a cliff. Not in the distant future, but in a year and a half. Production of all liquid fuels, including oil, will drop within 20 years to half what it is today

20 April, 2010

A 'Watershed Month For The Truth About Peak Oil'
By Matthew Wild

By any measure, March was a watershed month for the truth about peak oil. Estimates on the timing of the peak have narrowed dramatically, and now center on the 2012-2015 time frame. The range of estimates on the peak rate of production remain a bit broader and shrouded in caveats, but they are rapidly drawing closer to 90 mbpd. And the globally averaged, post-peak annual decline rates are settling in around 2%

19 April, 2010

Pentagon Alert From ... 2008:
"Towards A "Severe Energy Crisis"
By Matthieu Auzanneau

The report of the United States Joint Forces Command, the Joint Operating Environment for 2008 already offered the same diagnosis, word for word (p. 17): By 2012, surplus oil production capacity could entirely disappear, and as early as 2015, the shortfall in output could reach nearly 10 MBD

WhenThe U.S. Energy Secretary Spoke Of
"Peak Oil" ...
By Matthieu Auzanneau

The U.S. Secretary of Energy, Steven Chu, knows and understands the issues of global peak oil production. During a talk he gave in March 2005 as director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, a U.S. Department of Energy National Laboratory, a U.S. Department of Energy National Laboratory, Steven Chu advanced the hypothesis of an imminent decline in world production of liquid fuels

Peak Ego And The Ego Descent Plan
By Bob Banner

For me it appears to be a logical result to speak of peak ego, especially since cheap oil gave rise to affluence which in turn gave rise to more separation, separation in the meaning that affluence has offered us NOT to need each other the way tribal communities in the past did but a lifestyle that separates us from the inherent wisdom of interdependence. When we have reached the ultimate separation perhaps we have reached peak ego. How more separate can one become? How much more ego can we have before the level of “happiness” runs out?

Forever And A Day
By Kurt Cobb

Talk with many green technology advocates and you might get the impression that we have forever and a day to make the transition from an unsustainable society to a sustainable one. But the most critical question is how much time we have to make the transition. A fully equipped hospital with on-duty surgeons and staff may be the ideal technology for a critically injured patient. But they mean little to such a patient if we are in the position of having to build the hospital and train the surgeons and staff before administering treatment

16 April, 2010

Peak Oil: Surveying The Field And Charting A Course
By Guy R. McPherson

It’s all the rage to talk about a double-dip in the industrial economy. That would be an economic trend in the shape of a W. I think an M is far more likely. The assumption of never-ending growth underlies all neoclassical economic assessments, but I think that assumption is about to break up on the shore of resource limitations

12 April, 2010

US Military Warns Oil Output May Dip
Causing Massive Shortages By 2015
By Terry Macalister

Surplus oil production capacity could disappear by 2012, says a report from US Joint Forces Command. Shortfall could reach 10m barrels a day. Cost of crude oil is predicted to top $100 a barrel

How Much Oil Is Left
By Lars Schall

Interview with Richard Heinberg

10 April, 2010

Peak Oil: Are We Heading Towards Social Collapse?
By Emily Spence

We collectively have to stop our delusions about perpetual economic growth and find another way to live from this point forward. We need to stop pretending that all is well because our myopic view of life shows no oil or other major shortfalls in the very near future. If we do not face up to the truth, the repercussions are clear

The Peak Oil Crisis: Countdown At The Guri
By Tom Whipple

Water flow to Venezuela's great Guri dam this past summer has been dismal. Any fall in electricity generation from this dam can have devastating consequences for America's petroleum import from Venezuela

03 April, 2010

Post-Peak Oil Reality Trumps Right Wing Trend
By Jan Lundberg

As we cannot control collapse that must stem largely from the loss of cheap, abundant energy -- a process already begun -- it is time to put our "political" energy into building local economies and forming our family-neighborhood tribes for the tough future and eventual sustainable culture ahead. This will help prepare everyone for the post-peak oil dissolution of the U.S. as we know it -- no matter who next holds the White House or is kissing the ass of today's Wall Street elite

30 March, 2010

Washington Considers A Decline Of
World Oil Production As Of 2011
By Matthieu Auzanneau

The U.S. Department of Energy admits that “a chance exists that we may experience a decline” of world liquid fuels production between 2011 and 2015 “if the investment is not there”, according to an exclusive interview with Glen Sweetnam, main official expert on oil market in the Obama administration

Quacks Like A Duck
By Richard Heinberg

What doe Glen Sweetnam actually admits? "We don't believe that world oil production will soon reach a maximum and begin to decline (the "peak oil theory"); instead, we believe that world oil production will reach a maximum, stay there for a few years, and then decline. That decline could commence as soon as next year."

