DrumBeat: March 23, 2008
Posted by threadbot on March 23, 2008 - 8:56am
Now for some wise words from the readers of The Oil Drum...
“Government is too big and too important to be left to the politicians.”
—Claire Huchet Bishop
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All of the discussions of how to control global warming have centered on demand side solutions. Various governments pledge to reduce emissions by some percentage at some future date. Treaties are negotiated requiring reductions in emissions by those nations willing to ratify the treaty.
A major difficulty in achieving these agreements is they are perceived as requiring a sacrifice by those whose consent must be attained.
Why would elected leaders agree to emissions cuts if they could result lower incomes and fewer jobs? Why ratify treaties with the potential to limit growth when other nations are continue to expand their economies and there emissions at a rapid pace? Why agree to reduce emissions when the likely net result will be the export of emissions and the associated jobs overseas?
Even in Europe, which has taken the lead in ratifying treaties limiting emissions, there has been discussion of exempting some heavy industries from the emissions cuts to preserve competitiveness.
I’d like to propose an alternative method of controlling greenhouse gas emissions: a supply side solution.
Instead of pushing nations to agree to reduce the use of fossil fuels target the producers.
Persuade the producers to limit the production of oil, natural gas, and coal.
Some advantages of a supply side solution to global warming:
1) Little or no sacrifice is required of those who must take action. If enough agree and production increases are slowed or eliminated profits will expand as demand growth continues.
2) The agreement of fewer nations is required. The reserves of the various fossil fuels are concentrated in a limited number of nations.
3) Agreement of a nation to limit its production is unlikely to result in only the shift of jobs and emissions overseas.
The easiest place to begin is with oil. An organization controlling the production of oil already exists: OPEC. For several years around the turn of the century OPEC maintained relatively fixed production. During the last few years OPEC has constrained production enough to stop the increase in world oil production.
All that would be necessary would be for some of the prominent leaders in the fight against climate change to persuade the rulers of the OPEC nations to hold a press conference announcing that in the interest of limiting climate change OPEC will cap production at current levels. Furthermore, in a few years OPEC will reduce production as necessary to stop the growth of world oil production and eventually make the cuts necessary to reduce world oil production.
Achieving the same for coal production will be more difficult as a substantial share, ~40%, of world production is in China which would be unlikely to agree to production limits. In this case again targeting the exporters may be an easier option. As with oil coal exports are concentrated in a small number of nations.
A cap on coal production in exporting nations while only having a limited impact on the growth of coal production will have a significant impact on price. Higher coal prices would make alternative energy sources more competitive and will discourage the continued building of coal power plants which has recently been accelerating in developing nations.
Brilliant! I'm serious.
The United States has lots of coal which is even exported to Europe among others. The only problem I can see is it would put a cog in the wheel of globalization and probably bring on a world wide depression if effective. It might be so effective that pressures would be brought to bear to reverse it as unemployment increased in Europe.
I disagree on the effect on price. The price of coal would fall since there would be a surplus in the United States for example as coal piled up because of no export market. This has happened before with grain embargoes put on by the Nixon administration, if I remember correctly. The price of grain fell and never really recovered. Huge subsidies were the only way to keep farmers afloat and until recently have been the rule. Expect the government to have to support the coal industry with subsidies because it would be they who destroyed the market. The effect would be to slow down or stop alternative energy developement as there would be little need with such low coal prices.
Yeah, a brilliant approach that would have as it's only drawback 'a world wide depression.'
Just what markets need...more government intervention...which leads to?...more government intervention. Slippery slope, that one.
Well, that's certainly a possibility. But, just how would you go about reducing CO2 emissions, which might mean that the world's economies must go toward zero emissions in a short time period? Wouldn't any effort to do that require some sort of government intervention?
E. Swanson
It seems strange to worry about global warming when in England we are having a white Easter. Not normal here.
This is the earliest Easter since 1818. Easter can fall between March 22nd and April 25th.
And I'll bet the final March average temperature across the UK will be above average (as were November, December, January and February).
It's not 'Global Warming', it's Climate Change.
While the overall trend is towards warming, the great deal of disruption and dislocation with come from the fibrillation and arrhythmia of 'Normal' weather patterns.
Extreme fluctuations of temperature and rain fall can average out to Normal.
However, it's alot different experience to have 2 weeks of 100 degree(F) heat wave followed by 2 weeks of zero degree(F) freezing. The Average is 50 degrees(F)
It will feel alot different than 4 weeks of 50 degree (F) weather.
This is what is coming. The heat part will be the least of our problems.
How about 2 years of no rain at all followed by 2 years of torrential flooding.
The 'Average' over 4 years is 'Normal' rainfall, Not.
If climate change deniers (mostly rightwingnutters) what to see an example of real world conservative business models response to the weather fluctuations coming our way, just give a good gander to the insurance industry. They are bleeding from weather pattern losses that were based on old outdated actuarial tables that had 100 year storms only happening every 100 years. Those same storms are happening once a decade.
Does this make those same storms 10 year storms now?
Inflation in weather patterns?
Reminds me of the bumper sticker I just saw:
The Quarter is the new Nickel
Seems that we have reached a point where government intervention is the worst possible solution.... except for all the rest.
Maybe I was clear, I am advocating the production, not exports, be capped. what I'm advocating is in essence a coal producers cartel. If demand continues to grow at the current rate while the production growth is constrained the price should climb.
The companies producing coal would have increasing profits with no additional effort needed. Thats one of the advantages of this plan: the parties that be required to act will not resist taking action because they are likely to benefit from the plan.
Modeling work with the Millennium Institute's T21-USA model ## shows that
The Best Economic Policy is the Best Energy Policy and the Best Environmental Policy (and also the Best National Defense (if not offense) Policy)
The same policy resulted in the highest GDP, greatest reduction in CO2 and greatest reduction in oil use (for the USA) of all policies modeled. It also provided a place for some oil based transportation to go to when oil shocks are modeled.
The policy ?
A maximum push for renewable energy coupled with a maximum push for building a Non-Oil Transportation system# in parallel to the existing Oil Based Transportation system.
# Non-Oil Transportation was defined as electrified and expanded existing freight rail system, massive build out of Urban Rail, more bicycling and Transit Orientated Development (walkable neighborhoods).
The interaction between renewable & Non-Oil policies appears to be multiplicative and not merely additive.
We suspect that a massive push for conservation would improve these already excellent results. One restraint is just how much investment the USA would be willing to make, we cannot "crash everything".
I recently returned from 2.5 weeks in DC working on a peer reviewed paper on this (on my nickel).
Best Hopes for pro bono publico efforts,
Alan
## ASPO-USA sponsored the T21-USA model which has EROEI and other energy and environmental add-ons to standard econometric models (CBO & World Bank caliber).
Thanks once again to Alan Drake (Big Easy) for expressing what I was having trouble doing.
I think that "Alan" (Initial poster in thread) was accurate about describing the problem of promoting something that is lobbying for a 'negative', which is a hard concept to grasp as an Action Item or as a Business proposition. I think that, as with 'Giving up something', like Coffee or Cigarettes, it can be more helpful to focus on the positive of the replacement, not the 'desired absence' of the current problem (CO2).. Alan Drake's examples of Electric Rail and Renewables are both (IMO) Great Positives that can create jobs, quality infrastructure and economic liveliness without having to be focused on the 'Negative Space', as artists call it.
Not that 'Negative' or 'Less' is bad or undesired, but instead of describing it as 'What I'm NOT producing.' (CO2, or whatever).. to redescribe it as what you ARE, what you ARE DOING, what you ARE PRODUCING.
I would like to discover more language for how this applies to individual lifestyles and behaviors, too, so that selling these concepts can focus on the Water in the Rapids, not the Rocks..
You are HEATING your own house with the sun..
You are SAVING money(and energy dependence) and you are 'TONING UP yourself' by leaving lights off, consolidating refrigerators/washloads/commutes.. ie trimming the fat, being sharp and conscious about how you live.
It's funny, as soon as I said that last sentence, ... and actually struggled to get the words out.. it reminded me of one of the 'latent elements' of the 'American Way' being implicitly synonymous with 'continual material gratification' and not only refusing to compromise on such, but in fact that compromise, and with it, self-restraint is ultimately A)Synonymous with failure, giving in, being a loser.. B)That it's TOO HARD.. I CAN'T do that.. and C)ultimately dangerous. "It will hurt the Economy", "It will compromise our security!" It was basically a reminder that a lot of this comes down to Addict Behavior, and needs to be addressed with that in mind. It makes the fear of "Less" make a lot of sense, of course. Even though we seem to celebrate the idea of self-control, self-discipline.. these are the traits that addiction destroys. The language I said I was seeking is common enough, but it's funny how the brain jumps away from using them when considering speaking them to such an addicted audience, as it will be laughed out of the room, even if it's the right word.
Hey Americans, SAVE MONEY. Actually SAVE some of your income as your first action on payday. THEN figure out how much COFFEE and ICE CREAM and CABLE CHANNELS you can afford.
And Naturally.. well ARTIFICIALLY, really, we are being encouraged to OBEY OUR THIRST everywhere we look. It's not that it's JUST the Advertisers' fault, but I don't give them a pass on this either, by any means.
"Can't Live Without Chocolate? Well now you don't Have To!!" Because the whole carnival ("Meat Market"..almost mistranslated) has been conditioned with the unapologetic goal of convincing you that you need their product.. and the more addictive that product is, the more it's sales will pay for psychologists, salespeople and artists to work their damnedest to keep convincing you that 'It's okay.. you deserve a break today.' "Don't just sit there. Well, OK just sit there ABC."
Alright.. so just as a conscious, well-informed and activated public would threaten a number of our most lucrative industries, it would also radically transform the major political parties. Piece of Cake!
I did it, though. I threw out the girl-scout cookies.. after eating a 'few'. They are really crap. Well intentioned, but crap. Next year, I'll just give them the $14 and toss in a couple Apples.
Bob
What about Nega-Watts?
Those are the watts one doensn’t use, so they are ‘sold’ back to the community in the sense that they are never produced, not called for, and thus spare the environment, nature, reserves, etc.
It is largely the 'Negawatts' idea that I was (initially) thinking of here. I strayed off about 90 degrees from the original thought with the Addictions/Adverts ideas..
Running Rapids on my stream of consciousness, I guess. I'm a little delirious with some sudden stomach thing today, so I've been a little more 'impressionistic' than usual.
I am just trying to point out that it can be counterintuitive to write about 'what isn't'.. People describe themselves, sometimes, by starting out with what they are NOT, and while the process of elimination can work, it is a roundabout way to get there. It feels like the energy equivalent to "Picture in your mind anything BUT a blue elephant.."
Anyway, I'm not going to do much better than this today.
Happy Birthday, TOD, Happy Easter All (My Agnosto-antagonist brother is serving up a Rabbit to the rest of the family tonight, blessings of the Great Pumpkin be upon him!) Time to pray to the porcelain!
Bob
One that we would like to model, but do not have the resources to model, yet.
A good conservation tool.
Alan
I fancy maximum push for efficiency, renewable energy, nuclear energy and non fossil fuel transportation. This must to a very large degree be made on an as free markets as possible to catch the economical solutions and not the politically correct or popular solutions since it would be a disaster if too much resources are wasted. Every region and business sector must make an effort based on its current strenghts.
The Millennium Institute is quite willing to develop a T21-Sweden or T21-Nordic. Not that expensive and one can try out different policies.
Humans have difficulty considering the interactions of more than 4 or 5 variables at once (politicians usually consider only one or two variables), and the computer can vastly increase that #.
