The DUI appointee at the Pentagon is consistent with RFK jr at HHS, Noem at Homeland Security, and virtually all of the rest. No consideration of competence, only some weird ideological alignment and likely subservience. The really horrifying circumstance is that the Senate has consented. How has partisanship come to such a level that experienced representatives with safe positions could sink so low?
How has partisanship come to such a level that experienced representatives with safe positions could sink so low?
With the party primaries, I’m not sure anyone is safe from challenges. Except maybe in Alaska, where they’ve gotten rid of party primaries, and now Murkowski is openly challenging Trump.
Nick
No, I’m thinking that every Republican Senator, save McConnell, voted to confirm RFK jr for example.
This buffoon is so extraordinarily unqualified for any position of responsibility anywhere on the planet that no rational person could have voted for him.
Yet they did. Why?
Many, if not most, of the other Trump appointees are unqualified for their positions yet sailed through the partisan Senate.
If you want to undermine institutions of democracy and national security Donald is doing it right. Only problem is his incompetence and lack of vision for anything but his psychopathic emotional needs. I figure he’s building a foundation for a real fascist to build on. When real hard times come and a clear majority of the country is willing to toss the Constitution out the window. We’re only half way there.
Hegseth? Excellent men’s hair products model. And he can do pushups. When Donald’s press secretary said Pete is doing great and all of the Pentagon is against him she perfectly expressed Donald’s gas lighting nonsense. If he has actually stopped drinking he must be climbing the walls.
Trump selects people on what he sees ( TV, Magazines, in person events ) not on academic study or research ( requires reading ) or actual qualifications for the job beyond very surface level connection.
You have to be physically attractive, constantly compliment him and a YES man. The other route is to be a billionaire.
He recently picked Dr. OZ for some high ranking medical position, a day time TV personality who is a con artist.
Andr
RFK jr is not physically attractive but he makes up for it by being stark raving nuts and a danger to the nation. That works for Trump as a distraction from his real agenda; plunder.
Trump thinks TV is the world, but also just blabs what he heard ten minutes ago regardless of source. He met Zelenskyi in Rome today and came out saying Putin is just stringing him along. Then a little later he started babbling about free transit for America ships through the Panama Canal, meaning he called Putin and Putin successfully distracted him from real world issues.
Putin has his number, no need to contradict, just distract.
WP linked an article late last thread- that deserves reposting
On China and Industrial/Economic Policy-
I am a fan of long term planning. Its one of the big things I find very faulty with the US approach.
Yeah, China has been lucky to have relatively good leadership for the last 40 years. Mao demonstrated the perils of autocracy, with his catastrophic Great Leap Forward and Return to the Land programs, but lately they’ve done much better.
There’s a strong contrast with India: India’s per capita income was twice as high in 1980, they were about equal in 1991, and now China’s economy is 5x as large as India’s.
Similarly, China is moving away from FF as quickly as they can, while India is moving much more slowly – it’s just terrible in the face of India’s good, cheap clean solar resource and relatively scarce (high imports of coal and oil), expensive and polluting FF resources.
There is probably a lot more to it than being lucky.
I’m no expert but “China is largely meritocratic. The system isn’t perfect (what system is?) but it generally does produce capable, intelligent leaders with a …”
I doubt someone like Trump would have gotten past the village level of leadership in China, and then lasted for only a short time before being returned to the used car lot sales position.
This is an aspiration, not a guarantee. China is lucky that they’ve sustained a strong meritocratic element lately, but the Chinese Communist Party has a membership that is .1% of the population, and it is a top-down hierarchy which is at least as vulnerable to a conversion to pure autocracy as any democracy (e.g., Russia which is technically a democracy, but is actually totalitarian). Don’t forget Mao…
They’ve been lucky. Under Xi things are deteriorating a bit – let us hope their luck continues.
The China we all know was built on western capital. Eurodollars to be precise. Without those dollars flowing into China. China would still look much like they did during the 1970’s and 80’s.
There would be no world’s manufacturing base in China without the Eurodollar inflows. You could say that Chinese leadership capitalized on the opportunity. Cheap labor with a home grown energy supply. From a bank point of view there was nothing but $$$ signs.
Labor is currently cheaper in Mexico. Only we have to export natural gas to Mexico in order to have manufacturing there. Labor is currently cheaper in a lot of places. But you have to build manufacturing facilities. Which takes time and money. Lots and lots of borrowed money. And really you need a long term energy supply in place which a lot of places don’t have.
Over the next 20-25 years manufacturing in China was always going away anyway. Because that’s how much coal they have left at current rates of consumption.
So if you still want the manufacturing of goods it will have to be done elsewhere.
Without the inflow of Eurodollars China would have a whole lot more coal still left in the ground than they currently do.
Now, use the oil decline curve that Dennis projected in his last post. Over the next 20-25 years or so. The decline of oil production globally will pretty much equal what is available for exports currently.
Dennis could be off a little bit. Might only be 15years or maybe 30 years. Doesn’t matter. Somewhere in that timeframe oil exports are going to zero.
In a no coal and no oil imports world exactly what does China look like?
Yeah they can’t even replace all the solar panels and windmills at that point.
So goes China so goes the rest of the world. The impacts of default in China will hit the Western economies hard who depend on their cheap goods and debt. All the pretty curves get thrown out the window if oil goes to 40 and drill pipe doubles. Export decline is higher than well decline and accelerates.
Time is definitely not on our side. Capacity utilization is falling which will create insolvency globally. The risk of a deflationary spiral has never been higher because pouring more debt on the system will break it. When you run out of levers to pull what do you do?
Panic and run for the exit.
Yeah, The decline profile that Dennis has put forward is best case scenario. Regardless of if his timeline is correct or a little off.
I think we both know that the debt required to even make the best case scenario into reality won’t happen. It won’t be issued because it can’t be paid back.
We both know there is an abrupt ending coming. Because of the way money is loaned into existence and how energy is required to pay it back principal plus interest.
That associated gas coming from the Permian basin isn’t going to be a long term energy supply. If you’re investing in manufacturing in Mexico you better have an early exit strategy.
This move lower in the dollar is much like the move we seen in late 2008 early 2009. Maybe for slightly different reasons but the reason actually doesn’t matter.
We have the selling of US assets by foreign investors. Mainly US stocks. Which they receive US dollars for. And I should add that it’s foreign government entities doing the selling. Private foreign entities are still buying.
Then they are selling the dollars they receive and buying their local currencies. Mainly USD/JPY, USD/CHF and EUR/USD is where the dollar weakness is.
So they are selling dollars buying back their own currencies. By doing so they just took a massive amount of dollars out of the market that are no longer available to service dollar denominated debt. Notice they aren’t paying down dollar denominated debts with the dollars they are receiving. At least not yet.
The dollar shortage is going to be exacerbated by this move.
2008 was in fact a massive dollar shortage in the Eurodollar market. Which actually started in France when a few banks were unable to properly price the collateral they had on their books.
I’ve heard 2008 can never happen again because the Fed and other central bank are on it and all over it and have the tools necessary to stop it.
Which is bs because none of the central banks can create the dollar liquidity that the world uses for trade and finance.
There are a lot of dollars stashed away in Swiss bank accounts. Switzerland’s banking sector is multiples of the size of their actual economy. They take the excess dollars that come into their banking system and buy assets to back these deposits. Because they are required too.
So they actually have to sell assets in order to get dollars if people start drawing dollars out of their accounts to meet their dollar denominated debt payments.
So if this is the beginning of a repeat of 2008. As the dollars leave Swiss bank accounts the Swiss franc will get crushed.
Keep an eye on the USD/CHF pair. The Swiss banks only have so many dollar denominated assets to sell.
And as always there is more to it. There are a lot of Euro’s deposited at Swiss bank accounts. Now if a dollar shortage shows up in Europe and Europe has already sold a lot of dollar denominated assets what do they have to do in order to get dollars?
They have to sell Euro’s and there is also a large stash of Euros on the balance sheets of Swiss banks that will get tapped in a dollar shortage on par of bigger than 2008.
There is no such thing as safe havens. You’ll sell whatever you have in order to meet debt obligations.
I agree we already see the Swiss Central Bank approaching zero interest rates and threatening negative.
I really think that the system has been gamed for awhile already and now there is little that can be done. In the fall of 2019 the global economy was tipping into recession. Conveniently COVID came along and saved the day. All the stimulus was still running through last year but obviously couldn’t keep running. So we bought 3-4 years with a mountain of debt that would have been unacceptable had there not been a pandemic as an excuse. But even after all that and as it continued in 2023 things started breaking and have been getting worse throughout 2024 globally. The 3trillion a year and unfettered immigration papered over the US recession but it was unsustainable.
Now we’re facing a housing, and stock market bubble simultaneously. The dollar shortage is a result of the real economy of goods and services contracting reducing loan creation. This was caused by the 2018 peak in oil production. The inflation the Fed is fighting clearly isn’t inflation because it suggests there are too many dollars when in fact there are too few. So we’re actually facing supply scarcity/affordability because the energy costs are spiking. Because the economy can’t grow the manufacturing and service sectors are trying to compensate for critical mass loss with price increases. This accelerates the decline.
Illegal immigration has ended, student loan forgiveness has ended, FHA mortgage modifications are ending. Unnecessary employment is ending at federal agencies. All of this is deflationary less dollars being created and spent.
Already we are seeing a decline in air travel, Chipotle tried to raise prices and lost 1.9% top line and 0.4% bottom line. Verizon is losing customers. UK pubs are going out of business and the same is happening in Singapore. China is in deep trouble with manufacturing and real estate.
Everywhere you look the trend is down in the real economy. And accelerating.
“So we’re actually facing supply scarcity/affordability because the energy costs are spiking.”
Sorry, but that doesn’t ring true. I think it likely will be in the future.
Oil at $70 is cheap, and is roughly average for the past 50 years. Nat Gas and Coal are bargains.
PV achieved a (low) pricing revolution as of 2017.
If you were referring to new nuclear power, yes it is very expensive to build.
We probably do agree that is most ways the US, along with the rest of the world, is grossly overextended.
I think a lot people don’t understand banking in general. Most people think their money is warehoused at a bank when they deposit money into their account.
No the bank takes your money and buys dollar denominated assets to back your deposit. The bank buys short term government T-bills with your deposit. Which are very liquid and can be sold in order to get cash when needed. Banks are earning 4% on your deposits currently.
People don’t realize their deposits are funding government spending. People view banks as money warehouses because they can write a check or use a debit card at any time and access their money.
When you spend money your bank deposits become someone else’s bank deposit. And the banks continue buying short term debt to back the deposit. It’s just someone else’s deposit instead of yours now. And the banks are still making 4% on the deposits.
All the deposits are created by the banks in the first place when they loan money into existence. Money or deposits are literally destroyed through the process of repaying a loan. The liabilities side of a bank balance sheet shrinks as loans are repaid.
When you repay a loan principal plus interest. The principal portion of the loan is destroyed. But because of the interest expense you payback more than was loaned to you in the first place.
This means that you could take all the dollars ever loaned into existence and use them to pay off the principal. Then there would be zero dollars, zero deposits. But there would still be trillions owed in interest expenses.
The fact that the interest expense is being paid. Means more dollars are leaving the economy than were lent into it to begin with. Loan growth has to be exponential. Or things become very deflationary.
Low and negative interest rates aren’t inflationary. Just a sign we can’t get growth regardless of how low interest rates go.
Most people also includes Ben Bernacke who thinks banks are intermediaries. The system is being run by a bunch of chimps. That’s why it doesn’t matter who’s in the Oval Office.
The reality of the money system is too perverse for most people to contemplate. For the older generation they view it as wealth and a security for their retirement. They don’t comprehend that the next generations need to be wealthier than they are or their store of value disappears.
It also doesn’t matter what form money takes. Imperial Spain learned this lesson despite its hoards of gold it fell into economic collapse. It was the quest for gold that built its economy not the acquisition of gold.
Similarly today the economy must grow but the natural forces behind a debt based currency is deflation. As loans are repaid money is destroyed so new loans must be made that are larger than the previous loans or the system becomes insolvent.
Bottom line is the energy supply is limiting loan creation. There is nothing that can be done about that. Money is being mopped up in speculative assets globally instead of driving industry for that same reason. Costs are escalating even as people become poorer. Business is seeing its top line shrinking and are cutting costs. Everyone is going to blame Orange Man but as usual they mistake the symptom for the cause.
If you don’t even know the fundamentals of the monetary system how can you possibly identify the the problem? Unfortunately in this case even if you do there is nothing that can be done about it.
What a pile of manure. There is no such thing as air travel/cargo without being part of the mass destruction-
“Fly mindfully. Check out these suggestions, each of which, if multiplied by others, can help subdue climate change: Choose airlines that offer carbon offset programs. Donate to carbon offset organizations yourself. Choose eco-friendly airlines. Sit in economy class. Take nonstop flights to limit layovers.”
The only way to make aviation low-carbon is to use synthetic jet fuel manufactured with carbon captured from the environment, and electrolyzed hydrogen powered by renewable electricity.
It would be more expensive, but it can be done with existing technology and would work just fine. As the engineering advanced and scale increased, costs would decline somewhat.
The aviation industry and the military are pretending that biofuels are scalable, but that’s not realistic. They don’t like the idea of a higher cost structure, but they are just going to have to bite the bullet.
You’re just spreading blatant lies now. Don’t pretend you aren’t.
Due to extreme temperature variations in the interior of Spain, there were anomalous oscillations in the very high voltage lines (400 kV), a phenomenon known as ‘induced atmospheric vibration’. These oscillations caused synchronisation failures between the electrical systems, leading to successive disturbances across the interconnected European network.
Electrical grid engineers have stated for some years that solar and wind do not have the ability to maintain a stable grid frequency which turbines do.
You are not a grid engineer just an ignorant troll
Spain has a high percentage of wind and solar that fluctuate often in the opposite direction to demand.
Oops. On re-reading your comment, I realized that you’re suggesting that both wind and solar are inversely correlated to consumption. That’s incorrect. Solar is strongly correlated with consumption. After all, all living activity evolved in response to sunlight.
Now wind is stronger at night, and winter. And, that’s a good thing. Wind and solar are inversely correlated, which reduces their combined “intermittency” sharply.
That’s why analysis of solar (or wind) in isolation is unrealistic. And a sign of very bad analysis.
—————-
Nuclear generation is pretty much flat, which means it also works nicely with solar, which takes care of daytime peak consumption.
In general, a diversity of power is a very good thing.
Why don’t you look at wind and solar output and educate yourself as to exactly how many hundreds of occasions wind and solar are falling just as consumption is increasing.
Ah, I see the two resident experts on ruinable energy have have given us new pearls of wisdom in reply to Loads of Oil
.
“Now wind is stronger at night, and winter. And, that’s a good thing”.
Really?. Maybe you should research the diurnal wind effect. Just type it into any search engine.
As for an explanation of what probably happened in Spain try this:
Carnot and Loads.
I know you guys seem to despise nonfossil energies….does that include nuclear?
But I want to point out that the UK could just retreat and rely on the domestic fossil resources while they last, mothballing the wind and nuclear sector.
I see that-
‘The United Kingdom has proven Coal reserves equivalent to 1.9 times its annual consumption. This means it has about 2 years of Coal left (at current consumption levels and excluding unproven reserves).’
‘the United Kingdom has Oil proven reserves equivalent to 4.8 times its annual consumption levels. This means that there would be about 5 years of oil left (at current consumption levels and excluding unproven reserves).’
‘the United Kingdom has proven Natural Gas reserves equivalent to 2.6 times its annual consumption levels. This means it has about 3 years of gas left (at current consumption levels and excluding unproven reserves).’
Give it a shot if that is your wish.
Or perhaps try to advocate for grid upgrades.
Grid instability as the cause of the blackout (rather than something like a cyberattack) is likely, and perhaps with solar/wind generators as the trigger.
But keep in mind that huge grid blackouts have been happening around the world long before there was wind or solar. For example the US northeast and adjacent Canada had a blackout just as big in 2003, which is just one of dozens of massive blackouts before intermittent energy sources where added to the mix.
There is no magic number of solar grid penetration that results in instability…places do learn how to manage grids for stability, although if you look at the long history of major blackouts it would be fair to ask if the operators in Pakistan have been learning. I suspect the problem there is lack of funds rather than lack know how.
The big problem with solar away from the tropics is seasonality…no two ways about it.
You got to have a complimentary and reliable power production source for the winter or you will need to put your economy into hibernation.
At a certain point of grid penetration this does become a big problem. In the US Jan solar output is only 40% as much as in July, nationwide.
In specific regions with a cloudy winter this is a much more dramatic problem. For example, in the US this includes the Pacific Coast/NW and the Great Lakes Region places like Pittsburgh and Detroit, and in Europe this includes a broad stretch from Ireland to St. Petersberg.
By tropics i assume you mean equatorial areas. Those areas won’t have seasonality issues but the cloud cover is consistent.
In Northern areas of Australia which is generally dominated by tropical climates, seasonality is significant when it comes to solar. Wet and dry seasons. Wet season is dominated by intense rainfall between Nov-April more than 2.5m of rain will fall in that period. In certain areas this will easily exceed 3m of rain. Dry seasons would be good for solar in these regions.
