[pea-jay]

Talk about moving the wrong direction...

As many of you know, I am the resident planner on the forum and a natural resource planner when offline. I have been working on various energy planning projects (mostly on my time) and slowly increasing knowledge at my workplace on energy matters. But ultimately this was to culminate in a public planning process whereby energy would be openly discussed. To that end I sought and got approval to speak on the matter in front of this Wednesday's commission meeting.

Well apparently, not any more.

My presentation and subject matter was more or less rejected by the long range planning director.

According to him, there is no energy crisis. Not now, not ever.

Here are some choice quotes from the director:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')“Yes, as long as there is money, there will be an energy supply”

and

“I don’t care what the laws of energy say. Energy is all around us and will always be. There is abundant energy out there (motioning toward the cornfields to the south)”

or try this (very common) arguement...

“Look, there are no energy issues, we will just use ethanol”

[mididoctors]

What is a planner?

Who do you work for?


Boris
london

[seldom_seen]

You know what they say. It's not proper to discuss religion, politics or the laws of thermodynamics at work

[Barbara]

You are unlucky: if oil still was at $58 that man would have kept his mouth shut.

[Pops]

That’s a tough position PJ, but I applaud your efforts.

I’m not sure how far down the valley you are from the bay area commuters but even around Fresno commutes must be getting long. Any talk of expensive gas is bad for builders.

The “Business Boosters” have been around since the railroads were promoting their new towns as a way to sell land and increase business – things are little different today as developers have a big hand in local governments in many areas.

Perhaps this is one of those situations where getting the word out - at the expense of ones own well being, may not be a good trade.

Good luck.

[RonMN]

I also applaud your efforts...but you may want to just drop it & leave the topic DOA. People have a tendancy to entrench themselves in their position & all you might end up doing is making your work-place miserable for yourself. (or worse yet, loosing your job).

They wont give an "energy" reason for firing you...they'll just say "he couldn't stay on the topic of the day" or some such crap.

Unfortunately when it all happens...some people will need to be left behind

[NeoPeasant]

I hope you are independently wealthy and you do not depend on your job, pea-jay. I am convinced that local governments and road planning and civic planning as they exist today are mostly for the service of the development industry. You are trying to stir up some very unwelcome waves.
You are like a peak-oil aware hummer salesman telling your potential customers they really ought to go look at those little hybrid cars for sale on the lot across the street. And the boss is getting pissed.

[aahala]

Watch out for the "kill the messager" thing. Your boss may not always
be right, but he's always the boss.

Nuts come in all sizes and shapes. Some believe the US did not land
a man on the moon, but rather captured ET at Roswell. Some of these
folks are above us on the food chain.

[Aaron]

On the up side...

If you get canned over this, just post his email here.

[pea-jay]

At this point I am at almost zero risk of firing. I have long had the rep here as one of those liberal lefties and it has not hurt my job prospects or reviews. The director whom I refered to otherwise respects my work (non energy of course) and as long as nothing comes of this, nothing is harmed.

But the termination of any dissenting opinion is never helpful in any circumstance. We'll see how this evolves.

[Doly]

You have a tough one here. I suggest you try a bold one: tell him that you *agree* with his statement: "As long as there is money, there will be an energy supply".

Wait, don't scream yet.

After this, say: "What price do you think the energy will have in the future?" Remember, the point you are trying to make is not that we are running out of energy, but out of CHEAP energy.

If he answers something like "Not much more than now", put a copy of the issue of the Economist about oil on his table.

If this technique doesn't work, jump over him. That's your only hope.

[Revi]

I know exactly where you are coming from. People who are not in the know can't hear us. They are entrenched and won't let reality into their minds. It's too painful. They will not be convinced by arguing. Let it go. They will understand soon anyway. It is however very disheartening. I have decided that I am not a very convincing person, so if someone refuses to hear what I have to say, I just stop talking to them. I may be able to remind them gently what I said after prices climb, but I won't rub it in.

[bobaloo]

Pea-jay, I can sympathize. I'm also a planner for a small town. I'm fortunate in that one of my City Councilors is also a member of a peak oil group in the area, so I have an ally on the Council, but we still have never mentioned those words in a public meeting.

We take another tact, which is to work towards what we want to do, and find other reasons for doing it. For example, we're working on a program to start a community garden project, which will help low income people and support local productions of food. We're also working on setting up a Farmer's Market for the town to try to get more local food production going, and have hooked up with a local organic farmer who is looking for people to grow for him to resell on very favorable terms. Our hope is that this will also encourage more local people to start growing food or at least shopping and consuming locally. We've also started a local "salon", which meets once a month to discuss various issues, including energy issues and food production. The last meeting had about 50 in attendance, which in a town of 1500 is a huge turnout. These kinds of projects are being received very well by the community and the Council, without ever having to convince them of the scary thought of peak oil.

I guess what I'm trying to say is see if there's not some other good rationale you can use to get to the end result you're trying to achieve, something that is more politically palatable. I'm finding that even in a very conservative community a lot of the things we'd like to do can move forward, we just have to sell them with a different pitch.

[threadbear]

Give me a personality profile, and I just might be able to help you, as a student of the arts and science of propaganda. My guess is you've irritated this guy with your politics, already. If he won't work with you and you're in a strong position, career wise, run him down like a humvee full of cheap crude.

PM me if you like.

[oowolf]

Ever feel like you're on Easter Island?
http://dieoff.org/page145.htm

[Raxozanne]

This guy sounds alot like my dad except that my dad accompanies his absurd claims by laughing in my face.

[FoxV]

that's too bad pea-jay. When you posted about preparing for "peak oil in 15 minutes" I was really looking forward to the out come. Too bad you've been shot down at the starting gate.

One of the wonderful things about the egos of "superiors" is that quite often critizing their ideas (neccessary to present a contrary view) also means to critize them. This guy is obviously hot for ethanol, and proving that ethanol is wrong is to prove that he is wrong. Something that could become disasterous if done in public

its unfortunate that he seems to have picked all the sterotypical wrong arguments for his optimism (with us good ol canucks to the rescue again). I would say your best bet is just to wait until things start heating up this summer and the $3.00+/gal of gas start smartening people up a bit.

The US economic bubble may also burst during the summer and perhaps your directer will also realize that sure the solution is where the money is, but the money is not in the US

good luck

[pea-jay]

Well, now its official:
The energy crisis has been officially cancelled (at least for my county)
Now go home...

As expected, there will be no presentation, nor any discussion of energy issues in the general plan. We will officially plan for 30 years of peace, prosperity and easy motoring with nary a though to the alternatives.

Any discussion of energy issues will relate to infrastructure issues such as transmission lines and gas mains only, with no discussion of whether or not they have access to enough gas or electricity for their supply lines.

I took at pass at making modifications and pulled the item.

At this point I am torn between going over him, going public on other terms or packing it up an moving somehwere more progressive.

We'll see...

[Raxozanne]

I expect that you are frustrated beyond words.
Just as I am when I try to explain Peak Oil to my family.

They just reject the idea, as if they won't even let it infiltrate their brains for a second. Its my opinion that deep down they are scared shitless, they are scared because peak oil means the end of their way of life and frankly they know that if their way of life changed they might die or at least lose the power they currently whield.

With attitudes like this that permeate the average European/American we are doomed - well in any case change won't be easy. A controlled collapse will not be possible if people don't except there is a problem in the first place so we have only a chaotic crash to look forward too.

[Frank]

Not really any of my business, but if I were you I'd think about alternatives "informally", just to have something to pull out of your hat when oil does hit $100/barrel or some other calamity happens. Can't hurt...