UN: World must act today to boost rice supply

Urgent action is needed to reverse inefficient farming methods and boost the world’s supply of rice in order to prevent rising poverty and hunger, experts told a major world rice congress on Tuesday. “We must take action now, not next week, not next month, not next year, but today,” Kanayo Nwanze, president of the UN’s […]

Sharp Rise In Oil Prices Could Hinder Recovery

Crude oil futures took a sharp jump last week and are approaching $90 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Back in January 2009, oil was selling for less than $32 per barrel. Higher oil prices could hurt an economy struggling to recover. Kevin Leung, the owner of the Magic Rabbit Car Wash & […]

On building community resiliance

The power was out at my house last week,  I arose the next morning to spent candles and dried food jars scattered around the kitchen (hub) table. My family knew not to open the refrigerator door during a power outage, so they ate dried apples, nuts and seeds. While putting the jars of food away, […]

OPEC: Global oil demand rising, with marked upswing in Asia

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries forecasts continued growth in global oil demand over the next 20 years, while acknowledging the potential impact of environmental policies on the energy market. “Over the period 2009-30, consumption in developing countries increases by more than 22 million b/d. Of the total global oil demand growth in the long […]

Arab world to face extreme water crisis by 2015

The Arab world, one of the driest regions on the planet, will tip into severe water scarcity as early as 2015, a report issued on Thursday predicts. By then, Arabs will have to survive on less than 500 cubic metres of water a year each, or below a tenth of the world average of more […]

Peak oil Canadian task force recommends steps to reduce oil dependency

The first Canadian task force to tackle “peak oil” is recommending that the Squamish-Lillooet Regional District work to reduce oil imports and exports by 2.6 per cent annually. The “boldest recommendation” from the Energy Resilience Task Force is for the SLRD to adopt a peak oil resolution and the Oil Depletion Protocol, an international agreement […]

Food prices will continue to grow

IF CONSUMERS are unhappy about food prices now, they won’t like what’s coming. Population rises are just one of a range of factors listed by economist Professor Claudio Malagoli as contributing to an ongoing escalation in food prices – although not necessarily with any price benefit to farmers locked into a system geared only for […]

The coming liquid fuel crisis

We face a liquid fuel crisis in two to five years. That was the stark message from an international conference on peak oil in Washington DC that I attended last month. It will be far worse than the 1973 and 1979 oil shocks that induced panic, disorientation and insecurity. Back then stock market declines followed […]

Year of the zombie

Transylvania has vampires. Japan has Godzilla. And America has grain-fed, brain-dead zombies—the perfect malady for a land with a critical cultural identity crisis and Abrahamic doom lurking just discernibly below the horizon, our heads blissfully buried in oily Gulf Coast sand. Zombies are what we can’t run away from. AIDS epidemics, impending economic collapse, climate […]

India/ China To Contribute Majority Of World Middle-Class Population By 2030

Recent financial and demographic studies have revealed that by the time the year 2030 comes around a majority of the middle class population of the world will be from China and India. It has been estimated that the people of India and China will account for as much as 45 per cent of the middle […]

Rescuing suburbia

VIDEO of Jeff Vail’s talk (courtesy of ASPO TV) Below the fold are the slides, and a rough approximation of my presentation entitled “Rescuing Suburbia” from the 2010 ASPO-USA conference in Washington, D.C. The presentation takes a fairly one-sided approach to the issue of how suburbia will fare for the long haul, primarily as a […]

An open letter to medicine, nursing, and public health upon reaching the limits to growth

* 206 reads * Printer-friendly version Bookmark and Share Published Oct 30 2010 by Energy Bulletin, Archived Oct 30 2010 An open letter to medicine, nursing, and public health upon reaching the limits to growth by Dan Bednarz, PhD, J. Mac Crawford, PhD, RN and Nancy Lee Wood, PhD 0 Please Log in or register […]

Can you really afford that second child?

