Guest post by orgfarm
Part 2 of 3
The “Sixties”
Severe food and energy shortages intensify in 2060, and ignite national fear and anger. State survival now depends on seizing the last reserves of vital resources – primarily fossil-fuel – making war inevitable. Alliances form, nations act with righteous determination, conflict erupts around the world.
But military operations are energy intensive – and thus energy limited. Over time, state war machines begin to consume more resources than they seize – a combat negative EROI. The fighting leaves industrial infrastructure – including refineries – in ruins. Stocks of transport fuels, food, and equipment – required for battle – are depleted and cannot be replaced. After a decade of conflict, major hostilities slowly grind to a halt.
The 150 year project known as “modern industrial civilization” has suffered irreparable damage, insuring the experiment will not be run again.
Without fossil-fuel, industrial agriculture shuts down. Food is grown manually, production is meager, people are hungry. Without fossil-fuel, industrial “renewable energy” shuts down. Wind towers become corroding monuments to a bygone age. Without fossil-fuel, industrial economies shut down. Surviving nations adapt, reset priorities, and now seize control of top-soil, water, and forest resources. Remaining wealthy regions in isolated parts of the world stubbornly resist but are eventually overrun.
Without fossil-fuel, cities become unlivable, dangerous, and are abandoned. Scavenger groups strip anything of value left behind. In un-defended suburbs, wood-framed buildings and trees are used for fuel. Notably, schools and libraries are not spared. Humans born after 2040 are now un-educated young adults. If not conscripted or scavenging, they work in agricultural fields helping their families “meet quota” in various neo-feudal land sharing arrangements.
In rural areas, wind is captured by canvas, and water harnessed by small dams – powering mills to grind grain, pump water, provide mechanical energy for primitive machinery. But take note: the energy density of wind and water is a mere fraction of fossil-fuel energy and cannot keep billions of people alive.
By the end of the decade, starvation, disease, and savage global war take a shocking toll. Population declines by 3 billion. Health care becomes hospice care.
The “Seventies”
Most of the world’s people now survive on wood energy. As remaining forests are cut down, some communities learn to grow and manage woodlots using coppice and pollard techniques. Wood becomes the primary energy source and a valuable commodity in the post-civ age.
Importantly, it’s made into charcoal to fuel the forges that shape scavenged metal into tools for farming, devices for the home, parts for wagons and boats that move goods and supplies . In a few regions, a return to steam power is considered a high-technological achievement – until wood supplies run low.
Some coal remains, but without oil-dependent mining equipment, reserves are inaccessible using manual labor. Production is negligible, certainly not enough to keep billions of people alive.
Communities become isolated as commerce, communication, and transportation systems shut down from lack of power, damage, looters, or neglect. Barter economies emerge in rural areas. In lively, local street markets, people trade goods and news, tell stories, find solace and maybe some cheer. Time slows and the world expands as traveling any distance now becomes difficult and dangerous.
Blacksmithing, animal husbandry, militia training, are important community activities – but farming is essential. Food must be produced if there is any hope of surviving “these terrible times”. Alas, fossil-fuel based fertilizer is no longer available. Low yields cannot feed billions of people. Without Haber-Bosch, growing crops in depleted soils is nearly impossible.
Humans begin to accept the existential risk and harsh realities of their predicament.
Population continues its steep decline. By the end of the decade, starvation, disease, exposure, high infant mortality, trauma, and resignation cause a loss of 4 billion. Most are buried quickly without ceremony as overwhelmed cultures adapt and customs change.
The “Eighties”
Many regions of the world, once dotted with countless towns and cities amid great expanses of farmland, are now un-inhabited. Life is scarce in these barren and eroded landscapes. Nomadic people seasonally wander this windswept scrubland with small flocks, looking for pasture and seeking shelter in the scattered rubble.
Like most biodiversity, many mammal and bird species are extinct from habitat loss and over-hunting by desperate humans. Natural systems – the foundation of all economic production – are severely degraded. Ecosystem services – that enable human well-being – are damaged and diminished. The biosphere has been transformed by overshoot.
Without fossil-fuel driven complexity, declining populations return to fundamental social units and revert to basic moral codes and values. Family unity, loyalty, and heritage provide stability and protection in a chaotic and haunted world. Hard-wired tribalism – suppressed in the age of cheap and plentiful food and energy – reemerges as a group organizing principle and shapes cultural identity, custom, and tradition.
Human life expectancy is 50 years. No one alive has lived in “modern industrial civilization”. Folks have little understanding or interest in how or why “collapse” occurred. Getting safely through the night and surviving another winter occupies most thinking.
But a change is noticed. As population density falls, conflict and violence recede. Death rates decline. Tentative peace, and more workers, increase food production – though famine and malnutrition remain constant threats.
By the end of the decade, total population hovers precariously at 1 billion (a relatively “sustainable” level – a century ago).
Part 3 will outline The “Nineties” and conclude with a Requiem and a Question.
Non Petroleum comments are also welcome below.
I like the phrase: “combat negative EROI”. The rest sounds about right for some decades but as you previously said it could be a couple of decades earlier (or later maybe). One thing I think will be significant will be increasing climate instability. Major, damaging events will be much more frequent than now and there will be no possibility of prediction and avoidance before they occur or triage and recovery afterwards. Once a category 6 hurricane hits somewhere most people die in place and the survivors abandon it. Similarly agriculture will be especially difficult in an unstable climate where in any given year there would be a significant probability that the harvests could be total losses due to drought, floods or heatwaves (and any two such seasons consecutively would kill pretty much the whole population – with any left forced to move or try to survive as hunter-gathers in a degraded ecosystem). This is on top of the average yield loss caused by rising average temperatures, degradation of soils, inundation and salinisation of the most productive delta and estuary lands, and loss of deep aquifer irrigation – and, of course, no NPK to cover up all those issues.
“One thing I think will be significant will be increasing climate instability.” – George Kaplan
Yes, that issue is covered briefly in Part 3 (spoiler alert):
“…but because [this scenario] does not account for the force multiplier of several high probability events: non-linear climate change, unlimited nuclear exchange, wide spread nuclear power plant meltdown, international biochemical warfare, to name a few….”
One of the subtle points attempted in this scenario was to show how collapse could occur just by exceeding carrying capacity and going into “overshoot”. And that situation by itself – excluding all of the other difficult problems that will be encountered – is enough to put our species in great danger.
Lukasch, on the petroleum thread a few days ago, pointed out correctly that peak oil was a “symptom” of overshoot. Dennis Meadows correctly and calmly pointed out in a recent interview (50th anniversary of the Limits to Growth publication) that climate change is a “symptom” of overshoot. All systems-thinking type folks understand this.
The major headline issues that the media tells us must get solved, all intentionally ignore that they are symptoms of overshoot. Why? Because stabilizing and then decreasing population level is no longer a politically correct topic to discuss. And because stabilizing and decreasing consumption threatens corporate profits and the economy.
It’s much easier for media to conclude that science and technology will solve peak oil or climate change or pollution or loss of biodiversity… rather than identify, and deal with, the cause of all those issues – which is… too many people consuming too many resources.
Anyone who has worked with people, business, or government will know that humans much prefer to treat a symptom instead of confronting directly, the cause of a problem – it’s easier, less expensive, and will get you re-elected.
Of course that’s not effective problem solving. In fact, it’s intellectually dishonest and irresponsible. Why then does it happen so often? To a certain extent it’s hard-wired, like greed.
But it’s also due to living without consequences in an era of cheap food and energy. This brief moment in human history, called the fossil-fuel age, will soon pass and folks will know once again, up close and personal, the consequences of treating symptoms instead of dealing with causes.
Arctic sea ice extent has been quite high through the winter but the peripheral seas on the Atlantic side are currently getting smashed by a series of storms and warm Pacific waters are encroaching into the Chukchi Sea. Hence the area has been plummeting the last two days with more to come. By Wednesday a major storm and above freezing temperatures will be sitting over the North Pole. In previous years thick multiyear ice might have acted as a bulwark against the storms but that has mostly gone. It has only been possible to attempt measurements of sea ice thickness relatively recently and the initial results have shown winter thinning to be significant.
“Arctic sea ice snow depth is estimated, for the first time, from a combination of lidar (ICESat-2) and radar (CryoSat-2) data. Using these estimates of snow depth and the height of sea ice exposed above water, the study found multiyear Arctic sea ice has lost 16% of its winter volume, or approximately half a meter (about 1.5 feet) of thickness, in the three years since the launch of ICESat-2.”
https://phys.org/news/2022-03-icesat-remarkable-arctic-sea-ice.html
This shows the coming storms:
https://climatereanalyzer.org/wx/fcst/?mdl_id=gfs&dm_id=arc-lea&wm_id=prcp-mslp-gph500
And this shows the extent measurements:
https://ads.nipr.ac.jp/vishop/#/extent/&time=2017-10-20 00:00:00
Note that the shown line is an average of recent days (I’m not sure how many but 2-5 I think) so there is a lag which means even without additional storms the extent would continue falling for a couple of days.
Imagine a world where we could all spend time watching ice melt instead of worrying about getting caught up in war, conflict, famine, poverty, prejudice, or any number of other real atrocities.
imagine this:
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019GL082914
“Abstract
During recent decades, there has been dramatic Arctic sea ice retreat. This has reduced the top-of-atmosphere albedo, adding more solar energy to the climate system. There is substantial uncertainty regarding how much ice retreat and associated solar heating will occur in the future. This is relevant to future climate projections, including the timescale for reaching global warming stabilization targets. Here we use satellite observations to estimate the amount of solar energy that would be added in the worst-case scenario of a complete disappearance of Arctic sea ice throughout the sunlit part of the year. Assuming constant cloudiness, we calculate a global radiative heating of 0.71 W/m2 relative to the 1979 baseline state. This is equivalent to the effect of one trillion tons of CO2 emissions. These results suggest that the additional heating due to complete Arctic sea ice loss would hasten global warming by an estimated 25 years.”
No need to imagine this:
https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/
The trend line line is looking rather ominous.
No need to imagine this:
https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/
The trend line is looking rather ominous.
“What happens in the arctic doesn’t stay in the arctic.” – Paul Beckwith
I have done a lot of research and can only apply the conclusion that earth is in an interglacial period and (generally) by warming exhibiting the same behavior as in every other interglacial period. Further on point, there is heat stored in our oceans which will be shed over time to melt ice so that action is not unprecedented either.
NITELITE,
Earth is in an interglacial, yes, but it isn’t acting like previous ones. The pattern is for a fairly fast end to the glacial followed by rapid warming during which CO2 and methane rise quickly for a couple of thousand years and then begin to decline for around ten thousand years until temperatures are low enough for the next glacial to start to develop. By then the CO2 level in the atmosphere is about 280 ppm or a little below.