It seems to me solar would generally be more ideal in arid, semi-arid climates (also in terms of longevity and efficiency due to lower humidity). But most people don’t live in those areas. Subtropical climates would generally be better for rooftop solar installations in my opinion compared to tropical in terms of energy output. But i could be wrong. If i owned a house in Australia i’d definitely invest in rooftop solar, especially if the house has a north-south orientation.
1. Overshoot
2. The End of Cheap Fossil Fuels
3. The Failure of Green Energy
4. Dwindling Resources
5. Topsoil Erosion
6. Water Shortages
7. Climate Change
8. Biodiversity Loss
9. Migrant Crisis
10. Increasing Conflict
Conclusion
The term “peak oil” “is mentioned 6 times in the 10 reasons. 4 times under “The end of cheap fossil fuels.” Quoted below:
People have been talking about peak oil for decades, but if you’ve never heard of it before, peak oil is the point at which the amount of oil extracted every year peaks then goes into terminal decline. This happens because there is a finite supply of oil on the planet, so as time goes by, oil companies make fewer and fewer new oil discoveries.
Although oil companies like Exxon Mobil continue to find new sources of oil, overall, oil and gas discoveries are at their lowest level in 75 years, leading many people to believe that we have already reached peak oil. And in fact, there are signs that worldwide peak oil production happened in 2018.
And once under “Migrant Crisis” quoted below
Although the surge in climate migrants will lead to civil and regional wars, that is only one of the many reasons major wars will become more common in the coming decades. In fact, most of the reasons listed above (peak oil, dwindling resources, water scarcity, food shortages, biodiversity loss, and climate-related disasters) will all contribute to a steep rise in wars and conflicts.
And once under “Increasing Conflict.” Quoted below
I believe Russia recognizes that the world has passed peak oil and that energy is going to become more scarce. They also understand that droughts and floods (along with fertilizer shortages) are making it harder to produce food.
The first two lines of the “Conclusion.”
For decades, it’s been obvious that our global industrial civilization has an expiration date, but only recently have many scientists come to realize that the expiration date could be during their own lifetimes.
I would like to poll anyone interested, their opinion on the subject. Your reply could be in as little as two words, like: Doomer Porn, or, Bullshit, or Spot on, I agree, or any other comment you might like to make.
Thank you, this is important to me.
Many of those things are real risks for serious problems, but none of them are likely to cause civilization’s collapse.
Humans can sometimes snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, and we have many serious challenges, but this article is not realistic about inevitable collapse.
I could go through the problems with each of his points, but I don’t have the time. But let’s take the first: the author claims that the Global Footprint Network tells us that we’re in catastrophic overshoot. This is false. In fact, the analysis tells us that we need to kick the FF habit. Which, of course, brings us to points 2 and 3, which are also deeply unrealistic: there isn’t any use for FF that can’t be replaced, mostly with substitutes which are cheaper, cleaner and more reliable.
Nick, thanks for the reply. Your reasons are about what I expect from at least half those who respond.
I disagree with your answer but I do not wish to debate anyone right now.
Yeah, we’ve discussed these things often. But, what the heck, you wanted feedback.
A general thought: there are a lot of reasons to participate in discussions like these, but one of mine is I hate to see smart people distracted by incorrect information. It distracts people from the real problems.
The real problems are many but not hopeless – hopelessness is a weapon used by those people who are contributing to our problems, and who want people to give up.
This diagram shows that multiple global crises—like fossil fuel depletion, climate change, air pollution, and geopolitical conflicts—overlap and amplify each other, creating compound, systemic risks.
In essence:
Each problem isn’t isolated; their intersections (e.g., fossil fuel depletion + climate change → resource wars) create new, bigger challenges.
Compounding effects mean solving one issue (e.g., air pollution) might not matter much if the intersecting crises (e.g., climate refugees, political instability) continue unchecked.
Public narratives (like focusing only on air pollution) can obscure deeper systemic threats (like existential risks to global civilization).
In short:👉 Intersectionality multiplies complexity and makes single-issue solutions ineffective.
Paul,
I agree multiple problems interact, sometimes unpredictably.
But…fossil fuels are central to most of these problems. They cause resource wars. They create killer smog. They create climate change, which in turn creates refugees.
Perhaps I’m missing something, but your Venn diagram seems like a very good illustration of the problems caused by FF, and the enormous value of transition away from FF to solve most of them.
That’s called intersectionality and what the Venn diagram shows.
?????
Intersectionality is an analytical framework for understanding how groups’ and individuals’ social and political identities result in unique combinations of discrimination and privilege. Examples of these intersecting and overlapping factors include gender, caste, sex, race, ethnicity, class,
sexuality, religion, disability, physical appearance, and age.[1] These factors can lead to both empowerment and oppression.[2][3]
Intersectionality opposes analytical systems that treat each axis of oppression in isolation. In this framework, for instance, discrimination against black women cannot be explained as a simple combination of misogyny and racism, but as something more complicated.
Very much agree with Paul’s analysis, but have additions.
All the points mentioned are part and parcel of why we collapse. However the author, like most others misses the role of complexity and growth as a function of continuing complexity’s importance in every aspect of the modern world.
Our modern civilization is just like every other civilization that has ever existed and collapsed, only orders of magnitude larger.
Civilization itself is a self adapting system, a physical entity that has behaved like every other self adapting system we know of, that grows, increases complexity, reaches climax and collapses. The larger the system the faster the collapse. It’s a physical system based upon movement of energy within the system.
Every self adapting complex system that grows, does so until it reaches maturity, or it runs into some type of energy constraint or habitat constraint before maturity and collapses prematurely.
Even those that reach maturity eventually fail due to entropy and dissipation, more inexorable processes of our physical reality. Our continuing complexity is the only reason we are able to access the energy, minerals, metals food and water we do gain access to after depleting all the high grade resources.
The complexity only came from both human ingenuity and market size that allowed for every speciality that exists. Take away growth or size of markets and our ability to gain access to resources plumets.
Using the history of growth and collapse of civilizations or empires from pre-industrial times is extremely misleading. Look at Tainter’s “The Collapse of Complex Societies”. The subtitle is “New Studies in Archeology”. This tells you that this is not the study of modern societies.
A perspective on analyses of the collapse of civilizations: pre-modern civilizations were primarily agricultural, and had very, very low growth rates. So, agricultural productivity was key, and empires with high growth rates were essentially Ponzi schemes: when the underlying economic growth rate is .01% per year, an empire can only grow temporarily by stealing. The core of the empire exploits (loots) the periphery. The periphery expands until the empire becomes too large, and then it collapses due to the lack of new victims. Agricultural products include food and wood, and a common symptom of collapse is Peak Wood, as observed for both Athens and Rome.
Any analysis of the growth and decline of pre-modern civilizations has very, very limited application to modern times.
Modern empires are different. Japan, the UK, even Russia are all far more affluent now than they ever were during the heyday of their empires.
So…comparisons of ag empires to modern conditions are not very useful.
“New Studies in Archeology”. This tells you that this is not the study of modern societies.
Wut?
I have a friend who is an archeologist for the state. He digs nineteenth century as well as twentieth century urban sites. There’s no time limit on archeology.
There’s no time limit on archeology.
Yeah, good point. My impression, (the common impression) is consistent with the etymology: (‘ancient history’*), but of course you’re right.
So, I said that wrong. The point remains that Tainter is dealing with pre-industrial societies.
*I looked it up. Ain’t Google grand?
Nick G
People like you think the solutions are easy because you know little about any of the subjects under discussion.
Have you ever worked on a farm to see the crops fail due to lack of water?
Do you know the cost of irrigation and what it would cost the end user?
Why don’t you go to Africa or Australia and explain to the farmers with failed crops and dying animals what they are doing wrong?
I don’t see an argument in there. And, somehow you don’t sound like an African farmer…
These problems are not inherently insurmountable, but the fact that none – or few – of them (“migrant crisis”) is the main topic of discourse makes me think we are really, most sincerely, undeniably and reliably fucked.
Having cancer and being motivated by it is one thing. Trying to pretend it isn’t happening is quite another.
Mike
EDIT: I just realized a friend sent me that article a while back.
(PS I have an article coming out in a couple of weeks called “A Tree-Hugger’s Parable” that many of you, I think, will appreciate. It’s about emerald ash borer, and population “exuberance,” and Malthus, and fossil fuels and a few other things.)
Lack of growth. The debt required to keep everything going can’t be serviced much less repaid. Not in world with a contracting energy supply. Doesn’t matter if solar and wind are a thing.
There will be no growing or inflating our way out from under the debt. Governments everywhere are in denial. With every round of fiscal stimulus and monetary stimulus we go deeper into debt, not only public debt but private debt as well. Then we are left without the growth needed to repay the debt.
Collapse will begin as a monetary collapse. A collapse in the actual monetary system. Which will lead to a sovereign debt crisis and currency crisis around the globe.
You have to have a functioning monetary system in order to have an economy that is able to produce oil, coal, natural gas, solar and wind.
And the actual monetary system is the commercial banks that create all the loans via collateralized lending.
contracting energy supply. Doesn’t matter if solar and wind are a thing.
That’s unrealistic. Solar and wind really do produce energy. Their energy is just as…ahem…energetic…as Fossil Fuel.
And wind and solar are cheaper, cleaner, and more reliable. They are far more scalable and faster and easier to install: they can easily replace FF just as fast as it depletes.
How is China doing? You know their interest rates don’t lie. 1.6%
The Chinese don’t have anywhere near 5% GDP.
The real number is less than 2%.
How is Europe doing?
Maybe they both just need to install solar and wind at the speed of light. Give up every last FF then maybe GDP can go to 10% and stay there forever. And all the Chinese and European citizens can live in Utopia for the rest of their days.
I suspect you think that anyone who disagrees with you must be missing something. Sadly, that’s not so, and you won’t find that out without listening to the people you disagree with.
The author tries to offer a solid definition of ‘collapse’, but doesn’t quite lock it down. Let’s go with the two offered definitions though….
Collapse 1 = ‘By collapse, I mean a breakdown of social institutions like governments and economies, followed by a dramatic decline in the human population.’
Collapse 2 = ‘A collapse is the process at the end of which basic needs (water, food, housing, clothing, energy, etc.) can no longer be provided [at a reasonable cost] to a majority of the population by services under legal supervision.’
More importantly, the author completely glosses over what ‘soon’ means. Will civilization collapse tomorrow? No. Next year? Unlikely. 100 years? Perhaps. 200 years? Looking that way.
I agree with Paul. This is a systems issue, not a group of single issues that can be solved independently. As such, the benchmark has to be the LTG study. The business-as-usual baseline in that work predicts collapse this century along the lines of the above definition 1 dramatic reduction in population. LTG still looking robust 50 years on now.
Some comments point by point on the single issues anyway
1. Overshoot – Yes, the work by Rees and Wackernagel on ecological footprint is compelling. This is a real predicament.
2. FF limits – Uhm, I’m posting on peakoilbarrel…. Yes? Sarcasm aside, absolutely. The contributions to carrying capacity from Haber-Bosch process fertilizer is tough to overstate.
3. Failure of Green Energy – I’m not convinced. EROI remains pretty strong and is growing. Materials are a challenge. Likely not adequate for current and growing global population forever, but likely able to support a reduced number in closer to modern conditions for maybe 100 years. Long term of 1,000 years is an entirely different story.
4. Dwindling resources – There is absolutely some merit here with the broad concept. Ore grades are declining for example, no dispute. However, I always become wary of a source that spouts misleading information as this one does regarding desert sand use as a construction material. Fine aggregate (sand) is one of the constituent parts of concrete. Desert sand can be used as fine aggregate for many normal infrastructure purposes. Fine and coarse aggregate shape, grain size distribution and strength can become more important for some higher strength applications. This author makes it seems like the sand apocalypse.
5. Topsoil erosion – Not as concerned about this one. Absolutely concern, but in localized areas. Definitely not a concern everywhere across the globe.
6. Water shortages – Somewhat similar to topsoil, but more concerning. Significant concern for a substantial share of the globe, but there also remain plenty of places with what is a reasonably stable hydrologic cycle and adequate rainfall.
7. Climate change – We’re screwed, just with a built in time delay. Our Faustian bargain for all of that energy dense FF is coming due. On track for 3C by 2100 with locked in consequences that are only growing.
8. Biodiversity loss – I don’t have the expertise here for a full judgment, but this one scares the heck out of me.
9. Migrant Crisis – Yes. See climate change, FF resource limits, water shortage, … The author cites Syria as an example of migration induced in part due to climate change driven drought. Author misses the chance to add peak oil to this with a link to the dramatic reduction in oil production in 2010. Prior to 2010, the government is commonly cited as getting 25% of its revenue from oil production. Production collapsed in 2010. An example of systems issues.
10. Increasing conflict – Certainly some scary risks here, but from a broader historical context I’ve seen many argue the world has less armed conflict than much of history.
. As such, the benchmark has to be the LTG study. The business-as-usual baseline in that work predicts collapse this century along the lines of the above definition 1 dramatic reduction in population. LTG still looking robust 50 years on now.
Does human civilization face an inevitable collapse due to geological limits on fossil fuels, or other limited resources? Are we powerless? Or is our fate in our hands, and does it depend on our behavior and management of our economy?
The Club of Rome Limits to Growth study is sometimes presented as evidence for an inevitable collapse. But…it’s not. It’s simply an analysis of what it might look like if we DID hit resource limits.
It’s a very, very simple model. It has one variable called non-renewable resources, which in a recent revision is explicitly modeled on fossil fuels. There is no provision for wind, solar, hydro, nuclear, geothermal, etc, despite the fact that these resources are much, much larger than fossil fuels. The only renewable resource is a relatively small one, agriculture: “Non-renewable resources, measured in resource units Meadows et al. (1972), include all non-renewable resources on Earth… In order to provide suitable and accurate data, fossil fuel consumption is chosen. Although this proxy does not include metal resources, it is the most appropriate and available data. “ https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jiec.13442
“Can anything be learned from such a highly aggregated model? Can its output be considered meaningful? In terms of exact redictions, the output is not meaningful.…The data we have to work with are certainly not sufficient for such forecasts, even if it were our purpose to make them” (Meadows et al. 1972, p. 94).” http://wtf.tw/ref/costanza.pdf
Meadows was right – the Club of Rome LTG models were not predictions, they weren’t forecasts: they were *scenarios* that assumed imminent limits to growth, and simply modeled the dynamics we’d see in the model outputs when the economy hits those limits. Basically, they modeled “overshoot” – what happens when there are lags, delays and positive feedback between the point of hitting limits and seeing the results in the economy.
Most of all, they *assumed* limits to growth were very close – they didn’t prove that those limits *were* close.
Sadly, Dennis Meadows has forgotten this basic fact, or chooses to not remember it, and lately has been talking as if those scenarios were in fact forecasts, and discussing how close they came to reality. In fact, the overshoot modeled in those scenarios has not been seen in any way – so far the world economy is pretty much simply growing in the same exponential way as before.
The Club of Rome models did do us a service, by showing us what overshoot might look like, and showing us the impact of lags and delays. This appears to be relevant to Climate Change, though probably not relevant to Peak Fossil Fuels – for Fossil Fuel, the lags, delays and positive feedbacks that might impair mitigating the impact of a peak are much smaller and shorter.
I was sloppy with my word choice. The LTG authors did indeed create scenarios to model different possible outcomes and took care to note that these scenarios were not forecasts or predictions.
Yes, LTG used a simplified model of a hugely complex system. However, model complexity does not necessarily add value all by itself. Arhhenius made the first model prediction of CO2 impacts on global temps in 1896 and it is holding up pretty well.
I may be misinterpreting your comment about 1 variable, but I believe that there were actually 5 key variables considered.
Your strawman argument about LTG being used as proof of an inevitable future is unconvincing. The LTG scenarios modeled a range of outcomes. How exactly did they assume imminent limits to growth as you suggest?
Do you have an alternate systems model that you can point to as better? Or perhaps a more compelling critique? Please don’t offer anything from an economist.
I don’t recall the details with certainty, but had thought that the model did consider impacts from technological change on things like pollution and energy in a very coarse, lumped manner.
Models are useless they have underestimated loss of consistent rainfall, they have underestimated the droughts, they have underestimated the flooding events
However, model complexity does not necessarily add value all by itself.
No. But they need to be sufficiently complex to capture the problem. In this case they were looking at the dynamics of collapse, assuming collapse will happen. They weren’t really evaluating whether collapse would happen, just how it would look if it did.
I believe that there were actually 5 key variables considered.
It had 5 major variables: population, industrialization, food production, resource depletion, and pollution.
Again, “Resource Depletion” models non-renewable resources, which in a recent revision is explicitly modeled on fossil fuels. Except for agriculture (basically, food & biofuel) there is no provision for renewable energy such as wind, solar, hydro, geothermal, etc, despite the fact that these resources are much, much larger than fossil fuels. The only renewable resource is a relatively small one, Food : “Non-renewable resources, measured in resource units Meadows et al. (1972), include all non-renewable resources on Earth… In order to provide suitable and accurate data, fossil fuel consumption is chosen. Although this proxy does not include metal resources, it is the most appropriate and available data. “ https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jiec.13442
So, basically we’re dealing with a prediction about Peak Oil. Which is not, repeat not, going to cause inevitable collapse. Modern society is, of course, complex and volatile. It’s certainly possible that we could screw things up completely: there are many possibilities: runaway climate change, malevolent super intelligent AI, engineered pandemics, nuclear war, etc. But PO is pretty low on the list.
