This post by James Kunstler, “10 Ways to Prepare for a Post-Oil Society,” is a little old, but still timely, as the economy is in the midst of its first major convulsion caused by a radical swing in energy prices.
The first point is especially applicable: The religious belief in the ability to substitute any fuel for oil never seems to wane. The eighth point is oft-overlooked: Although we discuss the future at length, we remain silent about the kind of programming for the past that schools teach.
Read the rest of Kunstler’s list below the fold:
1. Expand your view beyond simply finding fuels other than gasoline to power vehicles. The obsession with keeping cars running at all costs could prove fatal, especially because so many self-proclaimed "greens" and political "progressives" are hung up on this monomaniacal theme. Cars are not part of the solution, no matter what fuel they use. They are at the heart of the problem. Trying to salvage the entire Happy Motoring system by shifting from gasoline to other fuels will only make things worse. Think beyond the car.
2. We have to produce food differently. The Monsanto/Cargill model of industrial agribusiness is headed toward its Waterloo. As oil and gas deplete, we will be left with sterile soil and farming organized at an unworkable scale. Many lives will depend on our ability to solve this problem. Farming soon will return closer to the center of American economic life. It will have to be done more locally, at a smaller and finer scale, and it will require more human labor.
3. We have to redistribute the population ...
4. We have to move things and people differently. Get used to it. Don’t waste society’s remaining resources trying to prop up car and truck dependency. Water and rail are vastly more energy efficient. Start with railroads, and let’s make sure we electrify them so they will run on things other than fossil fuels. We also have to prepare our society to use water much more to move people and things. This will require rebuilding infrastructures for our harbors and for our inland river and canal systems, including the towns associated with them.The great harbor towns, such as Baltimore, Boston, and New York, no longer can devote their waterfronts to condo sites and bikeways. We have to put the piers and warehouses back in place (not to mention the accommodations for sailors).
Programs are under way to restore maritime shipping based on wind—yes, sailing ships.
5. We have to transform retail trade ...
6. We will have to make things again in America. However, we will make less stuff ... As a practical matter, we are not going to relive the 20th century. The factories from America’s heyday of manufacturing (1900-1970) were designed for massive inputs of fossil fuel, and many of them have been demolished. We’re going to have to make things on a smaller scale by other means. Perhaps we will have to use more water power. The truth is, we don’t know yet how we’re going to make anything.
7. The age of canned entertainment is coming to an end ...
8. We’ll have to reorganize the education system. The centralized secondary school systems based on the yellow school bus fleets will not survive. The huge investments we have made in these facilities will impede the transition out of them, but they will fail anyway. Since we will be a less affluent society, we probably won’t be able to replace these centralized facilities with smaller and more equitably distributed schools, at least not right away.
9. We have to reorganize the medical system ...
10. Life in the USA will have to become much more local, and virtually all the activities of everyday life will have to be re-scaled ... An entire social infrastructure of voluntary associations, co-opted by the narcotic of television, needs to be reconstructed. Local institutions for care of the helpless will have to be organized. Local politics will be much more meaningful as state governments and federal agencies slide into complete impotence. Lots of jobs here for local heroes.
Making buildings more efficient: It helps to understand human behavior
Why buying cheap energy certificates worsens climate change
Comments
View as Flat
Bob Wallace Posted 8:27 am
19 Dec 2008
K-ster gets stuff right even less than chance....
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 8:59 am
19 Dec 2008
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
JMG Posted 12:59 pm
19 Dec 2008
In Kunstler's case, the number of people willing to pay hard money to read his books or travel to hear him speak indicates that, to a large degree, he is correct.
Kunstler may seem a buffoon to you, but from where I sit, of the two of you, the better case is the one being made by the person who is willing to point out that there is no magic pony to replace oil, which means that there is no source of magic pony urine that's going to let us stay shackled to infernal combustion engines or to keep propping up carburbia.
The 5% Project
Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 1:13 pm
19 Dec 2008
Kunstler even identifies the problem of the decline of manufacturing. The one place I disagree with him with is that we will relocalize to a small town type level. I think we will recentralize to a fairly large town to a large city level, because as we've also discussed, crammed in like sardines is very efficient (although I'm not talking about going back to preWWI tenement NYC, maybe the most crowded human situation in history). I also think he tends to underestimate how much electricity we can generate.
He might be, well he is, snarky, but for some reason many of our best writers are, it makes for good reading. The clarity of what he is saying is very sobering, which is definitely a good thing in these times.
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 1:59 pm
19 Dec 2008
No we don't. We know that electric batteries won't push SUVs with 500 mile ranges at a reasonable cost. But they can drive $23,000 to $26,000 2 seaters with a hundred mile range. A suburban family can use that for commuting and errand running, and use the damn SUV a few times a week for major shopping and recreation. Which doesn't save the suburbs in their present from, but lets us transition away from them or transform them more slowly. Do you know what you call shifting a large part of the population suddenly to a new location? A refugee crisis.
Permalink
Adam Stein Posted 2:12 pm
19 Dec 2008
the number of people willing to pay hard money to read his books or travel to hear him speak indicates that, to a large degree, he is correct.
By this metric, Bill O'Reilly is Aristotle.
www.terrapass.com/blog
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 2:25 pm
19 Dec 2008
If Americans and the rest of the planet were content with the current crop of electric vehicles, and were willing to "infill" and construct town centers in order to coagulate towns out of the sprawl, then we could say that the technology is here now. But if people won't accept that, then the jury is still out on whether we'll get to electric Happy Motoring simply because, at the very least, it's in the category of Real Soon Now, that is, it looks promising but it may never arrive.
So can we push for a short-distance, slow model of automobiles/towns? Or is that too far outside the box?
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 2:43 pm
19 Dec 2008
He's made multiple predictions of plunging markets. And no plunges appeared when predicted. (They did show up from time to time when he wasn't predicting them.)
He started that stupid "suburbs are going to die" crap that now pops up like Al Gore inventing the internet.
He can't do simple car math.
Back to small farms? Don't think so. While we might get better quality by eating seasonally and eating fresh and eating locally we won't be forced to that style of farming because we run out of oil If nothing else we can farm with electricity. That might be one of the easiest of all places to replace oil.
We're unlikely to move to the water for much of our transportation. It's just to slow. And the resistance of water against a hull doesn't make for the efficient use of fuel.
Change the way we do retail? Well, we'll likely do more internet. But we're not going back the days of the pack trader walking from house to house. Nor are we likely to give up our big box stores. Unless someone comes up with an even more efficient way to distribute goods.
We're not going to return to some 18th Century model of manufacturing where our machines are turned by overshot water wheels. We're learning to make electricity without fossil fuels and make it cheap.
Canned entertainment is over? Can you say "YouTube"?
Yellow school buses won't run anymore? We goin' to paint the electric ones green?
Reorganize the medical system? Well, reorganize the way we pay for our medical services and move some of the nurses away from insurance paperwork and back to nursing. But the likelihood that we'll give up the doctor office/clinic -> hospital model?
Local heros taking care of local people? Isn't that what we already have? Anyone seen the US Hospice Corp driving its tanks down the freeway lately?
How about platoons of uniformed federal food line servers?
This guy writes doomer porn....
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 2:52 pm
19 Dec 2008
Permalink
LPS Posted 2:53 pm
19 Dec 2008
My own point of view is informed more by Richard Heinberg's attempts to understand the human trajectory of population/energy/resource interactions, which lead, however, to many of the same conclusions.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 2:57 pm
19 Dec 2008
The main point, I think, of what Kunstler is offering is in the way of discussing the proper urban design. Others do it in a much less snarky manner, but the idea is pretty similar: there are much more efficient - and arguably more pleasant - ways to organize living patterns. For instance, you laid out an interesting idea, of going from villages to cities.