Try out various policies and look for "unintended consequences" and which policies work better. Good data for projections is needed.
One can download a simplified T21-USA or T21-NA at
http://www.millenniuminstitute.net/
BTW, Some of the MI staff have Nordic links, Andrea is getting his PhD in Bergen and his girlfriend is working on that Danish renewable island south of Copenhagen, and MI is negotiating to move to Riga.
Best Hopes for Rigorous Policy Analysis,
Alan
Basing political decisions on rigorous policy analysis do to me seem a little far fetched from the political day to day world but it is an intresting ideal.
I am happy that statistical and scientific arguments carry a fair ammount of weight both in the Swedish parliament and to the general population. If an institution, organization or knowledged individual do a realy good analysis it can be heard thru the buzz and PR people. Appealing both to feelings and science often wins debates over people who look good and only appeal to feelings.
How much people listen to scientifically based argumentation varies greatly between different areas of politics and it varies over time. My conclusion is that it often is very bad if decisionmaking separates from reality and drifts up in the clouds to deliver ideology or religion.
My aim was to produce one result: reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
How nations adapt to the reduced availability will determine the impacts on society. I like your plan and if it is put into wide practice society would benefit.
Unfortunately without a limit on the production of fossil fuels I they will most likely be exported and burned elsewhere. If developing nations try to follow our 20th century path the communities following your plan while receiving the benefits of your plan will still face larger problems from climate change produced by the exported emissions.
One benefit of my plan is it becomes more difficult to avoid following your plan.
.
One of the goals of the Millennium Institute is to create a T21-World to test global strategies.
Shifting carbon burning from one nation to another does little good, reducing emissions from the #1 polluter but making no change in the #2 polluter does do some good. Reducing everyone's CO2 emissions will likely be required.
The most profound insight is that doing right by the environment also results in a significantly larger GDP than BAU.
Best Hopes,
Alan
Alan...You are advocating production controls in order to slow growth. You, or someone else, can give it a fancy name, but production control is what it amounts to.
Many wars have been fought over resources. When FDR constrained resources to Japan, WW2 ensued in the Pacific...just one example.
The governments of the world would have to agree to such a scheme in order for it to be effective. The world's major manufacturing nations would have to say 'OK, we are going to limit our growth, and not go to war, because the EU, US, China, India, etc, have all agreed to do the same.' The idea might be a good one on paper but the implementation of such a plan would be frought with problems. First, it would put OPEC in the position of making allocation decisions...a political as well as practical football. What if OPEC continues down their current path of importing more industry and saying that they needed an ever larger share of the FF production? A huge black market would probably spring up, for people and governments are human and greedy. Who will over see this cut back to insure that all FF exporting countries are playing by the rules? Remember, any time governments intervene in markets, which production controls are, stresses are set up in the markets. In order for governments to go down this road they would have to admit to their citizens that 'we have agreed to constrain growth through production controls.' Do you believe that citizens of these governments would stand still while their governments agreed to and implemented these rules? Perhaps the plan would work in a tyrannical form of government but I do not see it working in a democracy. Take a close look at what economic distortions caused by government intervention is doing to Zimbabwe, for one. Before such a plan could be implemented the idea and practice of continual growth, and continual economic expansion would need to be changed to one of limited growth. Might not sound like a big deal but it is...governments that are answerable to voters, must tread very lightly when visiting such a policy shift.
If governments mandated limited production of FFs, goverment intervention would also be required in the downsteam use of the available FFs, otherwise their populations would simply say 'you started this limited production and now I can't get fuel for my small biz and I am bankrupt'. If governments did not implement distribution controls of FF resources a bidding war for remaining resources would start and the resources available would go to large businesses, and the government itself, that could bid the most. How would you local fire station get gas for their fire trucks? A bidding war already is in progress between have and have not countries and we are seeing the beginnings of bidding wars inside the 'have' countries as FFs become more constrained. So, what you are advocating is probably going to happen without government intervention...usually better in the long run.
Alan...You are advocating production controls in order to slow growth
Quite wrong. We modeled only a "positive" approach. No constraints on market reaction, nothing was prohibited.
Carbon taxes are possible source of funding, but other sources are possible.
The result from our advocated policy is about one quarter larger GDP than a BAU market based reaction to Peak Oil.
That is why it is the best economic policy !
Best Hopes for Being All Things to All People :-)
Alan (from Big Easy, you may have been addressing the other Alan)
AlanFromBigEasy...My comments were directed to alan, not you. But, thanks for responding. :)
So, peak oil is a good thing as it amounts to one element of the proposed plan? I have to admit this is my viewpoint, as market forces will correct desires for petroleum over consumption. Ditto for natural gas. While peak oil and global warming share many constraints to effective political response, the absence of an inherent market mechanism to address global warming is the key difference between these issues. Resource limitation is perhaps the only approach that will effectively address global warming, as coal is the only fossil fuel exported by the developed countries; providing them with considerable leverage. Combined with a moratorium on new coal plants without carbon capture, one can almost see the outline of the response that could limit CO2 emissions.
Most here expect peak oil to hit soon if it hasn't already. I believe its still 5-10 years out. If peak oil is about to hit the net result of my plan will only be to announce that peak oil is around the corner, although it will officially be for a reason other than geology.
At least this way everyone will know its coming and will have sometime to prepare. Better than the knowledge being confined to some fringe groups and perhaps a few leaders who are keeping it to themselves.
Nonsense! People will deny even years after peak oil. And they will deny for the very same reason you are denying right now. This reason they will say:
That is just another form of denial. You are saying in effect: "If peak oil hits, it will not be be because there is still not plenty of oil in the ground!"
Wrong! That is exactly why we are on the peak plateau right now. And it is because of geology. It is because we have run out of the very easy oil, the very large fields, and now we are scraping the bottom of the barrel, trying to cook oil out of the bitumen in oil sands and trying to find tiny pockets of oil in the very deep ocean. All the easy oil is gone and it is gone because of geology!
Ron Patterson
There is no geological reason why bitumen could not be extracted first, and light sweet crude later.
Oil with the best profit margin is extracted first: that's economics, not geology.
Bob, that is sheer nonsense. Picking the low hanging fruit first is geology. Getting what you can get easy first, because of the geology of the oil patch, is geology.
Of course economy is always present. You get the most profitable stuff first, then as the price goes up, because all the good stuff has already been picked, you go after the scrapings at the bottom of the barrel. The geological easy stuff to get at is gone, geologically gone! Now because of geology, you are milking the almost dry holes but you will be in decline anyway.
Bitumen can be extracted only at a very slow rate because of geology.
Methinks Bob, that you are more than a little confused here.
Ron Patterson
I understand what you're saying, Bob. People made the decision to take the easy stuff first, for obvious reasons. Imagine how bad the situation would be if they did start with the bitumen? We probably wouldn't peak until 2025 or 2030 in that case, but it would be a much faster production drop off since we wouldn't have those "bottom of the barrel" sources to fall back on.
All in all, it comes down to how people assess the economic viability of a given geologic situation. Oil with the best profit margin has the best profit margin because of geology. Therefore, it economics and geology, together.
Alan said: "I’d like to propose an alternative method of controlling greenhouse gas emissions: a supply side solution"
You need to read about environmental economics to understand why this has not happened. In basic terms, producers are incentivised to deplete resources at the fastest rate that demand allows, because the more they extract, the more they earn and that money can be reinvested in the activity or in the broader economy, but they can only invest when they extract. What we need is an economic system that incentivises resource efficiency. But fundamentally it is caused by a lack of feedback mechanisms. These should not be controlled by a bureacracy because the market would destroy any attempts at that and we would see a Mugabe style state. What we need are changes to the economic system to bring in feedback mechanisms to producers. Ultimately, it requires global agreements and governance because resources are controlled by global corporations, not by national governments. This is where I hope to God that global warming is a scam to bring upon new world order, because it would be a lie capable of being exposed. The reality of global warming itself is too scary to imagine.
So here it is, the grail is a a global economic system based on ethical feedback between economics and environmental limits (with safety buffers in place). In reality, we have probably crossed many thresholds and need to shut down all energy production for a few years or decades, but I can't see that happening, so are we doomed? Given that we can't converse with many nations already, Russia, Middle East, etc. how can we bring about global governance? Particularly when the corporations we seek to control payroll governments, control media and have a massive say over who gets into power. I think that governments are aware of this, and there is a real risk of massive events being engineered to fear people into accepting a global government, which would be both a tool for liberation in the right hands and total suppression in the hands of those who wish to limit the autonomy of individuals, groups and nation states.
Higher prices = economic system that incentivizes resource efficiency. If energy prices in the US were equivalent to those in Europe or Japan, for thirty years, then energy use would probably be about the same as in Europe or Japan, namely 50% lower than the present.
When things are wrong, a more efficient system makes matters worse. More efficient ways to grind up forests, fish, resources. The paradigm is wrong. Making it more efficient might delay the crash but it will also make the crash harder.
Doing the wrong thing better - sort of like the Democrat's plan for Iraq. No, if you are going the wrong way, stop and turn around before it's too late. If what you are doing makes matters worse - and our economic activities are the direct cause of the crises around us - then doing those activies more efficiently makes matters worse. Find another way.
Doing the wrong thing better, faster, harder doesn't help. It just leaves more and bigger stone heads unfinished in the quarries.
cfm in Gray, ME
Well said. The whole project is wrong and impossible. Doing it harder and "better" is not the way to go.
Econ guy said: "Higher prices = economic system that incentivizes resource efficiency"
No, higher prices equal greater incentive to produce to get money to invest in more industrial activities, or exotic investment vehicles in the unreal economy. Higher prices open up more resources that are unviable without such prices. Come on, you should know that if you post in this site. Or are you playing with me?!
The only way is to limit primary production to environmental limits, ensure a trading system that provides fair distribution of resources. Resource efficiency could be used to increase the primary production quota and be part of the distribution system. However, whilst efficiency should be encouraged everywhere, taxation of the rich countries would be required to put poorer countries on an even footing, in the interest, not of fairness, but of stability of the system, because some of the industrial processes and transport infrastructure (especially cars) in poor countries lack efficiency from a lack of investment.
Taxation may sound anti-capitalist, but, every currency has it because interest rates can never be set for the whole of an economic union. For example, North England is subsidised by London and the South East of England, because interest rates are set for the dominant London economy and are too high for the subdued economy in the north since its industry was exported to China.
So, taxation and rational redistribution is required, not as a socialist tool, but as an extention of the integration of different economies within a capitalist structure.
But the redistribution must be rational or it is peverse and the system still breaks down. How would it work? We would need a global primary production administration run by a legal framework that linked production to scientific findings in a transparent bureacracy with statutory duties and an affective enforcement regime. Miners would have to apply for licences that tied them to the agreements. This would apply to logging and bio-fuels.
This would increase inflation, so countries would need to reduce the money supply and the process would have to be gradual to avoid economic meltdown. Those with technology that reduces the impact of consumption, i.e. carbon capture, could gain credits that let them have more resources. Those that are inefficient, and rich countries would pay money into a fund for others to invest in efficiency. That way, we work within limits and economic growth is focused on sustainable efficiency and thrift and we would have a market that makes spontaneous decisions about resouce distribution, within a framework chosen by mother earth.
And I suppose you would be the Administrator of this "global primary production administration run by a legal framework that inked production to scientific findings in a transparent bureaucracy with statutory duties and an effective enforcement regime"?
