[SoothSayer]

I am getting VERY tired of seeing posts & articles about how Peak Oil is a myth, or how it will not be here until say 2030.

Perhaps on a global level they may be correct - but local effects are already appearing.

All I can say is that the UK in a few years will be very short of North Sea oil & gas ... call it "Peak Oil" or call it "running out" ... the effects are the same.

Some gurus say "If Peak Oil is supposed to be here, then how come I can look out of the window and see traffic jams just like 20 years ago?"

Well, perhaps these gurus should see our electricity & natural gas bills?

Or perhaps they should review the UK's balance of payments in 2 or 3 years time?

Or maybe they should have a chat with residents of those countries whose gas was cut by the Russians last winter ... some had to burn from park benches to keep warm.

Or perhaps they should talk to Thai business owners who are scared that their businesses will be killed by high prices?

Or perhaps they should talk to the Chinese coal miners who are not allowed to take time off from their very dangerous jobs because China needs the fuel so urgently?

So, it may not be Peak Oil or Peak Gas ... but it's about time people accepted the fact that the world seems to have MAJOR energy problems.

Being "contrary" just because you dispute the precise definition or timing of Peak Oil - or because you want to show the world how clever you are - does not help the world much.

In fact, it tends to promote the idea that we have no long term problems and/or will all be saved by technology, biofuels or whatever. This attitude will simply delay any remedial actions that we might have a chance of putting in place.

I just hope that some of the more prominent opponents of Peak Oil realise what damage they are doing. Perhaps when THEIR house is repossessed or someone in THEIR family loses their job then maybe, just maybe, they will regret their stance.

[Lighthouse]

The problem with peak oil (local and global) is that people expect something drastic to happen on the day oil peaks. Somehow they are expecting that peak oil will pull the plug and all the lights will go out.

Unfortunately PO is very close, or already here as I write this lines.

Very gradually, we all get used to higher energy cost.

Its like the frog and the boiling water ...

[jeezlouise]

It's not the peak that'll kill you, it's the slide down afterward... I don't get why not everyone who knows about oil production curves understands that. It's like jumping off a building: you're perfectly healthy until that inconvenient moment at the end. Deffeyes recently predicted a 14.5 million barrel/day defecit by the time the next 4 years are up. It's not even a prediction so much as a matter of simple math. Yeah, I know that technically demand can't exceed supply by that much but what it means is that the "growth-or-death" model of economy is about to hit a very thick wall. In practical terms, time's up, folks. People haven't quite started yelling "fire" in large numbers yet but I'm sure as hell making my way quietly towards the theater door...

[SoothSayer]

Its like the frog and the boiling water ...

I'm not convinced ... I think this frog is OK with warm or even hot water ... but when it gets VERY hot it will then panic and splash around making a big mess.

The government know this so I assume they will quietly put plans & laws into place to control the populace when the "tipping point" arrives.

Oh ... I see that in the UK all the required laws have appeared over the last few years ... how convenient.

The UK could be a good model for what will happen to the rest of the world later on ...

[Jack]

I know exactly how you feel, SoothSayer.

There is a fellow in the pawn business here; he tells me that people are coming in to pawn their DVDs. They get $2 per DVD for disks in perfect condition, $1 each for less than perfect – and people employed in reasonably good jobs are taking the money to pay for gasoline.

Bar owners – whom one might think would be free from business contraction – face a loss of business. Why? Their customers are buying beer and staying home instead of going out.

We are seeing the effects of Peak Oil, here at the peak. As availability declines, the impact will build; but the deniers will always find an alternative explanation. They will blame interest rates, or the business cycle; the stock market, or growth in Asia; Bush, or Blair, Putin or Mugabe. It matters not – they will close their eyes firmly, and assert that peak oil has no effects because they cannot see them.

The general refusal to accept reality will result in a horrific situation, possibly worse than even my suppositions. It took us 66 years of building to take us from a 1940’s lifestyle to a 2006 lifestyle with plentiful, cheap energy. How long will it take us to build something to support today’s infrastructure with ever more expensive energy? Even 20 years is optimistic – and we don’t have 20 years. I question whether we can perform such mitigation even in principle – people don’t like to think about that.

We are on a course to kill about 5 billion people, and perhaps more. We won’t do it with guns and bombs, nor with bacteria. We’ll do it with famine. We’ll see Rwanda repeated endlessly, from the slums of Brazil to the cities of Zimbabwe. And perhaps in parts of the developed world as well. We are choosing this destiny; every day we deny the problem, we place ourselves more certainly on a track to that particular future.

