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Agric |
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Veteran Posts: 214  | But this time it's not me: "This will evolve as a systemic crisis; as the integrated infrastructure of our civilisation breaks down. It will give rise to a multi-front predicament that will swamp governments’ ability to manage. It is likely to lead to widespread disorientation, anxiety, severe welfare risks, and possible social breakdown. The report argues that a managed ‘de-growth’ is impossible. We are at the cusp of rapid and severely disruptive changes. From now on the risk of entering a collapse must be considered significant and rising. The challenge is not about how we introduce energy infrastructure to maintain the viability of the systems we depend upon, rather it is how we deal with the consequences of not having the energy and other resources to maintain those same systems. Appeals towards localism, transition initiatives, organic food and renewable energy production, however laudable and necessary, are totally out of scale to what is approaching. There is no solution, though there are some paths that are better and wiser than others. This is a societal issue, there is no ‘other’ to blame, but the responsibility belongs to us all. What we require is rapid emergency planning coupled with a plan for longer-term adaptation." Read the summary here: http://www.energybulletin.net/node/52068 ..then go read the full report that links to. I could re-phrase the above in more blunt, bloody and certain terms, and that would be more accurate in describing the future. But you probably wouldn't believe me, or perhaps just be too scared to believe me, heck - you might not find what's written above credible. Peak oil is not the problem, merely a symptom. It will likely, however, precipitate the widespead comprehension that unlimited growth within a limited system is, after all, implausible. That realisation shakes the economic system we depend on to ruins, decimates (and I mean that word literally, and worse) our wealth, and probably causes the systems our lives depend on to fail. Complex systems are resiliant - until they fail. Then they have a tendancy to fail catastrophically = fast and dramatically. Odds are our system (economic, monetary, trade, infrastructure, government, etc) will fail catastrophically within the easily foreseeable future (and I'm not talking a decade away, that's way too optimistic). If you and those you know can't provide what you need to live then you''ll have a problem. It really is time for lifeboats, hurrah for TBI, for that's what you must become. Fast! | ||
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Veteran Posts: 214 | An earlier (August 2009) presentation of the same thesis, different method of presentation that some may prefer: http://www.theoildrum.com/node/5633 However, I'd say the report mentioned above which I've now read quickly: http://www.theoildrum.com/files/Tipping%20Point.pdf Is much more comprehensive and persuasive. It summarises my thoughts on these things pretty well so won't be far from the 'truth'  You may wish to read the comments at TOD on it: http://www.theoildrum.com/node/6309 | ||
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Veteran Posts: 214 | http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/mar/21/peak-oil-summit "In a significant policy shift, the government has agreed to undertake more work on whether the UK needs to take action to avoid the massive dislocation that could be caused by the early onset of "peak oil" – the point that marks the start of terminal decline in global oil production." ...but... "A spokeswoman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change confirmed last night that Hunt and a range of energy-policy civil servants would be holding "private and behind-doors" talks at the Energy Institute. But she played down the significance of the session, saying the government had always taken supply issues seriously and met different parts of industry on a regular basis. "We do this all the time; it is just a normal stakeholder meeting," she insisted, adding that there was no "marked" change in ministerial policy." Ah well. Probably business as usual. Till it's not. | ||
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| David Franklin |
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Regular Posts: 80  | Just to underline what your saying and for anyone who doesn't think a total collapse is possible. I watched "Requiem for Detroit" http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rkm3y , shown Saturday 13th on BBC2. This documentary reports on life in inner city Detroit, but is more like the rise and fall of an Empire, with about 6 minutes of HOPE at the end ( including Guerrilla Gardening) | ||
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Veteran Posts: 214 | about that meeting last week from Rob Hopkins, well worth reading to get a slight feel for UK govt position: http://transitionculture.org/2010/03/24/government-%E2%80%98peak-oi... "After the presentations there was some discussion around the table, and the concept was mooted that the solution to peak oil might be to just leave it, that price signals would bring about change far better than any government policy-making ever could . This stimulated fascinating responses, mainly along the lines that if you leave it to the market, then what is the point of government? Such an approach would result in volatile prices, which hits the disadvantaged first. The purpose of government is, after all, to stop that happening. He responded by challenging the idea that if government does stuff it will be a smooth transition. It may not be, he argued, that government actually has such power. One participant stated that surely one of the key roles of government is to make it possible for people to live with less energy, and that land use planning has a major role to play here. Another person stated that as we enter the period of declining energy, the political context changes, from one of an expanding economy in which we distribute the surplus, to one where the cake we have to share out is shrinking." And some commentary on it from USA by Tom Whipple: http://www.fcnp.com/commentary/national/6148-the-peak-oil-crisis-a-... | ||