It's true that higher prices incentivize more marginal resource extraction. That wouldn't necessarily be a good thing. I was thinking more along the lines of higher resource taxes, as in the case of energy in Europe. You could have resource extraction taxes ie royalties as well, and this is already common.
It seems to me that the Europeans are doing a pretty good job of it. Their governments are not so corrupt as ours. They focus on efficient transportation (trains mostly), better insulation and other such efficiency gains, high taxes to discourage use, encouraging a variety of alternative energy sources, etc. A grab bag of stuff, some of which may work well and some of which may not. An important thing, however, is that this system is scalable. In other words, to use less resources (by choice or necessity), you just "turn the knob" a bit more. Higher prices, more focus on alternatives, etc. etc. Thus, although Europeans and Japanese already use about 50% of the energy per capita in the US, I think it would be easier for them to reduce their energy use by another 50% (to 25% of present US use) than it would be for Americans to get to where Europeans and Japanese are today. They just "turn the knob" a bit more, and I think most citizens would be pretty happy with this. For people in the US, it would mean the present structure (suburbia/cars/long commutes) would become unusable, and there is no alternative system that could be expanded to handle the demand.
Europe is doing better, but that is more an accident of history. We have stronger governance than US from longer democracies so don't have situations like LA where a car company can rip up rail roads so easily. And our cities were built pre-car so are walkable and public transportable by default. But we are still one of the largest importers of rainforest products and most of our pollution has been outsourced to China. We also still screw Africa and many other places, so yes, Europe has it good locally, but this is a global issue with global soutions. Just hope that the power hungry elite do not use solutions to global issues as an excuse to crush liberty and push their toxic corporate agenda, or most of the world will end up like Iraq and Afganistan.
Europe ... than US from longer democracies
Except for Switzerland and San Marino, simply *NOT* true !
And neither is an EU member state.
Best Hopes for the Finest Work ever done (in the history of humanity) by a committee, The Constitution of the United States of America,
Alan
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/environment/i'll-be-just-fine%2c-says-planet-20080306774/
I'LL BE JUST FINE, SAYS PLANET
THE planet Earth has dismissed claims it is in danger from global warming, stressing the worst that could happen is the extinction of the human race.
'If you don't mind, I've got some orbiting to do'The Earth spoke out after a series of books, television programmes and environmental campaigns urged people to do everything in their power to 'Save the Planet'.
Earth, 4,000,000,000, said last night: "I'll be absolutely fine, seriously. I might get a bit warmer and a bit wetter, but to be honest, that actually sounds quite nice.
"Try living through an ice age. Pardon my French, but it's absolutely fucking freezing."
The planet, based 93 million miles from the Sun, said it was 'sick and tired' of being drawn into arguments about human behaviour.
"Look, I'm just a planet doing its thing, alright? If you want to live on me, that's your business, but I've got important planet stuff to do, okay?
"Try being in elliptical orbit for five minutes, or balancing your gravitational pull with a medium-sized moon. Let me assure you, it's no fucking picnic."
The planet said environmental campaigners should change their slogan from 'Save the Planet' to something more relevant such as 'Save Your Sorry Arse'.
Earth added: "Okay, so there may come a time when, for a variety of reasons, I am no longer able to support pandas, polar bears, and humans, but you know what? Life goes on.
"Who knows, I might end up being a haven for toads."
That doesn't generalize too well to other commodities.
I keep coming back to the concept of footprint and boundaries - whether bioregions or local...national political boundaries. Smith's concept of capitalism presumed that Capital could not cross state boundaries. Ultimately, we have to return to an economy largely based on a footprint bounded by the visible horizon. Nothing else is going to be sustainable - and even that isn't sufficient requirement to guarantee sustainability.
As far as US goes, how many people have to starve before we abolish corporate personhood and rights and put the economy back under citizen control? Are the citizens so mis-informed that would make no difference? Certainly the US will have to break up well before that happens.
Can communities flying under the radar take care of themselves as Jeff Vail brings up? Not if the leaders and speakers stay under the radar, because then the discussion and implmentation of what needs to be done will never happen.
cfm in Gray, ME
"abolish corporate personhood"
A critical point, far too rarely mentioned, IMHO, and along with the need to unlearn the mantra "growth is good", a key element to giving us any hope of reigning in the monster we have unleashed that Daniel Quinn (Ishmael and others) describes as the 'Secret Plan' - i.e. consume everything as fast as possible until it's all gone.
Re: abolish corporate personhood:
This is the first step towards sanity that our culture might make. We won't, because governance is in the hands of the corporations. But it needs to be done...
Or, as an alternative, simply establish liquidation (with an award of all liquidated net assets to the victims) as the standard remedy for all corporate malfeasance. That would surely get the attention of shareholders!
Move Over Hemp, Opium Poppy Will Save the World !
Free registration required
http://www.the-scientist.com/article/display/54320/
Happy Easter,
Alan
"We are Addicted to Oil." GWB
You think it's bad now..
I think some crucial info has been withheld here. One is that insects like diamondback moth have made higher oil yield crops like canola unviable. Second is that illegal Afghan poppy growing has flooded the market for legal opiate feedstock so they need a new product. Without subsidies there would be no poppyseed biodiesel.
Bishop of Rochester: save your souls, you greedy bankers
Tim Henman's parents rally against 'eco-town'
Further £100 rise in energy bills looms
Livingstone fury at green plans veto
London's Mayor claims civil servants blocked his energy proposals for the capital because they put the interests of big business first
BP left confused after Russian police raid oil giant's office
The rise of British sea power
"He said the crisis gripping the world’s money markets was “almost certainly” due to amoral forces pursuing their own wealth-creating agenda and warned that without action the less wealthy might suffer disproportionately from the fallout."
This is completely backwards. The less wealthy borrowed more money than they should have and then stiffed the lenders when rates rose. The bankers are the ones "suffering disproportinately from the fallout" because the poor are just walking away.
Bankers used to be chastised because they didn't lend to the poor, now they are chastised because they lend to the poor. The Bishop needs less Bible and more Wealth of Nations.
Lending to the poor? Using sub-prime loans with teasers and re-sets that the lenders should have known that borrowers could not pay back? If the lenders had followed due dillagence lending guidlines the loans would not have been made to those that could not pay off the loans.
Responsibility lies with the lender to insure that the borrower can repay the loan, not the other way round.
If the fault is with the borrowers, this sub-prime mess would have and could have happened long ago. It didn't untill the lending practices and banking regulations were changed...at the request of the lenders. Lenders are reaping what they sowed.
K 100 - It was never about the money loaned out for mortgs.
It is ALL about the money made with those mortgs afterwards that is the real and HUGE problem.
The bankers chose to loan that money, Keithster100. They chose to overlook the financial status of those borrowers. They made that loan despite knowing it had a high probability of default. They deliberately paid S&P, Fitch, and Moody money to get those loans bundled as "AAA" securities, Keithster100, and then resold that toxic waste a "premium" grade investments to people who believed the ratings agencies lies.
The banks are complicit in this. The banks did this to themselves by loaning to probable deadbeats. And now the banks want to offload this bullshit toxic waste on the public?
Screw them. Let the banks fail, totally. They do not deserve to be rescued given the stupidity they just displayed. This IS the fault of the banks for failing to do due diligence of the borrowers or having done it then deliberately choosing to ignore the results of that process. Either the banks are incompetent or corrupt. And in either case they do not deserve to exist at all. In fact, most of those bank's top executives belong in jail.
Malefactors of Great Wealth
Theodore Roosevelt
Absolutely.
Nobody cared if the mortagees could, or could not, pay after some time. That didn’t matter, and doesn’t matter today.
Bad payers are not a problem. (For the lenders.)
As in many credit schemes, incl. US credit cards, for ex., high or usurious interest, late fees, and the usual take off, means a bundle can be made. Even the poor pay in their last pennies...
The point was to bundle up that 'house' debt and sell it on in some faintly respectable package.
See for ex., worth a read:
Subprime Securities Market Began as `Group of 5' Over Chinese
By Mark Pittman, Bloomberg, Dec. 17
link
I could not agree with you more, Grey.
The problem I see is the widespread business use of "hold harmless" and "arbitration" clauses. Not so much that business uses them, but that ignorant people accept them.
What has happened is sorely needed. You can tell a child till you are blue in the face not to play with the cook pots. Once a child pulls a cook pot full of hot stew on itself, the lesson is painfully learned. I learned that way and I STILL remember it. No lasting effects, but the psychological surprise to find out Mom wasn't able to protect me from my own ignorance of her advice is seill with me.
A lot of naive investors ( many claiming themselves professional stewards of retirement plans ) have been burned. Hopefully, they will remember.
The lesson will only take hold if the result was painful. Having the government step in and clean up the mess isn't helping - it only shows Mom will step in at the last minute and keep the hot soup from hitting ME. If I made the mess, Mom would make me clean it up. Old school.
I do not think our government has the guts to go to all those investment bankers and ask them to make good on all the promises they made - irregardless of arbitration and hold harmless clauses. It would mean a lot of very wealthy people would find themselves "out on the street", much like the fate they sentenced countless others to with their leveraged scheming.
I can now look companies in the eye when they put "arbitration" clauses and "hold harmless" agreements in their paperwork they had me and ask them just what they are up to. Such "businesstalk" is a sure indicator to me that the business may be up to no good. As a business, they need legal teeth to exact payment from me should I fail to keep my end. I now require - from any financial advisor - him to be PERSONALLY responsible for any claims he makes.
The days where a little headhocking will get the check signed are OVER. The first thing that trips me off to ask the financial advisor to put his PERSONAL assets on the line is arbitration and "hold harmless" clauses in the papers he hands me for signature. My question to him is that its MY money. If everyone is denying responsibility, then SOMEONE has to take it - and he's the one earning the commission for the sale. Why should I assume all the risk AND pay a commission?
If everybody would do this, we will not see a rerun of the financial idiocy that landed us all in this mess.
SIMPLY HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE!!!
Steve
A good idea to jail the bank executives. Trouble is the result of the banks failing could be devastating for the economy. Trouble is by creating liquidity we are relying on the people who got us in to the mess to get us out. Knotty.
"Trouble is the result of the banks failing could be devastating for the economy. "
Yes. They're banking on that. ;-)
The "free marketeers" have also been pushing degraded educational systems. Take away that free pint of milk before classes, let McDonalds train 'em in food service, etc, above all keep 'em dumb. Always, always "up sell" 'em.
Utterly charming how they are all for free enterprise etc. and then when things get rocky they go all socialistic and ‘responsible’ and ask for handouts. It is a scam they pull again and again, successfully. The tax payer bails them out, and - on we go to the next round.
The problem is that the present system is so deeply ingrained no one can see their way out of it. Gvmts., finance, corporations, (and in many countries the military as well) with their propaganda arm, the media, are all tightly tied together in circles of mutual influence and profit sharing, and few find it strange. It is just the way things are.
An educated and healthy workforce made sense after WW2. Morally and pragmatically. That is no longer the case today.
No banker jumped out of a van, grabbed people off the street and forced them to take a loan. These "less wealthy" the bishop describes did it of their own volition, now they should pay. If I were a banker I would go after these thieves and bring them to court.
Thou shalt not steal, right Bishop?