In the early part of the current interglacial, CO2 and methane rose quickly and began to decline but the decline stopped and levels began rising, linked to forest clearance for agriculture in the Old World, as they still are. CO2 level should have bottomed out around 280 ppm by the late 1880s but it didn’t, and it’s now 413 ppm, higher than it has been for 3 million years or so, and still rising. We’ve postponed the next glacial, for who knows how long, and we’ve done it largely by turning buried carbon in the form of coal and petroleum back into CO2. CO2 keeps much of the infrared emitted by Earth’s surface from heading out into space, and the warming since early in this interglacial is the result.
SYNAPSID —
Spot on as usual. This is the kind of comment we need here.
Best move for a population of organisms in condition of severe population overshoot and vulnerable to ambient earth conditions too hot or too cold, is to
rapidly downsize as a deliberate effort.
Rather than being forced to downsize via famine and warfare.
But that would assume the organism has some wisdom and foresight.
“Best move for a population of organisms in condition of severe population overshoot and vulnerable to ambient earth conditions too hot or too cold, is to
rapidly downsize as a deliberate effort.”
And I assume you’d want to start your forced population reduction in North America and Europe to make the greatest difference as soon as possible.
Synapsid, warm periods in the geological record lead to a build up of CO2. Therefore, we conclude that increased CO2 concentration is the result of global climate change, not the cause.
Nitelight,
The sole reason earth evolved humans was to help break itself free from the glacial-interglacial cycle it had fallen into over the past 20 million years. Which we have successfully done. And get itself back to the hot house climate it had enjoyed over the vast majority of its existence.
😀
And so Iron Mike…
I suppose with our purpose fulfilled we are free to wander off?
With our purpose fulfilled, we will end up with the same fate as the rest of the 99.99% of all species that have lived on this planet. So in some ways yes wander off would be the correct word usage.
Good links, George.
Here’s the Ch-arctic Interactive Sea Ice Graph from “Arctic Sea Ice News & Analysis”:
https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/
Looking rather ominous at the moment.
FYI: each of the above 3 comments disappeared when they were sent. Ron found them in a separate folder and just approved all 3. Only intended to post one of them. They are a reply to George Kaplan’s Arctic comment. Apologies for any confusion.
Without fossil-fuel, cities become unlivable, dangerous, and are abandoned.
Cities predate fossil fuels by millennia. Suburbanites forget how dependent they are on fossil fuel for heat and transportation. That is where the fantasies about living in a shack in Montana come from. There’s nothing to eat out there, which is why it is empty. If there really is a serious energy crisis, the suburbs will empty out before the cities do, because suburbanites won’t be able to drive their three ton SUVs to the shopping mall to get a loaf of bread.
In a typical American city 80% of the land is dedicated to single family unity on large lots. The main crop is lawn grass. Subsistence farming on land like this makes much more sense than going out into the wilderness where trade is impossible because of the long distances involved.
Cities predate the Haber-Bosch process also. Yet today, half their population would die without it. Simply stating how cities were when the population was half a billion people cannot possibly be any indication as to how they could survive without the fossil fuel that was directly responsible for the population explosion.
Small cities predate the fossil fuel driven population explosion. Food to feed the cities population in those days could be hauled into town from nearby farms in an oxcart. To say that 7.8 billion people could return to that way of life is preposterous. A fifth grader should know better.
Two thirds of nitrogen fertilizer and more than half the phosphorus is wasted. Poor farming practices means artificial fertilizers mostly pollute the environment instead of feeding people.
https://ourworldindata.org/excess-fertilizer
So destroying the land is only one of dumb things modern farmers do. I know it isn’t politically correct to criticize farmers, but they do a terrible job and are ruining the planet.
Haber-Bosch is not the only way to synthesize ammonia.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360319921012660
But neither of these have much to do with the fact that people in low population density areas are more more fossil fuel than in high population areas. One reason is that they drive more.
https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation.aspx?paperid=111813
Consider Holland, one of the world’s largest exporters of food and most densely populated countries. EVs are spreading rapidly. The country’s train system runs on wind energy. And its cities look like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPHnVU_UO0I&ab_channel=Streetfilms
Dutch living standards are among the highest in the world.
Alim , as Robert De Niro said in Taxi Driver ” You talking to me ” . Your post ” Consider Holland, one of the world’s largest exporters of food and most densely populated countries. EVs are spreading rapidly. The country’s train system runs on wind energy. And its cities look like this:” .
Yeah , I know . I live in Belgium but my son and daughter live in Netherlands ( no it is not Holland for me ,just like Germany is Deutschland for me ) and am there pretty often plus I have old business associates who I am in touch with . What the NL train system does is buy CC credits from other companies and proclaims it is running on renewables . Renewables just like shale , a scam . Oh , just to give you some additional info . The fruits and vegetables grown in Netherlands are in glass houses powered by Natural gas . Prices of this are now hitting the roof . Just purchased 4 tomatoes at a discount store cost was Eur 2.95 for 4pcs .
Ron’s dead on.
Modern day cities and towns will basically cease to exist if and when the electrical, water, and sewer grids go down.
The ones that do continue to exist will be rather small and located in places where water from a river is readily available and the surrounding countryside consists of decent farmland. Being on a coast with a harbor will mean a hell of a lot, or on a navigable river.
With you and Ron on this . Urban living is ” Import of resources , export of waste ” . This cycle will be shutdown with dwindling energy resources . The garbage trucks don’t run on piss , it is diesel .
P.S : What does Washington or Brussels produce ? Nothing but paper .
It took only 50 years for the cities studding the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean to go from opulence to ashes, circa 1200 BC. The disaster was mostly likely triggered by long-term drought, followed by famine, disease and war.
Once the collapse began, the “Sea Peoples” took to their boats, and complements of refugees hit the roads with their carts and beasts and burned the cities one by one–Mycenae, Knossos, Hatti, Ugarit and so on. The hordes swept through Anatolia, Mesopotamia, Canaan and down as far as Egypt.
From a clay tablet found in Ugarit:
“When your messenger arrived, the army was humiliated and the city was sacked. Our food in the threshing floors was burned and the vineyards were also destroyed. Our city is sacked. May you know it! May you know it!”
Once the tin and copper trade routes were disrupted, that was that. Most of those cities were never reinhabited and literacy was lost for centuries.
The vast majority of the people then lived hardscrabble lives. There had been many malcontents, called habiru, in the hinterlands, waiting to bring the system down. It was really the elite that lost, and they lost hard.
We modern humans are nowhere near as close to the bone as the ancients were: We’re fucking hopeless without our civilizations.
It is simply unreal how quickly things can fall apart.
That’s the Seneca Effect for you.
mikeb,
Just curious, what happened to your 2 comments posted earlier this morning? They went missing about 30 minutes after reading them.
I posted a second comment to George, and that too went missing.
Ovi, Ron…any idea?
I deleted a comment to a troll, somewhere above. I kick myself for wasting my time.
I read the comments in the trash file. They were spot on. I wish you hadn’t deleted them. The second comment that got deleted was probably posted as a reply to the one deleted. When you delete a comment, all replies to that comment get deleted automatically.
” . . . So, can it be a coincidence that the most
54:17 cataclysmic eruption of Hekla we know about was the one that took place
54:21 sometime around the Year 1100 BC, right as the Bronze Age collapse reached its
54:27 height? This eruption is known as Hekla 3. It threw nearly seven-and-a-half
54:34 cubic kilometers of volcanic rock into the atmosphere and covered the sky in a
54:39 dark shroud of dust that would have lasted for years after the event. In
54:43 Ireland, studies done on bog oaks, those are trees half-fossilized in marshy
54:49 waters, have shown that for 18 years after the eruption of Hekla 3, the trees
54:53 barely grew at all. Across the Atlantic in the United States,
54:58 Bristlecone Pines, the oldest living trees on earth, still show similar
55:03 records of this time of darkness and cooling which seems to have lasted about
55:07 two decades. The effect on our region would have been dramatic; crops
55:13 would have failed, soils would have blown away, and more than that; the dark cloud that
55:19 seemed to hang over the sun would have spoken to people of something dreadful
55:23 on its way, a punishment from the gods and perhaps even the end of the world. . . . ”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B965f8AcNbw
Yes, this is a good video. Also see presentations by Eric Cline, though he is not convinced of the climate change hypothesis.
Kaniewski and others believe the Hekla eruption occurred right in the middle of a general trend toward a cooler, much drier climate in the Mediterranean. It made a bad situation worse.
PLOS ONE
OFM —
True, but the grid is unlikely to fail from a lack of fossil fuel.
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=50818
In fact a massive transition away from fossil fuel burning is already underway in America. In many place building new solar is cheaper than maintaining existing coal fired plants. And the more solar comes on line, the lower the capacity factor of traditional power sources, especially in the daylight hours where they charge more for electricity.
And it isn’t just America. China is expected to add 75-90 GW of solar in 2022.
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202202/1252959.shtml
Meanwhile the Russian invasion of Ukraine has focused minds in Europe around reducing dependence on foreign (especially Russian) fuel.
https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_22_1511
ALIMBIQUATED
“If there really is a serious energy crisis, the suburbs will empty out before the cities do”
“A suburb (suburban or suburban area) is an area outside the downtown of a city, which may include commercial and mixed-use, but is primarily a residential area.”
I think you have it backwards and the suburbs are the better place to live. Supermarkets, restaurants, hardware stores, medical care and drug stores are all within walking distance. Bicycles would become a convenience or luxury from a walking standard. The larger lot size compared to a downtown city will be an advantage. With its ability to supplement food supplies, solar energy production, a latrine, workshop and space to store needed conveniences & supplies.
Probably the most important factor is the climate zone. A Mediterranean climate will be the best factor of a quality life style. Making winter conditions acceptable without fossil fuel and adding ability to supplement food production.
“drive their three ton SUVs”
Todays, 90 percent of modern suburban SUV’s are two tons or less and can get about 50 MPG highway at optimal speed with great utility. Also, 99 percent of the fuel consumed by them are for luxury or convince and not necessity. Government will ration fuel for necessity food production and distribution when push comes to shove.
>Supermarkets, restaurants, hardware stores, medical care and drug stores are all within walking distance.
Maybe we aren’t talking about the same thing.
“A suburb (suburban or suburban area) is an area outside the downtown of a city”
That’s why I started my comment with Wikipedia definition of suburban. I consider the Los Angeles basin suburban except for a few of its largest cities downtown area and the very edges along the mountains suburban. All of these services(Supermarkets, restaurants, hardware stores, medical care and drug stores) are within less than a mile of more than 95 percent of everyone who lives in the LA basin.