25 March, 2010

Government ‘Peak Oil Summit’ Starts The Process Of Government Acknowledging Peak Oil?
By Rob Hopkins

On Monday Peter Lipman and I represented Transition Network at an event which could potentially be the day people look back to as the day when UK government finally starting to ‘get’ peak oil. Fascinating and frustrating in equal measure, the event, “Policy Response to potential future oil supply constraints”, was billed as “a half-day workshop hosted by the Energy Institute in partnership with the Department of Energy and Climate Change

The Peak Oil Crisis: A Breakthrough?
By Tom Whipple

It came as a surprise that last weekend Britain's Energy Minister summoned a meeting of business leaders to discuss the government's response to a decline in global oil production should it actually be imminent

20 March, 2010

It's Time To Deal With Peak Oil
By Richard Heinberg

What should we do about Peak Oil? Start with what the U.K. Industry Task Force on Peak Oil (which included Sir Richard Branson of Virgin Airlines) has done: Acknowledge the reality of supply limits. Then study the vulnerabilities of transport and food systems to high and volatile oil prices, and start making those systems more resilient and less oil-dependent. But do it fast. Adaptation will take decades, and we are starting very late

18 March, 2010

Peak Oil In Four Years?
Mobility And Economic Vulnerabilities
By Warren Karlenzig

Last week, a report was put out by a Kuwaiti research institution forecasting global peak oil production by 2014. This follows a report last month by a broad-based British industry group that also predicted a global "oil crunch," or shortage of supply, by the same period

04 March, 2010

Life After Growth
By Richard Heinberg

We are in for some very hard times. The transitional period on our way toward a post-growth, equilibrium economy will prove to be the most challenging time any of us has ever lived through. Nevertheless, I am convinced that we can survive this collective journey, and that if we make sound choices as families and communities, life can actually be better for us in the decades ahead than it was during the heady days of seemingly endless economic expansion

23 February, 2010

Saudi Arabia Preparing For Oil Demand To Peak
By Tarek El Tablawy

A top Saudi energy official expressed serious concern Monday that world oil demand could peak in the next decade and said his country was preparing for that eventuality by diversifying its economic base

22 February, 2010

The Peak Oil Crisis: The Crunch
By Tom Whipple

An interesting sidelight to the new report's official launch was that Chris Barton, the government official responsible for Britain's energy security, showed up and answered questions about the government's position. In what can be best characterized as backing down the flag pole, Barton acknowledged that the government really does not know when peak oil will occur but acknowledged the risks could be serious. For a government that until recently had been in complete denial that is more evidence that the message and dangers of peak oil are sinking in

21 February, 2010

Bank Of America And Barclays
See Looming Oil Crunch
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

Bank of America and Barclays Capital, two leading oil traders, have told clients to brace for crude above $100 a barrel by next year, before it pushes relentlessly higher over the decade. "Oil has the potential to flirt with $100 this year. We forecast an average price of $137 by 2015," said Amrita Sen, an oil expert at BarCap

Joe Stack And Likely Coming Attractions
By Carolyn Baker

Most of us have heard it by now-software engineer torches his own house then crashes his private plane into an IRS office in Austin, Texas on February 18, 2010. In the same week as Stack's rampage, an Ohio man so enraged about his home being foreclosed upon, bulldozed the house so that the bank would not be able to repossess it. It doesn't take rocket science to grasp that these eruptions of vitriolic rage are most likely, previews of massive civil unrest worldwide, as individuals and families awaken to the current ghastly global transfer of wealth

15 February, 2010

Viral Collapse
By Guy R. McPherson

Even as the greatest economic implosion in world history accelerates, the underlying cause — peak oil — remains chronically under-reported. Nonetheless, Sir Richard Branson finally is warning that the peak-oil crunch will be worse than the credit crunch (thereby failing to recognize the importance of the former in creating the latter), the Wall Street Journal is warning us to prepare for peak oil, and British oil companies and CEOs are sounding the alarm

11 February, 2010

The Coming Oil Crunch
By Jeremy Leggett

Warnings of a crash in oil production are no longer limited to a prescient few individuals - major British companies and oil CEOs are now sounding the alert