Right K100, it's just like poor people. The wonderful people of Countrywide gave them a 0 down loan and did not even to ask to see proof of employment. While the RE cheerleaders including, MSM, gov't and financial institutions encouraged them touting how wonderful it is to own your own home and what a loser you are if you don't. Buy now or be priced out forever! Damn them for believing the collective lies of everybody in authority. I'm sure they abandoned underwriting procedures for the betterment of society and to give people a chance to live the american dream, and those damn poor people ruined it for every body. If those bastards would go out and get a 3rd job maybe my property value would not be falling. (sarcasm off)
I'm in San Diego, we have condos in my area going 40-50% off peak pricing. I personally would let if go regardless if I could pay or not. It's the better business decision.
fraud /frɔd/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[frawd] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
1. deceit, trickery, sharp practice, or breach of confidence, perpetrated for profit or to gain some unfair or dishonest advantage.
2. a particular instance of such deceit or trickery: mail fraud; election frauds.
3. any deception, trickery, or humbug: That diet book is a fraud and a waste of time.
4. a person who makes deceitful pretenses; sham; poseur.
It is typical of those who have a religious faith in the 'free-market' system to value the principle of 'caveat emptor' but to ignore or play down the issue of fraud. An excellent case could be made, and doubtless is being made in courtrooms as we speak, that lenders participated in large-scale fraud. They are supposedly the financial experts and have obligations which they willfully ignored.
A good article http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/banking_...
Surely you jest !!
Cayne, the chairman and chief executive of Bear Stearns, was paid $40m between 2004 and 2006 and made millions more by selling his shares. But he has just presided over the destruction of virtually the whole value of the shares in the bank.
What's to look forward to ?
Finally, what are the prospects for the ordinary person in all this? Not good, I’m afraid. If there is another great recession, tens of millions in the West will suffer real hardship. If we manage to avoid it, even more will feel it in their pockets in a much less dramatic but still noticeable way.
Hey that's me he's talking about,
'ordinary'.
I live within my means. I do all the other law abiding things a citizen is expected to
do. I expect, in return, the full letter of the law to be enforced on any and all law breakers.
It is simply too late to do anything else this time round.
Bull !!!!
weatherman, "good article", my a**
Cayne may have lost $500 million in the collapse of Bear Stearns. There is justice in this situation.
Jack,
I think you're tap dancing here ...
may have -- mayyyyy have ?
$500 million -- nice number, but just plain meaningless - how about some pertinent context like ... what's his total worth ?
I am not tap dancing. This is pretty much cold hard fact. Cayne held a huge amount of Bear Stearns stock. How much he lost depends a lot of when you price it and what the final settlement winds up being. $500 million is a reasonable estimate.
I have no idea how much he is worth, but do expect that this is the majority of his wealth. In fact he could be underwater, if he has enough debt.
Saying that losing $500 million is meaningless is just plain silly. You are asking for the private sector to bear the pain of their failings. It is clear and indisputable that Cayne did.
You really are a piece of work.
You don't think there was, let's say, misrepresentation of what was being sold? No taking advantage of the complexities of the fine print and such?
But don't worry. The little people will lose everything, and the huckster loan sharks will get bailed out. As always in this "free market" "democracy", risk is socialized, profit is corporatized.
What a f**king joke.
You are a real tool, you know that?
It certainly seems that there was a high level of misrepresentation involved in subprime lending. If I am not wrong, there is a "Truth in lending law" that does require relevant details to be spelled out clearly. Any lender who violated the spirit of this law should be punished.
However, the rest is not so easy. If you have "little person #1" who basically conspired with a lender to inflate their earnings and qualify for loans they both should have known could not be paid back, they should both bear some of the responsibility. It would be unfair to bail them out and ignore "little person #2" who watched the whole thing and made the right decision not to lie, borrow or get over extended.
It also does not seem clear at this point that risks are being socialized. Bear Stearns was effectively bankrupted with shareholders getting somewhere near 2 cents on the dollar (using peak value and the $2 share price). They bore 100% of the risk and the punishment. As for other money that is going into the system to strengthen it, the judgement is based on public good. You may not like the banking system, but it is an essential part of a functioning economy. Destroying the banking system because you are mad at bankers would be like cutting your leg off because you can't run fast enough.
Finally, there is an unavoidable tension between availability of loans to the poor and protecting them from predators and bad decision-making. You have to err on one side or the other. The commentariat will alternate between saying that cruel banks won't lend to the poor and saying that cruel banks are expoiting the poor by lending to them when some can't pay the money back. Perfect doesn't exist.
Something else that people are not mentioning very much is that often the valuations of the properties involved were inflated, if not downright fraudulent, as well. Appraisal is more of an art than a science, and it should be understood that there is a fairly wide margin of error implicit in any appraisal, and wider in some than in others. Appraisers are constantly under pressure from lenders, borrowers, and real estate agents to come in as high as possible, and they know that if they consistently come in too low and wreck too many deals, they will stop being asked to do appraisals.
Simply overvaluing a refi by 10% will turn a 90% LTV transaction into a 100% LTV transaction - or a 100% LTV into 110%. I suspect that a fair number of these troubled mortgagees were underwater before the ink was even dry on the loan papers.
Jeez Louise!
Would YOU loan your money to people with the qualifications listed in "sub-prime"? If your neighbor loaned his money to someone with the qualifications listed in sub-prime would you feel sorry for him or think he was a stupid moron for doing something clearly idiotic? And would you put up with him coming over and demanding to tax you to pay for his screwup?
That is what the bankers are demanding - that the rest of us pay for THEM making STUPID LOANS.
Unbelievable.
Like Saudi Arabia's "voluntary" reduction in net oil exports, from 9.1 mbpd (total liquids) in 2005 to around 8.0 mbpd in 2007, Lukoil is saying that the continuing cutoff of crude oil exports to Germany is also voluntary:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aIlAkMVIhYpc
Lukoil Won't Send Oil to German Refiners in April, Reuters Says
By Greg Walters
A totally different topic....but I just wanted to toss out a question that has been on my mind for some time. What will universities look like in the future as energy supplies become more constrained? Does anyone have any ideas? Any links? I've seen so much written on financial co.s and suburbia, on living arrangements and transportation and food supplies, and it has been greatly interesting and helpful. Yet what about universities? They have been around for a long time (some at least), so it is likely they'll still BE around (some at least) but beyond that does anyone care to speculate on the particulars of what universities will be like in the future?
From a California perspective, I'd say that a college education will be less common in an energy-constrained future. Here in California, the U.C. - but particularly the C.S.U. - systems are made possible with a lot of public money subsidizing public education for a broad middle class. The U.C. system will probably survive, as it carries more prestige, and many of the campuses are centers for research. The C.S.U. system has always been the affordable way for anyone to get a degree. Also, its campuses are also commonly thought of as 'commuter' schools - with very few students living on campus.
I think that there will be an upsurge in student interest in social changing "trades/skills" with decent post-graduation employment possibilities.
Agricultural and Engineering schools could do well, lawyers (despite being a renewable and undepletable "resource"), liberal arts less so. Likewise business schools will see changes, perhaps more Management, Statistics/QM majors and less Marketing majors, with an overall decline.
Health care may make less money than today, but they will be needed none-the-less.
If our society holds together, there may be a massive upsurge in Social Workers. The FWOs are going to need help, as will many of the rest of us.
Student loans may be more targeted (will practicing lawyers practice "birth control" on new lawyers ?) and fewer will get them.
Best Hopes for a Better Student Body,
Alan
Western Countries, to make it short:
1) educate all to some level, and wait for a shake out, egalitarian like
2) have a competitive system, supposedly based on ‘merit’ in fact heavily on pedigrees and riches, an ‘elite’ class replication system
3) import the educated as needed, or outsource activities (much the same), thereby capitalizing on what others spent, what advantageous price workers can be bought for
Most today mix, using all three strategies in various doses. All wrapped in grand rhetoric and much obfuscation.
The Education market is huge ... the US used to earn a bomb from foreign students for ex.
Basically, the money for 'useless' education will dry up.
I get the idea theology will be the most secure/stable occupation of all.
The rich do not need God. The poor do.
It looks we will have an avalanche of poor.
Personally, I am sticking with an ability to fix things to be a trait that would help my survivability. If I am not useful to my society, its only logical I perish to make way for someone else who is.
I feel this is when my knowledge of refrigeration thermodynamics will be useful. If TSHTF, no one is gonna care what refrigerant is in a system. I can go to the scrap heap, find damn near any scrap parts for old systems and bring up a perfectly good ice bank with a bottle of barbeque gas. If need be, I will find ways of running my compressors and vacuum pumps from solar panels.
Or build ISAAC's. (Intermittent Solar Ammonia Absorption Chillers ). A chemist friend of mine can get ammonia from pee. Admittedly, it takes a *lot* of pee to make a ton's worth of coolant, but it can be done. )
But until then, I await becoming useful. Right now, no one seems interested in alternative systems when conventional systems can be delivered with just a signature in a checkbook. When their signature, combined with a hard day's labor in the field, will net a meal, there will be a need for what I can do.
I know there are a lot of people out there just like me. Old cantankerous packrats. They know exactly what they are doing. And by today's standards - unemployable - because we don't subordinate well and hate cubicles.
In a way I look forward to being useful again... when society appreciates the tool guy more than the tie guy.
Steve
There's lots of absorption coolers/refrigerators in old campers. I see then all the time in the local dump, probably put there because the electric heating element has burned out. I think it would not be a big problem to make A/C units using absorption, using solar concentrators. They would be perfect for days when the sun was out, but wouldn't do squat after dark. What would be needed is some method of storing thermal energy for an overnight period, to keep the humidity down after dark.
E. Swanson
The rich need God more than any of us may ever realize. John
before the industrial revolution they were for the upper class children only.
the lower classes only got a few years education(depending on the area that might include reading and writing), then they were apprenticed to either their father, realitive, or complete stranger for a trade or craft they will then spend the rest of their lives in.
As dismal as this sounds to people now, this was a real good system for stability. Though it must sound like hell for people who like me live in the age when it is thought it is a right for a person to have a proper and complete education.
I suppose people would need to spend most time making a living, not only for themselves but for the ones in the family that have less capability of supporting themselves. Therefore only the privileged (even more than today) would have the opportunity, let alone professional motivations to undertake lengthy periods of student life.
As long as there is a more-or-less functional civil society, community colleges should do fine. These represent the best value in higher education available today (except for the genius that can swing a full-ride scholarship to some elite campus like MIT, and applies to something like 0.0000001% of the population). Ordinary people should go to their local community college if they can possibly swing it (in terms of their intellictual abilities, the time commitment, and the very minimal money involved). Given a declining economy with decreasing opportunities, this may be all that most people will ever need or can afford. The practical training that one can get at a community college will certainly serve most people better than a BA in some nonsense field.
There will still be colleges and universities where one can transfer from community college to complete their bachelor's degree, and to move on into graduate-level studies. There are likely to be far fewer career opportunities for highly educated people in the future, so IMHO, there will be fewer such institutions in the future. This suggests that a very substantial and traumatic shakeout is coming to higher education within the next decade or two. When it is all other, there will be a handful of elite, highly-selective, well-endowed 4-year colleges catering to the very small number of rich (who we will always have with us) and geniuses (which brings us full circle back to the way things were over a century ago), and maybe one or two universities (with a network of branch campuses) in each state that focus on upper-level undergraduate and graduate-level education only. The universities will have to shrink in size and facilities, and re-engineer their curriculum and schedules so that students can complete their degree programs much quicker than at present (longer = more costly). A handful of specialized private institutions might also survive, but your typical generic non-selective, non-well-endowed private liberal arts college has a pretty bleak future.
BTW, you can kiss intercollegiate athletics good bye - in a decade or two, it will all be gone. Too costly to sustain.