As for agriculture, if you look at Sharon Astyk's work (she blogs here infrequently, usually she's at energybulletin.net and has her own blog), she's much more pessimistic than Kunstler, I think, concerning food production. Maybe that's overblown too, but it's important to question all the assumptions of our current food production system as well.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 3:03 pm
19 Dec 2008
We could get rid of the heavy steel 'top box' metal seats and replace them with light weight composites.
There's a company that's started to make hybrid buses with light weight stainless steel frames. The frames are quite a bit more expensive, but reusable and cut down.
And batteries will improve.
Worst case, we'll have to use some liquid fuel to make the last half of the run with our PHEV buses. Remember, they make a run and then rest a number of hours....
--
Got any pounds per pupil data?
Six passenger vans have two headlights, one steering wheel, two tail lights, one brake pedal.
90 passenger buses have two headlights, one steering wheel, .... Less doors....
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 3:16 pm
19 Dec 2008
But some schools might actually work better in smaller buildings anyway, the big ones seem rather oppressive. That way you could have schools closer to the students.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 3:22 pm
19 Dec 2008
You never owned a sailboat did you?
Want the experience?
Stand in a cold shower and rip up $100 dollar bills.
;o) It's an old sailboat owners joke....
----
That aside, here's the problem with K-ster's car/oil problem.
We aren't going to 'hit peak oil', fall off a no-oil cliff, and die.
We will hit a point in the supply demand function where under supply will cause prices to rise and rising prices will cause demand decay.
Remember a couple of months ago when we had $4 - $5 gas?
And remember how people quit buying big SUVs/pickups and cut way back on their driving?
Near term solutions to expensive fuel are available. Take the guy paying $4 a gallon. Put three other 'drivers' in the car and gas drops to $1 for each. Add a 5th person and each can drive by himself for a 'personal errand' day and fuel is only $1.60 a gallon.
Take the average 12,000 miles per year driven by Americans. That's 33 miles per day.
The high range for electric cars is 0.35 kWh per mile. That's 12 kWh per day.
(I'm rounding up, not down. Don't want to push the numbers in my favor.)
US average electricity cost is (I think) $0.10 per kWh. Daily cost of fuel $1.20.
Less as the cost of electricity comes down, as we start paying off-peak prices.
Oh, 33 miles in a 33 mpg car burns up a $4 gallon of fuel in this exercise.
Gas goes to $8 per gallon? Car pool now pays $2 per gallon - 2006 prices.
BEV driver goes solo and pays $1.20. I suppose he could car pool and cut his cost to $0.30....
----
(BTW, don't get too carried away worrying about my emotional state. I'm having great fun playing ranter..... ;o)
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 3:26 pm
19 Dec 2008
Permalink
LPS Posted 3:44 pm
19 Dec 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 3:52 pm
19 Dec 2008
He's repeating his Y2K schtick. Peak oil is just goofy talk, but he make a living talking and writing about it.
When will he switch to peak GHG, talking about the climate tipping point? Never. Why?
Because it is a real turning point, not a drummed up fake. Jim has an instinct for pop culture, mad max peak oil, back to horse farming feudal living is pop. Climate disaster is not.
Fake emergencies are entertaining, like horror or crime stories. Real emergencies like GHG climate disaster are disturbing and depressing, not entertaining. Like foxnews and drug limbaugh, Jim is primarily an entertainer.
I repeat my shout out to him, once again. "Jim, the Amish are buying solar panels."
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 4:04 pm
19 Dec 2008
We can keep that demand down and cut it further as a near-term solution. It's highly likely that all we have to do is to push affordable supply forward a very few years and we will have quite workable BEVs. And we're already building the wind farms.
And did you hear that solar has more or less hit grid parity?
Now the general population might be in for a world of hurt. But not due to disappearing oil, but changing climate.
Heard that there's multiple pieces of data telling us that methane has started to bubble up in the far north. Now, that's some scary stuff.
Cutting our carbon emissions might not be enough. We might have to do some geo-engineering/mitigation. And we really don't know how....
Permalink
Gar Lipow Posted 4:27 pm
19 Dec 2008
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 4:40 pm
19 Dec 2008
They could stop halfway and get a fresh set of batteries inserted.
Little battery garage with a battery change robot that rolls out behind the stopped bus and exchanges packs, returns to its house and plugs back in....
Or we could simply relocate the schools. Remember how we all used to walk to school through the snow, uphill both ways?
Just put the schools down hill and we can coast both ways....
----
It's not about the best/most likely solution that we'll use a few years from now.
It's about the fact that there are likely solutions, not just oblivion which is all K-ster seems to be able to forecast.
Permalink
stevenearlsalmony Posted 10:10 pm
19 Dec 2008
With human population projections indicating that the human community will have 9+ billion members by 2050, perhaps it is time to open discussions here and elsewhere about the profound implications of a 40% increase in the human population in the coming four decades. After all, the frangible biological systems and finite resources of our planetary home make clear to a sensible observer that a planet with the size, composition, and ecology of Earth cannot indefinitely sustain the unbridled increase of human overproduction, overconsumption and overpopulation activities.
Now for a question: Is it reasonable to conclude that the unbridled increase of the clearly visible and distinctly human global overgrowth activities we see overspreading Earth in our time cannot be sustained much longer, much less indefinitely, secondary both to Earth's limitations and humankind's "feet of clay"?
Steven Earl Salmony
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population,
established 2001
http://sustainabilityscience.org/content.html?contentid=1 ...
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 12:34 am
20 Dec 2008
You do realize
that the US is almost unique in the world in packing its urban & suburban kids into steel tubes twice a day to ferry them around town
the reason for the widespread paranoia among parents is that schools are generally detached from their communities by scary bike/ped-nonnavigable road systems that are not even well-designed for the automobiles they are supposed to serve
that a huge proportion of the budgets of local systems are tied up in the costs of these should-be-unnecessary machines - the recent relatively minor blip in gas prices sent shock waves through the entire education community
from the kids' perspective time on the school bus is about universally acknowledged as the nadir of their entire school experience from kindergarten up
that it sets kids up to expect mechanized transportation for every single aspect of their lives not just in school but also throughout their adult lives
that the entire damn mess would be totally unnecessary if a little intelligence had been applied to urban and regional planning over the last fifty years or so
and that we continue to perpetuate this madness without questioning the basic premise of building factory-like schools surrounded by acres of parking and separated by continuous barriers of dangerous blacktop from the communities they are supposed to serve.
I tell you, this is at least one of his talking points where Kunstler's snarkiness is beyond justified. I'm not going to get started on the rest. I've about used up my rant ration for the day.
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 2:11 am
20 Dec 2008
Actually, for neighborhood electric vehicles (NEVs), according to Wikipedia, "Because of the federal law, car dealers cannot legally sell the vehicles to go faster than 25 mph (40 km/h), but the buyer can easily and inexpensively modify the car to go 35 mph".
Ironically on a number of levels, Chrysler produces one of the major NEVs, the GEM car.
But nobody wants to seriously discuss NEVs, partly because most Americans have to be able to go 60 mph for 300 miles at least, and partly because NEVs would require some densifying. How about subsidizing NEV purchases, just like SUV purchases?
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 2:23 am
20 Dec 2008
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 3:15 am
20 Dec 2008
I think I'm pretty much on the same page as you in terms of what needs to be fixed, etc., but I think I'm taking it one more step and trying to think pragmatically about getting change made.
