Malawi: Fuel Shortages Ignite Violent Nationwide Protests

In light of the recent spate of protests in Malawi, government should rethink its policy to devalue the local currency, economists say. Economic and democratic governance concerns against President Bingu wa Mutharika’s government amid persistent fuel shortages ignited violent nationwide public protests on Wednesday as protestors called for Mutharika’s resignation. People looted shops and torched […]

Malthus, Ehrlich, Gore And Other Population Control Mystics

Something that happened to me a few years ago may throw light on the popular mindset regarding what’s called overpopulation. I was standing in the middle of Ronald Reagan/National Airport in Washington, D.C. talking on my cell phone about demographic winter (the precipitous worldwide decline in birthrates). When the call was over, I was accosted […]

Energy in the Industrial Revolution

The above graph shows energy consumption in the UK through the industrial revolution, along with Italy in the 1860s, when they were still an agrarian society.  It’s from an essay by Tony Wrigley, a retired Cambridge economic historian.  He writes: The most fundamental defining feature of the industrial revolution was that it made possible exponential […]

Ugo Bardi: Peak Research

Life has been very hard for scientists during the last few years. Already, the life of an active scientist was a rat race in which you had to run in circles, trying to get grants that would allow you to pay students and postdocs and they would help you write more papers that then would […]

Typhoon increases level of radioactive water in Reactor No. 1 basement by 17 inches in a day — Likely to continue rising

Heavy rain brought by a tropical storm has increased the level of radioactive contaminated water at the basements of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. […] Tokyo Electric Power Company or TEPCO, the plant’s operator, says that at 7 AM local time on Thursday, the level of contaminated water pooled at the basement of […]

Growing Water Deficit Threatening Grain Harvests

Many countries are facing dangerous water shortages. As world demand for food has soared, millions of farmers have drilled too many irrigation wells in efforts to expand their harvests. As a result, water tables are falling and wells are going dry in some 20 countries containing half the world’s people. The overpumping of aquifers for […]

Is Peak Coal Real?

About a year ago, I wrote an article about peak coal. And I took some heat for it… “I’ve had it,” wrote Mark S. “Peak oil, peak natural gas, peak water, peak uranium. What about peak fear mongering, Ian? These peaks don’t exist. We have plenty of oil. It’s not going anywhere. You’re just trying […]

“New Thinking in the Transition Movement” with Rob Hopkins

On Monday, July 18, Transition US hosted a Maestro Conference call featuring a fascinating conversation between Transition Movement founder Rob Hopkins and the author of the recently published book, The End of Growth: Adapting to Our New Economic Reality, Richard Heinberg. The title of this event was “New Thinking in the Transition Movement” and primarily consisted […]

Roscoe Bartlett Notes Urgency to Reduce Oil Dependency at the first joint United States Air Force and Army Energy Forum

Congressman Bartlett is the Chairman, Tactical Air and Land Forces (TALF) Subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) and a member of its Subcommittee on Seapower and Expeditionary Forces. He is also a Member of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee and its Subcommittee on Energy and Environment; a member of the House […]

Matt Simmons – Peak Oil (2008)

Matt Simmons addressed members of the Minnesota Senate Energy, Utilities, Technology & Communications Committee and the Minnesota House Energy Finance and Policy Division (4 Feb 2008). This is a 5-minute sample from a 2.5-hour presentation. I edited the video, inserting the speaker’s slides and adding markers to help viewers follow along.

IEA: Additional crude oil stock releases possible

The International Energy Agency announced its completion of a 30-day review of the Libya Collective Action launched on June 23. IEA said it would take additional action if market conditions warrant. The review concluded that the release of strategic stocks of oil among IEA member countries served a market need by adding liquidity and bridging […]

Headed for a lower standard of living?

The amount of oil that is extracted from the ground each year has been close to flat since 2005, regardless of what has happened to price. Since world population has been growing, this means less and less is available for each person. We use oil in many important ways, including growing food, manufacturing and transporting […]

The world’s biggest problem? Too many people

Our unsustainable population levels are depleting resources and denying a decent future to our descendants. We must stop the denial. Think back on what you talked about with friends and family at your last gathering. The latest game of your favorite team? “American Idol”? An addictive hobby? The new movie blockbuster? In a serious moment, […]

Sorry, but Fracking Doesn’t End the Peak Oil Debate

Here’s his peak oil take: A decade ago, the Peak Oil theory attracted a lot of adherents. It postulated that global oil production would peak in 2006, and that the following shortage would send oil prices skyrocketing. Sure enough, in 2008 a barrel of oil shot to $150. It looked like the Peak Oil theory […]

Preparing for post-peak

South Africans trying to fill their cars with petrol last week will have some idea of what it would be like to live in a world of diminishing oil supply. Though sector strikes were the reason this time, future oil price shocks, supply disruptions and shrinking economies could be the outcome of a continuing global […]