Good riddance. Time to put the money into useful things on campuses.
Hey WT appreciate the update and focus on the Russians. By this quote it would seem to me that the simple response is why not deal directly with the refiners? Is there a legal barrier or is the pipeline the competitve barrier preventing this from happening? Is this just a varient of the don't ask don't tell charade? I mean they are serious about a $.50 upcharge on a +100 barrel of oil stopping that significant of level of commerce. Whom is supposedly getting this fungible supply now?
They may not have it to export. Our outlook for Russian net oil exports, showing the projected 10 year net export decline rate (which would start out slowly and accelerate with time):
Lukoil is a PRIVATE corporation which makes SEC filings. If you want to claim it has no oil to sell then prove it. It is interesting how anything negative about the west is fobbed off as "conspiracy" theory. But basically everything I read in the western media about Russia is one massive tin foil hat spazz.
Perhaps because (former) KGB runs the nation and they use a state sourced Polonium on those they do not like.
Alan
I don't believe I said that Lukoil has "no oil" to sell. What I was talking about was the oil that was formerly exported to Germany. Because of a combination of flat to declining production and rising domestic consumption, I believe that Russian net oil exports are declining, and based on the mathematical model, the net export decline could be quite severe. Our middle case is that Russia approaches zero net oil exports around 2024.
It really has nothing to do with nationality or politics. Regardless of whether one is a capitalist, communist, socialist or a Paris Hilton worshiper, the Export Land Model math is relentless.
Maybe Germany can get Schroeder and Gazprom to throw them a bone or two.
Gerhard Schroeder's Sellout.
Interesting:
Drilling for oil to start in Falkland Islands
"The inhabitants of the Falkland Islands are preparing for a South Atlantic oil rush which they hope will make them among the richest people in the world.
After 10 years of frustrating delays since oil fields containing up to 60 billion barrels of "black gold" were discovered off the islands, oil companies are planning to start drilling within the next 12 months."
And the locals think they'll get a slice?
Look at the common Joe in Saudi for a sneak preview..
You've got to nationalize if you want your governors, not your Tourist/CEO's to benefit from this... if that oil is even producible.
Read the article.
"The Falklands' government will receive 26 per cent of the profits from companies drilling for oil, as well as nine per cent royalties on every barrel sold."
There are only 3,000 islanders. So IF there are 60 billion barrels of oil and IF oil stays at ~$100 per barrel then the island will receive millions of dollars per person. I don't know how much profit the oil companies make from a barrel of oil so I can't calculate it, but it COULD be millions of dollars per person.
Nationalization is the worst way to do it; communism always leads to perdition and ruin. They should just distribute the money directly into the bank accounts of the islanders on a quarterly basis or something.
Wow the Falklands government has become independent of the UK. When did that happen?
Falkland Islands
Wonder where any money will actually go?
There are British forces stationed in the Falklands to prevent a recurrence of 1982 war. I expect the if a significant oil is produced the British will send the Falkland government a bill for their services.
:) Good question. How does this work? Wikipedia says this about the government of the islands:
"Under the constitution, the latest version of which came into force in 1985, there is an Executive Council and a Legislative Council of the Falkland Islands. The Executive Council, which advises the Governor, is also chaired by the Governor. It consists of the Chief Executive, Financial Secretary and three Legislative Councillors, who are elected by the other Legislative Councillors. The Legislative Council consists of the Chief Executive, Financial Secretary and the eight Legislative Councillors, of whom five are elected from Stanley and three from Camp, for four-year terms. It is presided over by the Speaker, currently Darwin Lewis Clifton."
Do the Falklanders pay any taxes to the Crown? I imagine that they will pay for the defense of the islands. This arrangement should work nicely to keep the Argentineans away.
This paragraph seemed funny to me:
"The companies with licences to drill in the area met in Edinburgh on Friday to brief officials from the Falklands' government on their progress, and preparations are under way in the South Atlantic to ensure that the islands can cope with sudden wealth."
What is in Edinburgh? Is it just nice this time of year? Why wouldn't everyone meet in London?
You don't have to be communist to nationalize a resource.. but the comment was a slightly underplayed snark that says even with a nationalized oil supply, the 'Governors' would be getting the money first.. and we'll see how well that trickle-down actually works.. They make some pretty good sealants out of refined petroleum these days. Stops Trickles in their Tracks!
Watch 'There will be Blood' again for some pointers on the promises that you can give to the locals so they will Genuflect and bless your pumphead.
Check's in the mail.
Bob
'communism always leads to perdition and ruin' .. damn, is that from a Sermon or something?
Hello Keithster100,
What will be interesting to see is if the Falkland Islanders go to full Peak Outreach, or just go totally hogwild like the Nauruns did when they got paid for their mined guano phosphate.
Recall that the Nauruns used their currency as toilet paper, chartered jets for shopping extravaganzas, and other wasteful actions like the police chief buying a Lamborghini, then finding out he was too fat to drive it, plus the small island speed limit is only 25 mph!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7296832...
-------------------
...It took me about an hour and a half to cycle the narrow coast road, sweating profusely beneath the fierce equatorial sun. Before I knew it, I was back where I started. I had just circumnavigated the entire country.
Nauru may be little, but it once enjoyed enormous wealth. In fact Nauruans were among the richest people, per capita, in the world.
--------------------
If the FFs are there: my bet is the Falklanders' future shopping sprees will make the past actions of the Nauruns look like rank amateurs. 500-foot yachts for everyone! :(
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
Hi Bob, are you in the market for a condo? This could be the time to buy...but I would wait a bit. These things could go for a song soon...Mr. Soon is a good friend from Hong Kong.
Woes in Condo Market Build
As New Supply Floods Cities
By JENNIFER S. FORSYTH and JONATHAN KARP
March 22, 2008; Page A1
'More than 4,000 new units will be completed in both Atlanta and Phoenix by the end of the year. Developers in Miami and Fort Lauderdale, Fla., are readying nearly 10,000 total new units in a market already struggling with canyons of unsold condos. San Diego, another hard-hit region, will add 2,500 units, according to estimates provided by Reis Inc., a New York-based real-estate-research firm.
The new building comes on top of unprecedented supply. The U.S. finished 2007 with a supply of condos large enough to absorb 10 months of demand, the highest level since the National Association of Realtors began the tally in 1999.'...snip...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120614027637056019.html?mod=hps_us_whats...
I might add that the same thing is happening here in big cities in Japan. It's awful. Miles and miles of new empty condominiums. No one wants them. The population is going DOWN in Japan so there is no demand or expected demand. They are huge cement things that when finally abandoned will be extremely hard to get rid of when land for growing food is what is wanted. I personally believe it was all some sort of financing scheme, not meant to be sold off to willing buyers, just built and the loans used to employ lots and lots of people.
Population of Saudi Arabia: 27.6 million
Number of princes paid by the state: 3000 - 4000
Population of the Falklands: ~2500 (not including military stationed there)
''After 10 years of frustrating delays since oil fields containing up to 60 billion barrels of "black gold" were discovered off the islands, oil companies are planning to start drilling within the next 12 months."''
That is a downright lie:
There are no 'oil fields'
There are prospects of the right age, depth and cover.
There MAY be UP to 60 billion.
Nobody has discovered 60 billion bbls of anything yet.
6 exploration wells with traces of HC's. So far.
Dont bet the farm on this just yet.
In other words it’s just another exaggerated (yet to be proven) version of that “gigantic” Brazilian field claimed to be discovered, cited at CNBC the other day, and explained with different words by Simmons …
There's some information at Falklands Oil & Gas apparently based on seismic surveys.
I can't figure out how they are going to drill and extract and ship oil in a war zone, as the Argentinians would never allow The Brits to go ahead in 'Las Malvinas' without fighting.
It is one thing to re-take some islands, another to run a sophisticated oil business in those conditions.
"...drill and extract and ship oil in a war zone"
You just described the entire Middle East. Evidently, it is possible.
OFF TOPIC: Dave, saw this and thought it might interest you. And, no, this isn't a dig. The source is one that I think most would consider serious and respectable.
There's a video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JkrvSaL7-w and a .pdf http://globalwarming.house.gov/tools/assets/files/0401.pdf of his full testimony.
I haven't watched or read either. Just saw them and thought you might like to take a look.
Cheers
Thanks for the link. I always like to look squarely and as fairly as I am able at upsides AND downsides of all alternatives, so more information is always welcome.
I prefer conservation too, to virtually any new energy source- it is far more efficient, so long as care is taken to avoid Jevon's paradox by using the right price signals.
The real issue is how you generate the power you still need, and the most practical means can vary greatly depending on the local environment and conditions - It is trying to use specific renewables technologies where they are inappropriate that I do not think wise, not their use per se.
In a difficult situation though, it seems to me important to keep all options which don't produce huge amounts of greenhouse gasses on the table, and France does not exactly seem to have gone bankrupt through it's nuclear program.
Thanks again for the link.
Has anyone posted this?
Cheney and Saudis: No short-term fix for oil prices
It sounds like Cheney isn't having any more success than GWB had.
With Bush first, and now Cheney panhandling the Saudis for more oil production, blaming speculators for high oil prices grows ever-more incredulous. The mainstream media looks ever-more ridiculous as they peddle this bunk.
Why should Saudia Arabia provide more FFs or less expensive FFs to a nation that is debasing the world reserve currency, hurting the SA economy, debasing the value of the KSA soverign wealth fund, supporting Israel to the detriment of Paletinians, and threatening to destabilize the entire Middle East with a military attack on SAs next door neighbor?
Looking at the situation from perspective of Saudi Arabia, it's surprising that Cheney received an audience with the King of SA.
"Looking at the situation from perspective of Saudi Arabia, it's surprising that Cheney received an audience with the King of SA."
Not if you consider that those debased petrodollars can still buy a lot of weapons from American defense corporations.
No matter the weapons that the KSA has or will purchase from the US, the KSA military is notorous for its incompetence. If the King of SA wanted his military to be effective he could make it so. That the King wants his military loyal and incompetent speaks loudly of his desire to stop any coup attempts coming from the military. After all the King has about 600 princes that would like to be King, that is enough to shepherd.
Why does the King need more military weapons for a military that he chooses to keep at an incompentent level? He does'nt. He has the US to provide the military that he needs. But, the King does not want the US Military to carry out actions in the ME that are detrimental to his future reign. Nor does the King want US monetary policy to cause inflation in the Kingdom.
Observe the chess board from both sides.
'A man that can put himself in the shoes of another will go a long way'
It looks to me as if you answered your own observation
This is my first post here after about 6 months of lurking around. I find myself on here everyday, increasingly convinced that Peak Oil is now, or at least very soon. Tellingly for me, when I read about the opposing view: that we have nothing to worry about, the oil isn't going to run out any time soon, (and the economy is strong enough to weather the current storm) the arguments and reasonings, well, they just don't seem to make any sense to me. It all seems like so much wishful, or even deceitful thinking.
The topic came up in discussion with a friend and colleague last week, and I told him about my pessimistic views, knowing that he himself has the opposite view point. It felt good to be discussing it openly for the first time, even if he looked at me as if I was a little bit crazy, this website has given be the confidence to talk knowledgeably on the subject.
I realised that I've been weighing up in my head for a while, am I pessimistic, or am I actually being realistic when I see a huge downward slope lying just a few years, or months ahead of us?
Increasingly it seems that downwards is the realistic viewpoint. Growth simply cannot continue for ever, even ignoring the potential problems associated with peak oil. We can't keep growing, both in population and/or economically, indefinitely on a finite planet, to suggest otherwise is to believe in magic. It seems to me that we are the generation who will realise this, and be forced to live with the consequences.