I begin to wonder if the ever-so-prolific deniers may not be paid disruptors – people placed by those who wish to keep the status quo a little bit longer. Alternatively, perhaps they want to guarantee that mitigation isn’t possible, and to assure the global population is heavily pruned.

In general, they love to say that this or that claimed solution is a part of the answer. So we’re to assume that a patchwork of nonsolutions will replace a significant portion of the energy we now consume? Or, they press the case for coal – without addressing the question of how long before we meet peak coal. They speak of nuclear power – but carefully sidestep the issue of how this addresses the transportation problem. They speak of electric cars – without addressing the question of where we are to find the resources to make a billion batteries.

That said, they don’t yet realize the damage they’re doing. They will refuse to see it for a time. I do hope that people rub their nose in it as reality asserts itself.

[killJOY]

This really sets my wheels turning.

It's true: we all half-expect peak oil to manifest itself as a Big Event, a trauma. But "minor" events might be adding up to the Big One.

Think of bodily trauma: the above posts make me think about what happens to the human body during shock. One doesn't just up & die.

First: One's heart rate and breath rate increase.

Then: One's extremities lose feeling and mobility.

This doesn't sound like much. But it's prelude to the bad shit down the road, if steps aren't taken to reverse it.

Unconsciousness and organ failure only happen after time goes by.

And by then it's too late.

[SoothSayer]

I begin to wonder if the ever-so-prolific deniers may not be paid disruptors

Possibly ... but more likely simply very scared deep down ... or perhaps in love with the sound of their own voices.

Even after researching Peak Oil in fair detail I'm still confused. It's certainly clear that we have a major energy crisis of some sort on the horizon.

Even being "in the know" I haven't got a clue on what to do, and how to protect my career and family ... or even if I need to.

It's also clear that the governments and economists haven't got any real ideas on if there is a problem or not ... or what to do if there is indeed a problem.

People like a degree of certainty in their lives ... and this situation is one big stack of uncertainty ... with a possibly nasty downside.

I like driving my car and watching "Top Gear" and "Dr Who" on TV and eating take-away food. I don't really fancy the power going off and having to deal with the threat of hundreds of thousands of - err - recent arrivals to the UK leaving the local inner city scouring the countryside where I live for food.

I don't trust the government - and I don't believe that they have the capability to deal with major crisis such as several weeks of fuel shortages caused by supply panics, a war in Iran etc.

The upside is that we may have no real problems whatsover for maybe 20 years ... but there is an unmeasurable risk but significant of a very nasty downside too.

I have no idea what to believe, think or do

[spear]

No the govt cant handle a WHOLE city plus surrounding areas in upheaval.They will try with the <KATRINA> technique but who knows what will play out.
Maybe history repeats itself.
In Byzantium,during the reign of Justinian,the people were ready to revolt,the rulers were scared so they tricked them with false promises and after getting them into a stadium killed 30,000.

[Jack]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SoothSayer', '
')I have no idea what to believe, think or do

[Wildwell]

Firstly, we already have an energy crisis – look at some of the world’s poorer countries now. Economists may have bought into the idea of globalisation aka ‘the global village’, but they have no idea how to power its vast energy requirements and immigration/emigration is fast becoming the No1 problem. Then there’s climate change which nobody has a clue how to solve. So, if you like, we’re already in the crisis era of potential problems that could upset ‘business as usual’ and that’s been publicly acknowledged.

If you are planning to buy land and grow food, hoard guns and run your own genny on some remote commune or farm, forget it. You’ll be rich pickings either for the state, angry hoards or your friends and neighbours. What’s needed is a regional or national solution. I don’t believe there will ever be a global solution. There’s never been one to any serious problem in the history of this planet. Even in the good times millions get fat while millions more starve. The rich get richer. Oh and they aren’t immune either. They require the state to protect property, the banking system to work properly and less fortunate to do the dirty work – which only works while conditions are seen as ‘reasonable’. The history of capitalism is punctuated by strikes, riots, manipulation, and speculation.

Don’t believe anyone that gives you an exact date on Peak oil. 95% of the world’s reserves are unaudited.

Don’t believe anyone that tells you that technology and resourcefulness will save all, because they might as well go into the business of lottery number predictions.

On the other hand, don’t believe it will all go bad either.

That said, all the evidence points to a massive wake up call is coming soon, so we’ll soon find out the results of these bets.

It’s fairly obvious that certain presumptions have been made. How will this be handled by the decadent Baby boomers, the beaten generation X, and the clueless generation Y? Probably not very well, but solutions are lacking because there’s a few psychological problems now everyone has gotten into the idea of presumption.