Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Grieving for the illusion

I've been hit hard several times this winter by Peak Oil grief.  I think I keep flipping between anger and depression.  I'm watching people around me wallow in denial.

Recently one of my friends came to the stunning conclusion that the technology to prevent a crash is just not there.  Perhaps if we'd had a Manhattan Project for energy thirty years ago, we might have something practical by now, but now, there's nothing on the horizon.  Nothing but what Shell Oil calls the Scramble Scenario

This is SHELL OIL's scenario.  Not a group known to have a lot of sympathy to the Peakniks.

This week, the scramble's happening in Bahrain and Libya.  Saudi Arabia's bracing for it.  When people lose the ability to feed themselves, they march.

At the moment, I'm sitting in a coffee shop in New England.  I wish I could believe the illusion of safety and security that exists here.

These are "The Good Old Days", folks.  Make the most of them.

2 comments:

tubaplayer said...

I only just found your blog. Oh, this post so echos my own thoughts and feelings - thank you.

I moved from the UK to where I am now preciely because of the prospect of Peak Oil. I chose this place for two reasons. First it is a community, as I more and more appreciate. A community that is already fairly self-sufficient and with helpful, kindly and friendly neighbours. And secondly I could afford to buy a property here with a goodly plot of land outright which I could never have afforded to do anywhere at all in the UK.

As the unfolding events all across the Middle East and North Africa play out and drive up the price of crude once again high enough to devastate economies I wonder hoe long it will be before we see food riots in our capial city, and I wonder if this is actually the beginning of Kunstler's "Long Emergency".

Ceredwyn said...

2008, when the economy was melting down and oil was up to $150; that was I believe, the beginning.

I think now we are at the point where people are just starting to figure out that this is not a temporary thing.

I'm glad you're finding your lifeboat, tubaplayer.