Your strawman argument about LTG being used as proof of an inevitable future is unconvincing.
I replied to what you said. “the benchmark has to be the LTG study. The business-as-usual baseline in that work predicts collapse this century along the lines of the above definition 1 dramatic reduction in population. LTG still looking robust 50 years on now.”
I understand you to be saying that LTG study tells us something about collapse this century. Robust was the word that was used. It’s not robust – it’s not even weak. It’s just not relevant to the question of forecasting collapse.
Do you have an alternate systems model that you can point to as better?
Actually, Jacobson at Stanford has done quite a lot of modelling – you might want to take a look. There are other models, many of them. Dennis does good ones, that are far more realistic.
In general the energy models out there are fare more compelling than LTG, which was not, repeat not, intended to be a real world model or provide forecasts (and is, really, just an energy model).
Right, 5 variables. Population, industrialization, food production, resource depletion, and pollution. I disagree that LTG is ‘really just an energy model’ and don’t see any support for this by you.
You suggested that LTG is held as proof of ‘inevitable’ collapse this century. Not something I said and not something the LTG authors said. The LTG scenarios included a wide range of possible outcomes. I did suggest that the results of the LTG business as usual scenario remain robust to this point in time. They do. I would point to the separate works by Herrington and Turner.
If you want a compelling case for inevitable collapse in the long run, I would suggest reading the last few years work by Tom Murphy on his Do The Math blog.
I am familiar with Jacobson’s work on energy transition modeling, including the academic and other critiques of his work. I’m certainly familiar with DCs work on this site. (Thank you DC!) Regardless of their merits, they are not directly pertinent to the discussion of larger systems models other than as possible components of such models. Ron’s IP laid out many of the key issues that might be considered in such models.
In one of your prior comments, you linked to a collection of work from 2006 including a review by Costanza of various Integrated Global Models, including World3 from LTG. That is a more valid and valuable contribution to this particular topic, and I thank you for the link. Costanza’s GUMBO model is particularly interesting, and certainly appears more complex than LTG. His other publications on the use of this model also include a range of scenarios. Unfortunately, a likely outcome from this GUMBO model appears distressingly similar to LTG business as usual.
I don’t *like* these results. No apocalyptic destiny for me, thank you very much. I’m also not interested in accepting fate. However, if we want to succeed in contributing to better outcomes then we need to have a solid understanding of what is likely. Dispassionate and with as few vested interest biases as possible.
Ron,
These are all things I’ve been seeing for a while, have to agree with it all. Several if not all these days aren’t “Problems” that have a solution but are “Predicaments”. Just going to have to deal with them, as unpleasant as they may be.
One thing mentioned there was something that I’ve been pointing out to people for at least a decade, the bugs on the windshield. in the 70’s I ALWAYS had to clean them off my windshield every time I filled my tank. Now I NEVER have to.
AUGJOHNSON,
It is interesting how when the bug thing is brought up in conversation, others will usually mention that they have noticed it, or some will say, “now that you jogged my memory…yes, isn’t that strange.”
But an alarming thing is how few are recognizing this mine-canary; and as you observe, it has been a long time since its been blinking on the radar. I watched a video last year about hand-pollination of fruit trees somewhere, maybe China. Tending bees and their hives as a hobby in the 1980’s created my deep appreciation of them. We’d harvest a few hundred pounds of honey and leave plenty for their winter survival. Later on around 2012, I managed to raise a million Black Soldier Fly larvae for feeding to a small flock of hens we had, down in the hill-country south of Austin, TX, and I can guarantee that we’d prefer not to rely on those prolific composters for nutrition in any foreseeable future. I think I’d rather eat fried earthworms if it came to that. I told an ‘old boy’ Texan neighbor about seeing someone eat a sauteed Walking Stick dipped in chocolate-sauce at a Bug Fest in Zilker Park, and to my amusement, he replied in his slow drawl, “THAT just ain’t right.”
All big problems.
But if the definition of collapse is ” the process at the end of which basic needs (water, food, housing, clothing, energy, etc.) can no longer be provided [at a reasonable cost] to a majority of the population by services under legal supervision” I think there is a lot of wiggle room between rich countries current expectations around basic needs and the actual basic needs which still allow “civilisation” to flourish.
I haven’t read the article but, I think I can comment on point 3, The Failure of Green Energy. Solar PV in particular is growing faster than just about anybody projected it would. “China met its 2030 target of 1,200 gigawatts of wind and solar capacity nearly six years early” is something I pulled from a internet search for “china hits solar target five years early”. Yesterday this was published on the PVTech web site Acciona Energía completes construction of 308MW solar PV plant in Queensland, Australia 7 months ahead of schedule! These are just two stories that highlight how solar PV in particular is being installed at a blistering pace. On January 2, 2025 The Guardian (UK) had an article with this headline, “UK electricity cleanest ever in 2024, with record 58% from low-carbon sources”. The recent blackout in Spain and Portugal comes a week after it was reported that Spain was running on 100% renewable energy in the middle of the day! All of this suggest to me that green energy is not failing. I put it to you that if the FF lobby would get out of the way and stop trying to derail green energy a transition to a renewable energy based economy would be a lot more likely. Is the transition going to be smooth? Almost certainly not but, it is not impossible.
On another front, The 21st Shanghai International Automobile Industry Exhibition is currently underway in China. I suggest that the folks in America really don’t appreciate what is happening in the auto industry in China. The second largest manufacturer of EV batteries in the world (BYD) last month announced 1 MW charging technology that facilitates adding 400 km of range in 5 minutes. Not to be outdone the largest battery manufacturer announced their new technology just before the start of the 2025 Shanghai Auto Show. Battery giant CATL showcases three innovations: 1500km range battery, 520km in 5 minutes ultra-fast charging, and 2025 mass-production sodium-ion battery. If you look at any of the reviews of the Shanghai Auto Show the advances in technology are stunning!
Share-wise, March saw plugin vehicles cross the 50% market share threshold, reaching 52%! Full electrics (BEVs) alone accounted for 34% of the country’s auto sales, while PHEVs had 27% share and EREVs 8%, making BEVs the best selling powertrain in China, above petrol vehicles and HEVs.
Does the surge of adoption of NEVs in China contribute anything to this Reuters headline “China’s fuel demand may have passed its peak, IEA says”? You could just say growing adoption of EVs won’t affect oil demand ……… until it does! I urge readers of this site to take a look at the automobile situation in China. For example the position taken by the Chinese central government, China aims for BEVs to dominate new car sales by 2035. My understanding is that there are people in the Chinese government that are “Peak oil Aware”. If I remember correctly The Hirsch Report (2005) said mitigation measures had to be started at least ten years before Peak Oil occurs to avoid catastrophic disruptions to the global economy. The world is in a much better position now in 2025 than we were in 2005, at least as far as Peak Oil is concerned.
I can’t say much about most of the other points but I can leave you with this little gem. The oldest newspaper in the island where I live, The Jamaica Daily Gleaner had an editorial headlined “Population Dangers” as the editorial in their first Sunday edition for 2025 (Jan 5). They were bemoaning the island’s declining birth rate.
For instance, in 1970, women of child-bearing age, on average, had 5.47 children. A decade later that had declined to 3.82. Now it is 1.9, down from 2.4 in 2008, reflecting the combination of better education among women; that more of them are in the workforce and delaying child-bearing; easier access to birth control services; and the success of family planning messages, like the acclaimed “Bev Brown” ad of the 1980s that promoted “two is better than too many”.
But there are issues that come with declining birth rates. The total fertility rate of 1.9, for example, is below the 2.1 that demographers say is needed to keep a country’s population stable.
Put another way, at the current fertility rate, if it is not reversed, Jamaica, when all things are taken into account, is on track for a long-term decline of its population. Which also means having a society with significantly more grey people and insufficient numbers of working-age ones to finance the social welfare needs of the older generations.
They obviously see a declining population as a bad thing! Some of us don’t!
WORLD POPULATION PROJECTED TO REACH 9.8 BILLION IN 2050, AND 11.2 BILLION IN 2100
“With roughly 83 million people being added to the world’s population every year, the upward trend in population size is expected to continue, even assuming that fertility levels will continue to decline.”
Ron
I see the first item as correct, the others as consequences of the first one. You could add many more consequences to the list.
The impacts are already getting ugly for many in this world, I expect those impacts to spread and increase in severity.
Whether we are in overshoot or not depends on which policies we adopt.
Oh goog gtavy. Ecological overshoot does not depend on what we adopt or what we think or believe. It is a fact of nature. It depends on nothing but cold hard facts.
Ecological overshoot occurs when human demand for natural resources and services exceeds the Earth’s capacity to regenerate them in a given year. This means we’re consuming resources and generating waste faster than ecosystems can replenish and process them. A key indicator of this is Earth Overshoot Day, which marks the date when humanity’s yearly ecological footprint exceeds the planet’s biocapacity.
Overshoot is not a matter of opinion or policy. It is a matter of facts, cold hard facts.
These things are not easy to measure and there are different estimates, humans can change policy to help to reduce waste as well as process waste and can change the way consume and produce things to reduce resource consumption, those are also possible futures. Note that the future is not written and facts are historical.
Dennis, you should know by now that what what humans can do and what they will do are two different things. Nevertheless, there is no possible way that one can define “overshoot” to deny that we are not already deep, deep into overshoot.
10,000 Years ago, wild animals made up over 99% of total mammal biomass on earth. Today that percentage has fallen to 4% and still falling. By 2050, or soon thereafter, it will be 2% or less. The below is from Google AI
Humans and their domestic animals collectively account for approximately 96% of the total mammal biomass on Earth. This means that wild mammals make up only about 4% of the total. Livestock, particularly cattle, dominate this percentage, with humans accounting for around one-third of mammal biomass.
All wild animals are dying out because we are taking over their territory for human habitation. I could name a hundred other things. Like the water table in India, home of 1.4 billion people, is dropping by half a meter per year. There will be widespread famine in India in less than two decades. Rivers are drying up. Ocean fisheries are almost gone. And I could go on, and on, and on. If you do not think that is overshoot, then you have no idea what the word means.
I hope we both realize that Trump is an idiot. However, I will say to you what I said to Dennis. If you think whether or not we ae in overshoot has anything to do with who is president, then you have no idea what the word means.
From the Web: Earth Overshoot Day 2024 falls on August 1st. 30 July 2024 – August 1st marks Earth Overshoot Day, the date when humanity’s demand on nature’s resources surpasses Earth’s capacity to regenerate them for the given year.
And that has not one damn thing to do with who is President.
Ron,
I agree with you about T, but I am allergic to the idea that policy doesn’t matter.
Alimbiquated,
Of course politics matters about a lot of things, but no politician or political program can save us now. We are talking about world phenomena that has taken place over the last 200 years, and is still happening within every nation on earth. One nations politics may have some effect but so damn little it cannot be detected.
This is about worldwide overshoot leading to collapse and no politician can fix it. We are at least 6 billion humans past the long term carrying capacity of the planet.
Ron,
I have sympathies towards the way T.Hill and Phil S. thinks about these issues.
It is not given that “overcomplicating” the world will not give results and that the expansionary model does not have some legs to run on; still. The contraction model while it would be a shock for sure, is not unfathomable for most. And that is why we most probably can keep going for a long time period (this century) with, most probably, an eventually reduced industrial lifestyle. The collapse is not a given.
Try telling an orangutan that their world is not collapsing. They are doomed to extinction within the next decade. Palm oil farms are taking over their habitat. They will all die. And that is happening to half the world’ wild animals today. The collapse has already begun; it is not something that will happen in the future. It is what is happening right now.
Just as sure as we are destroying the wild animal’s habitat, we are destroying our own. We are overfishing, over cutting forest, over working the topsoil, we are overconsuming our natural resources, we are…. hell, I could go on for pages. Anyone who are not aware that we are in deep overshoot and in the process of ecological collapse has their head in the sand. Or perhaps up their ass. I am not sure which but it is one or the other.
I am just curious about why people believe what they believe. It is obvious, I mean it’s so damn fucking obvious that the world is in deep overshoot and the outcome can only end in collapse. That collapse can come in ten years or fifty years, but it is just so obvious it is coming.
I was wondering who would deny it and why. Who and why would one deny something so goddamn obvious. I really know why, so I am not really sure why I asked. Just for grins and giggles I guess. Francis Bacon knew the answer over 400 years ago:
“Man prefers to believe what he prefers to be true.”
― Francis Bacon
When the obvious facts falsify what you desperately desire to be true, damn few can let the facts overrule their desires. That is even if the facts are so goddamn obvious, they knock you over, still, still, what they desperately desire to be true will be believed.
Hi Ron.
When I first became aware of Peak Oil and the surrounding cluster of predicaments (probably around 2007) it took me some time to believe it was true. Arriving at the “obvious” conclusion is not straightforward, particularly for those of us with Arts degrees (most of what little I know about statistics I learned on the Oil Drum). My guess is that gathering enough knowledge to be confident that we are in overshoot and that there is no hope- essentially adopting the Doomer position- is the equivalent to 2 or 3 University-level classes. Not everybody is smart enough, motivated enough, or intellectually honest enough to do the work.
Goddammit Lloyd, you do not need a university degree to know whether or not we are in overshoot. But what you do need is a third grade education. If you have that, and if you look at the data, the fucking data is so obvious that it will knock you over.
Lloyd, it is not a question of where we are now. That is a foregone conclusion. It’s all about where we will be in the future. But, unless we can acknowledge that we are on the preface of collapse, then there is no way we can prepare for it.
No, I am not preparing for it at all. In one month I will be 87 years old and on the preface of death. I am just so goddamn lucky. Born at the right time and dying at the right time.
Perhaps it is because I do not fear it is why I can see it so clearly. If I were younger, I would likely deny it too.
We would not know about the scale of deforestation were it not for many scientists doing field work and satellite analysis.
If the world’s forest size were stable, then we could be sure we were not in overshoot in this regard. Unfortunately there was a net loss of some 15 billion trees last year. That is the equivalent of all the trees in Great Britain every 4 months.
If the top soils of the world were stable or even increasing then there would be no issue in this regard. Unfortunately the rate of soil erosion and soil degradation is horrendous.
Globally we are losing 12 million hectares of arable land to erosion and degradation, the initiatives to reverse this trend are tiny. We would have to put ten thousand times as much effort and money into reversing the situation.
If we used water from aquifers at the same rate as they are replenished then that would be fine. Unfortunately many are in decline and already nearly 2 billion people are facing water shortages.
We are destroying everything that life depends on and this destruction is already killing people. These are not some issues in the future.
Globally we would have to support all farmers to protect land. Pay people to protect and regrow forests. Pay to store enough water to irrigate lands. Pay people to grow different crops. Pay to ensure clean drinking water for everyone.
This would cost approximately what the world spends on armaments $2.2 trillion per year and all the money lost to corruption about $2.4 trillion per year.
Chances of that happening are zero.
So we are in overshoot and balance will be restored at a population level that the resources can support. Probably at a level of the 1950s.
I read the article. I think it contains many mistakes and exaggerations.
1. I agree that the planet is overpopulated, I think by an order of magnitude. Unfortunately, the problem will be solved in a natural way – wars, extinction from hunger, diseases, possibly genocide of the victors.
2. Yes, of course.
3. Green energy is useful. Of course, it should be developed in tandem with storage methods. The use of hydrocarbons, however, gives some advantage, and if some country refuses to use oil, it will lose in the competition. Hydrocarbons will be used until they run out. It would be better if countries agreed to gradually abandon the use of hydrocarbons as energy, and use them only as raw materials for chemistry. Of course, this is not possible – they will burn all the oil and gas.
Fertilizers that are mined from the ground will also run out. 4. I think the author is exaggerating, of course the soil is being destroyed and the land suitable for use is shrinking, but the possibility of cultivating the land in the same volume due to the reduction in population and the impossibility of using hydrocarbon fuel for cars will come sooner.
5. I agree. But I cannot estimate the magnitude of this problem and it is different everywhere.
6. Of course the climate is changing. The anthropogenic factor is undoubtedly large, but its magnitude cannot be determined precisely. In the history of mankind there were times when the temperature was higher than today. I think that we will survive this problem and there is no need to worry, much less do anything about global warming. The anthropogenic factor will soon begin to decline (with a decrease in oil, gas and coal production), and then it will stop altogether. People will cook food on firewood. I looked at pictures of the Soviet Luftwaffe in 1942, where there is now a lot of vegetation, especially river floodplains and forest belts – bare ground – because the population used everything for cooking and heating. I am more afraid of a new ice age when 10,000 years ago a glacier 3,000 meters thick lay over northern Europe.