Now you, Jon, live in the heart of New York City, do you not? Someone starts talking about no more school buses and cars that don't go faster than 30 mph and you go "Why not?". There are no school buses in your neighborhood and you can't even hit 30 mph in the middle of dense cities.
Say that to someone who lives outside Fargo or Apalachicola and has school-age kids and they say "Are you F*ckin' Nuts?". They will take their golf clubs to the barricades before they go down that road.
Start talking about cars that don't go faster than 30 mph and even a lot of your fellow NYCers will think you're nuts.
They either have a car parked somewhere that they us to dash to the beach/mountains on the weekends. Or they fantasize about getting a 65 mph car and taking that big trip west.
You want to sell green solutions? IMHO they have to be priced roughly equal to what is now being done and they can't significantly decrease quality of life.
1) Let's look at what is currently successful:
The Prius.
2) Let's look at what is currently not being successful:
NEVs.
Not owning a car and riding a bike.
Segways.
3) Let's look at what can be successful:
PHEVs with a 20-40 electric-only range.
BEVs with at least a 150 mile range and rapid charging batteries.
Either of these last two give people the freedom that they either need or think they need to travel as they now travel. People will willingly move to those options if the price is right.
Try to make people adopt any of the #2 options and you'll get a lot of resistance. Elected leaders will lose elections.
----
K-guy.
He's a dangerous broken clock. He makes lots of predictions.
Many of his predictions are about things which are likely to happen. Some time. Problem is, he puts specific dates on them and he is frequently wrong.
The market takes great big downturns at times. Take your money out when K warns you of an upcoming crash and historically you'll loose your shorts.
Many of his predictions are heavily weighted to "worst case" outcomes. Feeds into the paranoid culture and scares the timid.
He's as useless as dentures for a chicken.
Furthermore, dentures would likely be dangerous for chickens.
(Just some info for you city slickers who don't know how chicken mouths work.... ;o)
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 3:50 am
20 Dec 2008
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 4:48 am
20 Dec 2008
Then from the ashes....
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 4:59 am
20 Dec 2008
I think that you're just as uber-green as me, the problem is how to proceed and convince the public. Al Gore remarked a couple of years ago that what is political acceptable is not what is needed to solve the climate change problem (nor the peak oil problem, nor the ecosystem-destruction problem...).
So we're constantly between a rock and a hard place. I guess the crux of the car problem is whether or not we can simply replace an internal combustion engine (ICE) with, first, a plug-in that gets 40 miles from the motor, and then eventually, when batteries are up to it, an all-electric.
As I think I've said before, the easiest path to climate change mitigation would be to 1) simply replace an ICE engine with an all-electric motor (same with trucks, God knows what to do with planes, but let's pass on that one), 2) simply replace coal with wind/solar/geothermal (I'd even go with nukes if it was really a choice between that and another Permian extinction), 3) somehow the international community would decide to protect all of the world's forests, and 4) throw in that you could still do large scale agriculture, but it would have to be organic and soil-conserving, somehow, in order to prevent emissions.
OK, so Mr. and Mrs. leaning-Republican-but-vote-for-the-Democrats-when -the-Republicans-screw-up, who live in suburbia and enjoy NYC tremendously when they visit but "would never want to live there", can basically keep their lifestyle and basically not know that the entire society has changed technologies in order to solve the climate crisis. Is that good enough for you?
Now, what happens if that's not enough? Milton Friedman, who I normally can't stand, once remarked that when an emergency comes people tend to use plans that are lying around. Isn't it a good idea to have some plans around in case this immaculate transformation can't take place?
Permalink
JMG Posted 5:07 am
20 Dec 2008
No, really, he's a complete buffoon
And this is the most wonderful argument for authority I've ever heard:
the number of people willing to pay hard money to read his books or travel to hear him speak indicates that, to a large degree, he is correct.
By this metric, Bill O'Reilly is Aristotle.
But, as bio-d likes to note, with computers Bill O and Adam can be easily corrected, as the text can be displayed readily to reveal the selective quoting:
i.e., thinking we have something to say that might be of interest or useful to others.
In Kunstler's case, the number of people willing to pay hard money to read his books or travel to hear him speak indicates that, to a large degree, he is correct.
Whether you like Kunstler or not, I don't think it's rational to argue that his work is not of interest or useful to others.
Unlike O'Reilly, no one installed Kunstler in a position of authority or mass awareness. As a scribbler and a speaker, he uses two not-very-powerful media. The fact that, like O'Rielly, you feel compelled to call him names without even addressing any of the points he makes, suggests that he has at least of modicum of success.
The 5% Project
Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 5:11 am
20 Dec 2008
That's geo-bio-engineering. Going to biodigestion/organic farming is another geo-bio-engineering project.
Yes we can! Geo-engineer our way out of this looming climate disaster.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 5:28 am
20 Dec 2008
How about big wave/wind/solar powered pumps that spray ocean water up into the atmosphere in a fine mist?
These operating near desert regions would increase rainfall and near arctic or antarctic ice they would increase snowfall in winter. Building up glacial ice.
The huge clouds created, reflect sunlight, just like clouds from rain forest do. Reflect more sunlight with clouds and get deserts to absorb CO2 with photosynthesis, that could be effective geo-engineering. Not to mention maybe enlarging glaciers, they reflect sunlight too.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 5:37 am
20 Dec 2008
This is exactly what we need to aim for with our solutions!
"Now, what happens if that's not enough?"
First, we try education. Melting Arctic ice is a great teaching aid. Get Mr. and Mrs. to understand that it really will be in their best interest to accept some changes.
Second, we rely on our elected officials to gently step on the third rail and force some changes.
Both of those mean that those of us who care need to do whatever we can do to educate and elect/support.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 5:50 am
20 Dec 2008
White/bright roofs.
Reforestation. Here's a great read that turned up today.
"New World Post-pandemic Reforestation Helped Start Little Ice Age, Say Scientists"
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081218094551 ...
Set up reforestation programs along North Africa using solar/wind desalinization and inexpensive labor.
People with jobs tend to be happier and less interested in killing others. (Side benefit.)
3) Making clouds. I really resent that "daffy" crap on the link. When we put unearned adjectives in front of new ideas we skew consideration.
Making clouds is consistent with lowering temps. One of the problematic feedback loops of global warming is that as surface temps increase clouds thin and are less reflective. More "heat" gets through.
We could use cheap nighttime (off peak) wind power to pump sea water into tanks/reservoirs and then let gravity create the spray during daytime.
Since the water vapor needs to be sprayed between 20 and 200 feet from the surface this is not big tech.
Will it work? Easy and cheap to evaluate. Set up one spray. Float an infra-red detector above the spray. Is a good hunk of what is coming down going back up? Then do some math.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 5:55 am
20 Dec 2008
We'd probably have to pay off shareholders in coal companies to accept the elimination of their industry, and we'd have to give utilities all kinds of assurances that they'd continue to make big profits with wind, etc, because besides not scaring Mr. and Mrs. with lifestyle changes we'd probably have to ensure that there were no major economic/political power changes either, if we're talking about the easiest route to mitigating climate change. And putting a price on carbon would probably constitute a lifestyle change, so that might be out too.
As for education, certainly, but I think it should be a two-pronged strategy: first, have models -- hopefully, slick animation -- showing what happens if we have business-as-usual, and second, models showing what we would have to do (hopefully involving as little lifestyle and power changes as possible) showing what would avoid the worst.