I'd like to get off the onrushing train, find a way of life that sidesteps the crazy consumerist, debt and oil based economy that we all depend on, but I just don't see a way out for me, or for most of the world. We're all too dependent on it now, we've grown too heavy, and now the supports are creaking with our weight.
I keep thinking: What can I do? What other options do I have? But the problem seems too large to see past, and I'm too lazy, too scared, too apathetic to try. I guess I'm like a lot of people. I'll probably just grip the seats harder and let the rollercoaster take its course.
What I do know is that friends seem so much more valuable now than in the past. I think we're all going to be relying a lot more on each other, on our little social networks, and no, I don't mean Facebook!
Find more good friends, and be a good friend to others. I think that's all I can do.
Concerned but powerless
Berkshire, Uk
Concerned but powerless
Buy a long handle shovel, a hoe and a bow rake. Go over to your community garden. Get a plot. Tell the neighbors you're a rookie. See what happens.
Concerned - There are several stages to coming to terms with this reality so you kind of have to be forgiving and understanding, with yourself as well as with others.
My plan, which I am well along the path to achieving, is to integrate into a smallish community, produce and or provide something that is necessary for the community to survive and do that thing with the highest level of integrity even if it means compromising maximum profit, (I have been rewarded in so many ways that I can't begin to list here).
Also encourage others to do same.
Reach out to Community leaders and gently begin to explain the situation and encourage action.
Encourage and even underwrite local production.
Prepare in all the ways outlined by the survivalist but keep it low key.
Use humor but be blunt.
Make love not money. (not saying you can't EARN money)
Welcome and cheers!
P.S. The other option is to get filthy stinking RICH as they shall survive.
The perception is the same here in upstate New York.I myself wonder about how realistic my feelings of impending hard times are,as around here there seems to be very little grasp of the subject.In fact about 2 weeks ago a local paper ran an article on high oil prices without even a single mention of possible supply problems.There is a way out though,good friends and lightening ship go a long way.First post after lurking for a long time.
Welcome out of the closet! Its been about 3 years since I read the Long Emergency, Deffeyes and Simmons and became convinced that the situation was real and fast approaching. Shortly thereafter I purchased about 20 copies of the Long Emergency and distributed them to friends and family. I made my other books available and forwarded lots of additional data and articles to the same bunch. Ended up with about 75% read 15% partial and 10% still never have turned page 1. While that created awareness, generated some good discussions, and even some acceptance I remain the only one that seems to have made any plans, changes, or executions (still behind the curve). That remains troubling as I agree that no person or immediate family will prosper longterm in significant seclusion. I am teased a bit about my Noah Syndrome and as a result remain a bit constrained in moving more aggressively. No one wants to wake up tomorrow and find out the silver bullet to fix this set of challanges has already been/about to be fired and you still fighting the last war. As often echoed here virtually everyone is conditioned to focus on the positive, and denial is paramount. I will admit I bite my tongue at times in order to avoid the eye roll of my friends and family. So today I remain pretty much a one man band and lack a true confidant with similar aspirations and yes that is self minimizing in my case. At times I wonder it thats not a bad thing....as it keeps me from going whole hog on this program but mostly I mildly dispair over the lack of inclusion company. The Oil Drum supplies a lot of salve here!
So what to do...well you have already become aware of a most important resource the Oil Drum (thanks and happy #3 by the way) whereby you gain access with a front row seat to the most dynamic forum with information and debates on the topic. Lots of great links, resources and support. Then mabe the best I can offer is I think you need to perform a decision tree type analysis based on your best guess on timing, with a range of probablity of various societal outcomes, compile your resources, and your ability to access resources. INPO (real estate, employment, capital&assets, security, food/health essentials, energy, team members, and community) My experience with this while it's all evolving the process will start to lead you to a somewhat comprehensive overview with ranges that will inspire you to address probablity and the degree of your response more objectively.
At this point I think you develop a set of response to the probabilities. Possibly make a dramatic change in how you can develop and access the presumed personal and societal resources. This may require the need to change actions, occupations, residences, friends. At which time the real action begins. Stay tuned and seek feedback and guidance. Good Luck!
To avoid taking over the whole DB, here is a highly redacted version of an essay I sent out to friends a few years ago. It's title is Some Thoughts on the Future - Establishing Priorities
"Here is a very limited list of key elements in what I believe to be their order of importance in a collapse scenario. Some are expanded to indicate the depth to which elements may be addressed but all could be further divided into finer, more discrete sub-elements.
Personal and Area Security
Personal Financial Security
Drinking Water Sources
Irrigation Water Sources
Moving/Transferring Water
Understanding Nutrition
Seed/Crops
Fertilizer
Field Preparation/hydroponics
Harvesting
Meat Production
Agricultural Feed Production
Aquaculture
Hunting/Gathering
Food Preservation
Clothing
Residential Energy Efficiency
Equipment Repair
Communications
Health
Roads/Transportation
Information/Culture
Once a priority list is established, it is necessary to determine which elements should or could be addressed on a Macro-Community,/b>, that is the entire area; on a Micro-Community level, that is the road where people live; on an Individual level. Finally, and it is only at this point, that action can be considered...."
Todd
I think that you have "Health" WAY too far down the list. And security too high up.
One can survive a mugging well enough, but not a significant health care crisis (from a broken leg to a bacterial infection to ...) without a modicum of health care.
Life expectancy in 1900 was 49 (21 more years for 50 y/o in 1900).
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/lifexpec.htm
Heading towards a place that can supply 1950s medicine and support for aging seems important.
Alan
Alan,
No, I don't think health is too low. You'll also note that "nutrition" is quite high (#6). My rationale for putting health low is that health doesn't do you any good if you don't have water, food, or are killed, et.al. and if you eat right you are likely to maintain your "health". Further, in my envisioned scenario, I don't believe we will have a health care system so "health comes down to eating right and, perhaps, knowing how to use herbs, massage and similar remedies.
Look at health care today. What can the medical establishment do without the drugs and technology? They aren't like the old-time docs when I was growing up. I can still remember our family doctor "prescribing" whiskey and honey for sore throats.
As far as old folks (like myself) go, I really envision extended families and common interest groups living together. I posted about this last year: http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2598#Comment-198259
Todd
Since it looks like a slower day, at least at 7:40PM western, I thought I'd expand one section, food preservation, since lots of people are interested in that.
Food Preservation
Dehydrating
Electric
Solar
Oven
Open Air
Hot Water Bath/Steam Canning
Canning Containers - about 250-300 quarts per person/year
Canning Lids
Canning Wax
Making Sugar/Sugar Substitutes
Pressure Canning
Juicing
Freezing/Refrigeration
Electric
PV/Microhydro
Generator
Solar Absorption/Ice
Wood gas to replace propane
Vacuum Packing
Vacuum Packing Bags
Canning Jars/Vacuum Packing Containers
Cold Cellar
Smoking/Jerky
Pickling/Brining/Fat Seal-Potting
Dry Storage
Now, even this list is somewhat superficial, but there is a limit for a site like TOD. Anyway, I hope it perks people's interest.
Todd
Well, I tried to edit this to look like my post but my efforts didn't work. Sorry.
Todd
There have always been ascetic monk-like philosopher types throughout the ages in every place. They stand aside and cast their slightly disapproving gaze on ordinary humans who are trying to "get ahead" in every way possible without regard for future consequnces or present costs. These ascetic figures are important, although the vast majority of folks don't want to hear their messages. The author of Walden, Thoreau, was such a monkish figure. In our day, Kunstler and Heinberg among others are fulfilling this role. You may find yourself agreeing with K. and H. (as I do) but you can't expect the vast majority of people to be interested in their ideas at all. People will adapt but they won't approach this from a sweeping viewpoint or see it as a "historical moment" I think. They will be Just day to day dealing with reality. Everyone I know is not interested AT ALL in peak oil. Not even a little bit. Some find it a depressing theory they'd rather not think about, others insist it is decades away, others just smile and nod and say "well, I wonder.." Not many people embraced Thoreau's message in his day either, but I think he would have enjoyed "The Oil Drum" a lot, had he had access to the Internet.
I get a huge kick out of Kunstler's writing, but a monkish figure he is not! LOL!
Hey CBP,
Thanks for chiming in.
One thought about the wording of "Growth simply cannot continue for ever" ..
While you did follow up with a clarification of what kind of growth you meant, and anyone at this site would know what it contains as well, I always feel dissatisfied with that conclusion, and I find the language to be psychologically self-limiting.
LIFE is Growth, and it is Decline/Loss. It is a continual march towards death, and then rebirth, but growth in this IS central, and when considering growth, even the growth of a business, I think it's essential to understand what kind of growth is healthy, and what kind is more like a Cancer. Some kinds of growth, like with gardens or trees requires pruning, culling and weeding, which means the growth is maintained, not rampant.
When we bailed out a dying GM (a few times?), I think we fed a cancerous growth that has continued to add to a deadly tumor, instead of letting the Auto industry (or Transit, or Commuter Culture) transform as it 'might' have were it allowed to die and let other fledgling sprouts survive without that behemoth overshadowing and outconsuming them.
I don't think all the notions of free Markets are wrong, just the ones that over-protect and glorify the giants, and the ideology that personifies a market economy as if it were able to think and behave as people do, and such will come to 'conclusions' that will be best for people.
Don't name the Eatin' Chickens, and don't get too fond of your Corporate Pets!
Bob
Hi, concerned.
I live in Bracknell, care to meet up or discuss PO, and what to do about it?
Mike at ladyshot dot demon dot co dot uk
Concerned_But_Powerless,
You're not all that powerless.
Just by actively participating in TOD comments you change the world.
Look at what your post did! All the responses from round the world.
Maybe you won't take TODD's advice. But somebody else might ... and in that you just changed the world.
(TODD, didn't you have a blog where you list all your survivalist ideas? How come you don't blog whore it on your TOD profile?)
"People are desperately trying to get rid of houses they can’t afford."
The slump hits high end real estate (in Kanasas in this case). From The Housing Bubble Blog:
More specifically Kansas City which is still a bit more Missouri than Kansas at present. Still have most of our extended families in Kansas City and in the past decade the McMansion fever was unmitigated. I think they were infected by transfers in from DFW (more specifically Plano and Addison (lol)) The extravagence reached beyond decandent it is nothing short of embarrassing how corrupted by the opulence and oneupmanship it became. Part of it is how far your money goes here versus the coasts but mostly its the belief that we can have and deserve it ALL!
I read the article which ran in the Kansas City Star on Sunday. Some of the homes featured were downright UGLY. . . and way "over the top".
Sounds like houses that could be remade into small hotels...
Has anyone else had trouble purchasing silver?
I can't find eagles, maple leaves or 10 ounce bars anywhere.
Everyone is out of stock since thursday.
How could the price have gone down if there is a shortage?
Can someone explain this to me?
http://news.silverseek.com/GoldIsMoney/1206119500.php
So why was there a price drop?
Could this be because there is plenty of manufacturing silver but a temporary shortage of investment silver?
Is it possible that the silver market is being manipulated?
One bullion sales site I went to said that silver Eagles and Maples Leaves are not available from the US or Canadian mints right now.
What does this mean?