8. Of course, this is unfortunately true and extinction will continue.
9. I cannot judge the migration from Syria, I have come across opposite assessments. I do not see any positive heroes in Syria, I cannot evaluate the rise of Islamists to power positively. I think that the author exaggerates the consequences of global warming in the Middle East, although I do not understand this. I have great doubts about research, it is often biased and on grants from interested structures. 10. The author is under the influence of lying Western media. The conflict in Ukraine began after the coup in 2014, paid for by the oligarchs of Ukraine and Western intelligence agencies. Russia took advantage of the situation, organized a referendum in Crimea (it is populated by 90% Russian people and until 1954 was part of Russia). I think that in the interests of security, Russia decided to return Crimea and keep its military bases there. Otherwise, Ukraine would have joined NATO and NATO could have dealt a disarming blow to Russia. The uprising in the east of Ukraine was started by Russians and Russian speakers, who made up 100% of the population. They did not use Ukrainian and knew it because it was taught as a foreign language in school, and instruction was also in Russian. Former FSB Colonel Strelkov and his nationalist comrades, armed with various weapons that they were able to acquire and steal (a total of about 50 people), entered the city of Slavyansk. He was a charismatic person and was able to attract many volunteers. Power in the east of Ukraine was in the hands of oligarch magnates and the security forces were also controlled by them. They were going to hand over the regions to the new authorities in Kyiv, but it did not work out. Russia quietly intervened after several months of war, intending to use the return of the regions to Kyiv during bargaining. I will not continue the story, this is not the article. I think that all the people present at the forum are already elderly and we will not live to see the beginning of the crisis of civilization, although most likely many will live to see the beginning of a nuclear war. Life after the collapse will of course continue, only it will be a different civilization, we will leave today’s comfort zone, there will be few individual cars and consumption will decrease. “Democratic governance” will also disappear, when political parties are interested in their victories, and not in the interests of the people of their countries, senators and congressmen do not bear any responsibility for their decisions. Parties and governors help businesses that helped them in elections.
I read your comments. I think they contain many mistakes and exaggerations. BUT, why should your opinions be more or less valid than anyone elses? I think I will just stick with my prejudice which is that if I want an opinion on climate I will seek the opinion of climate scientists, etc. This is perhaps strange way of thinking to you?
“They are far more scalable and faster and easier to install: they can easily replace FF just as fast as it depletes.”
I see that quote quite often.
Are there any instances though of solar panels, batteries and wind turbines being produced without energy provided by FF?
Until that actually happens, are we not pissing into the wind? . . . and what about the resins used in the manufacture of blades? where will that be sourced from?
So many questions that tend to be ignored.
The cheapest and most efficient KW of energy is the the one that is never generated . . . we need to get by and thrive with less.
That would be quite a coincidence, because that’s not a quote, it’s my original writing.
Are there any instances though of solar panels, batteries and wind turbines being produced without energy provided by FF?
Possibly not. It’s really, really doesn’t matter. It was many decades before either coal or oil were produced without horses – did it make them less useful?
FF is just a variety of hydrocarbons. It’s been convenient and affordable, but it’s not magic. We can create any hydrocarbons we need, if we really need them, from renewable energy, carbon and hydrogen.
And, of course, for most applications it’s far more efficient use renewable electricity directly in electric motors, heat pumps, etc.
“FF is just a variety of hydrocarbons. It’s been convenient and affordable, but it’s not magic. We can create any hydrocarbons we need, if we really need them, from renewable energy, carbon and hydrogen”.
Just like that!
Would you care to elaborate since you are so clever.
What sources of carbon, hydrogen and renewable energy were you thinking of?
Which processes were you considering?
How would you synthesize an epoxy resin for instance, and carbon fibre?
Carnot
Nick G is a waste of time he lacks the very cognitive ability to recognize he’s incompetent to comment on these subjects. And he’s found support for his cognitive bias. That’s the danger today you can believe anything you want and find so looney who believes it to. Dunning Kruger Effect.
We just witnessed a complete blackout of the Iberian Peninsula that was a direct result of Solar penetration that reduced inertia that was needed to stabilize the grid. But Solars not the problem right?
All listed items are true, but each effect has different timelines (apart from global warming), and different local effects. Local effects differ by geography, mineral complements, climate, distances, riverine transportways, growth rate of wood, governance, and so much more.
The big tragedies – floods, especially – have always been with us. Scale will be larger, little doubt, same for drought. There is no doubt we will return to more simple living conditions – just as many rural Chinese do now. Materials will revert to rock, wood etc. And yes, populations will shrink (mostly by choice), but we have a good chance to power down if the political will is there.
Luckily, many undeveloped countries are already living our future. We have have much to learn, and it will be very uncomfortable getting there.
But we will adapt to new circumstances. Humans always do.
Laurie, this statement of yours I must reply to” But we will adapt to new circumstances. Humans always do.
Yes we will adapt to less water, less topsoil, less energy, less food, more heat, and more resource wars. Yes, there is a way to adapt to all those problems. It’s called “die-off.”
“But we will adapt to new circumstances. Humans always do.”
So we are in luck, because only humans matter?
NUMBER OF SPECIES AT RISK OF EXTINCTION DOUBLES TO 2 MILLION
“While scientists have long documented the decline of species of plants and vertebrates, there has always been significant uncertainty over insects, with the UN making a “tentative estimate” of 10% threatened with extinction in 2019. Since then, more data has been collected on insects, showing the proportion at risk of extinction is much higher than previously estimated. Because there are so many insect species, this doubles the global number of species at risk.”
As Ron said-
“Yes, there is a way to adapt to all those problems. It’s called “die-off.”
It looks to me like we are in deep overshoot territory, and I am startled that it isn’t obvious to all human beings given our capacity to observe. I suppose there is just to much stimulus to put everything into context, and that our species is prone to harboring a few very dysfunctional states of mind like magical thinking, denial, and the embrace of outright delusional stories (religion for example).
If by collapse we mean living in places more like Haiti than Denmark, than yes I think large swaths of planet are prone to slipping toward collapse over the next 5 decades. Its very hard to predict who/where will be less affected…who could have predicted that Gaza tragedy of today would be a direct result of the German embrace of a certain man as leader in 1933. In human affairs things have a way of getting out of hand…mobs, you know.
our species is prone to harboring a few very dysfunctional states of mind like magical thinking, denial, and the embrace of outright delusional stories (religion for example).
Oddly enough, it’s religion that has developed a deep and widespread expectation of the end of the world.
Reminds me of Reagan’s Secretary of the Interior, who was enthusiastic about paving over our parks because he knew that the end of the world was nigh.
It should be pointed out that “End Times,” or “Apocalypse,” what have you, do not have a goddamned thing to do with either ecological overshoot or the collapse of civilizations.
The latter are documented natural phenomena. The former Christian horse shit.
I can say with near 100% that the world will not end (and that John of Patmos’s Book of Revelation is a crock.)
No, World will go on. Perhaps without us to bother it.
UNC Chapel Hill professor and world renowned New Testament scholar ( he is fluent in the deprecated Greek the original text were written in; Jesus spoke Aramaic ).
Jesus was a jewish apocalypticist who thought a celestial entity (Yahweh?) was coming to kill the Romans.
The entity would create a Kingdom of God made of earthly materials on Earth and Jesus would be King.
Even the “End Times” are not what Jesus taught. His apocalyptic ideas were different.
“End Times,” or “Apocalypse,” what have you, do not have a goddamned thing to do with either ecological overshoot or the collapse of civilizations.
Technically this true, obviously.
That has very little to do with the psychological reality, though. Lots of people resonate to things like Mad Max movies because deep down they’ve been soaked in apocalyptic mythology,
It’s similar to the way that most people have an unconscious expectation of an afterlife with judgement at the pearly gates. They behave as if what they do in life will do will affect that judgement, when obviously what they do when alive will have nothing to do with what happens after death.
So…a very significant percentage of people who claim not be religious still believe in an upcoming apocalyse (and not because they know anything about the stuff being discussed on this blog, like bugpocalypses or PO). Just because they’ve been soaked in the religious idea.
Mike
Yeah the Apocalypse is horseshit, of course, but even non-believers from Christian countries are influenced by it. They just tend to suggest non-Christian causes. It is striking that there is often a moralistic tone to these predictions: People are bad, overconsumption is bad, capitalism is bad, therefore the sky will fall.
Compare that to China. Chinese eschatology also exists, but the myth is more about cycles and the rise and fall of dynasties. In the popular imagination, changes between dynasties are cosmic events accompanied by droughts, earthquakes and other disasters. They result from loss of harmony, warning of political or social collapse, and the subsequent loss of the Mandate of Heaven.
The Communists buy into this myth, at least publicly. It’s no coincidence that Xi actively promotes the concept of “ecological civilization,” drawing on (that is cherry picking) traditional values from Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism that emphasize harmony between humans and nature.
It is of interest that some bible predictions have come true.
Jews lived in countries all over the world but persecution started to force many to consider moving to Israel a place they had never been to. WW2 hastened things along. In 1948 against all odds a new state was formed.
Ezekiel 13. 21 predicted such an occurrence. Interesting.
The bible refers to the generation born just before 1948 as the last generation. In that case we will all know soon if Revelation is true or not.
I’m expecting the giant sentient jellyfish that live on the other side of the galaxy will visit after the die-off to introduce themselves to the remnants getting by.
“We think you’ll have time to listen now”.
The great Bronze Age trade networks and civilizations around the Mediterranean — Mycenaean, Hittite, Ugaritic, Babylonian, Cypriot — collapsed right around 1200 BC. They almost took Egypt with them. Even literacy systems were lost in Hatti and Greece.
Hi Mike B . Just popped in to say ” Thank You ” for teaching me about the collapse of the Bronze Age . It was like a bulb going on . Regards and be well .
THAWING PERMAFROST DOTS SIBERIA WITH RASH OF MOUNDS
“In the vast white expanse around Churapcha in eastern Siberia, the ever more rapid thaw of the permafrost is changing the landscape, cracking up houses and releasing greenhouse gases.”
Question for you Ron, and secondarily for others who wish to comment-
Do you think there will be a real US presidential election in 2028, one that is not simply a per-ordained charade to anoint the next version of the current oligarchy? Or is the game of democracy over in this country?
I wonder why would they give up power since they are in a position to hold it indefinitely if they wish. Supreme court granted immunity goes a long way, along with all sorts of other empowering measures now in their grasp…insurrection act for example.
“The Trump administration is considering whether to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807, a rarely used law that allows the president to deploy the U.S. military …”
“I am just curious about why people believe what they believe. It is obvious, I mean it’s so damn fucking obvious that the world is in deep overshoot and the outcome can only end in collapse. That collapse can come in ten years or fifty years, but it is just so obvious it is coming.” – Ron
Well, yes, while I fully agree with Ron that the planet is being populated and exploited by humanity far in excess of its capacity to accommodate our rampant species, and I dispute that it is obvious to most people. Or more accurately, it is something that most people are either unaware of, or that gets crowded out from their minds by other and often more immediate worries and concerns. Indeed, even for those people to whom it is obvious that overshoot is around the corner, it is not something that occupies their mind constantly minute by minute, day by day. Everyday life is about dealing with the business of proceeding through the day and doing all those things we must occupy ourselves with, while scientific and economic truths and theories and possibilities are their, stored knowledge in our minds, but not constantly at the forefront of our consciousness, occupying our moment my moment behaviours and interaction with our immediate surroundings. . For myself, I awaken in the morning , wash, perform the ablutions, dress, eat breakfast, maybe think about need to get some eggs and bread and butter and vegetables and milk later in the day, think about watering the garden, paying bills and planning any shopping, write a card for aunt’s birthday, and generally prepare for the day (retired and on a pension and so happily not at work any more). I look at the TV weather report to decide should I water the rhubarb, but don’t immediately think about adiabatic lapse rates and jet streams and global warming and whether there is enough lithium in the world to permit a mass movement to electric vehicles. I scatter salt on my fried egg, without thinking too hard about those white cubic crystals of sodium and chlorine, and what ionic bonding is, and where those elements lie on the periodic table. It’s a sunny day outside, and it is not immediately obvious that that dazzling disc in the sky is 150 million kilometers away and the light and heat takes 8 minutes to get here to this little village in the south midlands of England. Off to the hardware shop to get some screws and nails for some jobs later in the day, driving along the road without immediately having at the front of my mind constantly the Peak Oil site and that in twenty years time it will be a battery driven vehicle I’m driving (If I still am driving – I’d be 100 by then) and petrol driven cars will be museum pieces. Now I have had a proper education in science and society and economics and politics, but frankly, the majority of people have little understanding of geology, chemistry, biology, astronomy, climatology and all the other -ologies. They have either forgotten or misunderstood what they were taught in school, or may never have learned them in school in the first place. I taught human and physical geography at school which was the only subject in the secondary school syllabus that incorporated global warming, world population, resource depletion, industrial location and agriculture and world food production. Several of those subjects have been taken off the secondary school syllabus or may be still be taught but have a very small and peripheral place in the timetable. The result is that, t least in Britain, and I suspect in much of Europe, North America, and other developed economies, there ignorance or limited awareness of the issues that occupy the minds of all who visit and contribute to Peak Oil Barrel – or Real Climate, or Sceptical Science etc. So, Ron, it may be obvious – TO US – that the world is as you say “in deep overshoot and the outcome can only end in collapse. That collapse can come in ten years or fifty years, but it is just so obvious it is coming”, but It is not obvious to most folk, and we on this site are a minority, secular John the Baptists, voices crying in the wilderness proclaiming the end is nigh.
One piece that I would add in response to Ron is that many of the topics in his list are complicated, with a range of current levels of human knowledge held even by the best people in each field. Few can claim expertise in all these areas, and it can take a significant effort for bright, educated folks to try to grasp each of these in any type of complete manner.
Ron, unfortunately I also agree that your Francis Bacon quote is true for many.
“According to the most recent data, the United States spends $14,570 per person on healthcare compared with just $5,640 in Japan, $6,023 in the United Kingdom, $6,931 in Australia, $7,013 in Canada and $7,136 in France. And yet, despite our huge expenditures, we remain the only major country on Earth not to guarantee healthcare to all people as a human right.”
LoadsOfOil, you just mentioned biblical prophecy from Ezekiel predicting the formation of Israel in 1948, a prophecy written in approximately 550 BC (I’m being generous), so 2,500 years before the event. Are you serious? I suspect you are indeed serious and for me that explains a lot of your beliefs expressed here on POB. Like, peak oil is not a problem (we have loads of oil), climate change is not a problem, renewables are a waste of time. This is all true (for believers) if we are living in the End Times and the apocalypse is near?
I’m just guessing here, so please forgive me if this doesn’t reflect your views and beliefs.
{Trump has always been a liar and a fabulist, but over the last few months, many of his fabrications seem to show a detachment from reality that is especially disturbing—even by his standards. }
“Putting an alcoholic Fox News bingo caller in charge of the Pentagon seemed like a great idea on paper, but:”
any thoughts comrades?
The DUI appointee at the Pentagon is consistent with RFK jr at HHS, Noem at Homeland Security, and virtually all of the rest. No consideration of competence, only some weird ideological alignment and likely subservience. The really horrifying circumstance is that the Senate has consented. How has partisanship come to such a level that experienced representatives with safe positions could sink so low?
How has partisanship come to such a level that experienced representatives with safe positions could sink so low?
With the party primaries, I’m not sure anyone is safe from challenges. Except maybe in Alaska, where they’ve gotten rid of party primaries, and now Murkowski is openly challenging Trump.
Were you thinking of anyone in particular?
Nick
No, I’m thinking that every Republican Senator, save McConnell, voted to confirm RFK jr for example.
This buffoon is so extraordinarily unqualified for any position of responsibility anywhere on the planet that no rational person could have voted for him.
Yet they did. Why?
Many, if not most, of the other Trump appointees are unqualified for their positions yet sailed through the partisan Senate.
If you want to undermine institutions of democracy and national security Donald is doing it right. Only problem is his incompetence and lack of vision for anything but his psychopathic emotional needs. I figure he’s building a foundation for a real fascist to build on. When real hard times come and a clear majority of the country is willing to toss the Constitution out the window. We’re only half way there.
Hegseth? Excellent men’s hair products model. And he can do pushups. When Donald’s press secretary said Pete is doing great and all of the Pentagon is against him she perfectly expressed Donald’s gas lighting nonsense. If he has actually stopped drinking he must be climbing the walls.
Seriously it’s effing tragic.
Trump selects people on what he sees ( TV, Magazines, in person events ) not on academic study or research ( requires reading ) or actual qualifications for the job beyond very surface level connection.
You have to be physically attractive, constantly compliment him and a YES man. The other route is to be a billionaire.
He recently picked Dr. OZ for some high ranking medical position, a day time TV personality who is a con artist.
Andr
RFK jr is not physically attractive but he makes up for it by being stark raving nuts and a danger to the nation. That works for Trump as a distraction from his real agenda; plunder.
Sorry, I forgot related to the Kennedys.
Trump is a completely superficial person who only cares about himself (A narcissist by definition)
At mid – 70s, he would throw all his kids under a bus if someone would make a statue of of him outside the Smithsonian Museum.
Trump thinks TV is the world, but also just blabs what he heard ten minutes ago regardless of source. He met Zelenskyi in Rome today and came out saying Putin is just stringing him along. Then a little later he started babbling about free transit for America ships through the Panama Canal, meaning he called Putin and Putin successfully distracted him from real world issues.
Putin has his number, no need to contradict, just distract.
