[EnergySpin]

2050....
After the peak reality hit the world hard the majority run for the woods. A small proportion of people stayed behind and were able to start the nuclear reactors that enabled them to keep the lights on. The human race has diverged to be (almost) two separate species.
The country side
--------------------
Now outside the big cities Megapolis I (formerly known as the State of New York), Megapolis II (formerly known as the State of Illinois) nature has started coming back. The environmental degradation caused by 5 billion disillusioned organic farmers/ hunter gatherers eating everything they could find (stale milk, bushes, nuclear waste, roaches, ants, each other) was unfathomable. A huge die-off was nature's answer and their descendants purposelessly wonder the earth losing their language skills with each generation. Occasionally they find a K-Mart that had escaped the looting or a nuclear sillo and can supplement their thin diet with protein of an animal killed 45 years ago. The tribal Elder (the last pre-peak oiler who can still walk, anyone who cannot walk ends up having their protein recycled) still recalls the days where their PO planning consisted of a peaceful existence in harmony with nature; the reality was so different ... nature was a bitch. However they adapted ... eating dead deople, newborns - in -overshoot was one way to get protein. Eating the eggs of the (now extinct) American Eagle and former domestic (now stray) cats and dogs was another .... wood chips provided enough fiber to maintain a non-constipated life (as If the tapeworms that had permanently colonised their GI tracts were not enough). Sometimes in the deep night he wonders whether technology could have saved the world from widespread environmental disaster (that people both before and after the crash, not technology had caused) but quickly dismisses those techno-fix heresies. All technology is unsustainable: look at the solar panels and the personal wind mills and the composting toilets that they had bought (?hoarded) before the oil crash; they stopped functioning 15 years after the peak and since they could not repair them they were scrapped. They were unsustainable technologies after all. But where did the unsustainability come from? Was their decision to live "all-natural" the prime responsible? No their pre-peak prophets could not be wrong on that!! This is unthinkable - eat locally and having no industry to replace what has stopped working were good solid ideas. Maybe a theory known as Odulvai Gorge? I guess the master prophets
Hensen and Duncan had seen the future better than anyone else after all . The future of humanity is the stone age, everyone else had seen the first few years but they were missing the Big Picture. No they were right, natural law is the only law .... even though the lights still visible in the cities make them wonder what life is like there. But are the lights still on? Or are they symptoms from the neurodegenerative diseases from the 40+ years of cannibalism (it is not called mad cow disease anymore, all cows were eaten), dumpster diving and nitrosamines from pickles made 40+ years ago. They lights cannot be on there, this is just a hallucination .. the reality is the ferral kid with the sharp teeth who is looking at me the way I used to look at a Double Mac and the three-tit females that are born with an alarming frequency. At least nature was kind to men, women had 3 breasts now and since "the natural law is the law" they can be beaten, rapped or sacrificed to the gods. And since people die in their 40s now ... they do not really grow old (however Mina that 35 year old cow with no teeth left looks like Elizabeth Taylor in her 80s, bliah).
The Elder forced his brain to stop the rambling. He has to enter the area inside the barb wire. There might still be some food left in the old cities (maybe even a parrott from the zoo! that would be a treat). However his tribesmen do not dare enter ... Megapolis had their borders lined with barbwire early after the Peak... and the people who entered were quickly blown up by anti-personel land mines. He wondered how long it will take for the nuclear power plant to cease functioning .... then at least the wire will not be electrified. Are there still people living in the cities? No it cannot be ... they had not arable land, no food they must have died decades before me. Anyway he will send the tribesmen to make another break. Maybe his 5 year old grandson will not trigger the land mine; this will be his Jamboree - a real ferral boy scout. With those pleasants thoughts he grasped over his head ... guess what he had gathered a cicada ... they last came 17 years ago. His tribe will eat again .... chewing on the nutritional meal and fondling the third tit of his young wife he went back to sleep .....
Inside Megapolis - II
-------------------------
The scientist formerly known as EnergySpin (SFKAES) quickly went over his notes. The personal messenger software alarm went off. It was time for the video-conference ... his colleagues in Metropolis I, Europolis I,II , Russianopolis I Asiapolis I-V and Aussiopolis I/II were already online. The satellite images (they had just launched 2 new Gaia-satellites) spoke of the environmental disaster that had been caused by climate change and 5 billion people eating what they could find in the aftermath of peak-oil. Stupid fools he thought, we could have down a global scale powerdown but they were too much in the Jevons paradox/capitalism/religion/Hollywood/tribal thing to see the Big Picture.
Those cities (and a few smaller ones that were slowly being integrated back to humanity) were all the remnants of old industrial centers and academic/research facilities. When the "Long emergency" came ... citizens , scientists, and a few enlightened military and religious leaders came together and formed their own coalition. Their own vision for the future ... no one was left behind. It was painful in the beginning ... but once people had grasped the fallacy of the economic growth things started accelerating. The old-folks would have called it a Participatory Democracy/Technocracy hybrid. But they too would have trouble understanding how this technical civilization would have such an appreciation towards the environment. Was it the simple realization that all life and non-life material on Earth is part of a super-organism with humans as its "brain cells"? Or they would interpret our fascination with living and non-living processes as the new "industrialism" kicked off by a movement called Industrial Ecology 90 years ago. Who knows - SFKAES quickly recalled the last 45 years ... what they were about to do was the culmination of the effort made by 1 billion people who stayed together ... the people that had the courage to ask the questions and make the sacrifices and go to the root causes of things.
Not that the beginning was pleasant ... neocons and fascists wishing for "instantaneous nuclear elimination of population centers" as an act of mercy or as a way to preserve "our way of life". Religious hatred spurking killings and inter-community violence in the multicultural cities of the world. People hoarding goods, killing each other with their semi-automatic riffles, stealing composting toilets. But in some centers reason prevailed ... military guards refusing to turn their guns on the population, grass roots movements that saw the fallacy of the "local-global" dichotomy ... the fact that we all live locally but share the global commons, that we are all sons and daughters of a small blue sphere which craves for sapience. Was it Searle who had said that intelligence is biology's ultimate goal? He was as wrong as the Artificial Intelligence prophets of the 20th century. The distinction between man and machine, artificial and natural local, global were all wrong; in reality we and our products are part of a web of interactions, out of which reason emerges. With this realisation, the political process subdued economy, subdued technology embraced science and nature. It was for the first time that technology was put in good use to solve actual (not pseudo- problems). Nuclear reactors were built ... organic (initially) and latter on genetic engineered semi-mechanized agriculture and finally hydroponics provided their agriculture (who would have thought that the Sears Tower would be the most productive farm in the world? The open source movement that had started 13 years prior to the peak phenomenon, biotech, systems biology, nuclear and electrical engineering were thrown to the solution of humanities problems. Religion was initially the big hurdle ... but slowly people kept the core of their religious systems and got rid of teachings that belonged to a different era . Every woman was now her own "master" (sadly this meant the demise of strip joints but nothing is perfect SFKAES reminded himself), no woman was a breeding factory; the only thing that was allowed to breed freely on this world was uranium and thorium in our breeder reactors but that too would stop ... why bother with the nuclear industry when nanocrystalline space solar stations provided more than enough energy. No the nuclear reactors will be kept only to provide Deuterium to the ITER reactor (darn it, I will never see an ignition or a break-even from Cadarache ), even advanced civilizations need a distraction.
The Europolis-I sent a nudge on the personal messenger ... the satellites had confirmed that no activity was seen over London. When the British Nationalist Party resumed control they killed all the foreigners and the tards and then without any fuel to satisfy their hatred they consumed everyone in their quest for the master race including themselves. It is funny that progressive California with their cancerous growth shared the same fate ... but SFKAES hoped that his Californian friends from that weird web site 45+years ago made it. But deep in his heart he knew that the sleepwalkers and the Baywatch viewers and horticultarists killed his friends when they tried to put Diablo out of function in search for "nature's purite". Isn't stupidity a bitch? Now we have to clean this whole fucking place he reminded himself. Luckily they had engineered the uranium eating bugs (that the NSF's aquatic program had discovered close to a century ago) to survive in land and water and an unmanned vehicle would deliver them in the right places. "Nature healing itself" he chuckled.
The video conferencing reached its end ... Florida had been under water for years now ... and Europolis I (didn't we use to call it Paris ?) had just had its second snowstorm but the Nuclear Plants kept electricity and water and society together. When the Gulf Stream stopped in 2015 everyone froze (literally) to death - but Seawolf I (an attack submarine build in 1996!) had uncovered signs of recovery of the thermohaline current system as early as 2030.
The genetic engineers (a clan that he once belonged to) were able to recreate life forms that died either due to climate change or were consumed by fat slobs/hangry hunter gatherers. Tomorrow the bioremediation program will be launced throughout the world ... The Judges will be sent in the wastelands across the world to establish the ecosystems and rescue (or eliminate) the cannibalist tribesmen.
"Judge it is time to go over the final details before Operation Re-Birth" told the figure that had just appeared in the video screen