5 Things You Didn’t Know About Oil

Oil is one resource that has been the subject of many conspiracy theories, controversies and myths. It has always driven the political dynamics between countries and played a pivotal role in crippling or elevating economies. Have you wondered what it would be like if the world hit ‘peak oil’, or what that concept entails? Do […]

The Peak Oil Crisis: Reality On Hold

As much of America bakes in some of the highest temperatures ever recorded and while Washington argues interminably over taxes, budget cuts and debt caps, one is struck by the unreality of it all. When the House of Representatives votes to preserve the incandescent light bulb for a while as a symbol of personal freedom, […]

Surge in Saudi oil burn adds new demand twist

Saudi Arabia is best known as the world’s largest oil producer and exporter and last month pumped 9.7 million barrels a day, the second highest level in three decades, but the country could soon become one of the world’s top oil consumers. The emergence of Saudi Arabia as an important consumer sets a critical new […]

24 Small Towns May Lose Air Service

Rural America, already struggling to recover from the recession and the flight of its young people, is about to take another blow: the loss of its airline service. That was underscored last week when Delta Air Lines announced that it “can no longer afford” to continue service at 24 small airports. The carrier says it […]

Is an “Oil Shockwave” America’s Biggest Energy Threat?

War games have long been used to prepare the military for battle, but what about the national threat of a global energy crisis? According to an advocacy group called Securing America’s Future Energy (SAFE), Middle East turmoil, a shaky national economy, and heavy dependence on foreign oil have combined to make America’s energy supply “dangerously […]

Great Depression II is Here?

The mainstream media have been trying to dispel the notion that we’re entering a second Great Depression, although people aren’t buying it.  Eerily, we’re witnessing the convergence of events similar to the first Great Depression.  The crash of the markets combined with environmental disaster:  tornadoes, flooding, extreme heat and drought.   Most recently, in Arkansas, Texas […]

Ensuring fair shares in a world of limits

As worldwide demand increases for natural resources that are already in short supply, how should aid donors and campaigners respond? As the 21st-century global economy increasingly hits natural resource limits and planetary boundaries, fundamental questions about fair shares will start to arise. How these arguments play out will exert a crucial influence over prospects for […]

Iran Opens Oil Bourse – Harbinger of Trouble for New York

The last three years of global recession have dealt a major blow to American capitalist ideas trumpeted throughout the world on the value of “free markets.” Wall St has been revealed as a form of casino economy, with the bankster insiders gambling with other people’s, and eventually, the government’s money in the form of bailouts. […]

A Vision For The Post-Peak Oil Future (Pt 2)

“Where there is no vision, the people perish” — Book of Proverbs. “We face a choice going forward. There’s a kind of false dichotomy, a false choice that we’re being presented between policies on the left or policies on the right. It’s not left or right, it’s forward or backward. It’s a choice between investing […]

Japan radiation specialists accuses TEPCO of total cover-up regarding radiation exposure of nuclear plant workers

Reports continue to surface about Japan’s tsunami-caused nuclear disaster at the Fukushima complex, and this time Japanese radiation specialists say the plant’s owner, Tokyo Electric Power Company, is engaged in a number of cover-ups and misinformation campaigns. One specialist, Nishio Masamichi, director of the Hakkaido Cancer Center, who initially called for “calm” in the early […]

Power from the Air: Device Captures Ambient Electromagnetic Energy

Researchers have discovered a way to capture and harness energy transmitted by such sources as radio and television transmitters, cell phone networks and satellite communications systems. By scavenging this ambient energy from the air around us, the technique could provide a new way to power networks of wireless sensors, microprocessors and communications chips. “There is […]

The Chinese Oil Spill

It took a month to admit that there was an oil spill in China’s Bohai Bay, from June 4 when it happened to July 5 when The Global Times, in an unusual reaction from a presumably government controlled newspaper, wrote “We cannot help but wonder: is the SOA (the State Oceanic Administration) a serious watchdog […]

International Oil Efficiency vs Gas Prices

The above graph shows per capita oil consumption versus the retail price of gasoline in 22 developed countries.  The 2010 oil consumption data come from BP, the population figures from Wikipedia, and the 2010/2011 gasoline prices from GTZ. This is a rough exercise – ideally I would have liked to compare vehicle fleet efficiency to […]

The coming UK energy meltdown

The UK desperately needs a new energy strategy based on a realistic assessment of its assets, its needs and the options available to it. Unfortunately, its freedom for technical and financial manoevre is deeply restricted by its self-imposed Climate Change Act and its commitment to the EU’s 20-20-20 targets. Its technically illiterate, if financially canny […]

The collapse of industrial society has been postponed indefinitely

“I’ve always been cautious about the argument that everything is about to collapse catastrophically,” Transition Network co-founder Rob Hopkins said yesterday on a conference call with hundreds of Americans worried about the effects of peak oil and climate change on the economy. Unlike peak oil writers including Dmitry Orlov and Mike Ruppert, Hopkins has not […]

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