[highlander]

Many have alluded to Easter Island as a model of a peak resource crash. Check out what was going on in Scotland in the late 1700's through the early 1900's. Using seaweed for fertilizer, pounding rocks into dust for planting, stripping off half of the topsoil and peat on an island and transporting it to the other side to get a little more productivity. Their "overshoot" was solved by emigration and the ability to produce ammonia synthetically. Since there is no new world to colonize, our only hope is for some crazy german to come up with another "Haber" process to allow us to continue our "non-negotiable" way of life. Or we can all move to the city and let the government take care of us.

[Jack]

Interesting post! Would you happen to have a link or two that would provide more extensive information?

From what you've mentioned, Scotland would be a useful model.

[Free]

It's interesting that you mentioned the Haber-process, because it just struck me today as I was thinking about the fertilizer-problem, that we learned in school, that during WW1 the germans had to come up with a synthetical solution due to blockades. (Interestingly enough in WW2 there was the similar problem with synthetical oil, the germans really seem experienced in getting themselves into deep shit and desperately looking for solutions...)
Is the Haber process very energy-intensive? Because otherwise it could be really the solution to produce fertilizers without oil? How much energy is needed compared to oil-based fertilizers?

[bart]

Interesting topic. I wish we had more discussions like this, based in historical reality.

I think that one has to go beyond the physical factors in anlalyzing the situation. Why was there a crisis in the 1700s? Why not in 1500 or 1300? Since farming began in Scotland, the population would have faced the same limiting factors of fertility, soil quality and sun. What special was happening at the time of the crisis?

I'd suggest that the something special was industrialization and the shift from feudalism to capitalism. Landlords could get more money by kicking out their tenant farmers, and the Enclosure Acts ensued.

My history is fuzzy -- didn't a lot of the lands end up as pasturage, hunting lands for aristocrats, and waste (gorse, heath, etc.)?

To me, the socio-economic story is more explanatory than a Malthusian interpretation.

My ancestors left about that time for better opportunities in America. The memory of the poverty remains though -- according to one study, Americans of Scottish descent save a greater % of their income by far than most other ethnic groups.

FWIW, in my opinion the future of Scotland and most other places will be:

1. Population reduction.
2. Re-localization.
3. Extreme energy efficiency.
4. Re-discovery of agriculture. Using saweed and rock dust to improve fertility, as you mentioned, are only a few of the practices of our ancestors that we will take up again.
5. Political struggles.

[Overlyhonest]

Wiki says- "the Haber process now produces about half of all the nitrogen used in agriculture as fertilizer."

Haber Process

so we don't need natural gas to make fertilizer but we still need energy.

[Overlyhonest]

I reread the wiki entry and it says it is exposing magnite to hydrogen feed stock. It is just a guess but I would say the way they get the hydrogen feed stock is from natural gas. Obviously you can get hydrogen other ways though.

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('bart', 'I')nteresting topic. I wish we had more discussions like this, based in historical reality.

I think that one has to go beyond the physical factors in anlalyzing the situation. Why was there a crisis in the 1700s? Why not in 1500 or 1300? Since farming began in Scotland, the population would have faced the same limiting factors of fertility, soil quality and sun. What special was happening at the time of the crisis?

[WhistleWind]

Tanad wrote$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'L')ook up the search terms LITTLE ICE AGE in google and read up on it, the world climate took a turn for the worse in the late 1500's which only ended in the 1850's. As a consequence lifestyles had to change because the climate came to be cruddy. Add that to the normal soil depletion and it makes things very tough for the northern farmer folks.

[katkinkate]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WhistleWind', ' ').... Resource wars are nothing new.

[nocar]

I am not a historian, but I learned in school that the population of Sweden (Sweden has a shorter growing season than Scotland, though similar latitudes) increased very rapidly from around 1800-1900(very approx). The reason: Peace, potatoes, and vaccination. Potatoes were important because they gave somewhat more calories per acre than grains and also vitamin C which was lacking during the long winters, but crucially because they (usually) would grow in years when the grains failed. Sweden had had recurring deadly famines when the vagaries of weather were unfavorable. It still did through the 1800s, but less frequently.

With increasing population, land that just barely could be cultivated was turned into fields, which made many poor farmers, (overshoot?), and then people started leaving for the USA, and then industrialisation got going (at least a century after England), and after 1930s much fewer Swedes emigrated to the USA. (Ironically, USA at that time had quota system for immigration which allowed far more Swedes to immigrate than who wanted to.)

