The sinking Titanic: interview with Michael C. Ruppert

…Even though major newspapers like the New York Times admit these days that the end of cheap oil is near, they rather avoid to discuss the underlying consequences of Peak Oil. How would you explain those consequences? Isn

The most dire consequences may lie in food production, anyway. Agriculture depends a huge deal on oil. At From the Wilderness (FTW) you had the thesis that we are eating fossil fuels. Can you explain those relations a bit?

In our world a farmer drives an oil-powered machine to plow fields. He or she then drives another oil-powered machine to plant seeds. Water for irrigation is — in most cases — pumped by electricity generated by coal, natural gas, and oil. Germany has made great strides in electrical generation through Feed-in-Tariffs which have exploded solar and wind generation but they do not resolve the whole equation. After seeds are planted and irrigated the crops are then sprayed with pesticides (derived from oil) and fertilizers (produced from natural gas). To harvest the crops the farmer then drives another oil-powered machine. Then oil is used to transport the food to processing plants and for subsequent distribution. Food is often wrapped in plastic (also oil) and frequently treated with chemical additives also derived from oil and gas.

Globalization has only compounded the issue by shipping food all over the world (wasting oil) for the sake of profit rather than sustainability. I live in California and can go to a market and find strawberries from Chile while Southern California grows great strawberries. This pattern is the same for most food consumed in industrialized countries. This only happened because cheap labour costs and less-stringent regulation became more important than common sense. Money overcomes logic every time. But just watching globalization end will not solve the problem. As I have said for years, globalization dies with cheap energy. There’s little point in fighting it anymore unless the struggle is in pursuit of a unified energy vision.

Energy Bulletin