23 January, 2010

Dealing With Peak Oil
By Salvatore Cardoni & Dr. Brian Schwartz

Peak oil is going to fundamentally change the way we live. We will be dragged there kicking, screaming, and resisting, but we will get there nonetheless. We will live in different communities, in different houses, eat differently, get around differently, and get our energy from much different sources. I think much of what is coming will provide us with benefits – better diets, better health, stronger communities--so I am not a pessimist about this issue

09 January, 2010

Is The World's Oil Running Out Fast?
By Adam Porter

BBC report from the Peak Oil conference in Berlin

27 December, 2009

Oil And Environment: A Contradiction
By Peter Goodchild

The issue of peak oil and that of the environment are mutually exclusive problems. As oil and other fossil fuels disappear, the environmental problems will also go away, even if very slowly. By trying to raise the alarm about both issues at once, we are placing ourselves in a self-contradictory position, and our credibility is rapidly undermined

Where To Live In Tough Times
By Peter Goodchild

As various chunks of the planet collapse, one big question is, “Should I start packing my bags?” There is probably no perfectly rational way for choosing a place to live, and we may well end up choosing the same country in which we have spent the most years.Nevertheless, if we are brave enough, or if we have already done some traveling, the factors listed below may be those we want to consider

20 December, 2009

Crime In The Post Peak World
By Peter Goodchild

As humanity plunges ever more deeply into the age of declining resources, what will be the future of law and order? The particular problem of which I am thinking might be called, more specifically, "future violence," since other acts that are now deemed criminal may seem trivial in later days. Unfortunately all discussion of violence becomes an emotional issue, and a rational answer may be elusive

16 December, 2009

Peak Oil, Peak Food
By Aetius Romulous

The single greatest challenge facing our modern economic food chain is the insanely unnatural low cost of food to the consumer, making the simple and necessary act of eating dependent on food that is almost free. The global edifice of cheap food rests on the volatility of a single input; the exponentially depleting supply of easy, cheap oil. We are gorging ourselves at the $1.99 all-you-can-eat oil buffet. Food is too cheap, a "correction" is coming, and there is not a damn thing anybody can do about it

08 December, 2009

IEA Forecasts Stir Debate
By Saadallah Al Fathi

The most important question regarding the oil forecast is the alarming view of the IEA that the majority of oil production in 2030 will be coming from "fields yet to be developed or found".The IEA goes on to say "sustained investment is needed mainly to combat the decline in output at existing fields, which will drop by almost two-thirds by 2030"

22 November, 2009

Historic Peak Oil Motion Defeated
In Australian Senate
By Dr Gideon Polya

The Australian Greens recently attempted to introduce what, to the best of my knowledge may be the first ever Peak Oil motion introduced into a national assembly. Unfortunately the motion was defeated 31 to 6

20 November, 2009

World Energy And Population: Trends To 2100
By Paul Chefurka

All the research I have done for this paper has convinced me that the human race is now out of time. We are staring at hard limits on our activities and numbers, imposed by energy constraints and ecological damage. There is no time left to mitigate the situation, and no way to bargain or engineer our way out of it. It is what it is, and neither Mother Nature nor the Laws of Physics are open to negotiation

America's Pending Collapse
By Timothy V. Gatto

I’m really not an alarmist, but I see the merit of what so many scientists are predicting. Not only will Peak Oil stop economic growth, but climate change according to a UN report will bring desertification to 70% of the planet by 2025. Maybe petroleum peaking out is in reality what may save our planet. Maybe a return to simpler ways to live and work will stop the CO2 emissions, but I don’t think so

19 November, 2009

Should We Prop Up A Dying Economy?
By Richard Heinberg

Rather than attempting to prop up banks and insurance companies with trillions in bailouts, it would probably be better simply to let them fail, however nasty the short-term consequences, since they will fail anyway sooner or later. The sooner they are replaced with institutions that serve essential functions within a contracting economy, the better off we will all be

17 November, 2009

Too Late To Prepare For Peak Oil?
By George Monbiot

It’s probably too late to prepare for peak oil, but we can at least try to salvage food production

Peak Oil: IEA Knew It Long Ago
By Colin Campbell

Colin Campbell's Response To The Guardian IEA Reporting

Searching For A Miracle: 'Net Energy’ Limits
And The Fate Of Industrial Society
By Post Carbon Institute &
International Forum on Globalization

The fundamental disturbing conclusion of the report is that there is little likelihood that either conventional fossil fuels or alternative energy sources can reliably be counted on to provide the amount and quality of energy that will be needed to sustain economic growth—or even current levels of economic activity—during the remainder of the current century

