[Serial_Worrier]

Peak oil will happen in 2036! Everything is fine in CornucopiaLand where JIT delivery continues, suburban sprawl is wondrous and a new Outback steakhouse on every corner! Yum yum another bloomin' onion. BTW, there is no obesity crisis. A few extra LBs never hurt anyone!

[Carlhole]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Serial_Worrier', 'P')eak oil will happen in 2036! Everything is fine in CornucopiaLand where JIT delivery continues, suburban sprawl is wondrous and a new Outback steakhouse on every corner! Yum yum another bloomin' onion. BTW, there is no obesity crisis. A few extra LBs never hurt anyone!

[JohnDenver]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TheDude', 'O')h, I could beg to differ. What in the past seemed like simple exercises in engineering and political/public motivation now seem insurmountable to modern society. Given your signature, you'll perhaps relate to an obvious example I use often: the apparent inability to build a new complex of skyscrapers in the rubble of the World Trade Center.

Not entirely apt a comparison to mitigating peak oil, but what's the holdup? This is some of the world's most prime real estate, and an icon recognized the world over. Putting something new in there would be enormously profitable in the end for a whole variety of reasons, not just financial, yet it just isn't getting done.

[shortonsense]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('yesplease', ' ')Another issue is lack of tolerance to criticism. I've got the admin on that other site telling me she supports moderator bias, even when the poster who receives favorable bias is literally stating that climate scientists can't do unit conversions just so they can assume their result is maximally bad. People (d00m3rs and c0rni3s) can't expect to be taken seriously if they're literally making up shiz, or supporting made up shiz, as they go along.

[DantesPeak]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('yesplease', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('DantesPeak', 'L')ynch has made many predictions here. His forecasts on oil supply and prices turned out to be very wrong.

He is also not above bashing others.

Check it out his record for yourself.
http://peakoil.com/peak-oil-discussion/ ... ilit=Lynch

[Carlhole]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('shortonsense', ' ')One way of doing that is to make sure that "believers" are safe to say whatever nonsense comes to mind, and then other believers recite it as a mantra and pretend it's fact, because of course, one of THEM said it. You can stack a set of encyclopedia's against that belief system and it makes as much sense as trying to convert the Taliban leadership to Christianity. Objective analysis of the information available is not the point.

[yesplease]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('DantesPeak', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('yesplease', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('DantesPeak', 'L')ynch has made many predictions here. His forecasts on oil supply and prices turned out to be very wrong.

He is also not above bashing others.

Check it out his record for yourself.
http://peakoil.com/peak-oil-discussion/ ... ilit=Lynch

[TheDude]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JohnDenver', 'I')n fact, I'd be really interested to see your personal argument for why we won't be eating dog corpses (or dirt, shoes etc.) Can you briefly describe your position for me?

[TheDude]

China is running into a whole host of environmental issues on their own that don't line up with projecting them into the future as the new equivalent of the burgeoning 19th century powerhouses. This isn't sour grapes on my behalf. Price of Water Rises in China

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he Chinese are water-poor. They are sucking their aquifers dry. It is particularly bad in the north of China. The groundwater under the North China Plains is draining away quickly. By some estimates, China will exhaust this water supply in the next ten years.

You probably know that the city of Venice is sinking a fraction of an inch per year. But that's nothing compared to what is going on in Beijing. Parts of Beijing are sinking 8 inches a year! According to Andrew Lees (The Right Game), it is the world's largest cone of depression (an underground hole created by a depleted water table) at over 15,000 square miles. The second largest cone of depression is around Shanghai.

So finally, many cities are raising the price of water. The WSJ points out several places where water prices could rise 25-48%. Shanghai, for instance, raised water rates 25% in June and plans another 22% increase next year.

The second event that caught my eye was the collaboration between China and India to monitor the health of Himalayan glaciers. This area is very important to both countries. They fought a war over it in 1962. So, the fact that they are getting together on the Himalayan glaciers is meaningful.

Here is why it is so important: Seven of the world's largest rivers, including the Ganges and the Yangtze, are fed by the glaciers of the Himalayas. They supply water to about 40 per cent of the world's population.

Well, those glaciers are shrinking. The Indian Space Research Organization, using satellite images, has studied the changes in 466 glaciers. It found they had lost more than 20% of their size between 1962 and 2001.

This melting increases the water flow at first, but eventually slows dramatically as the glaciers either melt completely or reform. These observations have given rise to a kind of "Peak Himalaya" where people wonder if we have not seen the maximum water flow from the mountains.