The LA basin is petty much a Mediterranean climate. The technology now exists that didn’t 10 years. That 95 % of all the individuals homes in the basin could power their transportation, lighting and HVAC needs with solar panels.
Northern cities without a source of reliable heat may become uninhabitable quickly in collapse while small rural communities with plenty of coppiced wood, knowledge/skills/tools and regenerative farming practices may be safer without the threat of marauding gangs from those abandoned cities.
On an on it goes.
RECORD DEFORESTATION IN BRAZILIAN AMAZON IN FEBRUARY
“The first two months of this year both set records for deforestation — 629 square kilometers so far, more than triple last year.”
That fueled fears 2022 could see even worse destruction in the Brazilian Amazon than last year, when deforestation hit a 15-year high of 13,235 square kilometers from August 2020 to July 2021, according to INPE monitoring program, Prodes, whose records go back to 1988.
https://phys.org/news/2022-03-deforestation-brazilian-amazon-february.html
Here’s an articles comparing solar panels to planting corn for ethanol.
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/03/11/solar-plus-food-in-ethanol-fields-could-fully-power-the-united-states/
1 acre of solar panels provides enough energy to propel America’s most popular electric vehicle – the Tesla Model Y – nearly 1.3 million miles per year…
… a comparable crossover SUV averaging 30 miles per gallon would travel only 6,600 miles per year on that acre of corn.
So you get about 200 times the mileage per acre from solar. And this doesn’t even address the fact that 60% of car trips are under six miles, meaning they could be done on bike.
https://www.energy.gov/eere/vehicles/articles/fotw-1042-august-13-2018-2017-nearly-60-all-vehicle-trips-were-less-six-miles
Any discussion of societal change brought about by fuel shortages needs to address the issue of efficiency, which is currently abysmal.
Yep.
Even better would be to place the utility scale solar production not on prime farmland where corn ethanol is grown (SE Iowa for example) but rather on even sunnier ground that is much less productive for food, fiber or wildlife (such as SE Colorado).
That 600 mile shift would give over 20% increase in annual energy yield, and move the solar from an area that gets roughly 35″/yr to 20″/yr (or less).
example
Even better would be to put the PV arrays on surfaces that are already impervious to rain: roofs especially. A bonus is the possibility of distributing both the energy and the economic benefits to the population. Current utility scaled projects, though much cheaper to construct, consolidate ownership in the hands of the wealthy and expand the destruction of the natural world.
If civilization does fall apart as this post projects, then it would be much better to spread out generating capacity such that it can be taken care of by those who use it. An analogy to biological diversity and resilience.
Jim
We need both.
Yes distributed generation and roof installs are good, but like you say much more expensivekWh-
” 2019 non-partisan estimates put the midpoint unsubsidised levelised cost for residential rooftop solar at 20¢/kWh, for commercial/industrial rooftop solar at 11¢/kWh, and for grid-scale solar at 4¢/kWh.”
https://www.lazard.com/media/451086/lazards-levelized-cost-of-energy-version-130-vf.pdf
Also rain has no problem percolating on PV installations, since lots of open space between arrays.
The ownership issue is not quite so clear cut as you say.
Whether on a big roof or in a field, the potential exists for coop or community type ownership structure. Just needs to to be set up.
We need much more of this- https://www.seia.org/initiatives/community-solar
Nonetheless, everyone who has a sunny roof and has some dollars would be wise to own solar on their roof.
The overshoot disruption described in this posting will be extremely variable in timing and severity, with some places finding energy and food unaffordable and/or unattainable as soon as now, and conversely a few other places perhaps able to string things along for decades prior to declining. The short term chaos in certain countries is unlikely to remain strictly within their borders.
Watch the grain supply and pricing situation this year to get a glimpse of things to come- some countries will enter into severe shortage of wheat. How much fertilizer supply will be off the market for next years planting?
Chaos is not a fertile ground for democracy, education, diplomacy, and civil rights.
Some of you may have been following an Oregon company with a small electric vehicle
Arcimoto.
They have unveiled a new product in late stage development- an innovative 3 wheeled tilt electric bike.
These things (or some version) will be widely adopted I suspect-
(the two videos on the page are well worth watching)
https://www.arcimoto.com/mlm
I had seen Arcimoto’s other products, but this was news to me…and this is awesome.
I drove to work today instead of using my ebike; it snowed yesterday, and the current conditions (about +3C) made the chance of wet ice too great for me to risk it. I would have taken this thing, however.
“this is awesome.”
Yes, that was my reaction as well.
I suspect they will may a small cargo version of it in the next phase.
I got a chance to visit the headquarters last summer.
Lots of good energy buzzing around them.
You can take the vehicles out for 1 hour test ride around the town.
“Access to information is key to pace of adopting a new technology like electric cars and trucks
In a previous column, I argued that the 2020s would be the “disruptive decade” (when the new technology becomes competitive) for electric vehicle adoption, just as the 1920s were for tractors. In this column, I want to discuss another similarity between EVs and power-farming, as it was often called: the complexity of buying the new technologies. Fortunately for modern consumers, they have a big leg up on their great-grandparents thanks to social media.
My social media feeds are full of consumers debating the relative merits of electric vs. internal combustion. Capital costs (purchase price), operating costs, public charging, range anxiety, service, and many more factors come into play. And the experience of Canadians in BC and Quebec, the only provinces with ZEV mandates and therefore an adequate supply of EVs to buy, is different than it is for others.
This reminds me of early attempts to speed up the adoption of tractors in Saskatchewan and hybrid corn in Iowa.”
https://energi.media/markham-on-energy/social-media-speeding-up-ev-adoption/
“Contrary to prevailing perceptions, renewable electricity is already competitive with fossil fuels, and, given today’s high gas prices, significant volumes of biomethane and green hydrogen will also now be economical. Indeed, we vastly underestimate the value of green gas. Unlike prices for traditional gas, renewable energy costs are generally known upfront and can be locked in for the entire project lifetime, which brings us to the question; with falling renewable energy prices and extreme gas price volatility, can blue hydrogen stay competitive?
Today’s fossil-based energy crisis, which is almost certain to be repeated in the future, should fundamentally change our perception of green gases as “expensive” alternatives. Furthermore, the prices attributed to fossil fuels do not reflect costly externalities, such as the health, environmental and climate impacts, all of which should be taken into account in the economics of the energy transition.
Governments must take account of the true cost of energy and consider the opportunities that renewable energy offers us to future-proof our economies and insulate them from the volatility and insidious long-term costs of fossil fuels.”
https://energi.media/opinion/renewables-and-green-gas-the-only-viable-antidote-to-high-fossil-fuel-prices/
“renewable energy costs are generally known upfront and can be locked in for the entire project lifetime,”
That is a very important point.
I don’t understand why wind turbines would be allowed to degrade if they are so desperate for energy.
“…why would wind turbines be allowed to degrade…” – bradley
Because fossil-fuel is required to maintain them.
No fossil-fuel, no maintenance. No maintenance, they don’t work.
Rust, like entropy, never sleeps.
What part of the repair process couldn’t be done with electrical power ?
“What part of the repair process couldn’t be done with electrical power?” – huntingtonbeach
Now I know why mikeb deleted his comment this morning.
So you don’t know. Just repeating from Tverbreg’s 10 year old post.
Mack Trucks LR Electric
https://www.macktrucks.com/trucks/lr-series/lr-electric/specs/
I continually oscillate between wanting to comment here and feeling dispirited, as if I’m wasting my time.
Mike, you seem to have a time management problem. Committing to non productive activity with indecision. Then finding an excuse for your useless adventure and appearing to be complaining about it.
Or, maybe it’s your process of coming to the realization the thoughts in your head don’t add up when you put them in writing.
“I continually oscillate between wanting to comment here and feeling dispirited, as if I’m wasting my time.”
Yes Mike, i as well.
That is the nature of participating in the world. Amazing that humans have made it this far without just eating each other until no one was left.
MikeB, Hickory,
I feel the same way.
I think part of the problem is that we aren’t that good at having real dialogues. You know, where we listen to each other, mirror back what is being said, think carefully about it, write thoughtful replies that really relate to what’s been said, etc.
Without that, there’ s no sense of progress, building consensus, getting somewhere with the discussion…
Mike B , buddy relax . Where we are ( Ron , me and many others ) past expiry date and waiting in the departure lounge waiting for our boarding call , don’t stress yourself .We are the ” lucky generation ” . We have enjoyed the fruits of ” Peak Civilization ” . It is for the next generations to now handle the problems . Hubbert warned them in 1953 . Nobody listened . Time to pay the piper for being deaf . Don’t be dispirited but if we can change even one POV ,we win . Adios Amigo . Be well and take care . Keep plugging .
MikeB, I feel that a lot of useful information and, for the most part, good argumentation goes on here. I enjoy the thoughtful analysis and seeing how others process perceptions of the future. Alas, the mass ecocide/suicide is a bit of a bummer.
When I’m having a tough time with things I do what I used to do on tough ambulance dispatches back when I worked prehospital; I remember that it’s not my fault, I’m here to try and put some toothpaste back in the tube, and nobody called 911 cuz they want me to show up and lose my shit.
HB is trolling for comments, and at link below brags of earning money from fossil fuel investment aka the destruction of the planet. HB’s priorities are BAU and profits for self.
https://peakoilbarrel.com/november-us-oil-production-surprises/#comment-734429
I believe it’s extremely unlikely that the government in a country such as the USA or countries in Western Europe will fail to ration diesel fuel and other petroleum products as necessary to maintain essential infrastructure and food production.
If wind turbines go down for lack of maintenance, then the shit has already hit the fan to such an extent that it’s game over for modern life and industrial civilization.
This is NOT to say that I believe our country or other countries will continue as democracies, but rather that it’s very likely that whoever IS in power will be smart enough and tough enough to make sure the basics are covered as far as fuel for maintenance work, etc, is an issue.
If they don’t….. it means the not so far off end of their own privileged lives in terms of having doctors, hospitals, television and internet, a wide variety of foods, etc.
An emperor a few hundred years back didn’t live as well as a successful modern plumber….. he couldn’t get his teeth fixed, or buy good eyeglasses, or have air conditioning, and if he wanted to go somewhere….. he bumped his ass on a horse or in a carriage on a rough road.
Levithans, nation states, aren’t going to just go peacefully into the night. They’ll be more powerful than ever in as many or more cases than not, once the shit starts hitting the fan hard and fast…. because that’s the nature of people and power.
Right now, we can’t get the idiots to accept a tax paid vaccine that will save their own lives and the lives of some of their family and friends.
But when war comes…… lets not forget that any and every country, without exception, rounds up young men, and more or less enslaves them as soldiers, and sends them off to fight, and win or die.
One must be naive indeed to think that federal and state governments in the USA won’t work, using as much raw muscle as necessary, to keep things from falling apart.