[gg3]

The two key developments of the early 21st century were the development of MVP -the Male Virtue Pill- and the rise of Sufism in the Islamic world.

MVP was a serendipitous offshoot of the need for antivirals to combat the raging cross-species pandemics that had reduced the human population by 1/5, back to the levels of the late 20th century. The effects of MVP were subtle but pervasive: the sex drive of male humans was reduced without them being aware of it happening!

Demographers quickly noted declining birth rates in areas where MVP had been widely distributed to combat disease. However, MVP snuck under the Vatican's radar entirely, as it didn't actually interfere with conception. In any case, given the outcome of the Church's prohibition of condoms on the AIDS pandemic of the 20th century, any further attempts by the Pope to ban a lifesaving intervention would have been met with a schism in the Church. Better to leave well enough alone.

Women around the world did however notice that their mates' adulterous appetites were substantially curbed by the new pill, and thus it gained its present street name. The idea of promoting male virtue in turn made it popular with puritans in every religious denomination. With that, the world's population problem was well under control, and today we clearly see the benefits of this change.

Almost simultaneously came the rise of Sufism in the Islamic world. While some cynics attribute this in part to the effects of an outbreak of resistant fungus on grain crops in Iran, the majority of Muslims came to feel that the accuracy of the New Prophets' visions and predictions reflected more accurately the will of Allah. But unlike their predecessor Sufi wise ones, the New Prophets -who were never spoken of as individuals, as per their well-known saying, "there are no separate selves"- did not consider themselves above participation in worldly affairs. The old fundamentalist regime was swept aside and its rulers sent off to spend the rest of their days in monasteries.