WP linked an article late last thread- that deserves reposting
On China and Industrial/Economic Policy-
I am a fan of long term planning. Its one of the big things I find very faulty with the US approach.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/commentary/2025/04/beyond-tariffs-what-the-us-can-learn-from-chinas-industrial.html
Yeah, China has been lucky to have relatively good leadership for the last 40 years. Mao demonstrated the perils of autocracy, with his catastrophic Great Leap Forward and Return to the Land programs, but lately they’ve done much better.
There’s a strong contrast with India: India’s per capita income was twice as high in 1980, they were about equal in 1991, and now China’s economy is 5x as large as India’s.
Similarly, China is moving away from FF as quickly as they can, while India is moving much more slowly – it’s just terrible in the face of India’s good, cheap clean solar resource and relatively scarce (high imports of coal and oil), expensive and polluting FF resources.
There is probably a lot more to it than being lucky.
I’m no expert but “China is largely meritocratic. The system isn’t perfect (what system is?) but it generally does produce capable, intelligent leaders with a …”
I doubt someone like Trump would have gotten past the village level of leadership in China, and then lasted for only a short time before being returned to the used car lot sales position.
China is largely meritocratic
This is an aspiration, not a guarantee. China is lucky that they’ve sustained a strong meritocratic element lately, but the Chinese Communist Party has a membership that is .1% of the population, and it is a top-down hierarchy which is at least as vulnerable to a conversion to pure autocracy as any democracy (e.g., Russia which is technically a democracy, but is actually totalitarian). Don’t forget Mao…
They’ve been lucky. Under Xi things are deteriorating a bit – let us hope their luck continues.
The China we all know was built on western capital. Eurodollars to be precise. Without those dollars flowing into China. China would still look much like they did during the 1970’s and 80’s.
There would be no world’s manufacturing base in China without the Eurodollar inflows. You could say that Chinese leadership capitalized on the opportunity. Cheap labor with a home grown energy supply. From a bank point of view there was nothing but $$$ signs.
Labor is currently cheaper in Mexico. Only we have to export natural gas to Mexico in order to have manufacturing there. Labor is currently cheaper in a lot of places. But you have to build manufacturing facilities. Which takes time and money. Lots and lots of borrowed money. And really you need a long term energy supply in place which a lot of places don’t have.
Over the next 20-25 years manufacturing in China was always going away anyway. Because that’s how much coal they have left at current rates of consumption.
So if you still want the manufacturing of goods it will have to be done elsewhere.
Without the inflow of Eurodollars China would have a whole lot more coal still left in the ground than they currently do.
Now, use the oil decline curve that Dennis projected in his last post. Over the next 20-25 years or so. The decline of oil production globally will pretty much equal what is available for exports currently.
Dennis could be off a little bit. Might only be 15years or maybe 30 years. Doesn’t matter. Somewhere in that timeframe oil exports are going to zero.
In a no coal and no oil imports world exactly what does China look like?
Yeah they can’t even replace all the solar panels and windmills at that point.
“The Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them.”
― Vladimir Ilich Lenin
So goes China so goes the rest of the world. The impacts of default in China will hit the Western economies hard who depend on their cheap goods and debt. All the pretty curves get thrown out the window if oil goes to 40 and drill pipe doubles. Export decline is higher than well decline and accelerates.
Time is definitely not on our side. Capacity utilization is falling which will create insolvency globally. The risk of a deflationary spiral has never been higher because pouring more debt on the system will break it. When you run out of levers to pull what do you do?
Panic and run for the exit.
Yeah, The decline profile that Dennis has put forward is best case scenario. Regardless of if his timeline is correct or a little off.
I think we both know that the debt required to even make the best case scenario into reality won’t happen. It won’t be issued because it can’t be paid back.
We both know there is an abrupt ending coming. Because of the way money is loaned into existence and how energy is required to pay it back principal plus interest.
That associated gas coming from the Permian basin isn’t going to be a long term energy supply. If you’re investing in manufacturing in Mexico you better have an early exit strategy.
HHH
Everyone is driving looking in the rear view. Sharp right turn ahead.
This move lower in the dollar is much like the move we seen in late 2008 early 2009. Maybe for slightly different reasons but the reason actually doesn’t matter.
We have the selling of US assets by foreign investors. Mainly US stocks. Which they receive US dollars for. And I should add that it’s foreign government entities doing the selling. Private foreign entities are still buying.
Then they are selling the dollars they receive and buying their local currencies. Mainly USD/JPY, USD/CHF and EUR/USD is where the dollar weakness is.
So they are selling dollars buying back their own currencies. By doing so they just took a massive amount of dollars out of the market that are no longer available to service dollar denominated debt. Notice they aren’t paying down dollar denominated debts with the dollars they are receiving. At least not yet.
The dollar shortage is going to be exacerbated by this move.
2008 was in fact a massive dollar shortage in the Eurodollar market. Which actually started in France when a few banks were unable to properly price the collateral they had on their books.
I’ve heard 2008 can never happen again because the Fed and other central bank are on it and all over it and have the tools necessary to stop it.
Which is bs because none of the central banks can create the dollar liquidity that the world uses for trade and finance.
There are a lot of dollars stashed away in Swiss bank accounts. Switzerland’s banking sector is multiples of the size of their actual economy. They take the excess dollars that come into their banking system and buy assets to back these deposits. Because they are required too.
So they actually have to sell assets in order to get dollars if people start drawing dollars out of their accounts to meet their dollar denominated debt payments.
So if this is the beginning of a repeat of 2008. As the dollars leave Swiss bank accounts the Swiss franc will get crushed.
Keep an eye on the USD/CHF pair. The Swiss banks only have so many dollar denominated assets to sell.
And as always there is more to it. There are a lot of Euro’s deposited at Swiss bank accounts. Now if a dollar shortage shows up in Europe and Europe has already sold a lot of dollar denominated assets what do they have to do in order to get dollars?
They have to sell Euro’s and there is also a large stash of Euros on the balance sheets of Swiss banks that will get tapped in a dollar shortage on par of bigger than 2008.
There is no such thing as safe havens. You’ll sell whatever you have in order to meet debt obligations.
1521
Magellan killed in Philippines
I agree we already see the Swiss Central Bank approaching zero interest rates and threatening negative.
I really think that the system has been gamed for awhile already and now there is little that can be done. In the fall of 2019 the global economy was tipping into recession. Conveniently COVID came along and saved the day. All the stimulus was still running through last year but obviously couldn’t keep running. So we bought 3-4 years with a mountain of debt that would have been unacceptable had there not been a pandemic as an excuse. But even after all that and as it continued in 2023 things started breaking and have been getting worse throughout 2024 globally. The 3trillion a year and unfettered immigration papered over the US recession but it was unsustainable.
Now we’re facing a housing, and stock market bubble simultaneously. The dollar shortage is a result of the real economy of goods and services contracting reducing loan creation. This was caused by the 2018 peak in oil production. The inflation the Fed is fighting clearly isn’t inflation because it suggests there are too many dollars when in fact there are too few. So we’re actually facing supply scarcity/affordability because the energy costs are spiking. Because the economy can’t grow the manufacturing and service sectors are trying to compensate for critical mass loss with price increases. This accelerates the decline.
Illegal immigration has ended, student loan forgiveness has ended, FHA mortgage modifications are ending. Unnecessary employment is ending at federal agencies. All of this is deflationary less dollars being created and spent.
Already we are seeing a decline in air travel, Chipotle tried to raise prices and lost 1.9% top line and 0.4% bottom line. Verizon is losing customers. UK pubs are going out of business and the same is happening in Singapore. China is in deep trouble with manufacturing and real estate.
Everywhere you look the trend is down in the real economy. And accelerating.
“So we’re actually facing supply scarcity/affordability because the energy costs are spiking.”
Sorry, but that doesn’t ring true. I think it likely will be in the future.
Oil at $70 is cheap, and is roughly average for the past 50 years. Nat Gas and Coal are bargains.
PV achieved a (low) pricing revolution as of 2017.
If you were referring to new nuclear power, yes it is very expensive to build.
We probably do agree that is most ways the US, along with the rest of the world, is grossly overextended.
Jt,
I think a lot people don’t understand banking in general. Most people think their money is warehoused at a bank when they deposit money into their account.
No the bank takes your money and buys dollar denominated assets to back your deposit. The bank buys short term government T-bills with your deposit. Which are very liquid and can be sold in order to get cash when needed. Banks are earning 4% on your deposits currently.
People don’t realize their deposits are funding government spending. People view banks as money warehouses because they can write a check or use a debit card at any time and access their money.
When you spend money your bank deposits become someone else’s bank deposit. And the banks continue buying short term debt to back the deposit. It’s just someone else’s deposit instead of yours now. And the banks are still making 4% on the deposits.
All the deposits are created by the banks in the first place when they loan money into existence. Money or deposits are literally destroyed through the process of repaying a loan. The liabilities side of a bank balance sheet shrinks as loans are repaid.
When you repay a loan principal plus interest. The principal portion of the loan is destroyed. But because of the interest expense you payback more than was loaned to you in the first place.
This means that you could take all the dollars ever loaned into existence and use them to pay off the principal. Then there would be zero dollars, zero deposits. But there would still be trillions owed in interest expenses.
The fact that the interest expense is being paid. Means more dollars are leaving the economy than were lent into it to begin with. Loan growth has to be exponential. Or things become very deflationary.
Low and negative interest rates aren’t inflationary. Just a sign we can’t get growth regardless of how low interest rates go.
Most people also includes Ben Bernacke who thinks banks are intermediaries. The system is being run by a bunch of chimps. That’s why it doesn’t matter who’s in the Oval Office.
The reality of the money system is too perverse for most people to contemplate. For the older generation they view it as wealth and a security for their retirement. They don’t comprehend that the next generations need to be wealthier than they are or their store of value disappears.
It also doesn’t matter what form money takes. Imperial Spain learned this lesson despite its hoards of gold it fell into economic collapse. It was the quest for gold that built its economy not the acquisition of gold.
Similarly today the economy must grow but the natural forces behind a debt based currency is deflation. As loans are repaid money is destroyed so new loans must be made that are larger than the previous loans or the system becomes insolvent.
Bottom line is the energy supply is limiting loan creation. There is nothing that can be done about that. Money is being mopped up in speculative assets globally instead of driving industry for that same reason. Costs are escalating even as people become poorer. Business is seeing its top line shrinking and are cutting costs. Everyone is going to blame Orange Man but as usual they mistake the symptom for the cause.
If you don’t even know the fundamentals of the monetary system how can you possibly identify the the problem? Unfortunately in this case even if you do there is nothing that can be done about it.
What a pile of manure. There is no such thing as air travel/cargo without being part of the mass destruction-
“Fly mindfully. Check out these suggestions, each of which, if multiplied by others, can help subdue climate change: Choose airlines that offer carbon offset programs. Donate to carbon offset organizations yourself. Choose eco-friendly airlines. Sit in economy class. Take nonstop flights to limit layovers.”
The only way to make aviation low-carbon is to use synthetic jet fuel manufactured with carbon captured from the environment, and electrolyzed hydrogen powered by renewable electricity.
It would be more expensive, but it can be done with existing technology and would work just fine. As the engineering advanced and scale increased, costs would decline somewhat.
The aviation industry and the military are pretending that biofuels are scalable, but that’s not realistic. They don’t like the idea of a higher cost structure, but they are just going to have to bite the bullet.
SPAIN GRID JUST FAILED.
Spain has a high percentage of wind and solar that fluctuate often in the opposite direction to demand
You’re just spreading blatant lies now. Don’t pretend you aren’t.
Due to extreme temperature variations in the interior of Spain, there were anomalous oscillations in the very high voltage lines (400 kV), a phenomenon known as ‘induced atmospheric vibration’. These oscillations caused synchronisation failures between the electrical systems, leading to successive disturbances across the interconnected European network.
Alim
Electrical grid engineers have stated for some years that solar and wind do not have the ability to maintain a stable grid frequency which turbines do.
You are not a grid engineer just an ignorant troll
Spain has a high percentage of wind and solar that fluctuate often in the opposite direction to demand.
Oops. On re-reading your comment, I realized that you’re suggesting that both wind and solar are inversely correlated to consumption. That’s incorrect. Solar is strongly correlated with consumption. After all, all living activity evolved in response to sunlight.
Now wind is stronger at night, and winter. And, that’s a good thing. Wind and solar are inversely correlated, which reduces their combined “intermittency” sharply.
That’s why analysis of solar (or wind) in isolation is unrealistic. And a sign of very bad analysis.
—————-
Nuclear generation is pretty much flat, which means it also works nicely with solar, which takes care of daytime peak consumption.
In general, a diversity of power is a very good thing.
Nick G
Why don’t you look at wind and solar output and educate yourself as to exactly how many hundreds of occasions wind and solar are falling just as consumption is increasing.
Ah, I see the two resident experts on ruinable energy have have given us new pearls of wisdom in reply to Loads of Oil
.
“Now wind is stronger at night, and winter. And, that’s a good thing”.
Really?. Maybe you should research the diurnal wind effect. Just type it into any search engine.
As for an explanation of what probably happened in Spain try this:
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2025/04/29/spanish-blackouts/#more-86634
https://newzealandenergy.substack.com/p/spain-lacks-intertia?r=8t72p&utm_medium=ios&triedRedirect=true
Perhaps not as cognitive bias will ensure that black is white.
Carnot and Loads.
I know you guys seem to despise nonfossil energies….does that include nuclear?
But I want to point out that the UK could just retreat and rely on the domestic fossil resources while they last, mothballing the wind and nuclear sector.
I see that-
‘The United Kingdom has proven Coal reserves equivalent to 1.9 times its annual consumption. This means it has about 2 years of Coal left (at current consumption levels and excluding unproven reserves).’
‘the United Kingdom has Oil proven reserves equivalent to 4.8 times its annual consumption levels. This means that there would be about 5 years of oil left (at current consumption levels and excluding unproven reserves).’
‘the United Kingdom has proven Natural Gas reserves equivalent to 2.6 times its annual consumption levels. This means it has about 3 years of gas left (at current consumption levels and excluding unproven reserves).’
Give it a shot if that is your wish.
Or perhaps try to advocate for grid upgrades.
Grid instability as the cause of the blackout (rather than something like a cyberattack) is likely, and perhaps with solar/wind generators as the trigger.
But keep in mind that huge grid blackouts have been happening around the world long before there was wind or solar. For example the US northeast and adjacent Canada had a blackout just as big in 2003, which is just one of dozens of massive blackouts before intermittent energy sources where added to the mix.
There is no magic number of solar grid penetration that results in instability…places do learn how to manage grids for stability, although if you look at the long history of major blackouts it would be fair to ask if the operators in Pakistan have been learning. I suspect the problem there is lack of funds rather than lack know how.
The big problem with solar away from the tropics is seasonality…no two ways about it.
You got to have a complimentary and reliable power production source for the winter or you will need to put your economy into hibernation.
At a certain point of grid penetration this does become a big problem. In the US Jan solar output is only 40% as much as in July, nationwide.
In specific regions with a cloudy winter this is a much more dramatic problem. For example, in the US this includes the Pacific Coast/NW and the Great Lakes Region places like Pittsburgh and Detroit, and in Europe this includes a broad stretch from Ireland to St. Petersberg.
https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Solar-Energy/Solar-Power-Surge-Sinks-Europes-Electricity-Prices-Deep-Below-Zero.html
By tropics i assume you mean equatorial areas. Those areas won’t have seasonality issues but the cloud cover is consistent.
In Northern areas of Australia which is generally dominated by tropical climates, seasonality is significant when it comes to solar. Wet and dry seasons. Wet season is dominated by intense rainfall between Nov-April more than 2.5m of rain will fall in that period. In certain areas this will easily exceed 3m of rain. Dry seasons would be good for solar in these regions.
It seems to me solar would generally be more ideal in arid, semi-arid climates (also in terms of longevity and efficiency due to lower humidity). But most people don’t live in those areas. Subtropical climates would generally be better for rooftop solar installations in my opinion compared to tropical in terms of energy output. But i could be wrong. If i owned a house in Australia i’d definitely invest in rooftop solar, especially if the house has a north-south orientation.
Fair enough…seasonality is a big issue in many places.
Fortunately most places can come up with mixed supply systems, as we do now.
If interested a person can look at the seasonality charts for anywhere in the Solar Atlas-
https://globalsolaratlas.info/map
If anyone needs help finding the monthly bar charts I can show you.
10 Reasons Our Civilization Will Soon Collapse
10 Reasons Our Civilization Will Soon Collapse
1. Overshoot
2. The End of Cheap Fossil Fuels
3. The Failure of Green Energy
4. Dwindling Resources
5. Topsoil Erosion
6. Water Shortages
7. Climate Change
8. Biodiversity Loss
9. Migrant Crisis
10. Increasing Conflict
Conclusion
The term “peak oil” “is mentioned 6 times in the 10 reasons. 4 times under “The end of cheap fossil fuels.” Quoted below:
People have been talking about peak oil for decades, but if you’ve never heard of it before, peak oil is the point at which the amount of oil extracted every year peaks then goes into terminal decline. This happens because there is a finite supply of oil on the planet, so as time goes by, oil companies make fewer and fewer new oil discoveries.
Although oil companies like Exxon Mobil continue to find new sources of oil, overall, oil and gas discoveries are at their lowest level in 75 years, leading many people to believe that we have already reached peak oil. And in fact, there are signs that worldwide peak oil production happened in 2018.