16 November, 2009

Too Fearful To Publicise Peak Oil Reality
By Madeleine Bunting

What the 2008 edition of World Energy Outlook report made blindingly clear was that peak oil was somewhere in 2008/9 and that production from currently producing fields was about to drop off a cliff. Fields yet to be developed and yet to be found enabled a plateau of production and it was only "non-conventional oil" which enabled a small rise. Think tar sands of Canada, think some of the most climate polluting oil extraction methods available. Think catastrophe

14 November, 2009

The Fallacy Of Alternative Energy
By Peter Goodchild

To say that the coming centuries will be a challenge would be an enormous understatement. Perhaps in a future scriptorium, when the facts and legends about the present era are being scratched onto parchment, there will be a chance to reflect on the foolishness of spending time on electric toys and magic tricks, when so much of more practical value could have been done to mitigate the ravages of famine, plague, and war

11 November, 2009

Can We Handle The Truth?
By Guy R McPherson

The International Energy Agency (IEA) released World Energy Outlook 2009 today. Even before the sham was shipped, it was exposed as a big 'ol bucket of lies. Seems the current administration thinks Americans can't handle the truth, so we need to apply some pressure to keep the lid on the facts

10 November, 2009

Key Oil Figures Were Distorted By US Pressure,
Says Whistleblower
By Terry Macalister

The world is much closer to running out of oil than official estimates admit, according to a whistleblower at the International Energy Agency who claims it has been deliberately underplaying a looming shortage for fear of triggering panic buying

From The Wilderness To The End Of Civilization
By Carolyn Baker

Carolyn Baker reviews Mike Ruppert's peak oil movie "Collapse"

03 November, 2009

Unwinding
By Guy R McPherson

Nine more banks failed last weekend, bringing the year's total to 115. Along with the banks, one of the largest companies in the country declared bankruptcy, further evidence every large entity in the world will go down with energy availability. Small businesses are joining the fiesta, declaring bankruptcy like Zimbabweans, and the mother of all carry trades is headed for a collapse the size of hell and half of Montana

30 October, 2009

The Recession Is Dead ... Long Live The Recession!
By Guy R McPherson

The world's first peak-oil recession has come to a close, according to third-quarter numbers invented by the federal government. Apparently dumping trillions of dollars onto big banks, insurance companies, and automobile manufacturers interrupted the plummeting descent of American Empire. The stock markets skyrocketed expectedly. Predictably, so did the commodities markets

26 October, 2009

The End Of Electricity
By Peter Goodchild

There seems to be a consensus that the depletion of fossil fuels will follow a fairly impressive slope. What may need to be looked at more closely, however, is not the "when" but the "what." Looking at the temporary shortages of the 1970s may give us the impression that the most serious consequence will be lineups at the pump. Fossil-fuel decline, however, will also mean the end of electricity, a far more serious matter

09 October, 2009

Era of Cheap, Easy Oil is Over
By Louise Gray

The world could start to run out of oil in the next ten years, sparking soaring energy prices and a rush for even more polluting fossil fuels, an influential new study by the UK Energy Research Council has warned

29 September, 2009

Systemic Collapse: The Basics
By Peter Goodchild

Systemic collapse has one overwhelming cause: world overpopulation. All of the flash-in-the-pan ideas that are presented as solutions to the modern dilemma — solar power, ethanol, hybrid cars, desalination, permaculture — have value only as desperate attempts to solve an underlying problem that has never been addressed in a more direct manner

Balance Is For Buddhists
By Guy R McPherson

Instead of extracting an easy life from fossil fuels and human slaves, while taking our life-support system down into the bowels of hell with us, let's try living as our predecessors did on this land. Never mind abandoning our beloved cars: In North and South America, we'll need to give up the wheel

23 September, 2009

The Era Of Xtreme Energy
By Michael T. Klare

We are going to enter an age of Xtreme energy and the last-ditch efforts to keep our world on its normal course are likely to devastate the environment, accelerate climate change, inflict widespread pain, and create global conflict. It's not a pretty picture

23 August, 2009

Peak Oil And The Generation Gap
By Peter Goodchild

The more we look at the fragility of money, then, it seems that the young survivalist with his army-manual reprints may not be living in a world so different from that of the wealthy pensioner who looks at oil depletion as a question of how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. Those who put their faith in the money economy were lucky enough to start saving cash in easier times. For young people today, however, working at a job that provides any savings can be a grim struggle. The two generations need to have more sympathy for each other. We are all heading into the same wilderness