As for politicians, I believe the all-time example of a politician easing the population into an idea was the effort of FDR to get Americans used to the idea of fighting again in Europe. But the politician/politicians have to be convinced that there is a problem first, and obviously it would help if a lot of their constituents thought so too.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 5:56 am
20 Dec 2008
Time lines have been severely shortened. Arctic ice is melting very much faster than we projected. Methane emissions are now being measured from melting permafrost.
We have to reduce our carbon emissions ASAP. More wind/solar/PHEV/BEV/ground loop geothermal/hot rock geothermal/slo flo hydro/insulation/CFLs/LEDs/.... Less oil and coal.
We most likely have to start mitigation projects.
California has already mandated white coverings on flat roofs. What's holding the rest of you back?
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 6:03 am
20 Dec 2008
Re-engineering the atmosphere without incurring nightmare side-effects: easy and cheap
Daffy tech projects planted in someone elses's back yard: priceless
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 6:28 am
20 Dec 2008
We create a carbon tax.
We allow coal companies to invest the tax money in green energy production rather than write a check to the government. If needed, we even dollar match with government funds.
In short, we create a financial incentive for coal extractors and coal burners to shift to green production. Better to spend some extra money helping them morph that spend money fighting them.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 6:32 am
20 Dec 2008
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 8:45 am
20 Dec 2008
Meanwhile, Kunstler. Wrong on Y2K. Right on fraudulent and overextended financial instruments. Right on the economic collapse when the shit hit the fan. Right on the failure of recent urban development models. Right, give or take a detail or two, with most of the stuff on this list. Don't like his gloomy prognosis? Neither do I, but that doesn't mean it ain't gonna happen.
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 9:39 am
20 Dec 2008
I certainly like the idea of reforestation, although this is a good place for numbers. From what I've been able to figure out about carbon emissions from deforestation, it's about 4 to 6 gigatons, about 10 per cent. Let's say we stop deforestation. Now, how much will how much reforesting take up? It's probably not a huge amount, and it won't be enough if fossil fuels, deforestation, and most ag emissions aren't stopped.
As for making clouds, never heard of that one before, except that my understanding is that cloud cover is very much a two-edged sword, and not well understood. It turns out that water is the biggest greenhouse gas of all, however, it's not understood how that balances out with the albedo effect of bouncing light back out of the atmosphere.
So in other words, we can't get around the profound lifestyle/power changes with the geoengineering you've pointed out, although the reforestation might play a significant role.
By the way, I think you asked me a while back if I live in NYC; I lived there for 24 years, but the housing go so expensive my familiy and I moved to Evanston, just north of Chicago, which has a walkable downtown, and proves that suburbs could be "infilled" to drastically cut down on car travel, in my opinion.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 10:43 am
20 Dec 2008
---
As for spaceshifter - I'm not sure I'll lighten up on people who post cynical replies rather than ideas.
I've pumped massive amounts of content into this thread. (I'm making note of amount, saying nothing about quality.) spaceshifter posted some attempted cute parody of a Visa commercial.
And it was off target.
Cynicism is so last century....
----
Mitigation. We probably need both significant reductions in carbon emission and mitigation looking at the last ice melt/methane release information. In fact, we probably need to everything we can think of all at once.
Or start loading topsoil on barges for shipping to Greenland.
--
I've got nothing at all against infilling burbs. I think relocating some businesses out of more dense areas and distributing them throughout the burbs might be a good idea.
I see that happening right now outside Sacramento. After a while the workforce is likely to migrate to those areas or change employment to a business closer to where they live.
I'd like to see businesses create small satellite offices for rural communities like the one in which I live.
Anything that cuts our need to move distances helps.
But I will continue to hold that we are more likely to be successful if we transform what we have rather than plowing everything under and starting fresh.
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 12:21 pm
20 Dec 2008
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 2:23 pm
20 Dec 2008
Not about his literary skills.
If you take a few minutes I think you'll find that I posted plenty on topic. Start at the top and work your way down slowly.
Please.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:33 pm
20 Dec 2008
Methane release from sea floor methane hydrate and tundra just might make this sort of benign cloud generating geo-engineering the last resort.
Romm's recent article indicates that we maybe too far along the feedback induced exponential methane release curve to avoid the climate tipping point by simply curtailing human related GHG.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 2:45 pm
20 Dec 2008
spaceshaper has made a couple of very critical arguments, it seems to me.
About de-densifying jobs, here's the problem: it makes things worse unless the employees follow the office. Are these people going to sell their homes if the office moves to the other side of the city, and buy a home in the new location? This would all be much easier if most people rented, but that's not that dominant Mr. and Mrs. culture we were talking about. So if people don't move, then moving from the center increases transportation -- it's just simple graph theory, it seems to me.
That's another efficiency of the city. Since everyone goes into a central point, assuming that when people buy/rent they don't particularly care how close they are to work -- again, apparently every American's God-given right, the house is more important than the location because we can travel as far as we want in a car -- so actually, sprawl means that the city as job center is even more important, efficiency-wise.
I happen to have a 2 minute walk to work. But I intentionally did that, and we rent.
Now, if we can be profligate with energy, sprawling the jobs is no problem (well, energy-wise). But that's a big part of the problem, isn't it?
Permalink
hapa Posted 4:08 pm
20 Dec 2008
just like financial innovation, with one hand behind its back, saved us from ever experiencing deep economic downturn! while its twin, technological innovation, rendered "brick and mortar" irrelevant while simultaneously saving us from environmental catastrophe.
the only thing i think is outright stupid/impossible on kunstler's list is "the end of canned entertainment." the clue you're missing is bollywood, mr james howard. people can produce and distribute an incredible amount of canned fun on a tight energy budget.
granted, ok, people might shift from watching 100 hours of television a day to something that fits inside the conventional 24, but, bollywood.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 4:18 pm
20 Dec 2008
If the XYZ Corp. moves its billing operations from downtown to the burbs some people will face the choice of moving, commuting, finding a new job.
New people looking for work will probably look for jobs closer to where they live or be prepared to move.
After the initial shuffle we would end up with connected "villages" where a greater proportion could walk to work. (Perhaps.)
---
Again, the most efficient is four tier high bunk beds and "hot berthing". I was wrong about one bowl and spoon for every eight. We can eat in 20 minute shifts and cut back to 2x per day. So a lot less bowls and spoons. No chairs, just start eating when you enter the food line and wash your bowl at the end....
If you don't include quality of life considerations you're going to have a lot harder time getting people to buy in.
---
My best guess is that "fueling" our cars just isn't a problem in the long run. I think we'll have plenty of cheap electricity at night from our wind farms. As we build wind farms to satisfy our daytime higher needs we create lots of power at night when demand is down and the wind typically blows harder.
If the numbers are right ~ $1.20 per day x 365 = $438 per year to pay for car power at $0.10 per kWh, that's not a big capital expense to create that power. Can't be, or power would cost more.
(Sorry if I've unnecessarily repeated myself. This thread has gotten much longer than my memory.)
---
Let me ask you, Jon. You've lived in NY and now you live in Chicago. Have you ever lived in a small town, village, or in the country? In a suburban neighborhood?
Permalink
hapa Posted 4:45 pm
20 Dec 2008
1, economic troubles continue to press down the price of oil, in which case people will be incredibly unhappy and communities destabilized by something else entirely.
