Two Views of a Post-Oil Future

Peak Moment 133: From the ASPO-USA 2008 conference: two long-standing peak oil awakeners: author James Howard Kunstler (The Long Emergency) and Post Carbon Institute Founder and President, Julian Darley.

Darley, founder of Post Carbon Institute, is big on sharing: Sharing ideas to quickly inform a public largely unaware of peak oil. Sharing cars as a quick way individuals can get fuel usage down. He notes the "Re" in Relocalization means positive actions we can revive from the past to enable the powerdown transition.

Kunstler describes his recent novel World Made by Hand, a richly textured life in a post-oil agrarian community where electricity and phone are rarely working, and people must of necessity rely on each other. He compares America's current financial and political "fiesta of dishonesty" with the 1850s, which preceded the "last great U.S. convulsion." http://www.postcarbon.org http://www.kunstler.com
http://www.aspo-usa.com
DVDs of the entire conference can be ordered through ASPO-USA at http://www.regonline.com/Checkin.asp?EventId=662327

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• peak
• oil
• energy
• economy
• collapse
• kunstler
• darley
• post
• carbon
• long
• emergency

[kingazzaman]

I live in a small town that's almost totally flat. Lots of retired folks are driving to local shop because the walk is too much for them.

I was trying to think of a way to distribute some community grown product to the old folks - many of whom are on tiny incomes and can't afford to buy all the fruit and veg they need for good health.

My brother's a welder and we're making a rickshaw for two drivers - two passengers and some cargo. The mayor loves the idea. It's looking good.

[peakmoment]

Fabulous idea. Keep us posted on the response.

Another idea: What about a service to bring the produce to people's homes (a certain region each day of the week)? Like a mobile grower's market -- something Peoples' Grocery in Oakland has done. It would work best for people who are at home daytime, like retired folks.

[BMWmotorrad14]

Although I'm interested in the topic of peak oil, I definitely don't agree with this video's intro where it's saying humans have peak in innovation or wealth. People in this movement just look like nutters who are scaring rational people away from the truth.

[peakmoment]

Good point. We're going to need a lot of innovation to transition away from fossil fuels on a global scale. Peak wealth? Well, if we look at a lot of nonrenewable resources that are reaching peak, too, that might count for diminished wealth. But if we count wealth in intangibles -- like creativity, compassion, renewable resources, community --then I think we may indeed not be at peak. Or at least I hope not.

[rvbarnesboy]

we are just finishing up a geothermal heat and cool system for the house. have garden. and a piano. lots of books. hope I don't need to stop off in VA to pick up my shotgun as I abandon my FL place, which is virtually unsalable.

[peakmoment]

Hey, just invite all your neighbors over, and share the music and potlucks. Find out who knows what, has what skills, whether you might want to form a tools coop or a buying club, or plant edible gardens on folks who have land but are unable to garden. Sharing, I think, beats the shotgun approach and makes all of you more secure--together.

[vanityfox451]

John Seymour : The Complete Book Of Self Sufficiency has to be the very best book you can buy to help you on your way to becoming self sustained. I think there are going to be a great many vacant building plots for the foreseeable future that would be of much greater value to a small likeminded community of friends in growing home produce. I'd also advise Richard Heinberg's book, The Party's Over and watching the film - The End Of Suburbia - here on You Tube. Hope this was helpful...

[jaymorpheus11]

The only way to bring it down even to 55... would be a 30 mph speed limit. People don't follow it anyway. A 45 speed limit? Try a 20 mph sign.

[CAngel57ful]

Way to say it Mr Kunstler!

[1981busch]

Here are some shared ideas, Peak oil, well lets put it this way. Peak Oil adds another large factor to the Drake Equation, one that earth, coincidentally, does not likely meet. 2. cats will replace rats. 3. Dogs will become the new wolves, except they will not be afraid of people or fire. 4. we really have to get rid of nuclear weapons, chemical weapons, and biological weapons. If we dont in ten years, lunatic tyrants in economic depressions will use them to gain oil. 5. move to your home town.

[sierracuban]

Some think that our SUBURBS may die in the future........Only downtown areas and small towns may survive.......Big cities may have skyscrapers to grow food.....One building for egg production, one to grow veggies etc........

[hollywoodartchick]

@symmetry08 People who find "challenges" "exciting" often are not the ones who believe they will be squeezed out of already marginal existances because they have enough personal resources to play personal conservation games. I agree that we would need large-scale, organized transformations that take into account all classes, especially those without property and choices. Otherwise, there is not an ivory tower tall enough to escape the chaos.

[hollywoodartchick]

@kingazzaman One thing I also love about your idea is that it could lead to jobs for low-skills people. If someone does not have an expensive education but could get a government job as a rickshaw deliveryman, and we have a LOT of these type of sustainable, manual-labor jobs, it could help solve the employment problem, too.

[ManicEightBall]

I think the idea of sharing is a bit short-sighted. It's not a bad idea for the short term, but a billion people in China and another billion in India are going to want our lifestyle. Any gains we makes in conservation are going to be completely wiped out by emerging economies. We need a sustainable solution.

[symmetry08]

whoever believes post oil age will be exciting are mistaking. Its sudden disappearance will wreck havoc on economies and life. Everything is oil. Factories cannot function without oil based and made products. No factories - equals social disorder of unimaginable porportion. People are starving, food is rationed. Countries are that can produce foods struggling to defend against invading hoards of hunrgy masses. This first wave of distruction will be unpleasant. Seconds will be resouce wars.

[jackoflava]

Electricity is mostly provided using hydroelectricity, bit more sustainable than burning carbon as long as there is the energy to spend on upkeep and maintenance. And it's a port city which will probably insure diversity and some trade. Sail may make a comeback and sailboats could keep at least some level of trade/connection to the other nearby eastern seaboard..

[KrunchyJD]

Why dont people think of that good old fashioned vehicle, the common bicycle?