Almost at once, peace broke out where wars and tribal feuds had raged. A new Palestinian leadership made peace with Israel, and to celebrate, work began on a new University dedicated to the cooperative study of Judaic and Islamic history and philosophies. The ongoing violence in Iraq simply evaporated, though in the United States, many still remembered Iraq as Vietnam II. Finally, after a lengthy meeting with the New Prophets, the King of the House of Saud himself converted to Sufism, bringing to an end the long rule of Wahhabism. Some say this was responsible for the policy change that led to a sharp reduction in oil production, to stretch the supply as far as possible into the future. In an earlier era this would have been catastrophic, but plus or minus a bit of grumbling from the US and China, the transition seems to have worked.

The peace in Iraq brought visits by large delegations of American veterans, much as Vietnam vets had gone back to visit the country they had once fought in. And from this came a new bridge between Sufi Islam and American Christianity, bringing a new moderating influence to the latter. Finally the leaders of the Catholic and Anglican churches were drawn into the picture, and within short order, the healing of history's long pains between the three Western monotheisms was essentially complete.

And this, not a moment too soon.

While the faithful and philosophical were bringing new light into religion, scientists and engineers were busy making sure the lights would stay on at night.

The end of the risk of nuclear weaponry in the Middle East brought forth a resurgence of the idealism of the Atoms for Peace days, along with three new reactor designs, one of which was fueled by thorium. Australia, with its vast uranium reserves, became a center of development for the reactors fueled by the uranium cycle, and the Central European Federation became the center of development for the thorium fuel cycle. The new Westinghouse-Tesla Corporation, named with deliberate ironic reference to the early 20th century "AC/DC feuds," was an overnight sensation and caused stock markets worldwide to perk up after a long period in the dumps.

Northern Europe, including the UK and Ireland, concentrated their talents on harvesting the wind. The Irish high-tech industry made a vital contribution in the development of the Generation III magnets, whose combination of ultra-light weight and high density magnetic flux extended the working range of wind turbines to allow full utilization of wind sites formerly considered unfeasible. The new Irish magnets also enabled construction of turbines up to 8 MW within the same physical package as had formerly maxed out at 6. The major turbine manufacturers consolidated into two companies: Vestas AG in Europe, and General Electric's GE Wind division in the Americas.

In solar, the Marks Process enabled the rapid manufacture of thin-film polymer PVs on a basis that made them cost-competitive with nuclear and wind. MIT released the intellectual property rights on the process, and in short order, manufacturing plants had sprung up around the world, with China, India, and Brazil rapidly taking the lead in this field. Today most new houses have PVs from one of these countries on their roofs, and most older houses have been retrofitted. If you know what year a house was powered up, you can usually guess which country the PVs came from, based on the cycles of competition between the three major producing nations.

Despite all of this, life has not been as easy as one would have expected. There is of course a delay between discovery and implementation, plus the fact of deferred infrastructure maintenance catching up with us when we least expect it. Despite the busy hum of construction activity everywhere, we have not yet fully made the transition to the new energy and resource paradigms.

First of all, in most parts of the USA, household electricity is on the equivalent of a "flow restrictor" that limits consumption depending on the available power. Even with widespread solarization, at times this means that there is only enough power for the fridge and a few light bulbs. We read, and we tell stories; watching the television is an occasional treat, particularly the travelogues that tell of life in parts of the world that the vast majority of us will never see in person. The back yard clothes line has once again become a site for socializing between neighbors. Neighbors often cook meals together, to maximize the efficiency of cooking; this can occasionally lead to humorous results, but in any case it does strengthen the bonds between people.

As well, many workers are at home during the day, connected to their jobs over one of the many public and private networks. Groceries are delivered a couple of times per week in most neighborhoods, but when needed, a "core store" is usually only a block or two away. Even in suburbs, where the core stores are basically houses that have been remodeled as shops inside.

There is not much need to drive. Most families have one small plug-in hybrid with an engine that runs on biodiesel; but the usual models of these have a top speed of 50 miles per hour as per the motor vehicle code and tax laws. In a pinch, these vehicles can be run in neutral while plugged into the house to keep the fridge running for up to a day (on a full tank) in the event of a power outage during a particularly cloudy week. The wealthy, and those working folks who choose to allocate their spending accordingly, can afford vehicles with higher top speeds, though it's considered in poor taste to show off by driving at or above the speed limit. For all other trips there are ample buses on the road, and open or enclosed HPVs (human-powered vehicles on two or three wheels) made of carbon fiber and composite materials. Every kid learns to ride an HPV of one kind or another as soon as she or he is able to climb on the seat and reach the pedals.

Popular music has gotten interesting since the Male Virtue Pill came on the scene. Suddenly all those lyrics about men drooling over women seemed utterly silly. But there are a lot of songs that make references to flight and birds and the blue sky, etc., probably because for most people, a trip on an airplane is a once-in-a-lifetime event (okay, twice, if it's a round trip). Instrumental music is back in a big way, as are acoustic instruments, and small night clubs where live performances occur every night of the week.

Paper is no longer used for printing periodicals or daily news reports. We still have books. You dial up the library on your Net Set, and download whatever you want to borrow into your FlexScreen and take it with you on the bus or to the cafe, etc. If all of the library's copies are already out, you can pay a small fee and get a new copy, and when you're done it goes back to the general stacks for the next person.