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Veteran Posts: 214 | http://www.theoildrum.com/node/6339 I'd like to focus on a few specific bits... 1. "One of the great virtues of the global economy is that factories may fail and links in a supply chain can break down, but the economy can quickly adapt to fulfilling that need elsewhere or finding a substitute. This is a measure of the adaptive capacity within the globalised economy, and is a natural feature of such a de-localised and networked complex adaptive system. But it is true only within a certain context. There are common platforms or ‘hub infrastructure’ that maintain the operation of the global economy and the operational fabric, without which they would collapse. Principle among them are the the monetary and financial system, accessible energy flows, and the integrated infrastructures of information technology, electricity generation, and transport." 2. "This current integrated complexity was not always so. We have adapted so well to its changes, and its changes have been in general so stable, that we are often oblivious to its ties. Imagine if all the integrated circuits introduced within the last 10 or even five years should stop working. Financial systems, the grid, and supply-chains would fail. Our just-in-time food systems would soon leave the cupboard bare, and our inability to carry out financial transactions would ensure it remained so, real starvation could appear in the most advanced (system dependent) economies. The question poses itself, how can something introduced only in the last five or ten years cause such chaos if removed, after all we were fine just ten years ago? " 3. "One of the great advantages of a growing interconnectedness between regions, and more trade with money was that localised risks could be shared over the whole network of regions. Surpluses could be sold to where prices were highest in the network, and the money received in return would hold its value better than the stored grain prone to rot or rodents. Distributing surpluses across the network was also the most efficient use of resources. What economists now call comparative advantage meant that more specialised roles could be performed in the network than in a similar number of isolated regions or towns with greater efficiency. This meant new products and services could be developed, especially ones that relied on diverse sub-components. This promoted further efficiency, increased wealth, surpluses, capital and a growing knowledge and technical base. Now increased investment in future wealth could be more ambitious in building the size of the network (through assimilation, integration and conquest) and its levels of integration (bridges, markets, and guilds)." 1. Is simply a statement of the resiliance of complex adaptive systems (CAS hereafter) and a warning that they have fundamental vulnerable aspects. 2. Talks about the difficulty of the system to function given a roll-back of technology. When I was developing computer systems 30 years ago we designed in manual paper based systems just in case the computer system failed, that is unthinkable now. 3. Encompasses several important related aspects. The importance of money as a means of exchange and store of value. The enlargement of scope that trade creates, as in Liebig's Law ( productive capacity of (A + B) > productive capacity of A + productive capacity of B ). The wealth creation effects of globalisation. When (yes, not if) our current CAS breaks we really will be up the creek with no paddle. Roll-back within the context of the system continuing to function will be virtually impossible. There is unlikely to be any way that some baseline system cold be implemented to keep it afloat, it will just fall apart in an irrepairable way. Then all the benefits of 3. will likely unwind (very probably very suddenly) and we will have to rebuild from some prior point. If we are lucky that point could be the equivalent of 1980 or 1950, that would be painful but recognisable. It might be worse - try 1900...1750...1250. May I suggest you checkout the global population at those times? I guess I should repost my 'levels of collapse', it's time I attempted to refine it. I guess the essence of what I'm saying is: when what will happen happens it is not a mild earhquake that shakes our lives for a few years, it is a fundamental dislocation of the reality we currently inhabit. Furthermore, we have almost zero skills appropriate to the new reality we'll face (many of us briefly). Can any of us make: soap, candle, screw, nail, knife, axe, saw, plate, cup, needle, thread, rope, planed timber, metal etc... and all the things needed to make those? Our success, specialisation, technology have created a system we are totally dependent on. Its shattering will expose a fundamental truth: our systems have replaced our previously innate ability to survive, we have un-adapted ourselves, with consequences you should be able to see by now but, if not, will have the pleasure of experiencing before long. | ||
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