[malcomatic_51]

A point made by the optimist of C_U's original post was that the consequences of PO would not be too bad if the decline rate was slow because it would give us time to react. I don't think this is true.

A sudden fall in production would put a knife to the world's throat and generate such massive disruption that TPTB would have the power to impose emergency measures not possible with a gradual decline. These emergency powers would enable unpalatable programmes to get forced through that would never happen in "peacetime".

Whereas, a gradual decline would be more like a British manufacturing company slowly dying. The contraction would be manageable without the incumbent incompetent management having to give up any of their self-serving practices and without the workforce having to make radical changes, beyond getting steadily poorer and made redundant every so often. Think of how the British shipbuilding and car industries died - slowly, over a matter of decades. Despite sporadic efforts by new leaders to turn things around, the middle management complacency and force of habit of the workforce just never had the pressure on them to change as much as they needed to, so they shrank and then they finally vanished.

I'd see a gradual decline being much deadlier in the long run than a sudden fall. The impulse to face the situation with radical measures just won't happen, so instead you'll have a long game of mass musical chairs as the population struggles to stay on the "have" side of the fence, with only a small percentage getting thrown over the fence every year.

[whereagles]

DOOM

Greatest. Game. EVER.

[dohboi]

I don't know the game, but the word "doom" originally meant "judgement." The change from the more neutral term to the more negative current meaning presumably came about as reflective folks thought about what a really just final judgement for most of our benighted souls would be like...still relevant in the current situation?

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('NEOPO', 'I')ts np, if that be the case then MQ hides it well and I think thats a good thing as these people are looking for any reason to cry foul.

[idomar]

I have just been reading Leanan's compilation of news at TOD.com

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2406

Is it me, or are the news stories that I am seeing on a daily basis getting worse?

I want to be optimistic, but it really is getting harder and harder with each passing day!

[NWMossBack]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KingM', 'T')he longer I'm here, the less Doomerist I become. ...

I say 1 in 4, PO is a non-event, a la Y2K. 1 in 4, it's a slight disruption. 1 in 4 we've got a Great Depression. 1 in 4 we're royally screwed. Hence, I'm hedging my bets, which means funding my 401K for my retirement while buying some gold on the side in case the word "retirement" becomes meaningless.

[goldmund52]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('abelardlindsay', '
')3. If we were as energy efficient as Europe we'd be exporting oil.

[Ludi]

I'm not totally convinced....people drive, in general, farther in the US than in Europe, I think, and there is much less mass transit, I believe. No, not entirely convinced just making our vehicles efficient would eliminate our dependence on foreign oil. I'm willing to be convinced, though.

[simontay78]

Even if we don't do any kind of improvement of fuel conservation...the cost will automatically balance the demand. According to most people, that is what they believe....

When the going get tough...maybe human will decide if they want to GO BROKE or share vehicles with friends or neighbors...

Smaller cars, hybrids, electric plug-in or simply changing to cheaper alternative might just the cost effective way...however...the world demand will cause the price to maintain higher..

The high cost of oil will increase inflation causing instability in the market too...so economy will bubble up and burst in any bad world events...geopolitical conflicts or natural disaster that touches oil supply line.

[Zardoz]

The originator of this thread still has a post count of just 1. You'd think that he/she would've had some sort of response to all that's been said on this thread.

Seems odd...

[MonteQuest]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('goldmund52', 'B')ill Bradly was making this very point on Meet the Press with Tim Russert just yesterday. If the average mpg of autos in the US was the same as Europe we wouldn't need to import (much, if any) crude. Is this not a reason for optimism that demand destruction can occur with destroying the US economy?

[MonteQuest]

Oh yeah, not to mention...as the 80-90 million baby boomers retire, many will trade-in their SUV for a mini and an RV.

Many are doing it today. 5 mpg.

[Newsseeker]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('goldmund52', 'B')ill Bradly was making this very point on Meet the Press with Tim Russert just yesterday. If the average mpg of autos in the US was the same as Europe we wouldn't need to import (much, if any) crude. Is this not a reason for optimism that demand destruction can occur with destroying the US economy?

[jdmartin]

Wow, there were some great posts on this thread, and I've been reading this board for quite a long time (about since inception).

I really like the post that stated, paraphrased "doomerism becomes an emotional attachment". I think there is a whole lot of truth in that statement. Sometimes I read posts and think "yikes! fringe lunatics!"