About those cafes. Once the cost of transporting coffee beans went out of sight, a good chunk of California's marijuana industry decided it was tired of paying the Grass Tax and converted over to coffee, with results that are prized across the country (and taxed only slightly less!). Now if only the same would happen for chocolate, that would make my day.

More later, gotta' catch a bus...

[Madpaddy]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '.') The Irish high-tech industry made a vital contribution in the development of the Generation III magnets, whose combination of ultra-light weight and high density magnetic flux extended the working range of wind turbines to allow full utilization of wind sites formerly considered unfeasible. The new Irish magnets also enabled construction of turbines up to 8 MW within the same physical package as had formerly maxed out at 6.

[gg3]

My recollection is, that was when Apple Europe in Dublin was the first to commercialize the Q-Fi network capability, that made use of quantum nonlocality as a transmission method. With that, came the development of NANs (nonlocal area networks), and simultaneously the pragmatic end of attempts by governments and the media monopolies to control broadcast content.

Q-Fi is now onboard the unmanned Phoenix mission to Mars, and will allow Earth-based scientists to control its robotic explorer in real-time rather than waiting for the previous ten-minute delay for lightspeed communication. This is expected to enable wider survey of areas of the Martian surface that were formerly considered too hazardous with the old ten-minute delay.

Meanwhile, back on Earth, the weather is still acting awfully weird and this year's storm season is expected to be a real doozy...

[EnergySpin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'M')y recollection is, that was when Apple Europe in Dublin was the first to commercialize the Q-Fi network capability, that made use of quantum nonlocality as a transmission method. With that, came the development of NANs (nonlocal area networks), and simultaneously the pragmatic end of attempts by governments and the media monopolies to control broadcast content.

Q-Fi is now onboard the unmanned Phoenix mission to Mars, and will allow Earth-based scientists to control its robotic explorer in real-time rather than waiting for the previous ten-minute delay for lightspeed communication. This is expected to enable wider survey of areas of the Martian surface that were formerly considered too hazardous with the old ten-minute delay.

Meanwhile, back on Earth, the weather is still acting awfully weird and this year's storm season is expected to be a real doozy...

[venky]

July 14th 2010, the NY stock exchange crashes. Trading is suspended indefinitely. It is offically recognized that the world is in the second great depression. The price of crude oil which had increased to $200/barrel now falls rapidly back below $60/barrel as demand destruction takes place. Theories that oil has passed sustainable peak production, which reached fever pitch in the years 2008-2009 now recede to the background.Analyst Martin Linch and KERA predict 15 million barrels of additional capacity and an oil glut by 2012. The blame for the depression is squarely put on the budget deficit and collapse of the housing bubble.

Riots breakout in several US cities and martial law is imposed in Chicago and New York. President Jeb Bush becomes a scapegoat and is impeached and convicted in the Senate by a vote of 71-19, with almost half his own party turning against him. Hilary Clinton sweeps to power in a landslide.

Stagnation continues for the most in 2011. Oil production increases slightly but falls back in the second half of 2011. The price begins to rise again to $100/barrel. In 2012,there is the long expected showdown with Iran. Frustrated by the breakdown in talks President Clinton orders NATO airstrikes on Iran's nuclear facilities. France, Germany and Belgium leave NATO.

Iran reacts viciously, closing the Straits of Hormuz for 2 months and targetting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. US special forces retake the straits, but tankers are still prey to submarines and suicide boats. Price of crude rises astronimically to $500/barrel. The world economy already in depression collapses almost completely.

A congress special commitee comes out with a report which concludes that oil production has probably passed sustainable peak. President Clinton orders Manhattan II, a crash program on Renewable energy research and restructing the economy to be less dependent on oil. 200 new breeder reactors are begun construction. Criticized in the right-wing media. Martin Linch predicts an oil glut by 2015.

Economic stagnation still continues. Unemployment in the US still remains around 40%. Law and order and civic society breaks down in several states. Secessionism grows stronger in the South and West. Martial law is imposed and dissent is crushed ruthlessly. Power cuts in major cites becomes common. By 2020, power is normally off for 12 hours a day on an average. However, the improvements from economic restructering begin to show as localized production and consumption becomes the norm. Unemployment finally begins to drop, due to self employment and part time jobs in the local economy.

The Socialist Party takes power in Washington, narrowly beating the Democrats. 90 year old veteran Noam Chomsky becomes President. Michael Moore is the minister for popular enlightenment and propaganda.

Oil production drops below 50 million barrels a day in 2025. Martin Linch predicts oil glut by 2030. He is lynched by an angry mob in his home town of Amherst. Blackouts become more frequent. However renewable sources of power, along with draconian controls of power consumption allow a slight growth in the economy for the first time in 20 years.

The Democrats regain power. The Greens show a strong showing coming second. Crucial technological breakthrough in Organic photovoltaics bring photovoltaic costs below that of fossil fuels. The photovoltaic industry becomes largest in the world. Economic growth picks up again. Unemployment drops below 10% in 2035.

World is now multipolar and peaceful with a balance of power between the US, the EU and the Russia-China-India axis.Energy problems seem to have solved.

The effects of global warming become more pronounced. Scientist warn of serious consequences demanding all curtailment to the use of coal and other fossil fuels which still provide roughly half of energy consumption. Scientist named Arthur Campbell predicts the shutting down of the gulf stream by 2050. Dismissed as scare mongering. Large movement develops on the internet.