2, the whole world isn't about to become 1990s japan except with no export revenue. oil prices climb up, destroying the used car market in the united states and leaving huge numbers of people without serviceable wheels.
either way, existing infrastructure and logistics are a ridiculous handicap and this will have a tremendous impact on real estate values and urban planning. add to that the absolute requirement for rearrangement of living to conserve energy to reduce the cost of replacing dirty energy, along with other resource constraints, and there's no question -- no question -- suburban life will become a luxury so expensive we won't be able to bill strangers for it anymore.
no more ponzi borrowing, no more invasions, no more nothing.
the embodied energy of today's housing stock -- even the bubble-built speculative ghost towns -- is something to consider. the required energy for operating today's sprawling logistics operation counters it. there's no way to predict how they will balance except that we're much more vulnerable to oil prices than we are ready to switch fuels.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:47 pm
20 Dec 2008
Why not go 30 mph and take a little more time to commute in order to eliminate that horror?
My only counter argument is pretty weak. Make safer cars.
Cars still use way too much energy. My counter? make more efficient cars. Still kind of weak.
Cars are only necessary for rural people or for rural trips by others. Cut them back by about 3/4 in numbers, make them very safe, to passengers and other people walking, biking, or using 30 mph BEVs, and make them ultralight and ultraefficient plugin hybrids. Nerf cars that minimize danger to pedestrians, that's also a moral imperative.
That could save the car, maybe. The stark brutality of the age of motoring still stands out as a very strong counter argument.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 5:30 pm
20 Dec 2008
We're in a recession. We've been in recessions before. No reason why we shouldn't pull out of this one. Very unlikely that the question is not "if", but simply "how long".
Oil is still plentiful. The oil suppliers can't even get $50 per barrel for it. They're having to cut supply to support $40. By the time we start sliding off the plateau (which may still be a decade or two away) we'll have alternatives.
We've now acquired evidence that there is softness in oil demand and that the price of oil responds to demand decay. Until we get BEVs or at least good PHEVs, we'll car pool and sleep under our desks until prices drop once more.
The market for used gas guzzlers may well be shot. The price of economy cars is most likely rising.
Suburbs dying. That's K-krap. No sense going through that one again. If you believe it then don't put your money in the burbs. I'll continue to own properties in them. Bet I win. Rent checks came in again this month....
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 5:51 pm
20 Dec 2008
We're just starting to include crash avoidance and stability systems. Those features will get better and better. Infra-red/radar detectors will track pedestrians and pussycats, slow or stop the car if the driver fails to act.
Now that fuel has become an issue we will continue to make cars lighter. Moving to in-hub motors will make a big difference. And somewhere down the road we'll go to non-metallic bodies. (Except that metal bodies might be more recyclable.)
Composite or metal, we'll make them more slippery.
Transportation in the US eats a total of 28% of our total diet. Take out the non-private car part and we're down to 15%(?) for personal vehicles. We're not talking some very huge energy usage when you look at the big picture.
The big issue when it comes to cars is decreasing our outward flow of cash for petroleum and being too much at risk of having our supplies curtailed for political reasons.
Carbon - coal. That's what is endangering the planet.
Permalink
hapa Posted 7:56 pm
20 Dec 2008
oil prices did not drop 70% because of single-digit percentage drop in miles driven.
i don't know what's going to happen to oil prices. you do. lucky you!
i never said the suburbs were dying. i said they were being subsidized by means that just stopped being available. you know where is another source of reliable financing. lucky you.
and you're bullish on detroit and your tenants appear to be solvent and you can wave your hand to make oil emissions leave the atmosphere and you're really lucky.
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 10:52 pm
20 Dec 2008
Kunstler grasps the implications of this inconvenient truth for our current land use patterns - there are many others who also get this, such as Rynn, JMG and Lawrence Auerbach who regularly post on this blog. These commentators also regularly point out the many social and personal benefits that would accrue from an early and intentional move towards a less car-dependent culture, I will not reiterate these benefits now, they have been repeated here many many times. Kunstler is more apt to point out the other side of the coin: the pain that's likely to come from waiting until the shift is forced upon us. If you don't like his style, fine, but his conclusions and his remedies are largely rational. You have yet to even attempt to demonstrate otherwise.
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 1:48 am
21 Dec 2008
Correct. It appears to be somewhat deeper than those of the recent past. And it threatens to get much worse if strong measures are not taken.
---
"oil prices did not drop 70% because of single-digit percentage drop in miles driven"
No,they didn't. They dropped because what we saw was the bursting of a pricing bubble. There was no underlying reason for $140 oil. The downturn in consumption popped the bubble.
---
"i don't know what's going to happen to oil prices. you do. lucky you!"
I don't know what will happen. But I do know what is happening. The bubble popped. Oil is back to cheap. Prices that we "would never see again".
I also know that we have learned that there won't be a "run on oil" as demand exceed supply. There's a price ceiling at which people quit buying, at least in the quantities required to drive prices "way up high".
----
"i never said the suburbs were dying. i said they were being subsidized by means that just stopped being available. you know where is another source of reliable financing. lucky you."
Sorry if I mistranslated this...
"suburban life will become a luxury so expensive we won't be able to bill strangers for it anymore"
---
"and you're bullish on detroit and your tenants appear to be solvent and you can wave your hand to make oil emissions leave the atmosphere and you're really lucky"
No. I think there's a decent chance that GM and/or Chrysler might disappear in the next year or so. Higher than even chance that Chrysler will be bought up or divided and sold off.
And I recognize that while carbon emissions from cars create some of our climate change problems it seems to me that some people are not looking at the larger problem. They've forgotten that auto-carbon is a much, much smaller portion of the problem than is coal-electricity.
They respond that as if the only way to save humanity is for all of us to destroy our cars and ride bikes.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 1:58 am
21 Dec 2008
Had he stuck to more general predictions he would have not fallen so flat on his face.
But he didn't.
If he wasn't such a doomer-porner and put more effort into suggesting reasonable solutions then he would, IMHO, have value.
But he is.
IMHO, K has damaged us. He has created and fed a subculture of despair.
He makes unreliable specific predictions. He spreads doom and gloom and helplessness.
I value the people who can recognize a problem and suggest answers. People who lead us forward toward solutions, not condemn us to a 14th Century existence.
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 2:13 am
21 Dec 2008
We are fairly sure that we are going to be able to build affordable PHEVs that cut our personal transportation oil consumpting to roughly 25% of what they are today.
A little less certain, but fairly likely, is the promise of BEVs which will require zero oil.
We will also most likely move some of our rail transport to electricity and a good portion of our shorter airplane travel to electric high speed rail.
Electricity to power transportation of all sorts costs a very small fraction of what we pay for oil at $100 a barrel, which is where the producers want to push it.
We now know how to use residual heat from the ground to heat our houses efficiently which means that we can start moving away from heating oil.
Airlines and the military are moving along with non-food biofuels which will at least partially replace petroleum.
All of these developments mean very significant drops in petroleum consumption. And that means stretching supply over longer and longer periods.
I'm comfortable in assuming that people 20-30 years from now will have much better solutions than what we can reasonably purpose today.
"Cling to your hopes of plentiful (and miraculously carbon-free) oil and limitless 10c./kWh electricity if you like. The facts simply point elsewhere."
The facts are that we are making electricity from wind for far less than ten cents. In fact, 'below a nickel' is where we are headed.
We may be right at the ten cent level with thin film solar. Without including financing and real estate costs we are at seven and one-half cents. Desert/solar real estate is cheap and capital costs nothing like nuclear engenders. And thin film should drop in cost to around 1/3rd of where it now is.
Hot rock geothermal is looking very promising and should be ten cent or less power.
How about we point at those facts?
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 2:40 am
21 Dec 2008
Previous to Laguna, in answer to your question, I lived with my assimilationist parents in beautiful suburban NJ, and some in other parts of suburban California.
So until I was 18, Bob, I was one suburban kid. And I hated it.