And once under “Migrant Crisis” quoted below
Although the surge in climate migrants will lead to civil and regional wars, that is only one of the many reasons major wars will become more common in the coming decades. In fact, most of the reasons listed above (peak oil, dwindling resources, water scarcity, food shortages, biodiversity loss, and climate-related disasters) will all contribute to a steep rise in wars and conflicts.
And once under “Increasing Conflict.” Quoted below
I believe Russia recognizes that the world has passed peak oil and that energy is going to become more scarce. They also understand that droughts and floods (along with fertilizer shortages) are making it harder to produce food.
The first two lines of the “Conclusion.”
For decades, it’s been obvious that our global industrial civilization has an expiration date, but only recently have many scientists come to realize that the expiration date could be during their own lifetimes.
I would like to poll anyone interested, their opinion on the subject. Your reply could be in as little as two words, like: Doomer Porn, or, Bullshit, or Spot on, I agree, or any other comment you might like to make.
Thank you, this is important to me.
Click on the blue headline to read the article.
Ron
Not realistic.
Many of those things are real risks for serious problems, but none of them are likely
to cause civilization’s collapse.
Humans can sometimes snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, and we have many serious challenges, but this article is not realistic about inevitable collapse.
I could go through the problems with each of his points, but I don’t have the time. But let’s take the first: the author claims that the Global Footprint Network tells us that we’re in catastrophic overshoot. This is false. In fact, the analysis tells us that we need to kick the FF habit. Which, of course, brings us to points 2 and 3, which are also deeply unrealistic: there isn’t any use for FF that can’t be replaced, mostly with substitutes which are cheaper, cleaner and more reliable.
And so on…
Nick, thanks for the reply. Your reasons are about what I expect from at least half those who respond.
I disagree with your answer but I do not wish to debate anyone right now.
Yeah, we’ve discussed these things often. But, what the heck, you wanted feedback.
A general thought: there are a lot of reasons to participate in discussions like these, but one of mine is I hate to see smart people distracted by incorrect information. It distracts people from the real problems.
The real problems are many but not hopeless – hopelessness is a weapon used by those people who are contributing to our problems, and who want people to give up.
And I appreciate your feedback. Thanks.
This diagram shows that multiple global crises—like fossil fuel depletion, climate change, air pollution, and geopolitical conflicts—overlap and amplify each other, creating compound, systemic risks.
In essence:
Each problem isn’t isolated; their intersections (e.g., fossil fuel depletion + climate change → resource wars) create new, bigger challenges.
Compounding effects mean solving one issue (e.g., air pollution) might not matter much if the intersecting crises (e.g., climate refugees, political instability) continue unchecked.
Public narratives (like focusing only on air pollution) can obscure deeper systemic threats (like existential risks to global civilization).
In short:👉 Intersectionality multiplies complexity and makes single-issue solutions ineffective.
Paul,
I agree multiple problems interact, sometimes unpredictably.
But…fossil fuels are central to most of these problems. They cause resource wars. They create killer smog. They create climate change, which in turn creates refugees.
Perhaps I’m missing something, but your Venn diagram seems like a very good illustration of the problems caused by FF, and the enormous value of transition away from FF to solve most of them.
That’s called intersectionality and what the Venn diagram shows.
?????
Intersectionality is an analytical framework for understanding how groups’ and individuals’ social and political identities result in unique combinations of discrimination and privilege. Examples of these intersecting and overlapping factors include gender, caste, sex, race, ethnicity, class,
sexuality, religion, disability, physical appearance, and age.[1] These factors can lead to both empowerment and oppression.[2][3]
Intersectionality opposes analytical systems that treat each axis of oppression in isolation. In this framework, for instance, discrimination against black women cannot be explained as a simple combination of misogyny and racism, but as something more complicated.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersectionality
Very much agree with Paul’s analysis, but have additions.
All the points mentioned are part and parcel of why we collapse. However the author, like most others misses the role of complexity and growth as a function of continuing complexity’s importance in every aspect of the modern world.
Our modern civilization is just like every other civilization that has ever existed and collapsed, only orders of magnitude larger.
Civilization itself is a self adapting system, a physical entity that has behaved like every other self adapting system we know of, that grows, increases complexity, reaches climax and collapses. The larger the system the faster the collapse. It’s a physical system based upon movement of energy within the system.
Every self adapting complex system that grows, does so until it reaches maturity, or it runs into some type of energy constraint or habitat constraint before maturity and collapses prematurely.
Even those that reach maturity eventually fail due to entropy and dissipation, more inexorable processes of our physical reality. Our continuing complexity is the only reason we are able to access the energy, minerals, metals food and water we do gain access to after depleting all the high grade resources.
The complexity only came from both human ingenuity and market size that allowed for every speciality that exists. Take away growth or size of markets and our ability to gain access to resources plumets.
Sounds like you’ve been reading Tainter.
Using the history of growth and collapse of civilizations or empires from pre-industrial times is extremely misleading. Look at Tainter’s “The Collapse of Complex Societies”. The subtitle is “New Studies in Archeology”. This tells you that this is not the study of modern societies.
A perspective on analyses of the collapse of civilizations: pre-modern civilizations were primarily agricultural, and had very, very low growth rates. So, agricultural productivity was key, and empires with high growth rates were essentially Ponzi schemes: when the underlying economic growth rate is .01% per year, an empire can only grow temporarily by stealing. The core of the empire exploits (loots) the periphery. The periphery expands until the empire becomes too large, and then it collapses due to the lack of new victims. Agricultural products include food and wood, and a common symptom of collapse is Peak Wood, as observed for both Athens and Rome.
Any analysis of the growth and decline of pre-modern civilizations has very, very limited application to modern times.
Modern empires are different. Japan, the UK, even Russia are all far more affluent now than they ever were during the heyday of their empires.
So…comparisons of ag empires to modern conditions are not very useful.
“New Studies in Archeology”. This tells you that this is not the study of modern societies.
Wut?
I have a friend who is an archeologist for the state. He digs nineteenth century as well as twentieth century urban sites. There’s no time limit on archeology.
There’s no time limit on archeology.
Yeah, good point. My impression, (the common impression) is consistent with the etymology: (‘ancient history’*), but of course you’re right.
So, I said that wrong. The point remains that Tainter is dealing with pre-industrial societies.
*I looked it up. Ain’t Google grand?
Nick G
People like you think the solutions are easy because you know little about any of the subjects under discussion.
Have you ever worked on a farm to see the crops fail due to lack of water?
Do you know the cost of irrigation and what it would cost the end user?
Why don’t you go to Africa or Australia and explain to the farmers with failed crops and dying animals what they are doing wrong?
LoL,
I don’t see an argument in there. And, somehow you don’t sound like an African farmer…
These problems are not inherently insurmountable, but the fact that none – or few – of them (“migrant crisis”) is the main topic of discourse makes me think we are really, most sincerely, undeniably and reliably fucked.
Having cancer and being motivated by it is one thing. Trying to pretend it isn’t happening is quite another.
Mike
EDIT: I just realized a friend sent me that article a while back.
(PS I have an article coming out in a couple of weeks called “A Tree-Hugger’s Parable” that many of you, I think, will appreciate. It’s about emerald ash borer, and population “exuberance,” and Malthus, and fossil fuels and a few other things.)
Lack of growth. The debt required to keep everything going can’t be serviced much less repaid. Not in world with a contracting energy supply. Doesn’t matter if solar and wind are a thing.
There will be no growing or inflating our way out from under the debt. Governments everywhere are in denial. With every round of fiscal stimulus and monetary stimulus we go deeper into debt, not only public debt but private debt as well. Then we are left without the growth needed to repay the debt.
Collapse will begin as a monetary collapse. A collapse in the actual monetary system. Which will lead to a sovereign debt crisis and currency crisis around the globe.
You have to have a functioning monetary system in order to have an economy that is able to produce oil, coal, natural gas, solar and wind.
And the actual monetary system is the commercial banks that create all the loans via collateralized lending.
contracting energy supply. Doesn’t matter if solar and wind are a thing.
That’s unrealistic. Solar and wind really do produce energy. Their energy is just as…ahem…energetic…as Fossil Fuel.
And wind and solar are cheaper, cleaner, and more reliable. They are far more scalable and faster and easier to install: they can easily replace FF just as fast as it depletes.
Nick G,
How is China doing? You know their interest rates don’t lie. 1.6%
The Chinese don’t have anywhere near 5% GDP.
The real number is less than 2%.
How is Europe doing?
Maybe they both just need to install solar and wind at the speed of light. Give up every last FF then maybe GDP can go to 10% and stay there forever. And all the Chinese and European citizens can live in Utopia for the rest of their days.
Nick
I found something you might need to watch
https://m.youtube.com/results?search_query=dunning+kruger+effect
Doesn’t sound like a relevant argument.
I suspect you think that anyone who disagrees with you must be missing something. Sadly, that’s not so, and you won’t find that out without listening to the people you disagree with.
Ron,
The author tries to offer a solid definition of ‘collapse’, but doesn’t quite lock it down. Let’s go with the two offered definitions though….
Collapse 1 = ‘By collapse, I mean a breakdown of social institutions like governments and economies, followed by a dramatic decline in the human population.’
Collapse 2 = ‘A collapse is the process at the end of which basic needs (water, food, housing, clothing, energy, etc.) can no longer be provided [at a reasonable cost] to a majority of the population by services under legal supervision.’
More importantly, the author completely glosses over what ‘soon’ means. Will civilization collapse tomorrow? No. Next year? Unlikely. 100 years? Perhaps. 200 years? Looking that way.
I agree with Paul. This is a systems issue, not a group of single issues that can be solved independently. As such, the benchmark has to be the LTG study. The business-as-usual baseline in that work predicts collapse this century along the lines of the above definition 1 dramatic reduction in population. LTG still looking robust 50 years on now.
Some comments point by point on the single issues anyway
1. Overshoot – Yes, the work by Rees and Wackernagel on ecological footprint is compelling. This is a real predicament.
2. FF limits – Uhm, I’m posting on peakoilbarrel…. Yes? Sarcasm aside, absolutely. The contributions to carrying capacity from Haber-Bosch process fertilizer is tough to overstate.
3. Failure of Green Energy – I’m not convinced. EROI remains pretty strong and is growing. Materials are a challenge. Likely not adequate for current and growing global population forever, but likely able to support a reduced number in closer to modern conditions for maybe 100 years. Long term of 1,000 years is an entirely different story.
4. Dwindling resources – There is absolutely some merit here with the broad concept. Ore grades are declining for example, no dispute. However, I always become wary of a source that spouts misleading information as this one does regarding desert sand use as a construction material. Fine aggregate (sand) is one of the constituent parts of concrete. Desert sand can be used as fine aggregate for many normal infrastructure purposes. Fine and coarse aggregate shape, grain size distribution and strength can become more important for some higher strength applications. This author makes it seems like the sand apocalypse.
5. Topsoil erosion – Not as concerned about this one. Absolutely concern, but in localized areas. Definitely not a concern everywhere across the globe.
6. Water shortages – Somewhat similar to topsoil, but more concerning. Significant concern for a substantial share of the globe, but there also remain plenty of places with what is a reasonably stable hydrologic cycle and adequate rainfall.
7. Climate change – We’re screwed, just with a built in time delay. Our Faustian bargain for all of that energy dense FF is coming due. On track for 3C by 2100 with locked in consequences that are only growing.
8. Biodiversity loss – I don’t have the expertise here for a full judgment, but this one scares the heck out of me.
9. Migrant Crisis – Yes. See climate change, FF resource limits, water shortage, … The author cites Syria as an example of migration induced in part due to climate change driven drought. Author misses the chance to add peak oil to this with a link to the dramatic reduction in oil production in 2010. Prior to 2010, the government is commonly cited as getting 25% of its revenue from oil production. Production collapsed in 2010. An example of systems issues.
10. Increasing conflict – Certainly some scary risks here, but from a broader historical context I’ve seen many argue the world has less armed conflict than much of history.
. As such, the benchmark has to be the LTG study. The business-as-usual baseline in that work predicts collapse this century along the lines of the above definition 1 dramatic reduction in population. LTG still looking robust 50 years on now.
Does human civilization face an inevitable collapse due to geological limits on fossil fuels, or other limited resources? Are we powerless? Or is our fate in our hands, and does it depend on our behavior and management of our economy?
The Club of Rome Limits to Growth study is sometimes presented as evidence for an inevitable collapse. But…it’s not. It’s simply an analysis of what it might look like if we DID hit resource limits.
It’s a very, very simple model. It has one variable called non-renewable resources, which in a recent revision is explicitly modeled on fossil fuels. There is no provision for wind, solar, hydro, nuclear, geothermal, etc, despite the fact that these resources are much, much larger than fossil fuels. The only renewable resource is a relatively small one, agriculture: “Non-renewable resources, measured in resource units Meadows et al. (1972), include all non-renewable resources on Earth… In order to provide suitable and accurate data, fossil fuel consumption is chosen. Although this proxy does not include metal resources, it is the most appropriate and available data. “ https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jiec.13442
“Can anything be learned from such a highly aggregated model? Can its output be considered meaningful? In terms of exact redictions, the output is not meaningful.…The data we have to work with are certainly not sufficient for such forecasts, even if it were our purpose to make them” (Meadows et al. 1972, p. 94).” http://wtf.tw/ref/costanza.pdf
Meadows was right – the Club of Rome LTG models were not predictions, they weren’t forecasts: they were *scenarios* that assumed imminent limits to growth, and simply modeled the dynamics we’d see in the model outputs when the economy hits those limits. Basically, they modeled “overshoot” – what happens when there are lags, delays and positive feedback between the point of hitting limits and seeing the results in the economy.
Most of all, they *assumed* limits to growth were very close – they didn’t prove that those limits *were* close.
Sadly, Dennis Meadows has forgotten this basic fact, or chooses to not remember it, and lately has been talking as if those scenarios were in fact forecasts, and discussing how close they came to reality. In fact, the overshoot modeled in those scenarios has not been seen in any way – so far the world economy is pretty much simply growing in the same exponential way as before.
The Club of Rome models did do us a service, by showing us what overshoot might look like, and showing us the impact of lags and delays. This appears to be relevant to Climate Change, though probably not relevant to Peak Fossil Fuels – for Fossil Fuel, the lags, delays and positive feedbacks that might impair mitigating the impact of a peak are much smaller and shorter.
Hey Nick,
I was sloppy with my word choice. The LTG authors did indeed create scenarios to model different possible outcomes and took care to note that these scenarios were not forecasts or predictions.
Yes, LTG used a simplified model of a hugely complex system. However, model complexity does not necessarily add value all by itself. Arhhenius made the first model prediction of CO2 impacts on global temps in 1896 and it is holding up pretty well.
I may be misinterpreting your comment about 1 variable, but I believe that there were actually 5 key variables considered.
Your strawman argument about LTG being used as proof of an inevitable future is unconvincing. The LTG scenarios modeled a range of outcomes. How exactly did they assume imminent limits to growth as you suggest?
Do you have an alternate systems model that you can point to as better? Or perhaps a more compelling critique? Please don’t offer anything from an economist.
I don’t recall the details with certainty, but had thought that the model did consider impacts from technological change on things like pollution and energy in a very coarse, lumped manner.
Models are useless they have underestimated loss of consistent rainfall, they have underestimated the droughts, they have underestimated the flooding events
https://climateandeconomy.com/2025/04/29/29th-april-2025-todays-round-up-of-climate-news/
However, model complexity does not necessarily add value all by itself.
No. But they need to be sufficiently complex to capture the problem. In this case they were looking at the dynamics of collapse, assuming collapse will happen. They weren’t really evaluating whether collapse would happen, just how it would look if it did.
I believe that there were actually 5 key variables considered.
It had 5 major variables: population, industrialization, food production, resource depletion, and pollution.
Again, “Resource Depletion” models non-renewable resources, which in a recent revision is explicitly modeled on fossil fuels. Except for agriculture (basically, food & biofuel) there is no provision for renewable energy such as wind, solar, hydro, geothermal, etc, despite the fact that these resources are much, much larger than fossil fuels. The only renewable resource is a relatively small one, Food : “Non-renewable resources, measured in resource units Meadows et al. (1972), include all non-renewable resources on Earth… In order to provide suitable and accurate data, fossil fuel consumption is chosen. Although this proxy does not include metal resources, it is the most appropriate and available data. “ https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jiec.13442
So, basically we’re dealing with a prediction about Peak Oil. Which is not, repeat not, going to cause inevitable collapse. Modern society is, of course, complex and volatile. It’s certainly possible that we could screw things up completely: there are many possibilities: runaway climate change, malevolent super intelligent AI, engineered pandemics, nuclear war, etc. But PO is pretty low on the list.
Your strawman argument about LTG being used as proof of an inevitable future is unconvincing.
I replied to what you said. “the benchmark has to be the LTG study. The business-as-usual baseline in that work predicts collapse this century along the lines of the above definition 1 dramatic reduction in population. LTG still looking robust 50 years on now.”
I understand you to be saying that LTG study tells us something about collapse this century. Robust was the word that was used. It’s not robust – it’s not even weak. It’s just not relevant to the question of forecasting collapse.