2050 - Gulf stream stream shuts down. The Green party takes power in Washington. Orders Manhattan III, a massive program to combat the catastrophic effects of global warming.

2075 - Global warming though causing catastrophic effects is by and large dealt with although the population of Europe is now down 55% in 25 years. Large resettlement takes place to the south. Economic growth picks up again.

Scientists predict new and more dangerous catastrophe's. Dismissed again as scare mongering. Life goes on.

[Ghog]

2050- 1.7 billion humans- mainly dispersed in major population centers that survive the chaos along with dramatic climate change. The rest are spead out in remote areas living simple, sustainable lives, though dying young. New diseases are driving some from the cities only to find they are unprepared to go it alone out in the wilderness.

Many of the worlds forest are beginning to recover as are the oceans, as even the governments of the world, when reality caught up with them, changed their outlook concerning the environment. New Super-Powers have arisen, although too few have the resources to squander conquering the world. The US doesn't carry the same weight with the world it once did. Alliances are broken as new leaders are brought in, new ones are formed. China/Russia unify under one banner, the EU are still in a strong position and a new player arises in South America. Without the US standing watch, this new player has been gobbling up countries and their resources at every turn.

Technology plays a smaller role in the future than in the past, but a few key developements have helped dramatically. Agriculture production, fusion energy and curbing(not eliminating) the effects of GW are all benefits of future tech. Unfortunately, this is when we find out where past tech has hurt us. Humans disease resistence has been greatly diminished because of our dependency on pharmaceuticals and now once controlled germs are some of our greatest enemies. Even the flu now takes more lives than in history. Luckily in some areas, reproduction is still rampant and has kept the world population from declining rapidly. Right now disease, not hunger, is the fear of the masses.

Out in the wilderness, if one dared to venture there, many species are making a comeback. Some making it very dangerous to travel even when armed as packs rule.

All in all, an interesting time. People care more about their survival than aquiring wealth. People work together for the benefit of the whole. The lack of cooperation in the US led to a quicker colapse, but now even the remaining citzens get it. They realize their selfish ways won't keep them alive. The 39 million citizens are all that is left of 250+ million after the second civil war and a very well armed population.

[cube]

year 2050

King George Bush the 2nd (a clone of GWB) declares project:
Operation
Iraqi
Liberation

A coalition of the un-willing is assembled and this is the 4th time America has declared war on Iraq. President elect Soddom Insane of the Islamic Republic of Iraq petitions France for a military alliance. The French debate whether such an alliance would be a violation of the 35 hr work week.

The Chinese attempt to use their excess US currency reserves to buy California, Texas, and New York while a national debate questions if this would be a threat to our National Security. The Americans foolishly reject the generous Chinese offer. The Chinese dump all of their US currency reserves onto the open market sending the value of the US dollar below that of the Soddom Dinar. America goes bankrupt and the American invasion force in Iraq mutinies because no one has gotten paid. The war is over in 6 hours without a single shot being fired. The Neo-Cons declare victory but the American forces are stuck in Iraq because they can't afford the fuel to get back home.

OPEC declares a 500,000 bpd quota increase to help "stabalize" the cost of oil which now trades at 1 pound of gold per barrel of oil.

[FatherOfTwo]

Love energyspin’s contribution - a good dose of humor for all of the run-to-the-hills folk out there. I wonder if they see the humor?

I'll post two stories for the price of one.


TheInternationalHerald.com - Available in 23 languages!
January 1, 2050

It’s with both great sadness and a profound sense of relief that we mark the coming of 2050. The decades between peak oil and the subsequent liquid fuel crisis that spawned the Second Great Depression and World War III are clearly unmatched by any other event in human history. It is easy to look back now to see how one event led to another. The old economic superpowers preoccupation in the early years with their own problems spawned by their over-reliance on oil directly allowed the many great atrocities in the third world countries. A blind eye was turned to the starvation, disease, genocide and war that ravaged those countries. It was these conditions and the lack of intervention that ultimately allowed WWIII to be spawned. Let us never forget the nuclear exchange that nearly sent us to our doom. Thankfully it was brief and the resultant worldwide outrage allowed the Great Awakening. May we be resolute in our forcefulness in enforcing the ZeroTolerance policy.

We see now the follies of our old ways and marvel at the spell we were under. We have come far, but paid a dear price. And we continue to pay that price. Each reader of this article can probably detail the many ways in which their local climate has changed – let this be our constant reminder that there is much work to do and that we cannot rest. As we rebuild our infrastructure with our CO2Free generators, let us keep the memories of these last 40 years always in the forefront of our minds. Let us also recognize that even now we are implementing many short term fixes. Our planet earth is a great gift that was nearly destroyed. Let this realization give us the strength to rebuild it for our future generations - we owe at least that much to them.



TheInternationalHerald.com - Available in 23 languages!
January 1, 2050

Do you remember?
Are you old enough to remember, or have you heard the stories, about how it was common to be able to go to a supermarket in the dead of winter and buy a banana from Costa Rica, or a kiwi from New Zealand? Were you lucky enough to travel to far away countries, taking only a few hours to get there on a quiet, safe airplane? Do you remember ever being able to take a “pleasure drive” through the remote country?