05 August, 2009

Oil Supplies Are Running Out Fast
By Steve Connor

The first detailed assessment of more than 800 oil fields in the world, covering three quarters of global reserves, has found that most of the biggest fields have already peaked and that the rate of decline in oil production is now running at nearly twice the pace as calculated just two years ago. On top of this, there is a problem of chronic under-investment by oil-producing countries, a feature that is set to result in an "oil crunch" within the next five years which will jeopardise any hope of a recovery from the present global economic recession

19 July, 2009

Investigate Peak Oil Urgently
By Phyllis Sladek

An online petition calling on national academy of sciences to study peak oil urgently

15 July, 2009

Peak Oil And The Remaking Of Iraq
By Michael T. Klare

Has it all come to this? The wars and invasions, the death and destruction, the exile and torture, the resistance and collapse? In a world of shrinking energy reserves, is Iraq finally fated to become what it was going to be anyway, even before the chaos and catastrophe set in: a giant gas pump for an energy-starved planet? Will it all end not with a bang, but with a gusher? The latest oil news out of that country offers at least a hint of Iraq's fate

30 June, 2009

Investing In Durability
By Guy R. McPherson

At this point, there is no stopping the arc of history or the icons of industry. We're all hanging onto the roller-coaster ride of economic collapse, which is fueled by the flawed notion of never-ending economic growth. Unless you're planning to withdraw to an anarcho-primitivist society beyond the reach of the industrial world, there's little you can do, as an individual, to mitigate the damage to Earth or your wallet

29 June, 2009

Peak Oil And World Food Supplies
By Peter Goodchild

Only about 10 percent of the world’s land surface is arable, whereas the other 90 percent is just rock, sand, or swamp, which can never be made to produce crops, whether we use “high” or “low” technology or something in the middle. In an age with diminishing supplies of oil and other fossil fuels, this 10:90 ratio may be creating two gigantic problems that have been largely ignored

12 June, 2009

It's Official: The Era Of Cheap Oil Is Over
By Michael T. Klare

The recent release of the 2009 IEO has provided energy watchers with a feast of significant revelations. By far the most significant disclosure: the IEO predicts a sharp drop in projected future world oil output (compared to previous expectations) and a corresponding increase in reliance on what are called "unconventional fuels" -- oil sands, ultra-deep oil, shale oil, and biofuels

23 April, 2009

Economics And Education
By Peter Goodchild

Education for the real world begins with the principle that every teenager, at least in rural areas (where any sensible person would be living) should know how to use a rifle and an ax, since the first might provide food and the second might provide a home. A university degree that leaves its owner many thousands of dollars in debt, on the other hand, is not providing a foundation for survival in the Age of Entropy. The corollary is that education in such real-world skills will not be acquired by sitting at a desk

05 April, 2009

Irondale: An Experiment In Post-Oil Survival
By Peter Goodchild

As long as there is chaos, there is hope. When industrial society has collapsed, there will be a chance for something better. One day, for some people, the enigmatic quest for a return to Nature will be fulfilled

19 March, 2009

FUTURE SCENARIOS, By David Holmgren
A Review By Carolyn Baker

Future Scenarios offers fascinating and fertile challenges for engaging Peak Oil and climate change and confronts us with the question that will not die: Will our journey to a post-petroleum world be a transition or a trauma? The longer we wait to make the profoundly radical choices necessary at this juncture of history, the greater the certainty that choices we would not prefer will be made for us

25 February, 2009

Aspects Of The Post-Oil Community
By Peter Goodchild

I have great hopes for the future, when the hard times are over. By the end of the present century, the human population will be much smaller than it now is. The 200-odd nations of the present day will be only a dim memory, and the major languages will have broken up into local dialects, to such an extent that a linguistic outsider will be one who lives only over the next hill. Grass will be growing everywhere, and the long miles of cracked highways will be merely a curiosity. Yet those days will not be the Dark Ages: on the contrary, starlight will once again appear over the cities at night

18 February, 2009

Peak Oil: Facts At Your Fingertips
By Peter Goodchild

The following may indicate some of the more important “names and numbers” in the complex issue of peak oil and its consequences. Besides that of oil production itself, one curve for which the numbers are significant is that of human population, since the interaction of those two curves will be momentous. Other vital sets of figures are those in the quest for alternative energy and those for post-oil survival

05 January, 2009

Peak Oil And The Century Of Famine
By Peter Goodchild

Around the beginning of the twenty-first century, there began a clash of two gigantic forces: overpopulation and oil depletion. The event went unnoticed by all but a few people, but it was quite real. As a result of that clash, the number of human beings on Earth must one day decline in order to match the decline in oil production

www.countercurrents.org