Sell Off or Smell Off
The hard money guys are calling this an Alice in Wonderland moment with Ben Bernache morphing into the Mad Hatter. Why did the metal and commodities markets fall out of bed when the Fed cut rates by only 100 pts(25+75) versus the 125 (25+100) some expected? I find the story that the banks are reigning in the heggies a bit by cutting there leverage factors from 10-15:1 to 5:1 fairly plausible( thus they had to sell their postions with more spec longs than shorts). Can anyone verify that? That coupled with technically very overbought conditions. Why anyone would be buying the Financials and Homebuilders in this market and selling commodities I find beyond delusional
I bought physical silver 3x this week during the selloff. By pure accident I happened to get the owner of the Northwest Mint on the phone for one of the purchases. He told me they were so busy selling that they could not return a call of guy that was trying to buy $500,000 worth of gold for over an hour. The fact that the big cheese was taking orders sez something also, My own experience for a much much humbler purchase took an email to a dealer I had previously worked with to make the purchase as the phones were always encouraging you to call back in 5 minutes. After the 5th or 6th time I tried email and that still took well over 2 hours to get a response.
Would also advise you to spend some time with Ted Butler on the silver markets you will learn some good stuff.
Ted Butler
http://www.investmentrarities.com/tb-archives.html
A physical shortage of silver is real and the shorts in the markets a very bullish factor
Also found this article by Paul Craig interesting
http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts03182008.html
In the long run I'm bullish on commodities. In the short run they had gone fully parabolic and a short term selloff is to be expected.
www.amergold.com worked well for me. Haven't had any problems getting silver coin or other PMs. They are a little more expensive than most (monex) but their service is alot better. Silver Eagles are sold in 20 coin lots.
Have you tried since thursday?
If the mint isn't making them and everyone else is sold out, I would be suprised if they actually had them.
I have also discovered that just because they are shown on the website does not mean they are available when you actually try to order.
THe price drop in silver was primarily caused by the selling of future contracts, not by dumping physical silver on the spot market. Normally, a lower future price would entice holders of physical to sell it on the spot market, and then buy it back at a lower price through a future contract. (Arbitrage). In this case, it would appear that instead, holders of physical is mostly withholding it from the market, believing that it is more valuable than what they can get as spot prices.
This may cause a big problem for the sellers of the future contracts last week if they are naked - i.e. dont actually have the silver they have sold forward, and will result in a "short squeeze" if that is the case.
One thing that the naked shorts may attempt is to sell even more futures, increasing the arbitrage opportunity until there is a general belief that silver really is heading down and physical silver selling starts to snowball.
This coming week should bring some clarity to what is going on.
Francois.
Hello WT,
Thxs for this info. At some future point: I expect the same for I-NPK, O-NPK, seeds, wheelbarrows, bicycles, and other biosolar mission-critical items at your local Lowes, Home Depot, and other supply outlets. Have you hugged your bag of NPK today?
Sure wish we could get started on building my future-oriented 'Federal Reserve Banks of I-NPK', Strategic Reserves of bicycles and wheelbarrows [plus repair parts], and SpiderWebRiding Networks emanating from the endpoints of Alan Drake's ideas for the massive recycling of urban O-NPK.
I don't own any land, but if I did: I would not be surprised if I awoke some morning to find out that someone had quietly raked up my autumn leaves the night before to add to their compost pit, or to use as their toilet paper replacement.
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
Tried eBay?
I bought 10-15 of the 10 ounce bars on there about a year ago at $10-11/ounce range.
No mine are not for sale:-)
I'm not surprised there are silver shortages. I started investing in silver a couple of years ago after I discovered there is less above ground silver bullion than gold bullion. The world wide investment market (physical delivery) for silver bullion is tiny. If you are a big investor it is nearly impossible to accumulate a large position without long delays.
In my oppinion this means one thing, eventually there will be a serious silver shortage of above ground bullion. And when that happens silver will rocket in price north of $50. This could happen as soon as this year. Once manufacturers begin hoarding, prices are going to take off.
In 1945 there was about 7-10 billion ounces of silver bullion above ground. Today that has decreased to about 1 billion. Where did it all go? Mostly landfills. Appliances, electronics, cars, etc., are made with traces of silver that are not recyled.
I'm guessing huge amounts went into photographs.
LIBYA
After sanctions were lifted Libya planned to increase oil production capacity to 2 million barrels per day. That objective is expected to occur this year. Libya recently stated a new objective to increase oil production capacity to 3 million barrels per day by 2012. There have been wildcat discoveries in the past couple of years and numerous companies willing to do business with Libya.
Ok, I am perplexed. Leanan is posting daily, Friay, Saturday, and today, over at peakoil.com but not here in the Drumbeat? Is the format of Drumbeat changing in some way? Has Leanan just tired of doing it? Will we get a new Drumbeat editor?
All I know is that Leanan's at spring training. I think the actual process of putting things up over at peakoil.com on the front page is a matter of checking a box (because they have a submission process) and not the extensive HTML work Leanan does over here too. So, it might just be that she had a few minutes and popped things up.
Either way, she deserves a break. :)
That would make sense. A submission process with a form to drop a hyperlink and which auto-extracts the first few paragraphs would make that sort of thing easy, I'd guess. And shouldn't be hard to write, at least in PHP or Java.
Hmmm... let me see if I can locate any mods to Drupal that function similarly. Maybe SuperG can integrate that for Leanan if one already exists.
Update: The only mod I can see quickly that might be adapted to such a functionality would be Bluga Webthumbs. But it's still listed as fairly primitive by its developer although it's in active development. There may be others that I've not found yet.
Leanan is a baseball player too??
Absolutely...a 5 tool player...can throw 120 mph fast ball with a 60mph change up...also runs a 4.1 40 yard dash and can jump tall buildings in a single bound.
Let us also consider trying to limit people production as the Chinese have done.
Truckers save 10 percent on their diesel fuel costs by slowing 10 mph
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080322/slower_truckers.html
Wind resistance at higher speeds caused significant reductions in fuel efficiency. During the oil crisis of the 1970's 55 mph speed limits were imposed nation wide to reduce fuel consumption. Voters polled indicated they prefered a gas tax to conserve fuel over rationing.
Gas price increases over the last few years have demonstrated how horribly inelastic the demand for gasoline is. The reduction in gas use has been virtually undetectable. I don't think anyone really knows what it would take to get,say, a 20% reduction in fuel consumption but my guess it would take gasoline prices of at least $15 per gallon. So, in order to get a significant reduction in gas prices, the level of pain applied must be massive and I don't think the people polled really understand that.
Further,much higher gas prices apply to rich and poor, those who conserve and those who do not.
Rationing would have an immediate direct impact on consumption and could be combined with market forces to reward the frugal while permitting those who consumed high quantities to find their fix at some price. Let the market determine the basic gas price and then provide tradeable certificates to each licensed driver. Those who consumed very little gas or no gas at at could be rewarded twice, onece for not using much gasoline and twice in the premium they would get for their gas certificate.
Drive less or not at all. Save on fuel costs and make some extra money at the same time. Even the homeless and other down and out people could benefit.
After a peak oil lecture a few weeks ago, a woman of the WWII era came up to me and said, "why don't we just ration like we did in WWII?" She was there and obviously didn't think it was all that horrible. She gets it.
At a minimum, we should prepare for the impending downward slope in oil production by putting a rationing system in place so that it could be implemented quickly when things really get bad.
People can be very innovative when the gas is simply not there. All of the sudden, for example, buying a smaller car, renting or buying closer to work, car pooling, or mass transit begins to seem doable. All of the sudden you find that you don't really "need" that SUV or you start thinking about being more efficient in your shopping patterns.
They would save 100% if they slowed down 100%.
High gas prices aid prop-plane comeback
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080323/ap_on_bi_ge/turboprop_renaissance_2;...
I suppose the street car and interurban train systems might make comebacks. Eventually trips to Europe might require steamship or sail... am not sure about this. One thing for sure; the sun and stars will not last forever either.
Went to the super market and saw they raised the price of vegetable oil again this week.
Went to google and found this:
http://www.eeo.com.cn/ens/Industry/2008/03/20/94588.html
The food to fuel initiatives produce terrible consequences.
Actually, I suspect hoarding (a normal human response) as a shortage of anything occurs makes the situation much worse - so expect this to happen for other essentials without alternates other than food, such as crude oil, inorganic fertilisers etc.
Even though I live in an OECD nation, the UK, in my life I have seen hoarding rapidly make a problem supply into a nil supply several times - for petrol, for sugar, for candles, to name but a few.
Governments can be responsible for making things worse too - by filling SPRs for instance or too slow a response to a crisis like New Orleans after Katrina!
Watch what is happening in the poorer nations of the world and see how they cope - they have shortages like peak oil or peak vegetable oil now, life becomes difficult but they don't all die!
Think! If you can determine what is essential and likely to be hoarded you may be able to protect yourself and family in a crisis - try and be proactive, have a well thought out plan B that you can bring rapidly into service if things suddenly change.
If you are going to panic be prepared to be the first to do it! Do not rely on others to look out for you in a suddenly difficult situation, they will be looking after themselves first!
Hello TODers,
Recall my prior posting series on building bat guano harvesting coops, and my speculation that the highest paid people in the country should be bat & bird biologists. Maybe now it is too late:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/science/jan-june08/bats_03-07.html
----------------------------------
March 7-Strange Malady Wreaks Havoc on Bat Population
New Englanders may face an uptick in mosquito swarms, insect bites and moths this summer as a strange malady has threatened the insects' top predator: bats.
..."We may be living in an ecological experiment that will demonstrate the role of bats," Darling said.
-----------------------
Will we see now bat colony collapse disorder like we see for bees?
For TOD newbies:
http://www.soilandhealth.org/03sov/0302hsted/030212campbell/campbell%201...
----------------------
What would the reader think, if he were asked to invest in a gold mine from which all of the ore had been taken out, and, at the end of a year, it had all replaced itself? What would he think, if he had, attached to his mercantile establishment, a warehouse in which, as fast as the goods were removed for display and sale, they would replace themselves without the expenditure on his part of one grain of energy or one cent in money!
-----------------------------------
I am still mind-boggled by the O-NPK info and amounts in this link!
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
I find myself running down the plagues that Moses brought down upon Pharaoh, if you're into that sort of thing.
I picked the wrong week to quit taking Amphetamines..
Bob
Hello Jokuhl,
Thxs for responding. Yep, Mother Nature is just SCREAMING in agony, but we can't hear her from inside the SUV as the radio blares away and the driver yaps endlessly on the cellphone. Bees, Birds, Bats, Polar Bears, Salmon, Tuna, Rhinos, Gorillas, Orangutans, the big Cats--where does it stop? How soon until cockroaches and rats are endangered species?
It would not surprise me if people burn gasoline in their SUV, then scrape the bugs off the front grill and windshield for the family evening dinner. :(
This is not good news either. I posted this story about a couple of weeks ago.
Dehydration caused by something.
Hello Samsara,
I'm sincerely sorry, but somehow I didn't see your original posting of a couple of weeks ago, or I just plain brainfart forgot. But I defer full First Finder's credit to you, as I encourage all TODers to search-engine for the latest breaking news that applies to our Peak Everything situation. My apologies.
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
Al Jazeera - Opec chief sees oil at $80-110
Apparently, Opec is also using the falling dollar excuse to shrug off accusations by the US that it is driving up oil prices. Perhaps Khalil knows something I don't, but $80-$110 seems pretty optimistic to me.
Last August, as the price approached $80, the president of OPEC said the price would be at $60 to $80 for the next year.
It moved out of that range 5 weeks later on a fast rise to $100, and has never been back to $80 since. We will never see $80 again. The next move will be into the $120s, followed by a dip to $110, and then we'll head up again and never see $110 again.