These were many of the pleasures that people were able to take advantage of in the early 21st century. Back then oil was still so plentiful that it cost less money then almost all other commodities. But these pleasures only superficially masked the sheer waste and the harm that the prolific use of oil did to our global climate. The arrogance about the finite nature of oil, and the difficulty that would be encountered in transitioning away from it directly led to the Long Recession. This in turn made the accompanying transition to our current electricity based infrastructure unnecessarily difficult. Who can forget the frequent rotating blackouts as the grid struggled to expand? Who can forget the wars over oil? Who can forget the refusals to address global warming? The lack of foresight was grossly appalling.

But are we suffering from the same lack of foresight? Our population increases have slowed, but still are increasing. The last few years of major crop failures have shown that global warming persists. Water shortages are frequent. Are we committing the same sins? What must we do now to ensure that people in 2100 are not shaking their heads at the way we live?

[DoctorDoom]

World oil production is 40 mbd and still falling. 10 mbd of this is from tar sands in Venezuela and Canada, 20 mbd from the ME and FSU. ME has become a confederation of Islamic states, and all of the ME and FSU production goes to Europe, China, and India. The US must run on less than 6 mbd, most of which is used to produce plastics and chemicals, to run heavy equipment, and for military purposes.

In the US food production is down, but still adequate to feed the population of 300 million. Organic agriculture has rebounded as production of artificial fertilizers and insecticides have fallen and prices have become prohibitive. Meat has become a luxury item and most people's diets are heavily vegetarian. People live on fewer calories and are generally leaner and healthier than they were 50 years earlier. Agricultural machinery is run mainly on locally-produced biodiesel, or on rationed diesel fuel. Some diesel is also being supplied by TDP plants reprocessing waste materials, and by coal-to-liquids technologies - this supplements the 6 mpd of petroleum being consumed.

Marine diesel is still available, but is largely used to power fishing vessels and the coast guard. Except for sail boats, pleasure boating has all but disappeared. Shipping of goods world-wide is now limited to high-value non-perishable goods, including petroleum. Hybrid wind/coal/solar ships now move most such goods, and transit times are much longer. There is talk of building a new class of nuclear-powered cargo vessels, to be run by the military. Most continental shipping of goods, including food, is by rail.

Gasoline is still available but only the very rich travel in gasoline-powered vehicles, and even these get 80mpg or better. Commuter traffic has all but disappeared as most people either take public transportation, work at home, or are unemployed. Real estate values shifted as people relocated closer to sources of employment. Short-distance travel is on foot or by bicycle. Medium-distance travel is by public transportation, mostly busses, or in electric cars and scooters (used primarily for shopping and similar household errand-running, but seldom for commuting). Continental travel is by train, which run on electricity and coal. Transoceanic travel is by ship. Vacations involving long-distance travel have become a once-in-a-lifetime event for most people. Only the very rich fly on the one government-run airline and into a very small number of remaining air terminals. Resort areas whose economies depended on cheap transportation are ghost towns.

After a decade of rolling blackouts in major metropolitan areas, electricity supply has reached equilibrium with demand. This is largely due to huge reductions in demand in response to conservation measures, and some level of distributed production. Most homes now have PV panels, solar heating of some kind, or both. Nuclear plants and wind generation farms have come on line to take up the slack created by the shutdown of many NG plants, and a reduction in the number of coal-fired plants as more and more coal has been diverted to transportation and construction needs. Most homes heated by NG have had to be converted to electricity, as have homes in NE heated by fuel oil. LNG shipments, which propped up the status quo for a while, ceased a decade ago as producers directed more and more of their production to local consumers. People still rely on TV and computers for much of their leisure time, especially since activities involving physical travel have been drastically curtailed.

Things are much the same in Europe, including the FSU, and Australia/NZ. Unfortunately, the drastic reduction in food calories available spelt starvation for many people in Africa and parts of Asia. World population peaked at 8 billion in 2040 and has been declining since.

After a decade of dike-building and other emergency measures, many cities in low-lying areas have been abandonded as rising seas reclaimed them. Much of coastal Forida and Louisiana are now underwater, as well as reclaimed (filled) land along both coasts. Temperatures have risen noticeably and there is no longer any argument about the effects of global warming. Fortunately, predictions of massive crop failures resulting from changes in the weather pattern have proven to be overblown. The main concern now is the continuing rise in ocean temperatures, and the effect this is having on marine life, as well as the predicted effect on currents.

Energy continues to be a top priority for world governments, as the current 40 mbd is predicted to continue falling in future years, coal production has plateaued in the US and is in decline elsewhere, and once-through use of uranium is stressing remaining reserves. Most reactors built in the last decade have been based on a new breeder design. Images of deprivation from less fortunate parts of the world have quelled opposition despite a small number of accidents. Research continues on nuclear fusion, but economic production of power still appears to be some decades away. Biotechnology has given new life to the idea of producing hydrocarbon fuels from sunlight, and for the past 20 years a growing number of plants have been producing liquid and gaseous fuels on non-arable land. The amounts are still a small percentage of total demand, but prices are competitive with increasingly scarce and expensive petroleum and NG, and the future looks good for this technology.

[gg3]

And who can forget the "20-20 vision" and, two years later, "20-20 hindsight"?

In 2019, an obscure Russian scientist published a paper detailing an experimental method for parsing the zero-point field. Though his claims were at first ridiculed, a graduate student at MIT, working in his spare time, replicated the findings.