But enough about me. I want to bring up another issue that has been thrown around, that is, that we can't abandon the building stock/infrastructure that has been created lo these past decades. Actually, the proof that we can completely reorient the society if we want to is exactly all of that infrastructure, because it has been built up over the last 50 years, it hasn't been here forever.
If we could build suburbia, we can build sustainable cities and towns to replace them. The big difference would probably be that for the vast majority -- this is an assumption, by the way, not necessarily true -- people wanted to have their own house and car, i.e., suburbia. However, if for some reason the vast majority decided that they preferred a denser lifestyle, then there would be many of the same pressures to transform our living patterns.
Amazin, unfortunately the vast majority of people seem to think that 40,000 plus lives per year, plus over 1 million serious injuries per year, are worth the "freedom", as Bob put it, of an automobile-centered culture.
Basically, we have been fighting a 50 year war for freedom. That seems to be the unconscious "reasoning", if I can apply a term to it, that the society has made. Every year, we repeat the carnage of the entire Vietnam war, and yet most people would shrug or just think you were crazy if you said we should not have cars in order to save those lives. So I don't know what to tell you.
Bob, people aren't walking around muttering about the end of the world because of kunstler. Most, I assume, are like me, we have read numerous authors -- and as LPS pointed out, Richard Heinberg goes into much the same matters as kunstler in a much more cool and reasoned way, I would very much suggest checking out richardheinberg.com and check out his museletter
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 2:49 am
21 Dec 2008
Best I can figure, electrical supply generates about 25%, and transportation about 15%, so if we transformed the electricity sector to carbon-free generation, and transformed transportation to all electric, we get 40% reduction -- which is great, but not everything. We still have to protect forests and transform agriculture and building heating and cooling.
Bob, you point out all kinds of great technological solutions, like geoexchange and wind. We don't know about electric automobiles. WE know about electric trains. So, as I've said before, we're basically on the same page except for this little problem of transportation -- that is, the probability of all=electric cars, and theh problem of peak oil.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 2:50 am
21 Dec 2008
Jim admires the Amish lifestyle, the Amish are going green with solar power.
I think there will be far fewer cars soon, auto makers maybe have a reason to extend a production break?
Efficient mass transit, NEVs (neighborhood electric vehicles) and bike trails would help, families would not need a second car.
I'm going to start haranguing for seawater could seeding too. Halting CO2 won't be fast enough to avert climate disaster now, with methane feedback driving GHG to the tipping point.
Like the fleets of Liberty Ships in WW II, we need cloud seeding ships, mass produced right now and producing massive reflective cloud banks, snow, and rain to cool/green the planet.
The arctic and antarctic could be built up with massive snowfall in winter. The wave energy available alone would power a huge cloud system, given efficienct mass production of the energy ships.
This could even effect glaciers that are melting inland, like in glacier park. Spray a fine mist of seawater up into the atmosphere 100 miles offshore and it will fall as snow on the rockies.
The concrete and steel Norsk Hydro "bobber" type floating wind machines with pumps and spray systems might be possible "Liberty Ships" to free us from climate disaster?
Maybe add wave power to the floating wind machines too? Then put up a line of them off of coastlines where prevailing winds would carry the rain and snow onto arctic, antarctic, north american, and other continenal shores.
ME deserts could be green in a few years. The oil nations could fund it.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 3:02 am
21 Dec 2008
Of course where we each do want to live is about as different as could be... ;o)
Now, all this car safety stuff (and I speak as someone who spent a week in intensive care a couple of years ago - came very close to dying) is not ringing true. It seems that this argument came to the table after the "we don't have to oil for personal cars" was failing.
Sure, cars need to be safer. And they almost certainly will get so. Air bags, anti-lock brakes, "lights come on when the car starts" - those improvements have been made in the last few years. Along with better crumple zones. And dedicated bike lanes. And better pedestrian crossings. Backup beepers in quite cars.
It seems to me that lots of greens are starting with the proposition that "cars must die" and then look for reasons why. (And I give K the blame for starting people thinking that way.)
I start from the premise that Americans who have (and everyone else in the world who has or expects to have) a car will greatly resist doing away with cars.
I then look at the vast amount of structure and infrastructure that we've created over the last many hundreds of years that allow some of us to live away from dense cities and realize the incredible cost of abandoning that capital. And I realize the incredible resistance that would be experienced were we to try to force Americans to dense cities.
So, I look for answers. Answers that allow those of us who desire to live outside of cities and desire not to abandon our wealth to continue to live more or less the way we now live.
While living in cities (big dorm rooms ;o) would be more efficient, I just don't think that we have to. And I don't think it possible to force people to.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 3:03 am
21 Dec 2008
GHG reduction is one front and geo-engineering is the other front. With organic farming constituting both. And really renewable smart grid, electric transportation, and conservation can be done on a global basis too.
Offshore cloud seeding and floating energy platforms to feed the power grid could be combined. So green local energy, applied globally, really is geo-engineering.
We need the geo-engineering outlook to address run away feedback mechanisms like methane release and ice melt/solar absorption.
Large government production contracts in nations all over the planet need to be issued for floating cloud seeding energy platforms. That's the Liberty ship in this battle.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 3:13 am
21 Dec 2008
Why a fleet of ships when we can do the same job with a 50" piece of pipe sticking up from Terra Firma?
--
Might want to hold off on prostletizing for cloud making for a little while. There's not quite enough "peer review" on the idea yet.
Now, white roofs. No reason not to move along on that one. Even if it turned out that for some weird reason white roofs didn't bounce heat back up to the sun as does white snow, it would at least cut down on air conditioning....
---
I suspect Europe would fund greening N. Africa.
The bigots alone would foot the bill if they thought it would cut immigration.... ;o)
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 3:36 am
21 Dec 2008
However, perhaps you, and definitely the right-wing, vastly overinflates the hatred of cars among environmentalists, in my humble opinion. In fact, unless someone explicitly argues against cars, you should assume that the environmentalist you're communicating with likes cars.
At any rate, you didn't answer the question: why is it worth a Vietnam-type body count to have an automobile-centered society? I agree with you that most people don't want to give up their cars, but that's getting into the realm of political realism. Morally, it seems to me that an automobile-centered society is indefensible.
I'd also like you to know that you join the pantheon of people that I've had long arguments with concerning the viability of suburbs, only to discover that they don't live in one and don't want to. There was one fellow who actually lived in a suburb arguing with me against transit -- but so far, he's the lone exception. And good for you, too, you're better off.
Amazin', I would concentrate on reforestation. As wild as it sounds, reforesting the Sahara is probably a better bet than cloud-seeding.
Permalink
spaceshaper Posted 3:58 am
21 Dec 2008
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:05 am
21 Dec 2008
The pipes, think of the pipes and pumps to transport all that water. Cloud transportation even reflects solar insolation. There's your water tanker, over head, that white fluffy stuff.
Geo-engineering takes maximum efficiency, due to scale.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
JMG Posted 4:06 am
21 Dec 2008
It seems to me that lots of greens are starting with the proposition that "cars must die" and then look for reasons why. (And I give K the blame for starting people thinking that way.)
I start from the premise that Americans who have (and everyone else in the world who has or expects to have) a car will greatly resist doing away with cars.
This doesn't compute, to borrow your term. If people love cars so much and will "greatly resist doing away" with them, then either greens aren't people or your premise is mistaken.
And isn't it odd that a mere "buffoon" would be able to "start[] people thinking" in a way that suggests that the "love affair" with the auto is more than anything else a creation of Madison Ave. creation (plus a remembered affection for a time in the US when the future seemed endlessly bright, resources seemed endlessly available, and hunger was something discussed in terms of China and India).
