Peak Oil
Bristol is the first city in England to have commissioned a thorough look at how Bristol can thrive after Peak Oil. This Peak Oil Report published in October 2009 is a ‘must read’ document, and the facts that it contains need to underpin all planning and decision making from now on.
Oil scientist M King Hubbert coined the term peak oil fifty years ago. It means the point when extraction reaches its peak and starts to decline. It doesn’t mean that oil is suddenly ‘running out’, it means that half is used up.
This is important because the global growth economy is founded on growth in production of cheap oil year on year. Rob Hopkins’ Transition Handbook gives a very readable account. If you want a deeper insight into how the economic and money collapse fits with it all then look at the Crash Course. Some environmental campaigners have viewed peak oil as an unhelpful distraction that could lull people into thinking that carbon emissions don’t matter. They do matter because even with peak oil there’s enough oil and coal to drive atmospheric CO2 levels to dangerous levels.
What we can’t ignore is that scarcity of oil and gas in relation to demand – which will happen now because global production is plateauing now, will undermine the whole way our market systems operate. This could;
- cripple food supply chains, transport systems, the global economy and any plans for humankind to live in a way that doesn’t trash the future
- trigger a dash to coal and destroy any chance of reducing CO2 levels in the atmosphere – see our news post of July 13
Richard Heinberg’s books, either The Party’s Over or Power Down tell you more. If you like technical information then look at The Oil Drum: Europe. James Hansen Director of NASA’s Institute for Space Studies, has put all the facts into a detailed letter to our Prime Minister, but there is no sign yet of any new thinking. All the talk of ‘clean coal’ seems to be window dressing, with the Government fully aware that Kingsnorth’s planned new coal-fired power station will not be able to capture and store its CO2 emissions.
The take-home message is that the future of human civilisation depends on us getting off fossil fuel sooner rather than later. This will only happen if individuals (yes thats you and me), families, and local communities all start working towards this now. Yet despite all this some people still insist that peak oil is ‘just a theory’..hmm