Sure tons of people are going to starve in countries that can’t produce food domestically, and tons more are going to die fighting.
But the tougher things get, the tougher government will get, and the people will go along in order to survive, once it’s obvious to them that survival means going along.
We’re not going to just RUN OUT of anything in particular, all at once, except locally.
Oil production will decline, for sure…… but probably not at a rate faster than a couple of percent or so, in countries such as the USA and other major producers. We can adapt to that…… if adapting means eating versus not eating.
But I sure as hell wouldn’t want to be caught in a country such as Egypt, with a huge population, almost nothing in the way of natural resources, and very little in the way of capital in the form of industrial plant and skilled labor so as to buy raw materials and export finished goods.. so as to buy food.
“This is NOT to say that I believe our country or other countries will continue as democracies,”
This is a huge point.
And is at much in play right now as it will be in some future decade.
In a country like the US, I doubt it would survive as single entity if democracy was no longer the format. More likely fragmenting in to regional autocracies (warlord states), or simply failed chaotic states.
People will either submit to the local cartel/regime, or will be in constant state of running battle and underground rebellion.
Martial law will be ineffective at maintaining a cohesive nation in a country without a strong national identity , and with a huge amount of weapons, such as the USA.
The regions will all be severely impoverished relative to now, since the economically functional national benefits will be gone- such as the interstate electrical grid and pipelines, rail and highway, free movement of labor, and material and products and customers from afar.
Things may seem peaceful on your street or in your field this week, but the US is at risk for an extremely tumultuous unwinding and fragmentation.
Save up your coins and goats to get through checkpoints to go to the market folks.
“you don’t know what you’ve got ’til its gone..” [JM 1970]
there are many important writings on this topic. here is one such article
https://www.brookings.edu/research/is-democracy-failing-and-putting-our-economic-system-at-risk/
Hicks , the future of democracies is in my personal opinion over . In a world where we have dwindling resources we are going to have a ” command and control ” structure as Seppo said the word ” autarky ” . Get ready ” You ain’t seen nothing , yet ” John Wayne
You may be right. And that alone is a remarkable event!
Perhaps the notion of democracy and a civil society was a quaint one all along.
You may yearn for autocracy, but its a very dangerous game
and you may get chaos instead.
Either way it will hard to keep warm in winter.
OFM ” We’re not going to just RUN OUT of anything in particular, all at once, except locall ” . Friend you are out of line here . Read about the Liebig’s law of the minimum . Did you hug your bag of NPK ? Hat tip TOTO from the TOD days . Two quotes I have said here repeatedly .
1. A small hole can sink a big ship .
2. A chain is as strong as its weakest link .
I learnt these from my grandparents ,no they were not intelligent but wordly wise .
Bradley- wind turbines are not desperate for energy. They have no desperation whatsoever.
And [“why wind turbines would be allowed to degrade”]
all things degrade, I have noticed.
For example, the radioactive fuel in nuclear plants needs to be replaced every 18-24 months, and the average lifespan of a nuclear power plant in the US is about 40 years.
Wind blows strong in certain locations almost indefinitely.
It will stop when the sun runs downs and destroys the earth.
That will be desperate times for wind.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10606487/Is-Putin-suffering-roid-rage-Spies-suggest-bloated-appearance-drugs-effect.html
Putin suffering from STEROID rage
Having had a friend who died from steroid abuse ( I have never done them )….This is a very real thing.
He would fly off the handle instantaneously….and started abusing his wife.
If true, not good, if the top oil exporter is abusing roids.
Roid rage is a very real thing. I have no experience with it myself, but I have family in the medical field that have dealt with it.
Note that a fair number of intel pro’s think it’s a likely or even near certain explanation for Putin’s behavior.
I used to compete in NPC bodybuilding competitions and did my fair share of steroids and obviously hung around with a lot of people who did as well. The only time I’ve ever seen anything close to “roid rage” was during those ominous videos in high school health class where billy starts gear and drives his friends away with his increasing rage and acne and ultimately roughs up his GF before going to jail. Even on dianabol or tren I never experienced any desire to rage. Steroids are sorta like money, they just amplify whatever personality traits are already there.
Now other side effects like acne, gyno and sexual dysfunction are real. Luckily I didn’t have any acne issues but if I didn’t run letrozole at the same time I was very susceptible to gyno. And yeah, by mid cycle I was basically asexual. Luckily it all came back a couple weeks after finishing a cycle. I was hyper sensitive to steroids, I would add muscle daily, just tying my shoes would add muscle lol. I used to work out with a guy who would get bad acne, so bad that just lying down doing bench press would cause the back of his shirt to have a whole bunch of blood spots soaking when he got off the bench. Yummy.
Putin might be on TRT, which would obviously be testosterone, which I posit most male billionaires and politicians also take. And why not? You look better, feel better, sleep better, perform better…it’s a no brainer if you have the money and power to get safe levels from a doc with proper blood testing it’s quite safe too. That wouldn’t cause bloating.
Putin ain’t wasting his time taking something like dianabol or deca which would cause water retention. Test is much safer and more effective and wouldn’t cause that.
LNGuy , thanks for narrating your real life experience to put things in their proper perspective and telling the truth . Now back to Mr Putin’s anal hemorrhoids . Who did the diagnosis ? Biden or Kamala ? Maybe Blinken , Nuland ? Hope they had a very good view when they shoved their head up his a***.
My post is somewhat anecdotal based on my experience. Could have summed it up with…He’s a billionaire…if Putin is doing steroids trust me it ain’t the type to cause bloating. And he clearly isn’t abusing them so roid rage is pretty much off the table. If anything we should be happy he’s on TRT. That would keep him in a better mood.
Cool story, bro, but it’s all fanfiction written for a niche audience that probably already unconditionally agrees with you. People have been predicting how civilization will end since the very start of civilization. How often does the future end up as predicted? Almost never. Once in a while reality is even worse than predicted. 😏
Your first sentence is mostly correct. The rest is unverified–we don’t know who has predicted what–but it is absolutely true that civilizations (plural) have repeatedly risen, crashed, and utterly disappeared. See “Mycenae.” See “Hatti.” On it goes. In fact, like species, most civilizations that ever were are GONE!
Go home and study some fucking history, you schmuck.
“Do you see all these great buildings?” replied Jesus. “Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down… Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.” (Mark 13)
It isn’t true that all people think the world is about to end. In China, for example, folk wisdom is that the world is steady state, with centuries of prosperity under a dynasty punctuated by chaotic periods between dynasties. The Chinese also doubt progress, because they believe history repeats. It is very different from the progress worship and doom preaching in America.
For example, a Chinese guy once told me Germans like candlelight dinners because Europeans used to live in caves. Few Chinese are comfortable with the idea that the Chinese use to live in caves. China has always been the same, and always will be. The truth is that Confucius would not have been able to read modern Chinese script (shaped by the writing brush), did not speak a tonal language, and never saw a rice paddy. Almost nobody in China can imagine that. China has always been the same. This also colors the Western view of China.
Christians worship a doomster. The Church downplayed this for centuries, but when Protestants started translating the Bible and more people learned to read, amateur theologians latched onto it. It is now the central tenant of Christianity in countries with weak religious structures, like America.
Claiming you don’t believe in gods is no real defense. When you grow up in a society where everyone expects doom, you expect it as well, whether you accept the religious explanation of this belief or not. It’s part of the Protestant mindset, not a universal idea.
Alim , I like your post . 100% with your view point .
Remember Nate? He’s brilliant. But get ready to feel helpless. He mentions P. O. at the very end.
Frankly.
Just break out your banjo.
Yep, a good presentation.
He wanted knowledge of some of my mushroom spots.
No way!
yeh, Good food for thought from N. Hagens.
Hickory,
I’ve noticed in Nate’s presentations that he believes that fossil fuels can’t be replaced. He wasn’t arguing that a transition away from FF would take too long, or some such. He simply believed that it wasn’t possible.
Does he seem to still hold to this view?
“Does he seem to still hold this view?” – nickg
Yes, because he understands that fossil-fuels can’t be replaced with something that is based on fossil-fuels.
Not sure why some find this so difficult to grok.
“based on fossil fuels”.
The first barrels of oil were transported by teams of horses (that’s where the Union’s name of “Teamsters” came from). Did that mean that oil was biofuel based?
“The first barrels of oil were transported by teams of horses…” – nickg
Yes, and the last barrels of oil might be transported by teams of horses.
“Did that mean that oil was biofuel based?” – nickg
All oil is biofuel based. Not sure what your point is. Please explain.
OrgFarm,
People who discuss energy generally make a distinction between biofuels (things that grew in the last year or two, like grass, hay, corn, wood, etc) and fossil fuels (things that have cooked for millions of years underground). Don’t you?
As to my point: let me start by trying to clarify what we’re discussing:
I’ve heard the argument that wind, solar, hydro etc are “based on fossil fuels”, or “dependent on fossil fuels”, or arguments to that effect. I’ve never seen a detailed supporting argument for it, so it’s hard for me to know exactly what is meant by someone like Nate when they make the argument. My guess is that he means that diesel powered trucks are needed to transport solar and wind equipment, and that coal and gas powered electricity is needed by the factories that make that equipment.
You made this argument, so…Is that what you meant?
Nick, I won’t speak for Nate since I don’t know his views well enough.
But speaking as myself, I assert that fossil fuels won’t be replaced
fast enough or at big enough scale to avert massive energy shortage among 8-10 billion.
And just how much energy production could be sustained in the future without much or any fossil fuel is some theoretical discussion with no bearing on the reality of the next few decades or century remainder. And is purely in the realm of speculative that I don’t tread, or ponder.
Its a mute point when ones considers the challenges of the near future.
Nate comes across as very realistic.
If you told me the goal was just to supply energy for 1 billion people who were all bright, disciplined, prosperous,living simply, and peaceable,
I might wonder if it was possible. But i don’t spend more than a minute wondering about that.
Nonetheless, I think people would be wise to get as much solar and wind installed personally and at a regional level as they can muster. it will help make the shortfall of fossil energy a little more tolerable for some time.
Well, thanks for the thoughtful and lengthy reply.
I think we agree on an important thing: that people in general should transition away from fossil fuels as quickly as possible. I think we agree that the feasibility of the last 10% of that transition is unimportant at this point. I think we also agree that it’s possible that very human government and private managers could screw up the transition, and therefore not do it nearly quickly as we need.
I think we disagree on how large the obstacles are to such a transition, and how fast it could be if it was reasonably well managed. That would be a worthwhile discussion at some point.
But, really…I think the things we agree on are more important than the things we don’t.
Only a world at peace, and well fed, and warm or cool enough, and well supplied with important products,
will take pause and have concern or take action on global warming.
