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“Peak oil” is a term that has hardly reached into the mainstream media. Yet, a new leaked report by a German military think tank says world-changing peak oil may be this year.
To start off, for those of you unfamiliar with the term, here is a concise explanation of peak oil from Investopedia:
Because oil is a non-replenishing resource, there is a limit to how much the world can extract and refine. Peak oil is the day that oil production reaches a maximum and will subsequently begin to decline until full depletion is ultimately reached.
The reason peak oil is such a big deal, of course, is that society as it is built today relies on oil for many of its basic needs, as well as a great number of its non-essentials. Even though 71% of oil use is for transportation in the US, oil is also used in the production of fertilizers, shoes, some medicines, carpets and rugs, paint, detergent, canned food, makeup, nail polish, candles, lipstick, plastic, and more.
Oil is actually used, either directly or indirectly, in 95% of our industrial goods.
Governments generally avoid bringing this term up, probably because of the great threats we face from peak oil and the potential public backlash to curtailing our use of oil. This makes the simple existence of this German military think tank’s new report a bit shocking, even before you read the dramatic potential future the report paints.
The think tank that conducted the report is the Future Analysis department of the Bundeswehr Transformation Center, “a think tank tasked with fixing a direction for the German military,” according to SPIEGEL ONLINE.
The military report doesn’t try to sugar-coat the scale of the issues, and is actually quite dramatic in discussing them. As Stefan Schultz of SPIEGEL ONLINE writes:
The team of authors, led by Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Will, uses sometimes-dramatic language to depict the consequences of an irreversible depletion of raw materials. It warns of shifts in the global balance of power, of the formation of new relationships based on interdependency, of a decline in importance of the western industrial nations, of the “total collapse of the markets” and of serious political and economic crises.
The report has been confirmed as authentic, but, apparently, it isn’t finished or approved for public sharing yet, and it is doubtful that the German military or German government will release it without cutting and editing some of the dramatic statements and predictions.
The study, whose authenticity was confirmed to SPIEGEL ONLINE by sources in government circles, was not meant for publication. The document is said to be in draft stage and to consist solely of scientific opinion, which has not yet been edited by the Defense Ministry and other government bodies.
The lead author, Will, has declined to comment on the study. It remains doubtful that either the Bundeswehr or the German government would have consented to publish the document in its current form. But the study does show how intensively the German government has engaged with the question of peak oil.
Peak oil concern is sneaking out of the back rooms of other world-leading governments as well. The UK Energy Minister held a “Peak Oil Summit” earlier this year, for example. But this report may contain the most forthcoming statements of any major government on the topic and risks of peak oil.
The report concluded that there is “some probability that peak oil will occur around the year 2010 and that the impact on security is expected to be felt 15 to 30 years later.” This fits the predictions of other scientists’ studying peak oil, many of whom say that peak oil has already passed or will do so within year.
Some of the problems expected to result from peak oil include:
With “Peak Coal” also perhaps happening as early as 2025, these concerns only get amplified if we don’t make a quick transformation to a clean energy economy.
For more information from the report and further discussion on this topic, check out SPIEGEL ONLINE story, “‘Peak Oil’ and the German Government: Military Study Warns of a Potentially Drastic Oil Crisis.”
Photo Credits: JFabra via flickr; Tennessee Journalist via flickr