Total run time: 29:00

Host: David Swanson.
Producer: David Swanson.
Music by Duke Ellington.

13 Comments on "Richard Heinberg on Our Renewable Future"

Plantagenet on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 1:45 pm 



This is a good listen. Recommended.

J-Gav on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 2:24 pm 



I’ll agree with you there Plant. Heinberg’s generally a good listen, even if he is a little mushy on some issues: doesn’t talk a lot about war, nukes, the urgency of the climate situation …

But heh, gotta have some reasonable commentators who don’t scare everybody away.

Davy on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 2:53 pm 



I am noticing Richard shifting to less support to the greenines view of a BAUgreen. He is decidedly reserved on what renewables offer for transition. He talks about change through crisis. He talks about less with less. He talks about triage. He is still offering a fair degree of hopium. Which I feel must be offered to get anyone to buy into his sobering message. It is hard for me to offer hopium but I am not the head of a movement like Richard is. I didn’t hear any talk about a population predicaments and a population bottleneck. That I feel is the number one issues for any transition. I know why there was no population talk and that is because it is a taboo for someone in Richard’s position. All in all a very good interview. I feel Richard is coming around more to the doomer view as the magnitude of the predicaments ahead become undeniable. Richard is in the top 5 of my early influences with doommism.

Perk Earl on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 5:48 pm 



“I didn’t hear any talk about a population predicaments and a population bottleneck. That I feel is the number one issues for any transition.”

I’ve noticed that a lot in these type of transitional discussions too, Davy. So easy to avoid the hardest part but really how do all those people that reached that level of population during a period of cheap energy, then live during a time of sharply declining energy? Right now a huge warehouse type building can manuf. 1/2 a million loaves of bread or a million gallons of milk, then trucks distribute it far and wide. How do we in a post collapse ever reach that level of food production? Answer: We won’t, so population will have to decline sharply through a bottleneck. It won’t be pretty either.

But it is true Richard is coming around. He use to try and wave the pompoms but now he understands better what’s coming down the pike.

hiruitnguyse on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 5:51 pm 



Yes, he always seemed to be a tad optimistic to me.

Perk Earl on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 5:54 pm 



I didn’t have anywhere else better to post this, but I was hoping to get some other posters to weigh in on a pattern I’ve noticed. Brent, not WTI, is going up in early morning trading somewhere else in the world, then in the afternoon PST, the price drops back down to about where it was before. These fluctuations are about 3 bucks each way, going up 3, then dropping later 3. That seems very strange. It’s almost like there’s an attempt to manipulate the price, then some other traders make money shorting it.

See below that Brent has dropped back down 3 after having risen about 3 earlier today:

http://www.bloomberg.com/energy/

Crude Oil (WTI) USD/bbl. 49.84 +0.25 +0.50% Apr 15 18:15:46
Crude Oil (Brent) USD/bbl. 59.54 -3.04 -4.86% Apr 15 03/02/2015

apneaman on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 6:17 pm 



WTI Explodes Higher, Brent Unchanged As Algos Reminisce

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-02/wti-explodes-higher-brent-unchanmged-algos-reminisce

Davy on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 6:44 pm 



Perk, I smell a rat but I am not a expert on these markets. I do feel if a market enters an environment of manipulation it will be manipulated.

GregT on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 7:07 pm 



If you really don’t like the smell of rats, do not pay any attention to the gold and silver markets. They have both smelled very badly for quite some time now.

Davy on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 7:24 pm 



Greg, other than it has allowed me to buy some gold being far lower price than it should be. So sometimes rats are really Angels in disguise.

GregT on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 8:39 pm 



Good point Davy!

Perk Earl on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 4:56 am 



Ok, so now it is 3am pst and Brent is going up. Tomorrow aft. it will go down and end up where it started. Someone or some entity is driving it up at this time of day and then another entity is shorting it in the pm pst. I’ll try to remember to post the afternoon price.

Crude Oil (WTI) USD/bbl. 50.36 +0.77 +1.55% Apr 15 05:39:01
Crude Oil (Brent) USD/bbl. 60.72 +1.18 +1.98% Apr 15 05:19:20

Perk Earl on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 11:20 am 



Crude Oil (WTI) USD/bbl. 50.15 +0.56 +1.13% Apr 15 11:30:11
Crude Oil (Brent) USD/bbl. 61.66 +2.12 +3.56% Apr 15 11:49:15

Now you can see further into that same trading session Brent has continued to go up, and is now up 2.12, near 4%.

Stay tuned for this afternoons swan dive back to where it once was. I’m predicting it because it’s been doing the same thing every day now for several days.