Its a trivial theoretical problem when issues of survival are knocking at your door.
Of course until the flood, fire or famine arrives.
Until then, coal and wood and guns will get premier locations at the marketplace, just like the old days.
Certainly the case in the UK from what I can see. Front page news is about keeping coal fired power stations running and accelerating approval for North Sea projects, plus lots of talk of fracking in the comments. Climate change has disappeared as a topic. Renewables are presented as much as means to fill the sudden gap left by Russian hydrocarbon fuels rather than a way to displace them permanently.
There’s also a big upswing in cargo cult technocopian drivel, which I’d expect is going to continue apace.
“Climate change has disappeared as a topic.”
Unfortunate but predictable, I suppose.
Washington state legislature approves $16.9B transportation package; targeting all new cars to be electric with MY 2030
The Washington State Legislature has passed the $16.9-billion, 16-year Move Ahead Washington transportation package. The package makes significant investments in reducing carbon emissions, preservation and maintenance, expanding multimodal options, public transportation and pedestrian safety.
Notable investments include:
$5.4 billion toward carbon reduction and multimodal expansion.
$3 billion for maintenance and preservation.
$3 billion for public transportation.
Free fares for passengers 18 and younger on all public transportation.
$2.4 billion to fund fish passage barrier removals.
$1.3 billion in active transportation, including Safe Routes to School and school-based bike programs.
$1 billion to fund Washington’s portion of an I-5 replacement bridge across the Columbia River.
$836 million to build four new hybrid-electric ferries.
$150 million towards ultra-high-speed rail.
$50 million for walking and biking infrastructure in underinvested communities, and more.
https://www.greencarcongress.com/2022/03/20220314-washington.html
George , BoJo is caught with his pants below his knees once again .
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10606801/PM-sets-oil-gas-taskforce-plot-way-energy-crisis.html
It occurs to me as I read the comments that I did not see a discussion about population. I think we are demonstrating OrgFarm’s point: we discuss symptoms, rather than causes. Nobody wants to talk about overshoot.
Stacy, I think you just have not been paying attention. Everyone has been talking about overshoot. We all know overshoot is the root of the problem. We also know there is no way to fix overshoot though some who really do not understand how human nature works thinks we may fix that problem. Of course these people make up a huge majority of the world’s population but only a tiny minority of the people on this blog. Nature will fix the overshoot problem and nothing else. It is a prdiciment, that is a problem that cannot be fixed by human efforts. Nature, that is natural collapse will eventually fix the overshoot problem.
Hain’t we got all the fools in town on our side? And hain’t that a big enough majority in any town?
Mark Twain, 1884 TheAdventures of Huckleberry Finn
Stacy, many of us here think that William Rees is the master of this subject:
Overshoot.
Stacy-
you have some comments or ideas on overshoot?
perhaps something that is a new perspective?
What does a managed retreat look like to you, what policy on childbearing and policies on longevity do you suggest, what about the role of the church, tax incentives, etc?
Its one thing to acknowledge the problem, its another to figure out practical ways to reverse course.
To me it looks like a 800 trillion ton bulldozer that is starting to slow down but momentum is going to keep the destruction going upward for a longtime. Seems baked in the cake.
I had no kids on purpose, despite full ability and typical inclinations for family.
But Ron is right-
“Nature will fix the overshoot problem and nothing else. It is a prdiciment, that is a problem that cannot be fixed by human efforts. Nature, that is natural collapse will eventually fix the overshoot problem.”
It is much easier to paint a livable scenario of the future if population is not longer growing, but instead is in a controlled decline for a longer time period. And if living standards are to be gradually decreased from a very affluent level, that makes the whole resource consumption “problem” much more solvable. This situation is most relevant for the most affluent nations as of now. Not so much for developing nations.
If we are talking 2060, I would say couple of things. As Nate Hagens pointed out (above), the world supposedly has to be simplified to meet challenges. In itself it is possible, but many of the solutions being proposed as of now are complex in nature? The concepts of utilizing the strength of technology to allocate resources, gathering in smart cities reducing the co2 footprint, automated agriculture and so on are probably going to beneficial for an uncertain time period. When the grid breaks down and infrastructure can not be repaired, it is still game over for “smart” cities (not all at once, but gradually). At some point it can be useful to introduce a managed (if it can be managed) incentive for people to move from cities to the country side, with the offer to live a more simple life with a very low energy requirement more in the tune of how it was 100-150 years ago. But still a lot better probably. People would lack basic skills but quite a few would cope somehow depending on age. As long as the population can decline gently and people go along with lower living standards, there is less need for war and the decline has the potential to be managed better.
I would hope that by 2060, we would have well established technology to use energy from any source to produce ethanol from non-fossil fuel materials, and that ethanol in turn could be used to replace the oil products needed for wind turbine maintenance. (We hauled our first barrels of oil by horse, but the horses didn’t stay necessary.) I recognize that when energy gets low you’d have to pick and choose. I suppose it depends on the math of how much wind energy you have to put into the maintenance
“I’ve never seen a detailed supporting argument for it…” – nickg
Then you haven’t looked beyond your cognitive biases. The reasoning is clear and understandable to any dispassionate analysis.
“Renewable energy” devices are made entirely of materials that use fossil-fuel energy for their production. These materials are primarily “metals” and include steel, aluminum, copper, silver, lithium, chromium, nickel, rare earth elements… the list is long.
These metals come from rock deep in the ground. This rock must be mined, processed, and refined. Mining, processing, and refining equipment is entirely dependent on fossil-fuel and cannot be done by using “renewable energy”.
Why? Because of insufficient energy density.
Moreover, there is not enough accessible ore-grade rock (and ore-grades are diminishing) to mine, process, and refine into those required metals to build-out a “renewable energy” system. And if there was, the biosphere would be a toxic wasteland, and the collapse of modern industrial civilization would be accelerated.
Or perhaps you’ll now assert, like so many RE apologists when cornered, that we can get all the metals we need by doing our mining and refining on asteroids in outer space. If so, then of course the conversation ends.
So the issue is energy density, ore quantity and grade, and the time required to build-out a new energy system (that provides for 10 billion humans and before any kind of industrial collapse). “Time required” being another conversation, but read Hirsch 2005 “Initiating a mitigation crash program 20 years before peak oil”, for a primer.
Here’s a website – with a timely article – that can help get you started on understanding the fantasy of transitioning to “renewable energy”:
https://energyskeptic.com
“you haven’t looked beyond your cognitive biases”
Your projecting
“Your projecting [sic]”
Reason is wasted on those in denial.
OrgFarm-
I point out that we are likely in full agreement that fossil fuels energy will not be replaced at full scale.
We seem differ on a subplot- solar wind hydro and some residual fossils and some nucs are going to be able to offset some of the depleting fossil energy- to some degree.
It won’t be enough for current population to live as if this energy flash is perpetual (like leisure travel, easy food, exotic products and frivolous uses like fashion or entertainment, and many other items we consider standard).
But it could be enough for a smaller population to live much more simply.
In fact that is exactly what will happen.
The speed of contraction and level of chaos partly dependent on choices made, and location lived.
“We seem to differ on subplot.” – hickory
Yes, there will always be differences in the details, none of us has that kind of granularity or precision. But we do know with a fair amount of certainty the broader themes that will overwhelm us. It’s those broader themes that guided the guest post.
“But it could be enough for a smaller population to live more simply.” – hickory
Problem is: the same “causes” that force population to get smaller will also collapse the industries that create “renewables, residual fossils, some nukes.”
“Nature will fix the overshoot problem.” A smaller population is guaranteed but high-tech energy won’t be powering it.
” A smaller population is guaranteed but high-tech energy won’t be powering it.”
For the next 30 years fossil fuel will still be around for lots of manufacturing and other important uses. High pricing and/or government rationing will funnel oil to petrochemical plants and smelters, for example. And yes, mining and energy industry (like solar PV) will certainly be considered priority use.
Light transport consumes about 60% of global oil use and that can all be replaced in 1-2 decades, if it were a goal , or if it was forced by pricing or shortage.
I’m not saying that miles traveled by motor will be maintained, but the important travel can all be electrified. i don’t consider planes to important travel. It is mostly optional, even for a ‘modern’ civilization.
“Light transport consumes about 60% of global oil use and that can all be replaced in 1-2 decades, if it were a goal” Approved
But if your a Doomer, anarchist or quitter it can’t become a goal
“For the next 30 years fossil fuel will still be around for lots of manufacturing and other important uses.” – hickory
In 20 years global population will be nearly 10 billion consumers. Crushing demand for limited supplies of fossil-fuel will make it unaffordable and then unavailable in many parts of the world.
Nations will not stand by and watch their citizens starve and freeze. They will instead attempt to seize remaining reserves from other countries with a Cheney-like “Our way of life is non-negotiable”.
That means brutal war (we’ve already seen the previews and precedents) which will damage or destroy industrial infrastructure, cause mass migration, and further undermine the ability to produce fossil fuel – a feedback loop that accelerates collapse.
To believe that humans will soon choose a gentle decroissance and in 30 years be living in a world with “lots of manufacturing, mining, “renewable energy”, and electrified travel” is (and don’t take this personally) simply naive and contrary to the evidence.
And it’s contrary to your position stated earlier today that “Nature will fix the overshoot problem”, and we are in “a predicament that cannot be solved by human efforts”.
You seem to be in a Kubler-Ross transition from “bargaining” to “acceptance”. Which, if completed, would be admirable.
Orgfarm-
Anyone who is not conflicted by the situation is just playing the game of just looking at a small slice of reality. [thanks for the free psychoanalysis though- its nice to have a framework for random thoughts]
What I am pointing out, as others have, is that this post peak situation will be a drawn out process rather than a sudden event. And the effects will vary widely from region to region.
I certainly agree that warfare, and simply chaos from failed states, is inevitable. As we see now the whole deck can shuffled quickly.
Nonetheless, some places are going to roll on with heavy industrial society for quite awhile.
Once again, I will not speculate beyond 30 years, and even that is a big stretch.
btw- I am not bargaining for anything. My expectations are very low, considering the behavior of humans. I am surprised every day to find that some semblance of freedom, security and prosperity are still aspects of life here and there.
From 2006 to 2012 I relied on electricity almost entirely for all my transportation needs. I had a car, but only drove it short distances on the weekend. For business I used trains which are electric in Germany, as they are in most of the world. I had a Bahnkarte 100 which allowed me to take pretty much any train in Germany for a flat annual fee.
You are saying things can never happen that have already been happening for decades.
“You are saying things can never happen that have already been happening…” – alimbiquated
You are being dishonest. Have taken many electric trains, not just in Germany, but in nearly every nation around the world that has them.
You’re reading comprehension needs serious improvement.