Do you have an alternate systems model that you can point to as better?
Actually, Jacobson at Stanford has done quite a lot of modelling – you might want to take a look. There are other models, many of them. Dennis does good ones, that are far more realistic.
In general the energy models out there are fare more compelling than LTG, which was not, repeat not, intended to be a real world model or provide forecasts (and is, really, just an energy model).
Hey Nick,
Right, 5 variables. Population, industrialization, food production, resource depletion, and pollution. I disagree that LTG is ‘really just an energy model’ and don’t see any support for this by you.
You suggested that LTG is held as proof of ‘inevitable’ collapse this century. Not something I said and not something the LTG authors said. The LTG scenarios included a wide range of possible outcomes. I did suggest that the results of the LTG business as usual scenario remain robust to this point in time. They do. I would point to the separate works by Herrington and Turner.
If you want a compelling case for inevitable collapse in the long run, I would suggest reading the last few years work by Tom Murphy on his Do The Math blog.
I am familiar with Jacobson’s work on energy transition modeling, including the academic and other critiques of his work. I’m certainly familiar with DCs work on this site. (Thank you DC!) Regardless of their merits, they are not directly pertinent to the discussion of larger systems models other than as possible components of such models. Ron’s IP laid out many of the key issues that might be considered in such models.
In one of your prior comments, you linked to a collection of work from 2006 including a review by Costanza of various Integrated Global Models, including World3 from LTG. That is a more valid and valuable contribution to this particular topic, and I thank you for the link. Costanza’s GUMBO model is particularly interesting, and certainly appears more complex than LTG. His other publications on the use of this model also include a range of scenarios. Unfortunately, a likely outcome from this GUMBO model appears distressingly similar to LTG business as usual.
I don’t *like* these results. No apocalyptic destiny for me, thank you very much. I’m also not interested in accepting fate. However, if we want to succeed in contributing to better outcomes then we need to have a solid understanding of what is likely. Dispassionate and with as few vested interest biases as possible.
Ron,
These are all things I’ve been seeing for a while, have to agree with it all. Several if not all these days aren’t “Problems” that have a solution but are “Predicaments”. Just going to have to deal with them, as unpleasant as they may be.
One thing mentioned there was something that I’ve been pointing out to people for at least a decade, the bugs on the windshield. in the 70’s I ALWAYS had to clean them off my windshield every time I filled my tank. Now I NEVER have to.
I drove from Maine to West Virginia last August. Very few bugs on the glass. This is fucked up.
AUGJOHNSON,
It is interesting how when the bug thing is brought up in conversation, others will usually mention that they have noticed it, or some will say, “now that you jogged my memory…yes, isn’t that strange.”
But an alarming thing is how few are recognizing this mine-canary; and as you observe, it has been a long time since its been blinking on the radar. I watched a video last year about hand-pollination of fruit trees somewhere, maybe China. Tending bees and their hives as a hobby in the 1980’s created my deep appreciation of them. We’d harvest a few hundred pounds of honey and leave plenty for their winter survival. Later on around 2012, I managed to raise a million Black Soldier Fly larvae for feeding to a small flock of hens we had, down in the hill-country south of Austin, TX, and I can guarantee that we’d prefer not to rely on those prolific composters for nutrition in any foreseeable future. I think I’d rather eat fried earthworms if it came to that. I told an ‘old boy’ Texan neighbor about seeing someone eat a sauteed Walking Stick dipped in chocolate-sauce at a Bug Fest in Zilker Park, and to my amusement, he replied in his slow drawl, “THAT just ain’t right.”
All big problems.
But if the definition of collapse is ” the process at the end of which basic needs (water, food, housing, clothing, energy, etc.) can no longer be provided [at a reasonable cost] to a majority of the population by services under legal supervision” I think there is a lot of wiggle room between rich countries current expectations around basic needs and the actual basic needs which still allow “civilisation” to flourish.
I haven’t read the article but, I think I can comment on point 3, The Failure of Green Energy. Solar PV in particular is growing faster than just about anybody projected it would. “China met its 2030 target of 1,200 gigawatts of wind and solar capacity nearly six years early” is something I pulled from a internet search for “china hits solar target five years early”. Yesterday this was published on the PVTech web site Acciona Energía completes construction of 308MW solar PV plant in Queensland, Australia 7 months ahead of schedule! These are just two stories that highlight how solar PV in particular is being installed at a blistering pace. On January 2, 2025 The Guardian (UK) had an article with this headline, “UK electricity cleanest ever in 2024, with record 58% from low-carbon sources”. The recent blackout in Spain and Portugal comes a week after it was reported that Spain was running on 100% renewable energy in the middle of the day! All of this suggest to me that green energy is not failing. I put it to you that if the FF lobby would get out of the way and stop trying to derail green energy a transition to a renewable energy based economy would be a lot more likely. Is the transition going to be smooth? Almost certainly not but, it is not impossible.
On another front, The 21st Shanghai International Automobile Industry Exhibition is currently underway in China. I suggest that the folks in America really don’t appreciate what is happening in the auto industry in China. The second largest manufacturer of EV batteries in the world (BYD) last month announced 1 MW charging technology that facilitates adding 400 km of range in 5 minutes. Not to be outdone the largest battery manufacturer announced their new technology just before the start of the 2025 Shanghai Auto Show. Battery giant CATL showcases three innovations: 1500km range battery, 520km in 5 minutes ultra-fast charging, and 2025 mass-production sodium-ion battery. If you look at any of the reviews of the Shanghai Auto Show the advances in technology are stunning!
Which brings me to the Clean Technica China — March 2025 Sales Report
Does the surge of adoption of NEVs in China contribute anything to this Reuters headline “China’s fuel demand may have passed its peak, IEA says”? You could just say growing adoption of EVs won’t affect oil demand ……… until it does! I urge readers of this site to take a look at the automobile situation in China. For example the position taken by the Chinese central government, China aims for BEVs to dominate new car sales by 2035. My understanding is that there are people in the Chinese government that are “Peak oil Aware”. If I remember correctly The Hirsch Report (2005) said mitigation measures had to be started at least ten years before Peak Oil occurs to avoid catastrophic disruptions to the global economy. The world is in a much better position now in 2025 than we were in 2005, at least as far as Peak Oil is concerned.
I can’t say much about most of the other points but I can leave you with this little gem. The oldest newspaper in the island where I live, The Jamaica Daily Gleaner had an editorial headlined “Population Dangers” as the editorial in their first Sunday edition for 2025 (Jan 5). They were bemoaning the island’s declining birth rate.
They obviously see a declining population as a bad thing! Some of us don’t!
Meanwhile, according to the UN,
WORLD POPULATION PROJECTED TO REACH 9.8 BILLION IN 2050, AND 11.2 BILLION IN 2100
“With roughly 83 million people being added to the world’s population every year, the upward trend in population size is expected to continue, even assuming that fertility levels will continue to decline.”
https://www.un.org/en/desa/world-population-projected-reach-98-billion-2050-and-112-billion-2100#:~:text=The%20current%20world%20population%20of,Nations%20report%20being%20launched%20today.
Islandboy
If China is so great why don’t you go and live there?
Oh wait a minute
https://pulitzercenter.org/stories/soil-pollution-crisis-china-cleanup-presents-daunting-challenge
Chinese industry and corruption in local governments where checks and fines should take place has poisoned the land and water
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1566519/#:~:text=In%20China%20today%20approximately%20700,and%2028%25%20in%20urban%20areas.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/chinas-energy-security-push-drives-up-fossil-fuel-approvals-research-2023-08-03/
Toxins and poison in water, soil and food
Ron
I see the first item as correct, the others as consequences of the first one. You could add many more consequences to the list.
The impacts are already getting ugly for many in this world, I expect those impacts to spread and increase in severity.
Whether we are in overshoot or not depends on which policies we adopt.
Whether we are in overshoot or not depends on which policies we adopt.
Oh goog gtavy. Ecological overshoot does not depend on what we adopt or what we think or believe. It is a fact of nature. It depends on nothing but cold hard facts.
Ecological overshoot occurs when human demand for natural resources and services exceeds the Earth’s capacity to regenerate them in a given year. This means we’re consuming resources and generating waste faster than ecosystems can replenish and process them. A key indicator of this is Earth Overshoot Day, which marks the date when humanity’s yearly ecological footprint exceeds the planet’s biocapacity.
Overshoot is not a matter of opinion or policy. It is a matter of facts, cold hard facts.
Ron,
These things are not easy to measure and there are different estimates, humans can change policy to help to reduce waste as well as process waste and can change the way consume and produce things to reduce resource consumption, those are also possible futures. Note that the future is not written and facts are historical.
Dennis, you should know by now that what what humans can do and what they will do are two different things. Nevertheless, there is no possible way that one can define “overshoot” to deny that we are not already deep, deep into overshoot.
10,000 Years ago, wild animals made up over 99% of total mammal biomass on earth. Today that percentage has fallen to 4% and still falling. By 2050, or soon thereafter, it will be 2% or less. The below is from Google AI
Humans and their domestic animals collectively account for approximately 96% of the total mammal biomass on Earth. This means that wild mammals make up only about 4% of the total. Livestock, particularly cattle, dominate this percentage, with humans accounting for around one-third of mammal biomass.
All wild animals are dying out because we are taking over their territory for human habitation. I could name a hundred other things. Like the water table in India, home of 1.4 billion people, is dropping by half a meter per year. There will be widespread famine in India in less than two decades. Rivers are drying up. Ocean fisheries are almost gone. And I could go on, and on, and on. If you do not think that is overshoot, then you have no idea what the word means.
I’d say that the fact we’ve changed the chemistries of both the atmosphere and the ocean is a pretty clear sign we’ve shit the bed, as it were.
Ron —
Policies don’t matter! So vote Trump! It feels so good.
It’s the American way.
Alimbiquated,
I hope we both realize that Trump is an idiot. However, I will say to you what I said to Dennis. If you think whether or not we ae in overshoot has anything to do with who is president, then you have no idea what the word means.
From the Web:
Earth Overshoot Day 2024 falls on August 1st. 30 July 2024 – August 1st marks Earth Overshoot Day, the date when humanity’s demand on nature’s resources surpasses Earth’s capacity to regenerate them for the given year.
And that has not one damn thing to do with who is President.
Ron,
I agree with you about T, but I am allergic to the idea that policy doesn’t matter.
Alimbiquated,
Of course politics matters about a lot of things, but no politician or political program can save us now. We are talking about world phenomena that has taken place over the last 200 years, and is still happening within every nation on earth. One nations politics may have some effect but so damn little it cannot be detected.
This is about worldwide overshoot leading to collapse and no politician can fix it. We are at least 6 billion humans past the long term carrying capacity of the planet.
Ron,
I have sympathies towards the way T.Hill and Phil S. thinks about these issues.
It is not given that “overcomplicating” the world will not give results and that the expansionary model does not have some legs to run on; still. The contraction model while it would be a shock for sure, is not unfathomable for most. And that is why we most probably can keep going for a long time period (this century) with, most probably, an eventually reduced industrial lifestyle. The collapse is not a given.
Try telling an orangutan that their world is not collapsing. They are doomed to extinction within the next decade. Palm oil farms are taking over their habitat. They will all die. And that is happening to half the world’ wild animals today. The collapse has already begun; it is not something that will happen in the future. It is what is happening right now.
Just as sure as we are destroying the wild animal’s habitat, we are destroying our own. We are overfishing, over cutting forest, over working the topsoil, we are overconsuming our natural resources, we are…. hell, I could go on for pages. Anyone who are not aware that we are in deep overshoot and in the process of ecological collapse has their head in the sand. Or perhaps up their ass. I am not sure which but it is one or the other.
Ron,
Not seeing anyone else bite yet, I’ll ask the obvious question. Why is feedback on this one important to you?
I am just curious about why people believe what they believe. It is obvious, I mean it’s so damn fucking obvious that the world is in deep overshoot and the outcome can only end in collapse. That collapse can come in ten years or fifty years, but it is just so obvious it is coming.
I was wondering who would deny it and why. Who and why would one deny something so goddamn obvious. I really know why, so I am not really sure why I asked. Just for grins and giggles I guess. Francis Bacon knew the answer over 400 years ago:
“Man prefers to believe what he prefers to be true.”
― Francis Bacon
When the obvious facts falsify what you desperately desire to be true, damn few can let the facts overrule their desires. That is even if the facts are so goddamn obvious, they knock you over, still, still, what they desperately desire to be true will be believed.
Hi Ron.
When I first became aware of Peak Oil and the surrounding cluster of predicaments (probably around 2007) it took me some time to believe it was true. Arriving at the “obvious” conclusion is not straightforward, particularly for those of us with Arts degrees (most of what little I know about statistics I learned on the Oil Drum). My guess is that gathering enough knowledge to be confident that we are in overshoot and that there is no hope- essentially adopting the Doomer position- is the equivalent to 2 or 3 University-level classes. Not everybody is smart enough, motivated enough, or intellectually honest enough to do the work.
Goddammit Lloyd, you do not need a university degree to know whether or not we are in overshoot. But what you do need is a third grade education. If you have that, and if you look at the data, the fucking data is so obvious that it will knock you over.
Lloyd, it is not a question of where we are now. That is a foregone conclusion. It’s all about where we will be in the future. But, unless we can acknowledge that we are on the preface of collapse, then there is no way we can prepare for it.
No, I am not preparing for it at all. In one month I will be 87 years old and on the preface of death. I am just so goddamn lucky. Born at the right time and dying at the right time.
Perhaps it is because I do not fear it is why I can see it so clearly. If I were younger, I would likely deny it too.
Lloyd
Overshoot is complex and is not just about population, but that is of course one of the main factors.
We only know details by reading results of studies conducted by scientists in many different fields.
https://wwf.panda.org/discover/our_focus/forests_practice/deforestation_fronts_/
We would not know about the scale of deforestation were it not for many scientists doing field work and satellite analysis.
If the world’s forest size were stable, then we could be sure we were not in overshoot in this regard. Unfortunately there was a net loss of some 15 billion trees last year. That is the equivalent of all the trees in Great Britain every 4 months.
If the top soils of the world were stable or even increasing then there would be no issue in this regard. Unfortunately the rate of soil erosion and soil degradation is horrendous.
Globally we are losing 12 million hectares of arable land to erosion and degradation, the initiatives to reverse this trend are tiny. We would have to put ten thousand times as much effort and money into reversing the situation.
https://sustainablefoodtrust.org/news-views/the-hidden-cost-of-uk-food-soil-degradation/
If we used water from aquifers at the same rate as they are replenished then that would be fine. Unfortunately many are in decline and already nearly 2 billion people are facing water shortages.
https://unu.edu/ehs/series/5-facts-groundwater-depletion
We are destroying everything that life depends on and this destruction is already killing people. These are not some issues in the future.
Globally we would have to support all farmers to protect land. Pay people to protect and regrow forests. Pay to store enough water to irrigate lands. Pay people to grow different crops. Pay to ensure clean drinking water for everyone.
This would cost approximately what the world spends on armaments $2.2 trillion per year and all the money lost to corruption about $2.4 trillion per year.
Chances of that happening are zero.
So we are in overshoot and balance will be restored at a population level that the resources can support. Probably at a level of the 1950s.
I read the article. I think it contains many mistakes and exaggerations.
1. I agree that the planet is overpopulated, I think by an order of magnitude. Unfortunately, the problem will be solved in a natural way – wars, extinction from hunger, diseases, possibly genocide of the victors.
2. Yes, of course.
3. Green energy is useful. Of course, it should be developed in tandem with storage methods. The use of hydrocarbons, however, gives some advantage, and if some country refuses to use oil, it will lose in the competition. Hydrocarbons will be used until they run out. It would be better if countries agreed to gradually abandon the use of hydrocarbons as energy, and use them only as raw materials for chemistry. Of course, this is not possible – they will burn all the oil and gas.
Fertilizers that are mined from the ground will also run out. 4. I think the author is exaggerating, of course the soil is being destroyed and the land suitable for use is shrinking, but the possibility of cultivating the land in the same volume due to the reduction in population and the impossibility of using hydrocarbon fuel for cars will come sooner.
5. I agree. But I cannot estimate the magnitude of this problem and it is different everywhere.
6. Of course the climate is changing. The anthropogenic factor is undoubtedly large, but its magnitude cannot be determined precisely. In the history of mankind there were times when the temperature was higher than today. I think that we will survive this problem and there is no need to worry, much less do anything about global warming. The anthropogenic factor will soon begin to decline (with a decrease in oil, gas and coal production), and then it will stop altogether. People will cook food on firewood. I looked at pictures of the Soviet Luftwaffe in 1942, where there is now a lot of vegetation, especially river floodplains and forest belts – bare ground – because the population used everything for cooking and heating. I am more afraid of a new ice age when 10,000 years ago a glacier 3,000 meters thick lay over northern Europe.