I think OPEC spokesmen simply get tired of answering the same dumb nagging questions day in and day out from the same dumb reporters.
I didn't have a chance to respond to yesterdays birthday thread. After an epiphany in 1999 about peak oil and it's ramifications, I spent a number of years in what could only be described as lonely depression during that portion of my life I allowed myself to go there. Deniers were the rule and people who would share your view few and far between. I actually started on Jeffrey's ELP in 2001, but going it alone was difficult. My wife and most of my friends thought I was crazy. Most of their attitudes are wider open now. The PTB on the Drum
( especially Leanan ), as well as numerous brilliant contributors, have brought some comfort and sanity to my life. Many thanks!
For what it's worth, you are not alone in this affliction.
"I spent a number of years in what could only be described as lonely depression"
Sorry to hear that.
I think everybody gets depressed when they first learn about Peak Oil.
Then they go through the anger, bargaining, etc. phases although not necessarily all or in that order.
I lost the link, but IIRC there is an on-line psychologist who deals with the PO depression thing and publishes the stories of those who are willing to share.
Anyway,
DITTO
HAPPY 3rd BIRTHDAY TOD
You are an oasis in the desert of DeNial.
Dear Oil Drum,
As you know, or might not know, I am running as a write in candidate for President in the 2008 race. My party is Free Right Now. I am a Christian, as such I am Free, but also everyone else is as well, Christ died and is alive today, once and for all. The Free Right Now party theme. But Lest you think it is only about Christian themes. Think about this also. We live in what has been said to be the Only Free Nation in the world. As citizens of this nation we are Free Right Now. Let us not loss that freedom to anyone.
Vote for me Charles Edward Owens Jr. Or as I normally write it, Charles E. Owens Jr. Write my name in on your ballot.
I Don't want you to send me money. I do not ask for donations. I am a freely paid for Candidate, you either vote for me or you do not. I do not care if you do or you don't. If I were to be elected, I would ask that my salary be set at the lowest wage in the nation, below everyone elses, 1 Penny a day. After all on it's face side we have the words "In God We Trust" stamped into it. In God I Trust alone, for everything I am.
I would also set Congress, both houses, If I can possibly do it within the frame work of the Nations Rules, to only get the lowest wage in the nation, that others have set to be what they give people to live on. They would get only that to live on while they do their jobs for those that elected them, so that they would better understand what they have told other Americans they have to live on.
There are somethings that I have not formulated my policy on yet, so if you have an issue that you want to know about that I have not said anything about, write me.
ceojr1963@yahoo.com
I am going to in the next few little whiles mirror this to my blog which is at dan-ur.blogspot.com
Thank You,
The Peace of Christ to you all.
Charles E. Owens Jr.
North Little Rock, Arkansas.
Uh...
What a country we live in. We're all f*cked!
"I am a Christian, as such I am Free"
No, as such you have abdicated your freedom of thought and judgement to a bizarro blood cult headed up by a wrathful and vindictive Bronze Age sky god. But, hey, whatever works for you!
We are all free to believe in whatever we want. Flying saucers, pink unicorns, Christ, Zeus, Chthulu, FSM, you name it.
Happy Easter! Spring is coming! It is real!
and one that rips off every other sun cult and lunar/stealer cult in the region.
You see here is the beauty of what I said and what you said together. In this country I was taught that your opinion is just as valid as mine is. In my faith, I understand that what you think and what I think will be two different things. I am not here to convince you of anything. That is my personal Christian point of view. Nor can I convince anyone of anything, unless anything I say touches something inside them and they themselves change. I do not care. I do not worry about where you are going.
I do trust something that you might or might not trust. I have faith that you might or might not have. Neither one of us can change much about anything in life after we die, it is only while we live that we can change anything about ourselves.
For what it is worth, I retired soon after getting out of High School. I learned how to program online in High School, Class of 1981. I live in a home that is mine, albeit I live with my parents, but I am the heir of this family home, it is paid for. My dad amoung other things is an Executive Chef, Has been since before I was born. Free Schooling, I am not papered as it were, Paper Degrees mean nothing really.
Love ya,
Charles.
That was unfortunate, Sgage.
you just went down a few pegs.
Wish you well on your rather offbeat political career... but I doubt TOD really wants to have people campaigning through their website. Responding to energy policy questions - yes, but soliciting support (even if non-financial) - ???
I have been on TOD for about 2 and 1/2 years. I have seen and read most of the things on here. I was a regular poster last year, when I originally posted my run up was on or around July 17th 2008. Tag my name as you can tag anyone's name and read the posters bio-info.
I am VERY Peak OIL aware, have been for over 20 years, even though most of you might shake your heads at that. If you have been a thinking person, You'd have known something was up ages ago.
I have read the reports and news articles and the stuff most of you have, but I do it for the information it gives me in doing my hobby better. I am a Techno-Geek. The world is no more complicated than it even was. We just have access to more of the information at our fingertips than we did 30 years ago, when researching something took weeks if not months.
Now I can in a matter of minutes, get hacked, hack back and pass the message on to the next team leader in the great ball game called "Kill the Hacker".
Hey Bob Shaw! Where are you when I need you to tell them who I really am....
Love Ya,
Charles.
Darwinian, check you mail, blogs up.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080324/bs_nm/usa_housing_paydayloans_dc;_yl...
Looks like pay day loans is making the housing situation worse.
Hello Magadorm,
Yikes!--That is all I can say for this link--Thxs!
Hey Bob, Check out Arkansas, The Attorney General is trying to ban over 153 of these "pay-day" loan companies from doing business in Arkansas.
Send me E.mail I have a few thoughts on your Yeast question for off list.
Love,
Charles.
Minister understands:
Other notable quote: "the United States is supposed to be a country where people can voice their opinions"
Mish had this posted at the top of his site this morning...about 7:30am, 3-24-08. If TODers, or aquaintences of TODers, need any items to complete their home stock, ie, baby food, candles, toilet paper, staple foods, water, etc, this might be a good time to purchase those items. I have no idea how this strike, or proposed strike, will play out. How will the large trucking companies react? In any case having a few 'extra' staples on hand is not a bad idea. I recently read that about 10% of all independent truckers have already parked their rigs because they were not making a living after maintenance costs and fuel prices were deducted from income.
I am not advocating hoarding. I am advocating the motto of all Boy Scouts. 'Be Prepared'. I noticed that above posts contained comments about silver/gold being in short supply. If you think that silver disappeared quickly, how fast do you think groceries and orther staples will disappear from store shelves?
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/
'Open Letter To All Truckers
Trucker Dan is proposing a National Trucking Shutdown as follows:
April 1, 2008 is when My trucking Co & thousands of others are shutting down at 8 AM on that date. From that time on we will no longer accept any loads at ANY price until such time as our FED Gov admits & puts into action a plan that will give all O/Os some help.
Here is what I would like to see happen,
1# suspend ALL Fed & State fuel taxes until such time that this economy is back on its feet
2# Fed create a FED Oversight Committee to oversee Ins Premiums Charged for Class 8 trucks Insurance
3# Stop allowing Large Trucking Fleets to self Insure, this would make a more level playing field for all trucking Cos
4# Fed Regulations for Brokers & Shippers that are enforced, with set max amounts they can charge.
5# Standardized Fines from Coast to Coast for safety violations. In other words if a log ticket cost $50.00 in Missouri then a log ticket in California should only cost $50.00
I will not return to hauling until our Gov. the people we put into office gets off their butts an does something to help this Industry my email address is dlittle@uscattlehaulers.com
Send me an email if you plan on shutting down on April 1, 2008'
I'm doubtful that this would have the desired effect without the direct involvement of the teamsters. Especially with the choice of April Fools Day. I mean, this type of voluntary shut down would likely be spread by word of mouth, and people are especially skeptical whenever "April 1st" comes up in conversation.
Not to mention, that the site statistics show <5000 hits. I just don't see enough site traffic or support to see this having a great effect.
That being said, I hope that whatever the independant and union truckers try in the future, they are successful in improving our government's public stance on these issues.
freeyourmind...I have a friend that drives for a upscale auto transport company. It is not unusual for his truck to be transporting $5 million dollars worth of autos at any time. I spoke with him yesterday, 3-23-08, on a cell phone...He asked me the question 'Have you seen anything on the internet about a truckers strike?'. I replied 'no'. Then he said 'its all over the grapevine, in the truck stops, and on the radio, I am surprised that it isn't on the internet.' This could be a black swan or it could be a bunch of baloney...but, my baloney detection module didn't go off.
Well, it is now...One day after he asked me about it. I found another source for the story via Prudent Bear, link below.
http://www.qctimes.com/articles/2008/03/19/news/iowa/doc47e03e9ea03bd427...
'What started as a small, online grassroots effort now appears to have the potential for something bigger.
Dan Little, the owner/operator of a livestock hauling company in Carrollton, Mo., estimated Tuesday that at least 1,000 other truckers from across the United States have committed so far to joining him in a strike on April 1.
Although none of the truckers interviewed Tuesday at the Iowa 80 Truck Stop, Walcott, which is just off Interstate 80 west of Davenport, has heard of the intended strike, some said they would shut down, too.
Weldon Kinnison, a Virginia trucker who was hauling soft drink from Indiana to Denver, heard about the plans for a strike for the first time Tuesday while stopping at Walcott.
“I’m an owner/operator with the American Truckers Association,” he said. “I’d park my truck for a week with the cattle haulers.
“The fuel is too high, and there’s no reason for it. I don’t listen to the CB (radio) that much, but I guess I’ll start now.”...snip...
That's about half a million dollars per car. What kind of cars is he transporting anyway?
Ron Patterson
I just re-watched the BBC drama "If the Oil Runs Out" last night and a major subplot relates to problems in the US trucking industry. The opening scenes take place at the start of 2016 when oil crosses $100 barrel for the first time. Looks like the BBC set it 8 years too late - rumour was they intended to set it in 2010 but didn't want to frighten people too much. It was made in 2006.
Real BBC News presenters appear in the drama-doc as do figures such as Matt Simmons. Absolutely no doubt the BBC knows all about peak oil even if it seems to have virtually banned mention recently.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/if/4989146.stm
Happy Birthday, TOD!
Longtime (almost daily) reader, occasional commentator (in an earlier life as Vermont Agatha Zoe). Have learned and continue to learn a lot from TOD. Although I've been Peak Oil aware since 2005 and even taught (with a much more knowledgeable colleague) an introductory college course on PO in the spring of 2006, I haven't felt I had much to contribute to the TOD discussions.
What I most appreciate about TOD, apart from the technical expertise of the various contributors, is the self-correcting character of the principled and respectful dialogue at the site. Congratulations and thank you!
I might add that, although I am by profession an historian of philosophy and early modern science, not a scientist per se, I feel a special kin with many folks at TOD; because my father was a petroleum engineer, working for ARAMCO just after WW II, then Socony Vacuum in Nigeria and Angola. I remember living in Nigeria and Angola (which I left for good in 1953!), but not Egypt, where I was born. My father is no longer alive, but I do wonder what he would have made of Peak Oil.
Anyway, thanks again for all the hard work you do and all the valuable, fascinating, and often chilling conversations that result.
One little clue about my inclinations: as a gift of appreciation,I gave the colleague with whom I team-taught the freshman-seminar-like course on Peak Oil a little enamel refrigerator magnet of Cicero's remark, "Dum spiro spero" ("While I breathe, I hope!").
All the best,
beingtime