But stay on track, keep chugging along, and don’t get de-railed by normalcy bias.
Orgfarm
“in 30 years be living in a world with “lots of manufacturing, mining, “renewable energy”, and electrified travel” is (and don’t take this personally) simply naive and contrary to the evidence.”
“You’re reading comprehension needs serious improvement.”
“Then you haven’t looked beyond your cognitive biases”
“Now I know why mikeb deleted his comment this morning.”
Here’s one MikeB didn’t delete – “Go home and study some fucking history, you schmuck.”
Don’t take it personal. Most anyone who questions or challenges your view of the future you attack and then you can’t back up your opinion with relatable facts. You seem to think that you have some kind of divine right to knowledge. When in fact your playing in the deep end and can’t swim. Here is some advice for the future, you need a reset.
The doomer porn is absurd. LOL.
There is no reason to believe that renewable energy with cheap battery backup cannot power civilization. Maybe we need next generation modular nuclear reactors too. When fossil fuels become scarce they will be rationed by the government the way rubber and other resources were rationed during WW2. Hopefully by the time fossil fuels become truly scarce we would have completed the transition to renewables. With cheap and abundant energy we can make synthetic fuel for aviation. If it is expensive then long distance aviation will go back to being unaffordable for most people. So what?
Food can also be grown indoors in massive vertical farms with LED lights. These farms can be located in densely populated areas in order to reduce transportation costs. Indoor farms require negligible water, very little fertilizer, and no pesticides.
Renewable energy with “cheap” battery backups will never happen (except for “homestead” level). Thinking only in “concepts” without any notion of numbers behind them is the usual pitfall.
The Fossile fuels use explosion since the beginning of the industrial revolution is what brought modern society.
Fossile fuel is akind to using FOR FREE, a HUGE battery (stock) that took millions years to fill up, and consume it in around two centuries.
You don’t even realize that the whole society still relies on fossiles or what ?
Primary world energy is still 85% fossile or something, the remainder being primarily hydro, wood burning, and nuclear.
Yves-
“Primary world energy is still 85% fossile or something, the remainder being primarily hydro, wood burning, and nuclear.”
Yes. I’m guessing that through very great effort the energy carrying capacity of the earth will still be over 4 billion by 2050. I refrain from any serious guesses beyond that. Some places will do much better than others. Some may guess 6 Billion, and others 3.
Energy availability will vary widely
Part of that is luck of location, and part is the steps that regions take to wean off fossil fuels before depletion becomes severe.
[ex- Iowa gets roughly 60% of its electricity from wind. Its just one small and early effort example of the kind of things that will make a huge difference in some locations]
I was trying to look into the energy mix in the US per state from the outside, and I must say it gives you the most diversified picture you could ever ask for as to what is possible in the future for different types of energy (with an emphasis on renewables from my side). It’s a patchwork not fitting with the inherited fossil fuel infrastructure. Overall, it doesn’t look too bad. A lot of potential, and a lot of challenges. And I kind of agree that the focus on renewable energy should have started earlier. Still; if it one nation than can start behind when it comes to for example offshore wind and still build it up sufficiently – it has to be the US. I can elaborate on my findings, but I am pretty sure it is still below the knowledge level for a certain percentage of people that visits this website frequently (after all it is a US dominated blog).
You are not alone on this. The vast majority of Americans have no idea how vast the wind (on and offshore) and solar reserve of this nation is. It is incredibly endowed, but very slow to get serious about collecting some of the energy available.
It will pick up the pace this decade for sure.
Australia and Argentina are two other sizeable countries with very healthy combination of both wind and solar (and some fossil fuels), with much smaller populations to supply.
https://globalwindatlas.info/
https://globalsolaratlas.info/map
speaking of Australia-“The World’s Largest Clean Energy Infrastructure Will Power Singapore From Australia”
this solar electrical supply project to Singapore is moving beyond the planning stage
https://interestingengineering.com/worlds-largest-clean-energy-infrastructure-from-singapore-to-australia
Hickory,
The value of these pipelines is that they last for a long time (etc. the Singapore one). And they should, given the high investment costs.
It is much better to overdo renewable investments than to restrict it. There are legit arguments that renewables are difficult to replace after a lot of years due to reliance on fossil fuels. This discussion is very interesting, some raw materials can be replaced if scarce, others can be recycled and some could maybe rationed (or permanently receive a price hike). In the end replacing renewables can potentially be prioritised above most other uses of industrial capacity.
Anyway, renewables will prolong the fossil fuel age. I have very little hope that a decrease of fossil fuel consumption globally below 20% of total energy consumption (including counting the efficiency of electricity when used right (x2 the value?) to make the total energy data more true), would bring anything other than misery. I do believe in a long term low carbon consumption society for a prolonged period is the right path. Especially if it is possible to have a stable situation for a longer time period.
“given the high investment costs.”
Yes, high up front costs but cheap considering the alternatives.
Other energy things also have up front costs- roughly
refinery- [$5 billion plus]
nuclear plant- [$6-9 B per 1000 MW] (and sometimes much more)
deep sea drilling rig- [$0.5-1B]
and then these things all have big operating costs, and risk.
This Australian project- roughly
[$1-2 B per 1000 MW generation capacity plus 3-4000 MW energy storage]
“Food can also be grown indoors in massive vertical farms with LED lights. ”
Lol, again an instance of thinking concepts without looking at numbers, which show how totally STUPID vertical farms are.
https://sustainabledish.com/vertical-farms-thermodynamic-nonsense/
Strange that this article cited data related to CO2/kg lettuce produced when talking about ‘Thermodynamic Nonsense’ of the system.
It seems as if they are a little confused about energy input vs CO2 outputs.
I would be interested to see info about the energy thermodynamics aspects of these artificial systems- I suspect they are poor.
Hickory,
Yes I agree, although with the current electricity mixes in mot countries, CO2 output and energy inputs might be considered quite “equivalent”.
Plus they don’t even account for all the “grey energy ” necessary to build and maintain the buildings and whole apparatus :
“This didn’t even account for the energy loss required to make the artificial lights to begin with, nor the energy required for the building, the trays, racks, etc.”
Speaking of collapse or out of sight, out of mind.
SEA ICE THAT SLOWED THE FLOW OF ANTARCTIC GLACIERS ABRUPTLY SHATTERS IN THREE DAYS
“In just three days in late January, a mass of ice the size of Philadelphia fragmented from the Larsen-B embayment on the Antarctic Peninsula and floated away, after persisting there for more than a decade. NASA satellites captured the break-up between January 19 and 21, and with it saw calving of icebergs from Crane Glacier and its neighbors as the sea ice no longer buttressed their fronts. Now more vulnerable to melting and acceleration into the ocean, the glaciers that line the Antarctic Peninsula could add directly to sea level.”
https://phys.org/news/2022-03-sea-ice-antarctic-glaciers-abruptly.html
Transition to renewables you say.
CHINA & INDIA: BREAKING NEW RECORDS IN COAL-POWERED GENERATION
Key messages from the IEA Coal 2021 report are that —
• “The 2020 collapse in coal demand [due to the downturn from the COVID-19 pandemic] turned out to be smaller than anticipated.
• Coal-fired power generation is set to reach an all-time high in 2021 (an increase of 9% in 2021, with estimated increases of 12% in India and 9% in China).
• China continues to dominate global coal trends.
• Global coal demand may well hit a new all-time high in the next two years.
• “Based on current trends, global coal demand is set to rise to 8,025 Mt in 2022, the highest level ever seen, and to remain there through 2024.”
• Coal production is set to rise to its highest ever levels in 2022.
• The pledges to reach net zero emissions made by many countries, including China and India, should have very strong implications for coal – but these are not yet visible in our near-term forecast, reflecting the major gap between ambitions and action.
• Momentum behind net zero has grown, but the era of declining emissions is moving further away.”
https://www.cop26andbeyond.com/blog/china-and-india-coal
What is ‘easy food’?
In the US a person can work minimum wage for 1 hr, and go to a store and purchase 10,000 calories of potatoes with that wage.
And people in who live far away from the subtropics can eat bananas.
And people in japan can eat fish caught off the coast of Chile.
And people can can and do eat large quantities of meat, and from places more than 20 miles away!
People eat fruit from beyond their neighborhood.
And fertilizer from another continent makes the grain they purchase 5 times cheaper than it otherwise would be.
All enabled by inexpensive fossil fuel.
How many hours of human labor does one barrel of oil replace?
Vertical farms are really not much more than high tech high rise greenhouses….. and building them is expensive.
But greenhouse technology does work…… and building greenhouses in places where there’s enough land is quite practical, because hauling the production isn’t all that big an expense, if the haul isn’t too awfully long.
It’s going to be far cheaper, in my estimation, to continue producing staple foods out in the boonies and shipping them to cities as necessary than it will be to build so call vertical farms….. which will work as a business only in places where you can sell the production directly at boutique prices on a daily basis as it’s ready.
Greens in relatively small quantities such as lettuce for nice restaurants and middle class and up house holds…. sure
For every body else….. not very likely at all.
“But greenhouse technology does work…… and building greenhouses in places where there’s enough land is quite practical”
One of the advantages suburbs have over cities
Driving through Poland in the 90’s I saw many rural and semi rural residences with additional greenhouses built everywhere one could practically fit. Low tech. Lots of homemade wine too.
Survivalist , I was in Hungary from 1992 to 2008 . 16 years and I support what you have pointed out . I lived in a village of 5000 people before I moved to Budapest . In the rural areas there was ” no poverty of the kitchen” yes there was ” poverty of luxury ” . I had to clasp my cloth dryer (East European because it vibrated all over the bathroom floor ) . ALL rural folks had a backyard garden AND were rearing a pig or chickens . They ALL baked their own bread . You have it all fats, carbs and proteins , not to mention the peach wine . Now the question ? How many Yanks + EU generation from the Fakebook , Tik Tok , Instagram generation have any experience on this ? None .
P. S ; I lived just 40 Kms ( 25 miles ) away from Budapest so that is not a big distance .
Thanks for sharing your story HiH. I feel that culture changes fast and many will adapt. I agree that if most folks today had to go back to my grans ‘era’ and raise three kids without a fridge it’d feel to them like living in the Stone Age; it’s really just Grans Age. Perhaps the pending population bottleneck will select for resilience, well roundedness and intelligence.
Hell, if folks (even poor folks) in the USA today had to go back to living like during my childhood of the 1960’s, they would feel like it was the stone age! Forget Grans Age. One, maybe two landline phones in the house (No such thing as cellphone). Maybe one 19 inch B&W television with 1-5 channels available less than 24H, no Cable or Satellite. At night, when everyone was asleep the only thing drawing electricity from the 60-100 Amp service was an electric clock and maybe a 7 watt nightlight. No AC in Tucson, AZ, just a swamp cooler. No computers. Etc… I lived in Ensenada, BC Mexico in the late 1970’s, 3 bedroom middle class house had 20 Amp service. No AC, No heat. One UHF TV station, ran 6 hours a day. What would they think of that?