8. Of course, this is unfortunately true and extinction will continue.
9. I cannot judge the migration from Syria, I have come across opposite assessments. I do not see any positive heroes in Syria, I cannot evaluate the rise of Islamists to power positively. I think that the author exaggerates the consequences of global warming in the Middle East, although I do not understand this. I have great doubts about research, it is often biased and on grants from interested structures. 10. The author is under the influence of lying Western media. The conflict in Ukraine began after the coup in 2014, paid for by the oligarchs of Ukraine and Western intelligence agencies. Russia took advantage of the situation, organized a referendum in Crimea (it is populated by 90% Russian people and until 1954 was part of Russia). I think that in the interests of security, Russia decided to return Crimea and keep its military bases there. Otherwise, Ukraine would have joined NATO and NATO could have dealt a disarming blow to Russia. The uprising in the east of Ukraine was started by Russians and Russian speakers, who made up 100% of the population. They did not use Ukrainian and knew it because it was taught as a foreign language in school, and instruction was also in Russian. Former FSB Colonel Strelkov and his nationalist comrades, armed with various weapons that they were able to acquire and steal (a total of about 50 people), entered the city of Slavyansk. He was a charismatic person and was able to attract many volunteers. Power in the east of Ukraine was in the hands of oligarch magnates and the security forces were also controlled by them. They were going to hand over the regions to the new authorities in Kyiv, but it did not work out. Russia quietly intervened after several months of war, intending to use the return of the regions to Kyiv during bargaining. I will not continue the story, this is not the article. I think that all the people present at the forum are already elderly and we will not live to see the beginning of the crisis of civilization, although most likely many will live to see the beginning of a nuclear war. Life after the collapse will of course continue, only it will be a different civilization, we will leave today’s comfort zone, there will be few individual cars and consumption will decrease. “Democratic governance” will also disappear, when political parties are interested in their victories, and not in the interests of the people of their countries, senators and congressmen do not bear any responsibility for their decisions. Parties and governors help businesses that helped them in elections.
Opritov Alexander —
I read your comments. I think they contain many mistakes and exaggerations. BUT, why should your opinions be more or less valid than anyone elses? I think I will just stick with my prejudice which is that if I want an opinion on climate I will seek the opinion of climate scientists, etc. This is perhaps strange way of thinking to you?
I do not claim to have the truth. I simply expressed my personal opinion about the article.
“They are far more scalable and faster and easier to install: they can easily replace FF just as fast as it depletes.”
I see that quote quite often.
Are there any instances though of solar panels, batteries and wind turbines being produced without energy provided by FF?
Until that actually happens, are we not pissing into the wind? . . . and what about the resins used in the manufacture of blades? where will that be sourced from?
So many questions that tend to be ignored.
The cheapest and most efficient KW of energy is the the one that is never generated . . . we need to get by and thrive with less.
I see that quote quite often.
That would be quite a coincidence, because that’s not a quote, it’s my original writing.
Are there any instances though of solar panels, batteries and wind turbines being produced without energy provided by FF?
Possibly not. It’s really, really doesn’t matter. It was many decades before either coal or oil were produced without horses – did it make them less useful?
FF is just a variety of hydrocarbons. It’s been convenient and affordable, but it’s not magic. We can create any hydrocarbons we need, if we really need them, from renewable energy, carbon and hydrogen.
And, of course, for most applications it’s far more efficient use renewable electricity directly in electric motors, heat pumps, etc.
More from the resident expert of petrochemistry.
“FF is just a variety of hydrocarbons. It’s been convenient and affordable, but it’s not magic. We can create any hydrocarbons we need, if we really need them, from renewable energy, carbon and hydrogen”.
Just like that!
Would you care to elaborate since you are so clever.
What sources of carbon, hydrogen and renewable energy were you thinking of?
Which processes were you considering?
How would you synthesize an epoxy resin for instance, and carbon fibre?
Carnot
Nick G is a waste of time he lacks the very cognitive ability to recognize he’s incompetent to comment on these subjects. And he’s found support for his cognitive bias. That’s the danger today you can believe anything you want and find so looney who believes it to. Dunning Kruger Effect.
We just witnessed a complete blackout of the Iberian Peninsula that was a direct result of Solar penetration that reduced inertia that was needed to stabilize the grid. But Solars not the problem right?
All listed items are true, but each effect has different timelines (apart from global warming), and different local effects. Local effects differ by geography, mineral complements, climate, distances, riverine transportways, growth rate of wood, governance, and so much more.
The big tragedies – floods, especially – have always been with us. Scale will be larger, little doubt, same for drought. There is no doubt we will return to more simple living conditions – just as many rural Chinese do now. Materials will revert to rock, wood etc. And yes, populations will shrink (mostly by choice), but we have a good chance to power down if the political will is there.
Luckily, many undeveloped countries are already living our future. We have have much to learn, and it will be very uncomfortable getting there.
But we will adapt to new circumstances. Humans always do.
There is a lot of work to be done.
This site is part of that work.
Thank you.
Laurie, this statement of yours I must reply to”
But we will adapt to new circumstances. Humans always do.
Yes we will adapt to less water, less topsoil, less energy, less food, more heat, and more resource wars. Yes, there is a way to adapt to all those problems. It’s called “die-off.”
“But we will adapt to new circumstances. Humans always do.”
So we are in luck, because only humans matter?
NUMBER OF SPECIES AT RISK OF EXTINCTION DOUBLES TO 2 MILLION
“While scientists have long documented the decline of species of plants and vertebrates, there has always been significant uncertainty over insects, with the UN making a “tentative estimate” of 10% threatened with extinction in 2019. Since then, more data has been collected on insects, showing the proportion at risk of extinction is much higher than previously estimated. Because there are so many insect species, this doubles the global number of species at risk.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/08/species-at-risk-extinction-doubles-to-2-million-aoe
As Ron said-
“Yes, there is a way to adapt to all those problems. It’s called “die-off.”
It looks to me like we are in deep overshoot territory, and I am startled that it isn’t obvious to all human beings given our capacity to observe. I suppose there is just to much stimulus to put everything into context, and that our species is prone to harboring a few very dysfunctional states of mind like magical thinking, denial, and the embrace of outright delusional stories (religion for example).
If by collapse we mean living in places more like Haiti than Denmark, than yes I think large swaths of planet are prone to slipping toward collapse over the next 5 decades. Its very hard to predict who/where will be less affected…who could have predicted that Gaza tragedy of today would be a direct result of the German embrace of a certain man as leader in 1933. In human affairs things have a way of getting out of hand…mobs, you know.
our species is prone to harboring a few very dysfunctional states of mind like magical thinking, denial, and the embrace of outright delusional stories (religion for example).
Oddly enough, it’s religion that has developed a deep and widespread expectation of the end of the world.
Reminds me of Reagan’s Secretary of the Interior, who was enthusiastic about paving over our parks because he knew that the end of the world was nigh.
Approximately 39% of adults in the United States believe they are living in the end times, according to a Pew Research Center https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/12/08/about-four-in-ten-u-s-adults-believe-humanity-is-living-in-the-end-times/ survey.
Forty Percent!!! And that belief affects many of the rest of us, who don’t subscribe to it consciously.
It should be pointed out that “End Times,” or “Apocalypse,” what have you, do not have a goddamned thing to do with either ecological overshoot or the collapse of civilizations.
The latter are documented natural phenomena. The former Christian horse shit.
I can say with near 100% that the world will not end (and that John of Patmos’s Book of Revelation is a crock.)
No, World will go on. Perhaps without us to bother it.
Mike B wrote:
The latter are documented natural phenomena. The former Christian horse shit.
I love it. I couldn’t stop laughing. And I agree. Overshoot has not one damn thing to do with Christian horseshit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0-tFahPVIU
5 minutes and great!
UNC Chapel Hill professor and world renowned New Testament scholar ( he is fluent in the deprecated Greek the original text were written in; Jesus spoke Aramaic ).
Jesus was a jewish apocalypticist who thought a celestial entity (Yahweh?) was coming to kill the Romans.
The entity would create a Kingdom of God made of earthly materials on Earth and Jesus would be King.
Even the “End Times” are not what Jesus taught. His apocalyptic ideas were different.
“End Times,” or “Apocalypse,” what have you, do not have a goddamned thing to do with either ecological overshoot or the collapse of civilizations.
Technically this true, obviously.
That has very little to do with the psychological reality, though. Lots of people resonate to things like Mad Max movies because deep down they’ve been soaked in apocalyptic mythology,
It’s similar to the way that most people have an unconscious expectation of an afterlife with judgement at the pearly gates. They behave as if what they do in life will do will affect that judgement, when obviously what they do when alive will have nothing to do with what happens after death.
So…a very significant percentage of people who claim not be religious still believe in an upcoming apocalyse (and not because they know anything about the stuff being discussed on this blog, like bugpocalypses or PO). Just because they’ve been soaked in the religious idea.
Mike
Yeah the Apocalypse is horseshit, of course, but even non-believers from Christian countries are influenced by it. They just tend to suggest non-Christian causes. It is striking that there is often a moralistic tone to these predictions: People are bad, overconsumption is bad, capitalism is bad, therefore the sky will fall.
Compare that to China. Chinese eschatology also exists, but the myth is more about cycles and the rise and fall of dynasties. In the popular imagination, changes between dynasties are cosmic events accompanied by droughts, earthquakes and other disasters. They result from loss of harmony, warning of political or social collapse, and the subsequent loss of the Mandate of Heaven.
The Communists buy into this myth, at least publicly. It’s no coincidence that Xi actively promotes the concept of “ecological civilization,” drawing on (that is cherry picking) traditional values from Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism that emphasize harmony between humans and nature.
Check out this lovely document: https://www.worldscientific.com/doi/pdf/10.1142/S2345748120500116
Bible predictions
It is of interest that some bible predictions have come true.
Jews lived in countries all over the world but persecution started to force many to consider moving to Israel a place they had never been to. WW2 hastened things along. In 1948 against all odds a new state was formed.
Ezekiel 13. 21 predicted such an occurrence. Interesting.
The bible refers to the generation born just before 1948 as the last generation. In that case we will all know soon if Revelation is true or not.
I’m expecting the giant sentient jellyfish that live on the other side of the galaxy will visit after the die-off to introduce themselves to the remnants getting by.
“We think you’ll have time to listen now”.
Hickory, and others interested in geothermal, here’s the latest from Michael Barnard at CleanTechnica:
Busting Geothermal Myths: The Promise & Limits of Deep Closed Loop & Enhanced Systems
https://cleantechnica.com/2025/04/28/busting-geothermal-myths-the-promise-limits-of-deep-closed-loop-enhanced-systems/
Thank John. It will take time to see if any of these efforts at electricity generation can be pulled off at reasonable input cost on a broad scale.
The great Bronze Age trade networks and civilizations around the Mediterranean — Mycenaean, Hittite, Ugaritic, Babylonian, Cypriot — collapsed right around 1200 BC. They almost took Egypt with them. Even literacy systems were lost in Hatti and Greece.
It seems to have been fiery and sudden.
But the world did not end.
Hi Mike B . Just popped in to say ” Thank You ” for teaching me about the collapse of the Bronze Age . It was like a bulb going on . Regards and be well .
Right the world did not end when civilization collapsed, and furthermore technological progress continued.
THAWING PERMAFROST DOTS SIBERIA WITH RASH OF MOUNDS
“In the vast white expanse around Churapcha in eastern Siberia, the ever more rapid thaw of the permafrost is changing the landscape, cracking up houses and releasing greenhouse gases.”
https://phys.org/news/2025-04-permafrost-dots-siberia-rash-mounds.html
Question for you Ron, and secondarily for others who wish to comment-
Do you think there will be a real US presidential election in 2028, one that is not simply a per-ordained charade to anoint the next version of the current oligarchy? Or is the game of democracy over in this country?
I wonder why would they give up power since they are in a position to hold it indefinitely if they wish. Supreme court granted immunity goes a long way, along with all sorts of other empowering measures now in their grasp…insurrection act for example.
“The Trump administration is considering whether to invoke the Insurrection Act of 1807, a rarely used law that allows the president to deploy the U.S. military …”
Ron, how does collapse and a fine-tuned universe fit together? I’m curious.
“I am just curious about why people believe what they believe. It is obvious, I mean it’s so damn fucking obvious that the world is in deep overshoot and the outcome can only end in collapse. That collapse can come in ten years or fifty years, but it is just so obvious it is coming.” – Ron
Well, yes, while I fully agree with Ron that the planet is being populated and exploited by humanity far in excess of its capacity to accommodate our rampant species, and I dispute that it is obvious to most people. Or more accurately, it is something that most people are either unaware of, or that gets crowded out from their minds by other and often more immediate worries and concerns. Indeed, even for those people to whom it is obvious that overshoot is around the corner, it is not something that occupies their mind constantly minute by minute, day by day. Everyday life is about dealing with the business of proceeding through the day and doing all those things we must occupy ourselves with, while scientific and economic truths and theories and possibilities are their, stored knowledge in our minds, but not constantly at the forefront of our consciousness, occupying our moment my moment behaviours and interaction with our immediate surroundings. . For myself, I awaken in the morning , wash, perform the ablutions, dress, eat breakfast, maybe think about need to get some eggs and bread and butter and vegetables and milk later in the day, think about watering the garden, paying bills and planning any shopping, write a card for aunt’s birthday, and generally prepare for the day (retired and on a pension and so happily not at work any more). I look at the TV weather report to decide should I water the rhubarb, but don’t immediately think about adiabatic lapse rates and jet streams and global warming and whether there is enough lithium in the world to permit a mass movement to electric vehicles. I scatter salt on my fried egg, without thinking too hard about those white cubic crystals of sodium and chlorine, and what ionic bonding is, and where those elements lie on the periodic table. It’s a sunny day outside, and it is not immediately obvious that that dazzling disc in the sky is 150 million kilometers away and the light and heat takes 8 minutes to get here to this little village in the south midlands of England. Off to the hardware shop to get some screws and nails for some jobs later in the day, driving along the road without immediately having at the front of my mind constantly the Peak Oil site and that in twenty years time it will be a battery driven vehicle I’m driving (If I still am driving – I’d be 100 by then) and petrol driven cars will be museum pieces. Now I have had a proper education in science and society and economics and politics, but frankly, the majority of people have little understanding of geology, chemistry, biology, astronomy, climatology and all the other -ologies. They have either forgotten or misunderstood what they were taught in school, or may never have learned them in school in the first place. I taught human and physical geography at school which was the only subject in the secondary school syllabus that incorporated global warming, world population, resource depletion, industrial location and agriculture and world food production. Several of those subjects have been taken off the secondary school syllabus or may be still be taught but have a very small and peripheral place in the timetable. The result is that, t least in Britain, and I suspect in much of Europe, North America, and other developed economies, there ignorance or limited awareness of the issues that occupy the minds of all who visit and contribute to Peak Oil Barrel – or Real Climate, or Sceptical Science etc. So, Ron, it may be obvious – TO US – that the world is as you say “in deep overshoot and the outcome can only end in collapse. That collapse can come in ten years or fifty years, but it is just so obvious it is coming”, but It is not obvious to most folk, and we on this site are a minority, secular John the Baptists, voices crying in the wilderness proclaiming the end is nigh.
Excellent. Concur.
One piece that I would add in response to Ron is that many of the topics in his list are complicated, with a range of current levels of human knowledge held even by the best people in each field. Few can claim expertise in all these areas, and it can take a significant effort for bright, educated folks to try to grasp each of these in any type of complete manner.
Ron, unfortunately I also agree that your Francis Bacon quote is true for many.
“According to the most recent data, the United States spends $14,570 per person on healthcare compared with just $5,640 in Japan, $6,023 in the United Kingdom, $6,931 in Australia, $7,013 in Canada and $7,136 in France. And yet, despite our huge expenditures, we remain the only major country on Earth not to guarantee healthcare to all people as a human right.”
Not a surprise
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-14665703/China-finally-reveals-Covid-originated-accused-lab-leak-cover-up.html
Interesting that China is not claiming Covid originated from an animal but rather in the USA.
I am completely neutral here ( lab leak vs animal ) simply think an interesting claim.
Animal from Wuhan ( sorry ) right near a Virology lab.
Attention all cornucopians.
FORECASTS OF GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS FROM FOSSIL FUELS SOAR IN TRUMP’S FIRST 100 DAYS
“Tariff chaos hampers Trump’s pledge to ‘drill, baby, drill’, but analysis still shows surge in planet-heating emissions.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/02/trump-drill-baby-drill-tariffs
Latest Daily CO2
May. 1, 2025 = 430.82 ppm
May. 1, 2024 = 426.34 ppm
1 Year Change = 4.48 ppm (1.05%)
LoadsOfOil, you just mentioned biblical prophecy from Ezekiel predicting the formation of Israel in 1948, a prophecy written in approximately 550 BC (I’m being generous), so 2,500 years before the event. Are you serious? I suspect you are indeed serious and for me that explains a lot of your beliefs expressed here on POB. Like, peak oil is not a problem (we have loads of oil), climate change is not a problem, renewables are a waste of time. This is all true (for believers) if we are living in the End Times and the apocalypse is near?
I’m just guessing here, so please forgive me if this doesn’t reflect your views and beliefs.
{Trump has always been a liar and a fabulist, but over the last few months, many of his fabrications seem to show a detachment from reality that is especially disturbing—even by his standards. }
“the apocalypse is near?”
A New Open Thread Non Petroleum has been posted.
https://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-non-petroleum-may-3-2025/
An update to US production has been posted.
https://peakoilbarrel.com/us-february-oil-production-marginally-higher/