At last!, it seemed, the era of energy scarcity would come to a close. The technique was so stunningly simple, so tantalizingly accessible. The media trumpeted the "20-20 Vision" of power too cheap to meter, and ecologists warned that we would only run up against another limit and encounter another die-off similar to the flu pandemics of the early teens.

However, there was one problem. The effect didn't scale. Ultimately it turned out that despite the best efforts, only a few milliwatts could be pulled from the ether, or as it came to be known, the plenum. Early start-ups based on the ZPE discovery tanked.

Meanwhile in Japan, engineers at Matsushita Industrial Electronics found a way to mass-produce the "ZP rectifiers" inexpensively, and found a use for them: replacing the otherwise ubiquitous batteries in most consumer and commercial electronics products. Batteries that at most, had needed to produce only a few milliwatts. This would at minimum have the effect of eliminating all of those batteries from the municipal solid waste stream, and of course it also meant that numerous devices which had previously depended on regular recharging or battery changes, were now freed of this tether permanently.

However, it also caused a sharp drop in demand for batteries worldwide. For a while.

A joint venture between Matsushita and its otherwise-rival Toshiba allowed both to convert their battery production lines to rapidly scale up production of the much larger cells needed in the powertrains of plug-in hybrid vehicles. GM-Toyota, Ford-Foden Ltd., and Diamler-Chrysler-VW, all signed up in a quick competitive hurry.

Thus have we come to the present point where, although average mileage driven is down over 70% from the cheap oil days of the previous century, and commuting by car is a questionable privilege only accorded to (or perhaps foisted upon!) rich executives, an automobile of some form -usually a tiny four-seater hatchback with bioplastic frame and body panels, and a top speed of 50 miles per hour- is still more or less affordable to the working person in most of the industrial world.

[MrBean]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergySpin', '
')Do you think that Quntum Computation will be any different? The computers might get faster ... but even they cannot go beyond a Turing Machine. Like your posts gg3

[EnergySpin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBean', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergySpin', '
')Do you think that Quntum Computation will be any different? The computers might get faster ... but even they cannot go beyond a Turing Machine. Like your posts gg3

[mercury121]

In 2050 we will be coming up from the bottom of the energy curve. The global economy is in ruins, population is down, living standard is much lower for everybody. But renewable energy sources are on the upswing, but slowly.

However a new generation will come into force. This generation will be brillant and very self-reliant.

This generation will rip most of the power away from the elite and this generation will own the power and resources while the elite be nearly powerless as they will have almost no fossil fuels left for ruling. Bye bye big box stores, big oil, etc yours days are over.

Amazing enough anybody can be a genius. It is the education system because of its complusory nation that makes everyone dumb. For example, very few existed in 1840s in USA. Yet in some places more than 99% were literate and most of these people read at what would be considered "College level" today. Another example is Athens. All the important positions were decided by lottery. The people had faith in each other that they could handle any job given to them.

Possibly after a hundred or two hundred years of accumlating power from renewable resources people may begin in mass colonize outer space for real.

[MrBean]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergySpin', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBean', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergySpin', '
')Do you think that Quntum Computation will be any different? The computers might get faster ... but even they cannot go beyond a Turing Machine. Like your posts gg3

[Cyrus]

I think a lot of you are hoping for a breakthrough which I think is not coming; so here is mine.

2050-Human population is around 2 billion. Due to our excessive use of coal once fields went into terminal decline, global warming, and raping of resources has completely, and permanetly destroyed and desertified most of the rainforest and in most places south of Illinois in North America. All remaining people live in parts of Australia which are not under water due to the ice caps melting, and various areas on other continents which aren't desertified or under water. We have electricty generated from some solar pannels and wind turbines which are beginning to deteriorate, as well as coal and tar sand oil. Small ammounts of biodisel are grown on the final arable land, which is fading fast, for food transportation and governement use. Computers and the internet are our communication hub. We sit and get the news, and enjoy ourselves commiserating with our fellow surviors on new sites and even some that exist today (I'm hoping peakoil.com!). The internet is also used to very rareily buy entertainment goods such as radios. We are all generally happy but, see an ultimate end to the human race in the next 50 years due to excessive climate change. We smile, use our internet, and farm our land with the thought in our head "We made it, and we are the last".

[HonestPessimist]

Wanna avoid riots, high gas prices, economic degradation, wars, famines, pandemics, end of US, end of EU, end of everything between now and 2050?

Change the current living infrastructure to the one that is less and less reliant on the usage of ICE vehicles to go from Point A to Point B or beyond. For goodness' sake, if there's a grocery store less than 1/4th of a mile from your place, don't drive your car to there and back!

Stop building up new housing and expanding the sprawl. End new retail and corporate developments on undeveloped lands. All of those are dependent on people driving their vehicles around.

The current Living Infrastructure we have in the suburbia and urban areas are the very reasons why oil prices will be so high due to rising populations and demands for supplies relying on ICE vehicles to get around or transport to. It needed to be radically and fundamentally changed for the better.

My proposal for a new law in the future: BAN ALL OIL-FUELED ICE VEHICLES and RESTRUCTURE THE LIVING INFRASTRUCTURE. Save the oil for real essential needs: heating oil and polymer-based materials.