[JohnDenver]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TheDude', 'C')hina is running into a whole host of environmental issues on their own that don't line up with projecting them into the future as the new equivalent of the burgeoning 19th century powerhouses. This isn't sour grapes on my behalf. Price of Water Rises in China

[BigTex]

For a general note on how unpredictably doomer scenarios can turn out, think about what the doomers of 1918 must have been thinking.

There was a world war on, and the Spanish flu was unfolding as the greatest numerical human death event in history.

And yet a few short years later people had FORGOTTEN about the flu-induced mini die-off and WWI was in the rear view mirror as Americans were doing the Charleston and enjoying a Tom Collins at the bar.

No one could have possibly predicted that the doom of 1918 would pass so quickly.

My point is just that people tend to extrapolate the current trend, and that's rarely the way history actually unfolds.

[kjmclark]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TheDude', '[')url=http://www.theoildrum.com/node/3481]Staniford's arguments[/url] about the efficiency of large scale ag carry more conviction than those of the eating fossil fuels we-must-return-to-the-land camp. Also, obviously I have a lot more faith in the potential of rationing, or any faith at all compared to many, that is. Some hand wave the whole idea away, saying starving hordes will derail trains to get at food, etc. This doesn't jibe with history, far as I can tell. In the face of shortages and rationing people will react accordingly and grow more of their own food as a hobby, too - see how this has gained in popularity in recent years, just from sluggish growth in the economy and a spike in fuel prices.

[kjmclark]

But did they eat dogs? I have no idea, and I'm sure anyone that did eat a dog didn't go around talking to a historian about it.

People seem to easily forget that the horsemen include war and disease as well as famine. Can anyone here really predict the next major war? Can anyone really predict the eventual death toll from H1N1? H5N1? Can anyone tell me what happens next with UG99? They're concerned now that it may spread into Afganistan, Pakistan, and perhaps India next year.

I liken oil resource decline to a community with failing food supplies. What will happen to them? Will they just agree to ration until they can find another food source? Will a bout of measles wipe out a quarter of them and temporarily solve the problem? Will they decide to fight with a neighboring community for their food? How do you know what will happen? I really don't know, and don't see how anyone can. However, anyone counting on slowly starving people to continuously and smoothly make rational decisions, or for a world community in a similar position to also make a smooth transition, strikes me as a bit too optimistic.

[JohnDenver]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kjmclark', 'H')owever, anyone counting on slowly starving people to continuously and smoothly make rational decisions, or for a world community in a similar position to also make a smooth transition, strikes me as a bit too optimistic.

[TheDude]

By coincidence I was just reading about WWI Germany and the Kriegsbrot. At the front lines food was stockpiled and being thrown away when it rotted, while people in the cities were mixing in potatoes etc.

I'd have my doubts about anyone out-blockading the US Navy, which is one point where WWI analogies with Germany would fall down. Also consider the whole notion of food-for-oil; we have a monstrous bounty of food in the US, while a nation like KSA has almost nothing to offer but oil. And I think I've shown that the US could be wholly independent for food production, barring the need to import fertilizer; and we could rebuild our production of that if pressed, too. Other obvious fat that could be cut is the massive amount of corn fed to feedstock cattle; ranchers would raise hell and beef prices would spike, but that would be about the end of it.

I also don't think very sharp declines in crude production are in the cards; fields can completely keel over but major producing nations tend to decline gradually, having a range of fields by default. Mexico is the poster child for decline, having gone down 9.05% for 2008, but other countries with sharp declines (Yemen, Italy, Chad) tend to be minor producers in the first place. The aggregate for the world would be that much more gentle in the first place. HL suggests this will be the case as well, fwiw.

How nations will react to the news of peak oil is another matter entirely, of course. I'm more concerned about that than the logistics of providing basic staples such as food, it being of more immediate import. How the renewable EV and fossil fuel ICE markets will coexist is something else I'm more interested in at the moment than how I'll get enough veggies to eat in 5 years; if that really becomes an issue and society hasn't adjusted somewhat beforehand it'll likely end in as dire a fashion as you're suggesting. Things like the new CAFE standards are steps in the right direction.

[kjmclark]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JohnDenver', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kjmclark', 'H')owever, anyone counting on slowly starving people to continuously and smoothly make rational decisions, or for a world community in a similar position to also make a smooth transition, strikes me as a bit too optimistic.

[kjmclark]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TheDude', 'I')'d have my doubts about anyone out-blockading the US Navy, which is one point where WWI analogies with Germany would fall down.

[JohnDenver]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kjmclark', ' ')And again, I'm not suggesting something dire.

[kjmclark]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JohnDenver', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('kjmclark', ' ')And again, I'm not suggesting something dire.