In other words, if this machine, this chariot of the gods, is so beloved, then why do so many people find that its costs far outweigh its benefits, and why would a mere buffoon find an audience for his jeremiads?
Growing up as a suburban kid in the 60s, a small paperback I found one day amidst the books was a little book from the 50s called "The Insolent Chariots." (Googling tells me it came out in 1958). Google also provides some words from the dust-jacket:
The Insolent Chariots
"Once upon a time, the American met the Automobile and fell in love. Unfortunately, this led him into matrimony, and so he did not live happily ever after."
This is a book about what America and the automobile have done to each other.
Do you ever wonder why today's cars look the way they do, and why they cost so much? Is the public at the mercy of Detroit? Or vice-versa? Are the new highways drawing the nation together -- or are they merely homogenizing it? What goes on behind the facade at your friendly dealer's, and when you buy a car do you know how to penetrate the Byzantine snarl of auto "financing"? Is our marriage to the automobile part of our greatness, or is it a disaster -- and what can we do about it, anyway?
Wielding a rapier tipped with wit, edged with anger and forged with the facts, John Keats slashes aside myth and chrome, to reveal the truth behind our fateful match. Whether you want to get a horse or settle for a horse laugh -- you will never again look at your car yourself, or your native land in quite the same way... (Excerpt from fly leaf)
In other words, Kunstler is not the first to notice that our "love affair with the automobile" more closely resembles Michael Douglas's experience in "Fatal Attraction."
Despite reading and enjoying the Keats' book, I grew up with the typical uncritical acceptance of motorhead, buying my first car before I even had a license using money saved from washing dishes in a restaurant and mowing lawns. I know I sure didn't start life with a "cars must die" mindset. I grew up in a neighborhood where a teen 16 or older would rather have gone to school naked than in the school bus (a/k/a "loser cruiser").
I took that car with me to duty stations across the country, never quite wanting to notice that the costs of insurance and repairs did more to keep my bank balance on low than anything else I did, including developing a real fondness for bourbon and beer, which I indulged greatly without ever reducing my driving much. I get a pit in my stomach whenever I think of the number of trips I took home from bars, three sheets to the wind, in the woods over windy rural roads. I easily could have killed someone other than myself, and I'm forever grateful that I didn't.
Drinking, driving, and dying were a big problem in the military. We used to have to attend a lot of mandatory education about alcohol abuse in those days -- which led me to say "If you're going to learn about something, learn from the pros," and boy, were we ever the pros of alcohol abuse.
When I got out of the service, I had an experience not unlike that at the end of Lord of the Rings, where the hobbits returning to the Shire can barely recognize it because it had become an ugly wasteland. And, for whatever reason, I was able to note that, essentially all of the ugliness in what had once been indescribably beautiful land was there because of or thanks to the automobile. The land was covered with a scabrous sprawl of concrete; the air was now dangerous (literally) and had a distinct petroleum scent; the water was spoiled at every point, burdened with oil, gasoline, and antifreeze. The first signs of the obesity epidemic were present -- between the new thing of "cable TV" and MTV and automobiles, kids didn't seem to do much involving their own muscles any more.
I didn't read or hear of James Howard Kunstler until the late 90s; he didn't put some weird loathing of automobiles into my head. The only thing Kunstler has done is get a tiny few people to look at ALL parts of the bargain we've struck with automobility and motorhead thinking -- the slaughter on the roads, the destruction of the natural environment AND of the human-scale civic environment.
The thing that always suggest to me that Kunstler is really onto something is the rabid scorn he generates from people who disagree with him -- it's always far more venomous than simple disagreement merits. What it seems to be is that people in the First Church of Carburbia hate him because he's heretical, and not because he's in the main wrong in his critique, but because he's right.
The 5% Project
Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay.
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 4:14 am
21 Dec 2008
This would replensih aquifers with rain and snow. the dead and flaming western forests could be drenched from hundreds of miles away, there's a way to fight firestorm.
Methane release climate feedback is the emergency, there is no better way to counteract it. We could be facing the tipping point tomorow. No one really knows, since the new methane information is coming in now. It looks very bad though, many times worse than any gradual switch to renewables over 20 years could counter.
I think this is the real "Pearl harbor like incident" on climate disaster.
Over complication? Me? Hmmm.. ok I'll take that under advisement, hehey.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 4:43 am
21 Dec 2008
Permalink
Bob Wallace Posted 5:01 am
21 Dec 2008
I've lost track of whether the Ace article got posted in this thread or not. That's the one that I've been working from. His proposal is to use sea water, not fresh water.
--
Everyone else.
I just don't feel that I have any more to offer to this discussion.
It seems that the same arguments have circled around again devoid of new ideas.
I do wish we had a forum that allowed us to start new threads. Some ideas back up the page would seem to deserve further contemplation.
Or perhaps that's just my perception....
Permalink
HWilkes Posted 5:02 am
21 Dec 2008
JMG wrote:
The thing that always suggest to me that Kunstler is really onto something is the rabid scorn he generates from people who disagree with him -- it's always far more venomous than simple disagreement merits. What it seems to be is that people in the First Church of Carburbia hate him because he's heretical, and not because he's in the main wrong in his critique, but because he's right.
Or, as an alternate explanation, maybe he generates rabid scorn because he's a deplorable spokesman for everything that a lot of people claim to value-even if they don't clearly articulate what they feel. I've read his blog from time to time, and he comes across as despising most Americans. I've read his Long Emergency and in the last chapter, there isn't a single group of non-white people (what an amazing coincidence) that he doesn't seem to have it in for-even if he has to concoct truly far fetched scenarios in order to present an issue with them.
In terms of his solutions, the manner in which he presents them, as far as I've observed, really has furthered a 'culture of despair'. By the time he's done insulting most people, or automatically leaping to either the worst case scenario, or the scenario that he wants because he thinks it'll be inevitable, a lot of the people I've known that have read his work are either interested in either 1) 'checking out' or 2) 'giving up'. How on earth is this supposed to be helpful, or is he just trying to reinforce his own misanthropic views?
Permalink
biodiversivist Posted 6:06 am
21 Dec 2008
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
Permalink
hapa Posted 8:16 am
21 Dec 2008
ok? oil isn't returning to normal. the market for that commodity like many is broken and depressed now. there's no more accurate info in $30 than there was in $150. this is a storm and there's nothing to do but wait it out.
Permalink
springbeauty Posted 3:16 am
22 Dec 2008
Permalink
amazingdrx Posted 3:27 am
22 Dec 2008
When the real emergency is peak GHG and the climate tipping point.
Yeah I agree bio-d, outstanding thread. Why do all the really good threads make some people angry enough to threaten to leave us? Hehey.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
Permalink
sjg Posted 6:51 am
22 Dec 2008
About 1.5 deaths result from every 100 million miles traveled in the
USA. I got that from http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/Main/index.aspx. If
the average person travels 15,000 miles per year, then their total
exposure is about 1/10,000 per year. How does this compare to other
risks? 39% of the fatalities were alcohol-related, so that strikes me
as an "easy" way to cut down. Easy for me to say, of course, since I
don't drink. What is the overall risk? One way to estimate it is to
compute the total fatality rate in the USA, which is about 1/78, from
all causes. Automobiles cause about 8 tenths of 1% of this. Accidents
cause 4.7% of all deaths, 6.1% among men and 3.3% in women. I got that
from page 21 of http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr56/nvsr56_05.pdf.