[RdSnt]

The US won't be a participant in WW3, it won't exist. The United States will fragment long before real war breaks out in Asia.
Horses will become a significant transport helper. Communities will return, large cities will become groups of communities as the high energy infrastructure degrades. Vehicles will become more and more utilitarian, simply work vehicles.
Tribal believes, particularly in N.A. will make a strong showing. We can see that now. Native languages will become more prominent, primarily because the contain the historical wisdom and structure of spoken cultures.
Television will die, radio will become more important. The internet will still exist.
There will be a strange new amalgamation of "primitive" and advanced technology. A resergence of appropriate technology. The horse is a practice local solution, rail for long distances.
Canada has built a space elevator in Fort McMurray, primarily to supply the energy required to extract and process the tar sands. Natural gas is preserved exclusively has feed stock to upgrade the tar sand to usable oil.

The moon is continuously occupied by teams of people and plans of Mars missions and harvesting asteroids are ongoing. Telescopes on the dark side of the moon have confirmed life exists on other planets in other solar systems. No intelligent life has been detected yet.
It is realized that the primary resources of the home planet are depleted to the point where progress of human civilization requires that we seek resources off planet. The human population of Earth is rapidly decreasing and it is also realized that for the human race to survive we must continously be increasing our population, compelling us to expand into our solar system and beyond.

[mercury121]

After a collapse of the global economy around 2020-2030, the next generation will learn self-reliance. This generation is too decendence and dependant to cope well with peak oil. Once the collapse happens they are in for hard times and learn fast. The next generation will not have our decendence as the formal education system is largely destroyed as well.

I think people of 2050 (the successful ones) will own a combination of wind, solar and other renewable power sources. The amount of power these personal power plants provide will be a fraction of what was enjoyed in 2005. Millions of windmills will be built from plans distributed community wide. A homebuild windmill will use local materials -- wood from the forest for the blades, the rest from landfills -- including those strong magnets from obsolete hard drives. Low efficiency but working solar panels might also be built from local materials.

Because the energy from these resources is meager these people will be frugal. Some will love being frugal -- more time and money for what is truely important instead of a meaningless consumption binge.

Energy efficiency will be designed into all things. Northerners may go so far as to construct massive snowwalls around homes as insulation for the cold months.

Most people will be farmers again. In their spare time they will sell excess goods and services at a market. Unlike previous times, this generation wil also have the Internet (but will be used sparingly). A high percentage of the population will be successful entrepreneurs (as they will only be able to sell quantities of the stuff they produce).

This generation will be democratic, power will be much more evenly distibuted. Want to have a lot of power? Good luck -- it won't happen.

Money will be a small part of the economy. More important will be the health of environment, families and communities. With power evenly distributed efforts to heal the environment might really work.

[deconstructionist]

[complete and utter fantasy world]
i'm writing this from the urn that holds my ashes. I just died. never thought i'd make it 75 years but i was able to tough it out. if my body hadn't been so resilient i would have surely died in the 20s, but i found strength in my love for my family and my friends, and it pushed us to do things we never thought we could...

in 2050, things are just starting to turn around themselves around. global population reduction seems to have slowed down and we are declining at about 0.5% per year, currently at about 4 billion. coal supplies are dwindling, deforestation is rampant, and carbon emmision build-up has begun to wreak serious havok on the weather patterns. large-scale wind farms and algae biodiesel production are being put into place by the recently formed global coalition on energy and environmental security. vast trenches have been dug all throughout the globe to syphon off the overflow from the swiftly melting polar ice caps. the biggest killers? lung cancer (from coal smog inhalation) and war. suicide rates have quadrupled since the early 21st century. all of these numbers are just estimates--there's really no way of collecting accurate data of that type on a large enough scale anymore...

crime, pollution, and scarce food supply has made large cities almost uninhabitable. most of the population has come to organize itself in somewhat sustainable communities, but even there, things are not entirely pleasant. there are constant interruptions in what's left of the power grid. there is inadequate medical care, inadequate food and water supplies, vast automobile junkyards clogging up the scenery... i don't know much about what life is like in other places. information doesn't travel quite as fast or as far as it used to.

but as i said things are starting to turn around--at least for those living in my area. the project that i started--wind and biomass powered hydroponic farming--is starting to catch on in some other places. you need the right environment and plenty of water to make it happen, but recent advancements in the desalinization and purification process have helped. finding glass or plastic for the greenhouses is pretty tough--not to mention plastic tubing and all of the other materials neccessary for this type of growing... but we improvise. we've got a few really excellent chemists, and as i mentioned, piles and piles of useless automobiles to pick apart for usable parts...

WWIII--the "oil war"--ended about 15 years ago. there is really not much left to fight for--most of the recoverable oil was used up fighting for the oil... our first and only child died in WWIII--but she was able to spearhead a movement that has given a lot of us a lot of hope. i'm not sure exactly how it happened, as the day she was drafted and literally hauled off into battle was the last time i ever spoke to her. but i've heard stories... she and her fellow soldiers were able to communicate in code, disseminating a message to all soldiers from all nations. they developed a system of communication amongst themselves that allowed entire armies to simulataneously put down their weapons, leave their tanks and airplanes, and simply walk away. she and many others were killed by their superiors and those few who remained loyal to the armed forces of their nations. but the end result was--global warfare was stopped by the soldiers.

so as a planet, we're just beginning to move in the right direction. i think in another few hundred years we will have changed enough to live sustainably on this planet for the forseable future. i think it will take mother nature a few thousand years to repair the damage that we have done and continue to do.
[/complete and utter fantasy world]