[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Pops', ' ')The US without huge energy surplus will lose standing and ability to project power, that obviously opens the door for the next contestant for Global Hegemon and of course that Means War! Likewise, resource constraints always Mean War!

[Lore]

I have to agree with the conflict scenario. Except this time it's not just about energy, but resource constraints along many avenues. Water, precious metals, gases, arable land, climate, not to mention credit. The list goes on. The additional historical difference is that there will be nowhere to run off to this time. No, untouched continent rich with an untapped source of fundamental supplies to draw from.

Which translates to many, many wars without end.

And I have come to believe It won't be that there is no gas in the tank that will get to us first, but lack of water and food.



$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]How Many Gallons of Water is in a . . .

Car
It takes an estimated 39,090 gallons of water to make a car. It's unclear if that includes the more 2,000 gallons used to make its tires--each tire takes 518 gallons to make.

Pair of Jeans
It takes around 1,800 gallons of water to grow enough cotton to produce just one pair of regular ol' blue jeans.

Cotton T-Shirt
Not as bad as jeans, it still takes a whopping 400 gallons of water to grow the cotton required for an ordinary cotton shirt.

Single Board of Lumber
5.4 gallons of water are used to grow enough wood for one lumber board.

Barrel of Beer
In order to process a single barrel of beer (32 gallons of booze), 1,500 gallons of water are sucked down.

To-Go Latte
It takes 53 gallons to make every latte, as I've noted before:

That sugar, doesn't that have to be grown as cane first? Hm. And then there's that plastic lid, which has to be created and distributed over hundreds of miles. And doesn't plastic require a pretty vast amount of water and oil to produce? Come to think of it, there's the sleeve and the cup itself too . . .

Gallon of Paint
Takes 13 gallons of water to make.

Individual Bottled Water
This irony shouldn't be lost on anyone: it takes 1.85 gallons of water to manufacture the plastic for the bottle in the average commercial bottle of water.

One Ton of . . .
Steel: 62,000 gallons of water
Cement: 1,360 gallons

One Pound of . . .
Wool: 101 gallons of water
Cotton: 101 gallons
Plastic: 24 gallons
Synthetic Rubber: 55 gallons

And that's just some of the stuff we make--check out how much water it takes to grow all of our food. We all need to make a conscious effort to watch what we buy for its water footprint. And it's not just the US, though--many countries around the world have alarmingly high water footprints, too. So keep your eyes open when you're shopping around--we're wasting way too much water.

http://www.treehugger.com/clean-technol ... -make.html

[Newfie]

I voted for 3. It seemed about right for my mood as of now.

This century has 85 years to run. Looking back 85 years ago was 1930. No one here was alive. We had just finished one Great War with another to go. Cheap abundant calories, and antibiotics lay ahead of us. The natural world had been hurt badly, but was still recognizable. Most folks in the U.S. still worked the land and could tell the difference between a sparrow and a starling, an oak and a fir.

In large scale we now have a very different future, mined out, logged out, top soil depleted.

Not looking so good.

[joewp]

I voted for 4, mainly because even if we completely run out of oil, natural gas, and coal we're still going to burn anything and everything on the planet that can burn, to cook food or to keep warm, so we are still going to be adding to the CO2 in the atmosphere. If anyone is still alive in 2100 I can almost guarantee that there will be less than 100,000 people on the entire planet, and those people will be in bad shape similar to the remaining reindeer on St. Matthew Island at the tail end of that population crash.

Everybody's pretty much catalogued all the reasons, but I'll add one more:

- Whenever we as a species are faced with a problem we always seem to do the exactly wrong thing, and I don't see that changing anytime soon.

let's face it, were in the middle of the sixth great mass extinction in Earth's history. What makes you think were going to survive, even if we are the ones who started it?

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('joewp', ' ')If anyone is still alive in 2100 I can almost guarantee that there will be less than 100,000 people on the entire planet, and those people will be in bad shape similar to the remaining reindeer on St. Matthew Island at the tail end of that population crash.

[onlooker]

Great idea, at least our bodies can be used for something worthwhile !

[Lore]

I actually had an idea for a self burial system. Where you stand before your grave, keel over and trip a lever that automaticaly piles the dirt on top of you. My only problem is timing.

[onlooker]

By timing do you mean dying prematurely

[ralfy]

"Limits to Growth was right. New research shows we're nearing collapse"

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... g-collapse

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ralfy', '&')quot;Limits to Growth was right. New research shows we're nearing collapse"

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... g-collapse

[Lore]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('onlooker', 'B')y timing do you mean dying prematurely

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lore', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('onlooker', 'B')y timing do you mean dying prematurely

[americandream]

Globalising capitalist levels of consumerism and toxicity? Go figure.