Wouldn’t be hard for us to go back to that, in many ways we’re there now. Willamette Valley, Oregon. All houses around us have AC, we don’t. No TV. Have huge garden, grow lots of food. Have salvaged greenhouse from a friend. Without Internet, Cell Phone we would still have Ham Radio for outside communications. Lived that way once, can do again.
Holland is one of the world’s most densely populated countries hand it has lots of greenhouses. They don’t take most space.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/The+Hague,+Netherlands/@52.0162302,4.2046253,5392m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x47c5b72f4298bd71:0x400de5a8d1e6c10!8m2!3d52.0704978!4d4.3006999
Of course they produce mostly high value, relatively low calorie food, not soy beans and wheat.
The Netherlands and Greater Los Angeles area have a lot in common in size, population and major port. The Netherlands has more low elevation topography which is more conducive to farming than construction. After WWll the federal government finished flood control dams in the LA area. The flood plains were turned into suburban homes for the soldiers returning and war material factory workers who moved to the area. Prior to the flood control the area was used for dairy and farming.
Huntington Beach,
Sadly, the choices for flood control in Los Angeles mostly revolve around dumping as much rainwater as fast as possible into the ocean, which is why the city has been steadily drying out for decades.
“which is why the city has been steadily drying out for decades”
It’s not the city that is drying out from human actions. The LA area is basically a desert by the sea. The area can go more than 8 months at a time without rain. When the rain does happen, it can be more than what can be stored safely. Then it must be dumped into the ocean to avoid flooding. Owens valley has dried out becoming the victim of LA importing water.
“The valley provides water to the Los Angeles Aqueduct, the source of one-third of the water for Los Angeles, and was the area at the center of one of the fiercest and longest-running episodes of the California Water Wars.[4] These episodes inspired aspects of the 1974 film Chinatown. The current arid nature of the valley is mostly due to LADWP diverting the water of the region. For example, Owens Lake was completely emptied by 1926, only 13 years after LA began diverting water.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Owens_Valley
“The Orange County Water District’s service area covers approximately 350 square miles and the District owns approximately 1,600 acres in and near the Santa Ana River, which it uses to capture water flows for groundwater recharge. Additionally, the Orange County Water District owns approximately 2,150 acres of land above the Prado Dam in the Prado Reservoir and uses that land for water conservation, water storage and water quality improvements.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_County_Water_District
It’s a desert because people have made it a desert.The water can be stored under water. It’s madness to dump it into the ocean. They should start by banning sealed pavement on parking lots, so the rain could soak into the ground. A runoff tax would be a good start.
Another thing California needs to do is legalize beavers. It is now illegal to release beavers into the wild in the state. Beavers slow the flow of water so it sink into the ground. Wiping out the beavers was a key step in turning California into a desert.
And I’m not just talking about Los Angeles. The whole Central Valley has been wrecked.
Alim-
Your comments on the west have always seemed comical to someone who has lived in that zone.
You might want to spend some time on the ground and studying the particulars before you profess to have understanding of the situation.
deserts are defined primarily by the amount and yearly distribution of precipitation the region gets. Soil quality, slope, temperature also play a secondary role.
Alim , “The water can be stored under water. ” . T think this is a typo or are you serious ?You can rectify .
Exactly.
It’s just not possible, for now and for quite some time to come, to produce staple foods such as beans, grain, potatoes, etc, in greenhouses at competitive prices, so long as suitable farmland is available for conventional production.
The arithmetic might change, eventually, given the possibilities of GMO technology, climate problems, and the availability of money to build enclosed aka greenhouse aka vertical farm infrastructure.. Such money might be made available on the basis of national security grounds for instance.
And except in places where electricity is and can be expected to stay dirt cheap…. it’s not likely to be economic for staples.
Of course there’s a real possibility that there may eventually be enough wind and solar power available at low prices to make the numbers pencil out……. twenty years or more down the road at best.
But in a few places, such as the Netherlands, where plenty of capital and a highly skilled work force are both available, plus there’s simply NO land available that’s not already intensively used….
ONCE the facilities are built…… they’re like wind and solar farms in one extremely important respect.
Such facilities are very expensive up front…… but dirt cheap to operate, considering the high production levels possible, the savings in water and transportation costs, RELATIVELY easy control of pests and plant diseases, etc.
So…. they’ve built greenhouses on the grand scale already.. but as far as I know, they’re only experimenting with staples….. so far at least.
It’s possible that staples might be produced in greenhouses and at least affordable to well to do people…… and most of the locals ARE reasonably well to do.They have a very high standard of living, on the national scale, and could probably afford to subsidize food for whatever impoverished citizens they have.
There is also the “sea of plastic green houses” in Spain (andalousia especially):
https://www.google.fr/maps/place/Espagne/@36.7339479,-2.727705,3780m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0xc42e3783261bc8b:0xa6ec2c940768a3ec!8m2!3d40.463667!4d-3.74922
China warns of ‘worst in history’ winter wheat crop
https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Agriculture/China-warns-of-worst-in-history-winter-wheat-crop
Well, at least we still have the largest exporter of wheat available, Russia (sarc)
Here’s another “it’s worse than expected” finding.
PERMAFROST PEATLANDS APPROACHING TIPPING POINT
https://phys.org/news/2022-03-permafrost-peatlands-approaching.html
“The frozen peatlands in these areas store up to 39 billion tons of carbon—the equivalent to twice that stored in the whole of European forests. …
“The projections indicate that even with the strongest efforts to reduce global carbon emissions, and therefore limit global warming, by 2040 the climates of Northern Europe will no longer be cold and dry enough to sustain peat permafrost.”
39 Gt is about a year’s worth of emissions so to compensate, so instead of a nominal plus 5% reduction per year we.d need 6 to 7% through 2040.
The main Nature article is behind a paywall: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-022-01296-7
There are plenty of other signs that we are turning sinks to sources, especially in the high latitudes and altitudes: FAST-MELTING ALPINE PERMAFROST MAY CONTRIBUTE TO RISING GLOBAL TEMPERATURES.
https://phys.org/news/2022-03-fast-melting-alpine-permafrost-contribute-global.html
Add them all up and maybe that 7% is getting to 10 or higher, not that it makes much difference because the only way there is going to be any reduction is either by demand destruction through a recession or supply decline through depletion.
Yes, the list of sinks-to-sources is long but maybe this is the most alarming member.
THE AMAZON IS NO LONGER A CARBON SINK. IT’S A ‘CARBON SOURCE
“The rainforests of the Amazon have long been known as “the lungs of the planet,” yet that may no longer be the case. The region’s forests produce more than a billion tons of CO2 a year, which means that they now emit more carbon than they absorb.”
https://www.sustainability-times.com/environmental-protection/the-amazon-is-no-longer-a-carbon-sink-its-a-carbon-source/
We’re so far past screwed that the light from screwed won’t reach us for 1.3 Billion years.
SURVIVALIST —
I expect you’re right. While we babble back-and-forth, among so many other disasters, the Amazon rainforest is currently losing about 10,000 acres a day, where since 1988, humans have destroyed an area of rainforest roughly the size of California.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/oct/07/the-amazon-rain-forest-is-losing-200000-acres-a-day-soon-it-will-be-too-late
“…light from screwed won’t reach us for 1.3 billion years.” – survivalist
Recent analysis shows it’s now worse than that:
https://www.photonphys.com/2022/feb/02/new-est-light-from-scrwed/measured/1.9/billion/yrs
No worries though, just wear rose colored glasses and make some green!
Russian demographics:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gj7irIrmN0Q&ab_channel=ZeihanonGeopolitics
That fits in with my limited experience. The Russian engineers I met were quite bright but inexperienced for their ages and few in number, and their main hope was to find ways to stay in the west.
Honda to install stationary fuel cell power station on California campus as first step toward commercialization of zero-emission backup power generation
Honda plans to install a stationary fuel cell power station on its corporate campus in Torrance, Calif. by early 2023. The station will serve as a proof of concept for the FUTURE commercialization of a power generation unit for use as a zero-emission backup power source for facilities such as data centers, which require reliable and clean auxiliary power generation to continue operations even in emergency situations.
https://www.greencarcongress.com/2022/03/20220315-honda.html
The costs involve pencil out a hell of a lot better for large stationary fuel cells than for small mobile ones. INFINITELY better.
Delivery can be made by pipeline or tanker truck, with no retail delivery infrastructure needed, and hydrogen can be far more efficiently stored in large quantities than in small.
And eventually…… maybe ten years down the road…. we will have enough otherwise surplus wind and solar juice to put it to good use manufacturing hydrogen…… which can then serve as a defacto battery capable of keeping the lights on for days or even weeks of bad weather.
Ford to introduce 7 new electric cars and vans in Europe by 2024; plans for new battery plant
Ford will offer a new generation of seven, all-electric, fully-connected passenger vehicles and vans in Europe by 2024. The announcement builds on the recent creation of the Ford Model e business unit focused on the design, production, and distribution of electric and connected vehicles (earlier post).
With its extended range of electric passenger and commercial vehicle models, Ford expects its annual sales of electric vehicles in Europe to exceed 600,000 units in 2026, and also reaffirmed its intention to deliver a 6% EBIT margin in Europe in 2023. The acceleration in Europe supports Ford’s goal to sell more than 2 million EVs globally by 2026 and deliver company adjusted EBIT margin of 10%.
https://www.greencarcongress.com/2022/03/20220315-fordeurope.html
India, Sri Lanka sign agreement to build solar power plant in island nation
Colombo: India and Sri Lanka have signed an agreement for developing a 100 megaw ..
https://energy.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/renewable/india-sri-lanka-sign-agreement-to-build-solar-power-plant-in-island-nation/90183681
https://mishtalk.com/economics/the-yuan-will-not-replace-the-us-dollar-nor-will-it-be-backed-by-commodities
USD being the world reserve currency is simply a function of math. The US buys more stuff, has biggest bond and stock markets. Therefore, other countries pile up USD reserves.
Commodities back currencies won’t work.
Robert Sapolsky on “us” vs “them” in military conflicts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yk5RDy6xFJQ
This is a brilliant video by a brilliant man.
As an aside it’s a lot about the insula – I’d be interested to see a study where an anti-vaxxer is put in an MRI and given a jab, my guess is the insular would light up like a neon sign, and much more so than in those with more rational responses.
Sapolsky is near the top of my list of favorite popularizers of science. His book “Behave”–while a TOME at 800 pages–is spectacularly fascinating. He’s also funny!