From the environmental sources I have since learned that better agricultural methods through the 20th century were important too, with the understanding of nitrogen fixing legymes. Industrial fertilizers and biocides did not become important until after 1950.

During WWII Sweden suddenly had to be self-sufficient in food, and introduced strict rationing. Nobody starved, but nobody got fat. (There had been a prerun in WWI, with hunger riots.) There was no gasoline for cars - there was hardly one car for 50 persons anyway. Trains and street cars, on hydroelectric power, went fine. And bicycles - I think everyone owned a bicycle even before the war. Coal (imported) was scarce, wood had to be burnt instead - the countryside used wood anyway (Sweden has no fossil fuel deposits but lots of wood) We were 6 or 7 million then, now we are 9 million. And have 4 million cars, with every drop of gasoline and diesel imported (today a lot comes from Norway).

By luck and some skillful (or cowardly, depending on your point of view) maneuvering, Sweden managed to stay out of the war, remaining a neutral nation. Our government and infrastructure remained intact, and I think the country pulled together in a common effort. (I have no personal memories, being born in 1944, but I have heard many stories) All young men were in military camps, preparing to fight against a possible invasion.

However, I think that the experience of Sweden during WWII is a good approximate model for how things could work out after PO, in benevolent circumstances. Sweden had energy in the form of hydroelectricy and wood. On the other hand, we do have long dark winters (solar is no option) and not very good agricultural conditions, so the most problematic aspects will be different in different countries. Cuba is a case in point.

The trick is to get people to work together - always easier when there is a common enemy. What is the common enemy after PO?

nocar

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('nocar', 'I') am not a historian, but I learned in school that the population of Sweden (Sweden has a shorter growing season than Scotland, though similar latitudes) increased very rapidly from around 1800-1900(very approx). The reason: Peace, potatoes, and vaccination. Potatoes were important because they gave somewhat more calories per acre than grains and also vitamin C which was lacking during the long winters, but crucially because they (usually) would grow in years when the grains failed. Sweden had had recurring deadly famines when the vagaries of weather were unfavorable. It still did through the 1800s, but less frequently.

However, I think that the experience of Sweden during WWII is a good approximate model for how things could work out after PO, in benevolent circumstances. Sweden had energy in the form of hydroelectricy and wood. On the other hand, we do have long dark winters (solar is no option) and not very good agricultural conditions, so the most problematic aspects will be different in different countries. Cuba is a case in point.

The trick is to get people to work together - always easier when there is a common enemy. What is the common enemy after PO?

nocar

[highlander]

We need to remember that all this was occurring as we were still going to more dense forms of energy (wood to coal to oil). It's also interesting how a small climate change can exaggerate the effects of overshoot. I'm not optimistic when I consider the dwindling energy available to deal with the present overshoot.
Leaf, sorry for the totally american reference to "non-negotiable way of life" It's a comment made, I believe, originally by Dick Cheney, our vice president, then echoed by Bush. I was being sarcastic. I now realize there is no place for sarcasm on this forum

[RIPSmithianEconomics]

Times were tough then. It was even colder, meat was a huge luxury, and potatoes and oats were the mainstay of our diet. But today, Scotland is much more fertile, and land is much cheaper because there are less farming families. Most live on the East Coast in suburban districts or port-cities. Here in the west though there's a population distribution similar to much of Siberia.

[SidneyTawl]

The Little Ice Age's cause has the Gulf Stream stopping as the prime suspect.

http://www.energybulletin.net/5998.html


Hang on to your hats. The timeline they give is a guess based on the data they have in hand. They haven't a clue as to how fast or slow this may happen. Or what the weather consequences will be if it continues to slow.

Combine this with peak oil and ......

As a poster pointed out (in another thread) the amount of energy required to make up for the extra BTU's needed to heat for that kind of climate is not very likely to happen for very long (with todays population).

[No-Oil]

That Haber Process won't last long, 450C is a high energy system, not to mention the 200bar pressure required & that you have to make Hydrogen first. It may be the most abundant substance in the world, but it has a horrible habit of combining with every goddam thing in the universe to ensure that it is practically non existent naturally, thus requiring much energy to produce in commercial quantities !

So I'd look for alternative sources of fertilizer. I used to live on a farm on the west coast of Scotland, it was part of the Culzean Castle estate in Ayrshire. The tennant farmer used to use crutacean shells from the local prawn processing plant as fertilizer, it worked great on potato fields, but jesus did it stink !