I had a conversation with a friend not too long ago who had one child in her mid-thirties and stopped there. She and her husband had an overwhelming desire to have one child, she said, but the desire for a second child just wasn’t strong enough to outweigh the cost. And that was that. I […]

Nitrogen independence crucial to sustainability

Nitrogen is the fertilizer nutrient used in the greatest quantity in our country, with 12.5 million tons consumed in 2008. In the past decade, the amount we import from abroad has dramatically increased from only 12 percent in 1999 to 52 percent in 2008. Production of nitrogen fertilizer with the Haber-Bosch process uses natural gas […]

Gas-Guzzling US Military Confronted with Reality of ‘Peak Oil’

It’s a secret just how much oil the US military uses, but estimates range from around 400,000 barrels a day in peacetime – almost as much as Greece – to 800,000 barrels a day at the height of the Iraq war.This puts a single nation’s armed forces near Australia as an oil consumer and among […]

Population Demographics, Energy Consumption

In our last Musings we discussed the aging population challenge China’s economy may be confronting and its possible ramifications on the country’s future energy consumption.  We have been doing more research on the question of population aging and energy consumption because the world is certainly aging, which is likely to impact energy needs globally, and […]

The energy prophet

Peter Tertzakian says the world is on the verge of an energy “break point” that will change the way we live and work. He talks to Derek Brower “ENERGY-consuming devices, such as air conditioners, light bulbs and the car, serve us like slaves and make kings of us all. But what do we do now […]

A Specter Is Haunting America

The American middle/working class is still preoccupied with gazing at the shadows cast upon the walls of its cave/prison, preferring to go on believing what they are told by their owners and handlers: that all will be right with their little world, provided they keep their head down and work hard (at trying to find […]

‘Peak Phosphate’ Spells End of Cheap Food

By way of background, all agricultural crops require phosphate, which is an essential element for plant growth. And it cannot be substituted with anything else. Unfortunately, the academics at Sydney’s University of Technology believe “peak phosphate” could become a reality as soon as 2030. They also include Professor Stuart White, who suggests that the price […]

When will Peak Oil arrive? How will it effect us? and can Green Energy save us?

Peak Oil could arrive as soon as 2012 while others say by 2017. Its effects will be monumental and life altering. Can Green Energy counter falling Oil production? Energy Experts and Economists fear the consequences of Peak Oil. Watch and see what lies ahead for us?

Peak Oil Pinball

After giving talks on peak oil and its ramifications, I am usually asked how I see it playing out when we begin to feel the tightening of supplies. We have read all the internet sources, and see all kinds of predictions and possibilities for the future. Some see it as a chance to “go back […]

Making cities more livable may save the world

Progress in my home city of Vancouver gives me hope – but even here we have a long way to go. The most important move urbanites can make is to get out of their cars. But governments must encourage this with better community design and investments in public transit and pedestrian and cycling infrastructure. Cycling […]

Food Versus Fuel – Again

I am off to Malaysia on Saturday for a business trip. I will actually spend some time in Bintulu, so I am looking forward to driving by and seeing Shell’s gas-to-liquids (GTL) plant there. I am unsure about my prospects for Internet access over the following week. When I was in India, I was without […]

Food Security – a must for everyone

Every second one person dies in the world of starvation. The terrible statistics were published by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations. According to the FAO experts, the starving population numbers about one billion people. And tens of millions of people suffer from systematic malnutrition. Two-thirds of the famine-stricken population live […]

U.S. power supply inadequate for economic recovery

U.S. utilities withstood one of the hottest summers in a decade without major blackouts, but the country might not have all the generation it needs if the U.S. economy rebounds quickly. U.S. electric use jumped 4.2 percent in the first half of 2010 from a year earlier, as the economy began to improve. The Energy […]

Transportation, Food, and Electricity Systems Not Well Prepared for Peak Oil

Earlier this month, I was able to attend the final day of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas (ASPO) USA conference, and it reminded me how far behind we are in preparing for a future in which oil is less readily available than it is now. Sharon Astyk, who’s an ASPO […]

Convenience is a Word in the Dictionary

We as a population have become addicted to convenience, even if it takes an engineering degree to figure out all the functions of the item we have acquired. Many products have had a swift demise when the public decided they weren’t convenient enough. When we start the long decline of the oil age, what happens […]

Video: Response To Peak Oil

This documentary is about what a select group of individuals are doing in response to peak oil. It includes a definition of what peak oil is.

Low Income families face “Fuel Poverty”

GST revenue from soaring energy prices should form rebates – AGL * By Annabel Hepworth * From: The Australian * October 15, 2010 8:51AM * 8 comments * Increase Text Size * Decrease Text Size * Print * Email * Share o Add to Digg o Add to del.icio.us o Add to Facebook o Add […]

After peak oil, peak steel?

You’ve heard of peak oil, but you may soon start hearing about “peak steel”. Or you will if you listen to Eiji Hayashida, chief executive of JFE Steel of Japan. The head of the world’s fifth biggest steelmaker told the FT that from around 2015 world steel output will reach a plateau for at least […]

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