Agree- great writer
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10617029/Australia-critically-vulnerable-China-rare-earth-metal-production.html
Producing and refining the commodity in Australia has not proven economically viable despite ‘massive reserves’.
But with Canberra and Washington’s relationship with Beijing souring in recent years, Australia and the West are now prepared to eat the extra costs if it means loosening Beijing’s stranglehold.
Ok , agreed we are going to bear the extra cost of processing . A few questions ??
1. How long will it take to set up the reprocessing facility ?
2 . Wherefrom the technical manpower ?
3 . How are you going to ship them to USA when we have a low sulphur diesel crisis in the pipeline ?
Easier said than done .
Australia will become 51st state of America.
Else, will be involuntarily joining the Chinese Communist Party
You heard it here first!
“HB [huntingtonbeach] is trolling for comments, and brags of earning money from fossil fuel investment aka the destruction of the planet. HB’s priorities are BAU and profits for himself.” – survivalist
Insidious BAU.
“All we have to do to leave a ruined world for our children is just keep doing what we’re doing now.” – James Speth, former Dean of Yale School of Forestry.
That was in 2005. Humans are now accelerating into the age of consequences – and nearing the top of the Seneca curve.
Orgfarm – If I were rating comments for “trolling”. I would give yours above a 10. If your looking for some financial advice. I would suggest you in brace the future and technology. If you missed the easy money made on all the majors (OXY, DVN, XOM, CVX, COP, VLO, PBF, SLB, RIG and MPC) over the last 18 months. Because it was a freebie. You can only blame yourself for having a negative view of the future and missing out on opportunity. I guess you were busy viewing the future with 2090 binoculars, when you could have just wore your rose colored glasses and counted the green. Some just like to learn the hard way. Please buy an EV. Stop pumping gasoline and putting your money in my pocket or you can continue your “Insidious BAU”.
****
“Trending 2050: The Future of Farming, Based on current developments, experts predict dramatic changes in agriculture by 2050.
Gene Editing Booms
“By 2050, there will be gene-edited crops, and it will trigger a much wider variety of crops being grown,” says Norman. This new technology allows scientists to precisely edit genes in DNA with the goal of creating a better crop variety.
By-the-Plant Crop Management
Water availability, environmental impacts and soil health will continue to challenge growers in the future. But new technologies will help them deal with these issues more efficiently, says Norman. For example, the Israeli company Phytech, which is collaborating with Syngenta, has developed a monitoring system that features continuous plant-growth sensors, soil-moisture sensors and a microclimate unit. Monitoring data is then accessible on mobile devices and computers for immediate action, if needed.
High-Tech Solutions Evolve
With its regulations already in place, drone technology is poised for a boom in farm usage. In the next 10 years, the agricultural drone industry will generate 100,000 jobs in the U.S. and $82 billion in economic activity, according to a Bank of America Merrill Lynch Global Research report. Potential use of on-farm drones by 2050 is huge, from imagery and product application to transporting supplies and jobs not yet imagined.
A Clue to the Future
While predictions can shed light on the future, we are still 33 years away from 2050. A whole new generation of growers, who are not yet born, will be farming midcentury, and much will happen between now and then that we cannot predict. But if the past is a clue to the future, U.S. growers will continue to seek better ways to produce crops by embracing innovation.”
https://www.syngenta-us.com/thrive/research/future-of-farming.html
“I would suggest you in brace [sic] the future and technology.” – huntingtonbeach
Survivalist’s assessment of your character is correct and based on evidence. And you’ve just provided more.
James Speth’s observation is also correct. And you’ve just proven why.
First rule in getting out of a hole is to stop digging.
I was dreamin’ when I wrote this
Forgive me if it goes astray
But when I woke up this mornin’
Could’ve sworn it was judgment day
… The sky was all purple
There were people runnin’ everywhere
Tryin’ to run from the destruction
You know I didn’t even care
… Say, say, 2000-00, party over
Oops, out of time
So tonight I’m gonna party like it’s 1999
… I was dreaming’ when I wrote this
So sue me if I go too fast
Life is just a party
And parties weren’t meant to last
… War is all around us
My mind says prepare to fight
So if I gotta die
I’m gonna listen to my body tonight, yeah
… They say, 2000-00, party over
Oops, out of time
So tonight I’m gonna party like it’s 1999
Yeah, yeah
… Let me tell ya something
If you didn’t come to party
Don’t bother knockin’ on my door
I got a lion in my pocket
And, baby, he’s ready to roar
Yeah, yeah
… Everybody’s got a bomb
We could all die any day, aw
But before I’ll let that happen
I’ll dance my life away, oh-oh-oh
… They say, 2000-00, party over
Oops, out of time
We’re runnin’ outta time
So tonight we gonna party like it’s 1999
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rblt2EtFfC4
It seems to me that perhaps HB’s primary interest and motive here in promoting ‘green tech’ and optimistic future scenarios is because of being financially invested in it.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” ~ Upton Sinclair
Survivalist- that doesn’t really make any sense.
Have no illusion- Promoting a particular position on a blog, no matter what the product or policy, does not influence the market or industrial policy whatsoever.
Certainly there are people here with a vested interest on energy issues, whether it fossil fuels or ICE/EV vehicles. climate instability, food production, etc.
I’d argue that everyone here has a major vested interest in energy issues outcomes, one way or another.
Touché, badly worded.
I did not mean to infer that HB comes here to conduct PR or is motivated to influence markets.
I should have said that I feel HB suffers from denial; that perhaps HB also feels BAU is projected to continue as ‘we’ transition from fossil fuel to green tech; and that HB appears to be amorally financially invested in both.
“Promoting a particular position on a blog…does not influence the market…whatsoever.” – hickory
Wrong. There are many blogs that influence the market – many investors read market and financial blogs. There are “social influencers” and “social influencer wannabes” all over the internet.
“…when you could have just wore your rose colored glasses and counted the green.” – huntingtonbeach
He admits his guiding principles in life are delusion and greed. Not sure why some here are defending this unhealthy and immoral behavior.
I mildly mock HB when I’m inspired. He seems to take things at face value and doesn’t seem to understand wit and sarcasm, responding in earnest, and then will say, “yeah, I knew that was a joke”. It’s really hard to tell what’s going on in his little head, like a dog that’s not “all there”. Not exactly harmless or without cunning, but ultimately not worthy of acknowledging.
On the other hand HB-mindset is perfectly easy to understand. He has accepted the reality of the situation and emulates the ideal affect. Will any individual action to the contrary of HB-mindset make any difference or change? No. Any thought that the system could be changed by even large scale actions or events should have been dissuaded in 2008 when the system died yet continued in undead form since then. It is most often compared to a zombie, but I think vampire is the better analogy. It is more aware of its own actions and more organized than your typical zombie fictionalization. Is HB aware that his mindset is rapacious? Probably, but we are almost all participating in the system on some level. Most people on this site are probably white and over 40 and therefore statistically more likely to have significant investment/retirement accounts. Does investing in ESG solely versus Energy solely make you a better person? A little. But what about ESG vs Risk Management (I.e. following where the market is telling you to invest). Losing money on purpose is not noble. HB is correct – energy has done extremely well for nearly 2 years and is still quite bullish, as are gold and gold miners at the moment (another two sectors that are pretty hard to justify morally). Does he need to be braying about it on a thread literally discussing the collapse of human civilization caused by the very mindset he praises? Maybe Vampire Troll is the correct taxonomic identification.
“But when I woke up this mornin’
Could’ve sworn it was judgment day”
I have an education in Economics and Finance. Oh, the horror to realize my entire career I’ve been a rapacious asshole for applying myself to the American capitalist system. Hopefully I can handle this. I have already called the doctors office to have my Prozac increased and refilled.
Maybe I will be able to live with myself if I can find a bigger asshole than myself to give my estate too. Any ideas ? Or, gfarm could probably help me with his list of charities. Than again, maybe I could hang out at his free roadside produce stand and giveaway hundred dollar bills with his magic mushrooms. So confused.
It’s to bad I didn’t meet you kind folks more that 50 years ago, when I started working at a carwash cleaning inside back windows for $1.35 an hour. I could have lived the happy peasant life with you waiting for collapse.
PLAINS DROUGHT TO CURB U.S. WHEAT HARVEST, ADDING TO GLOBAL SUPPLY WORRIES
(sorry for the capital letters)
https://www.agriculture.com/markets/newswire/update-1-plains-drought-to-curb-us-wheat-harvest-adding-to-global-supply-worries
With Russia being the largest exporter, this adds to a developing problem
“It looks like Cadillac’s (GM) electric vehicle (EV) transformation is nearly here.
Cadillac confirmed it will begin production of its LYRIQ EV SUV next week, on March 21, at its newly-reconfigured plant in Spring Hill, Tennessee.
Cadillac had initially sold out its first-run of LYRIQ pre-orders, which totaled around 200,000.
From a production standpoint Cadillac, like almost all other automakers, is trying to ramp up EV production. While initial production was planned for around 3,000 vehicles in 2022, Cadillac said demand remains high. In a statement, “Since [its] reveal, the interest in the LYRIQ has been very strong. Therefore we will continue to explore adding additional volume.”
Last month Reuters reported Cadillac had expanded initial production of the LYRIQ to 25,000 vehicles this year, up significantly from the prior plan.”
https://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/news/cadillac-enters-electric-vehicle-competition-with-the-lyriq/ar-AAV95lU?ocid=msedgntp#:~:text=It%20looks%20like,Spring%20Hill%2C%20Tennessee.
Well–
“I hope you are all boosted (as much as they’ll let you) and have a good supply of N-95s. And I hope you’re feeling lucky. It’s every man for himself.”
Back in SoCal shortly—–
New posts will be up around noon EDT today.
There are usually bright spots associated with dark clouds, if you can spot them.
https://cbsaustin.com/news/nation-world/elon-musks-plan-for-tunnels-connecting-airport-to-downtown-san-antonio-moving-forward-boring-company-alamo-rma
Tesla is in talks with the Houston airport management office to build some tunnels there.
And there won’t be much in the way of local NIMBY opposition AT ALL in Texas.
The tunnels will likely be built.
And every successful tunneling project is a show case for more tunnels in other cities, and possibly even inter city tunnels.
They’re going to be like wind and solar power… expensive up front but dirt cheap once built.
I foresee a giant boom in the industry……. assuming Old Man Business As Usual manages to hobble along a couple more decades.
I’d like to have a tunnel under my house.
Woodshop, pool, roller derby rink, and sanctuary from fire and heat.
It would be a good demonstration project for E Musk, I request.
New posts are up
https://peakoilbarrel.com/opec-update-march-2022/
and
https://peakoilbarrel.com/collapse-a-decadal-scenario-3/