Still, people who think that no reordering will be possible or necessary are deluded. If you crunch the numbers it quickly becomes obvious that someone, somewhere has got to suffer. No amount of wishing can create more oil than the earth has endowed us with. Even with these "greater" technologies allowing us to wring out every drop of oil from depleted wells is not going to create more oil (unless of course you believe, as some religious types do, that the center of the earth is a big ball of Exxon hi-test ). If you try to look at things in an objective way - meaning not hoping for the apocalypse, and not dreaming of utopia - you can see a lot of pressure taking place. For example, I run a municipal water & sewer district. In the past 3 years the price of copper has gone up about 300-400 percent. People are breaking into buildings, new construction, et al and stealing electrical wiring for selling to recyclers. I have people beating the doors down trying to get our old meters to sell the brass. All of this pressure is because the raw materials are having a tough time meeting demand. Anything we can do here in the US to make a difference (better gas mileage, for example) will be consumed easily by China, India, Malaysia et al. Forget about Africa and South America. And for all this talk of getting more energy efficient, the US has done nothing but increase its energy use, which only makes sense: more people and a better standard of living = more resources consumed. In 1970 we used about 10MBPD or so I think the number was, today it's 21.5MBPD. What's going to happen when (hypothetically) China and India achieve our standard of living, or something even remotely close? Does anyone believe there's really a spare 30-40MBPD extralying around?

I think the true answer lies somewhere in between. I think piles of fetid corpses lying around is unlikely, but I don't believe we'll all be zipping around in our moon cars, either.

[Eli]

I think the main reason to be optimistic is because it looks like this will be all over soon.

[Temperedoil]

I would like to be optimistic about the future. I would like to know that the stories I write shall be enjoyed by people who have plenty of leisure time and money to be able to afford to sit back and read or watch the stories I tell them. I would like to see a nice and easy transition period where there are sufficient resources available to see us through to the development of a system that does not depend upon finite and rapidly depleting resources.

Unfortunately, however, looking through the news and considering the lessons of history, I do not see any reason for optimism. Yes, there is a lot of research and development work being conducted now on renewable energy sources, and on alternatives to the oil-fuelled internal combustion engine - but it is too little, too late. We should have been developing these technologies decades ago. The time such work takes, the additional toll on resources involved, and the money that consumers need in order to be able to purchase the alternatives, mean that anything being developed now may not even be ready for the market before global economic collapse sets in.

Bear in mind that we do not need a severe reduction in supply of oil to create a messy situation. When the price of oil hit US$78 a barrel in July last year, the biggest reason given was fear over what would happen to oil supplies if the Israeli incursion into Lebanon spread into a war involving other Middle East nations, or if it led to Iran or others stopping exports in protest. Nobody else got involved, oil kept flowing, supply was still greater than demand. What happens when supply equals demand? What happens when supply falls slightly short of demand?

When supply fails to meet demand, high prices may lead to consumers buying less petrol, fewer oil-derived goods, but we all still need to eat, to transport ourselves and the goods we use, to produce the pharmaceuticals that save lives. Governments, realising that they aren't ready for the Peak Oil situation and that the free market system is probably not going to work in the changed situation, are going to find themselves having to think quickly about how to calm the people and keep them calm, how to encourage food production and discourage Playstation production. Or, should they encourage Playstation production and offer them for free to placate the masses? On the other hand, corporations like Sony are likely to have enough on their hands just trying to keep from going under in a world where costs are sky high and consumers aren't buying.

New Zealand is particularly reliant upon agricultural exports and tourism. Exports that will be more expensive and therefore harder to sell as the price of oil and therefore transportation increases. Tourism that will eventually become too expensive for all but the very wealthy as the price of oil and therefore air travel increases. Until airlines collapse due to unaffordable fuel bills combined with impoverished customers.

It would be nice to dream of a scenario in ten years time where everybody has thrown away the oil-fuelled car in favour of the electric or hydrogen - but it won't happen. It would be nice to dream of a scenario where governments around the world sit down and agree to amicably and fairly share a reducing stock of resources - but it won't happen. It would be nice to dream of a scenario where consumers realise that they cannot keep consuming ever greater quantities of resources and do not need to - but it won't happen. Why won't it happen? It won't happen because human history is filled with moving forward, consuming more, growing more, except over relatively short periods such as war. We are not ready for the situation we are facing, and our systems are not designed to cope.

[sameu]

i'm rather optimistic
I started stockpiling

[vision-master]

Dang stinky cars on the road. I need a quieter more peaceful bicycle ride within the city. CARS! Go away. Take the train, or bus, or walk, or bicycle for Chirst sake!!!

[Ludi]

Temperedoil, humans have always told stories and humans have always had time to listen to them.