So automobile accidents are roughly 17% of all accidents. There are a
lot of other things that are bigger considerations. It's possible that
driving so much has caused an increase in heart disease, stroke, and
even cancer. Those are the things that cause the most deaths, and the
death rate from heart disease has fallen considerably in recent years,
much more than it would if we eliminated all deaths from automobile
accidents. If we all rode bicycles instead of cars, the death rate from
accidents would probably increase, because bicycles offer considerably
less protection against collision, and they are inherently less stable.
Although the exercise might reduce the risk of heart disease, it isn't a
sure thing, and anyone who actually knows a fair spectrum of human
beings can tell you that they couldn't all ride a bicycle. Just as not
everyone can (or should) drive, not everyone can ride a bicycle. It
takes a certain level of fitness and coordination to ride. I think it's
dreadfully unrealistic to expect everyone to give up automobiles. It is
about as realistic as expecting everyone to give up alcohol. We could
greatly reduce our risk of accidents, child abuse, homocide, heart
disease and liver failure if we all gave up alcohol. It requires a
little knowledge of humanity and history to appreciate how impractical a
suggestion that is. I think we shouldn't waste large amounts of energy
trying to push for impractical things. Now, campaigns to reduce driving
are a whole different thing. That really can work, almost all of us can
drive less, save money and reduce pollution.
James Kunstler advocates a return to pre-industrial society, with a life
expectancy less than half of what we have now. If you are worried about safety,
you ought to oppose such a move.
Cheers,
Susanna
Permalink
JMG Posted 2:14 pm
22 Dec 2008
Nor have I ever heard him call or read anything where he calls for a reduction in life-expectancy.
Funny that you say it's dreadfully unrealistic to expect people to give up autos --- autos are fantastically expensive, polluting, and require copious amounts of hard to access materials to produce, yet in the main are used for trips where bikes and walking are good replacements. It's not unrealistic to note that, in the 20th C., government policy was strongly pro-auto and that it all but killed mass transit and even biking and walking as serious modes of transport in the US. Thus, it's not unrealistic to expect that, when the pro-car policies are reversed, the car's dominance will change dramatically.
The 5% Project
Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 2:58 pm
22 Dec 2008
If we replaced auto traffic with rail, I once calculated, we'd probably get at least 1/27th of the fatalities, that is, you could probably get fatalities down past 1/27th if you upgraded the rail infrastructure.
So autos really are death producing machines. I believe they are the number one (or number two) cause of death of people from around 5 to around 30, again I can't remember the exact details. To me, they are morally indefensible, but politically and culturally, obviously, highly valued. To me that is perhaps a good definition of barbarism; but since we live in the era of homo automobilus, we have to deal with it, and at the very least electrify the beasts so that we don't wind up tearing up the whole planet in order to supply replacements of oil and to try to decrease ghg emissions.
Permalink
sjg Posted 2:44 am
24 Dec 2008
"Based on everything we know right now, no combination of so-called
alternative fuels or energy procedures will allow us to maintain daily
life in the United States the way we have been accustomed to running it
under the regime of oil. No combination of alternative fuels will even
permit us to operate a substantial fraction of the systems we currently
run - in everything from food production and manufacturing to electric
power generation, to skyscraper cities, to the ordinary business of
running a household by making multiple car trips per day, to the
operation of giant centralized schools with their fleets of yellow
busses. We are in trouble.
....
"You can't manufacture metal wind turbines using wind energy technology.
You can't make lead-acid storage batteries for solar electric systems
using any know solar energy systems.
....
"Technology is just the hardware and programming for running that fuel,
but not the fuel itself. And technology is still bound to the laws of
physics and thermodynamics, which both say that you can't get something
for nothing, and there is no such thing as perpetual motion. All of
this is to say that much of our existing technology simply won't work
without petroleum, and without the petroleum ``platform'' to work off,
we may lack the tools to get beyond the current level of fossil-fuel
based technology.
....
"The Rocky Mountain region probably contains more political extremists
and cryptoreligious zealots per capita than any other region of the
country. Its remote valleys and mountain keeps are home to a breed of
of super-individualists who abhor authority and harbor paranoid
fantasies about Jews, blacks, Catholics, foreigners, and the ``New World
Order''. The Long Emergency will stoke their paranoia and make the
places that they control extremely dangerous. Though many fancy
themselves survivalists, they will discover the hard way just how
dependant they actually are on fossil fuels and high technology, and
within a relatively short period of time, an inability to grow food will
drive all but a few out of the mountains.
....
"Adolescence as we have known it could disappear and childhood will
afford fewer special protections. Reestablished traditional divisions
of labor may undo many of the putative victories of the femanist
revolution. In the context of new circumstances, these altered
relations will come to seem normal and inevitable.
These are daunting and even dreadful prospects. If there is any
positive side to the stark changes coming our way, it may be in the
benefits of close communal relations, of having to really work
intimately (and physically) with our neighbors, to be part of an
enterprise that really matters, and to to be fully engaged in meaningful
social enactments instead of being merely entertained to avoid boredom.
The idea of beauty will surely return from its modernist exile, as one
of the few consolations in the years ahead will be our ability to
conciously craft things for reasons other than to shock and astonish. I
believe that cases of what we label "clinical depression" in our effort
to medicalize all aspects of the human condition, will be steeply
reduced, despite universal hardship. When we hear singing at all, we
will hear ourselves, and we will sing with our whole hearts."
He certainly writes glowingly of traditional societies, and he says that
women's liberation will end, and we will have child labor. He seems to
be saying that very little industrial production can be done without
oil. That's somewhat difficult to disprove, since factories are very
price-sensitive and tend to do things the cheapest way, whatever that
is. Here's a little news item that suggests it can be done:
http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/chris-dannen/tech-watch/g ...
He tries to argue that renewable technologies are like a perpetual
motion machine, they get something for nothing. This is utter hogwash.
Our solar panels replaced the embodied energy of their manufacture
probably less than a year after we installed them. I've got a study
that showed solar panels in Holland replace their embodied energy in 2
years, and we have much more sunlight. The power contained in sunlight
striking the Earth in a year is about 7000 times as great as energy
content of all the fuel and electricity consumed in 2005. Admittedly,
solar power is a bit more expensive than power from coal. Comparing
retail prices, it seems to be about a factor of 3. I don't think
spending three times as much for electricity would bring about the end
of the world as we know it. Wind is even cheaper. And I think if solar
power can run an automobile assembly line, it ought to be capable of
powering a wind-generator plant.
He's got this strange idea of the entire West chock full of bigots,
without a farmer or rancher to be found.
The final quote suggests the author needs more human contact and
meaningful work. Since he is lonely, bored and depressed, he thinks all
modern people are lonely, bored and depressed.
He is really looking forward to the future he predicts. Most of us work at jobs
that we consider meaningful, we are not professional couch potatoes.
It's amusing how he confuses modern art with modern technology. He must
have no exposure to the myriad artists and craft-people alive in the
world today who are not modernist. It is clear that he believes that we
won't have any audio recordings made or used in the future, and that
implies a very drastic loss of technology on all levels. He simply says
nothing about life expectancy.
Permalink
Jon Rynn Posted 3:31 am
24 Dec 2008
What he mostly successfully did in "long emergency" was ask the question, "What happens if oil goes away?". It's an interesting and important question that not many writers have asked. He's never liked suburbia, to put it mildly, and you should take a look at "geography of nowhere" for a less apocalyptic view, but there is certainly reason to believe that suburbia encourages depression and loneliness.
So he's certainly got some problematic reasoning, but I think if you look at the 10 resolutions in this post, they're pretty reasonable.
Permalink
sjg Posted 6:25 am
24 Dec 2008
list actions that I personally can take. It is
more directed at governments. Here is my own list
from May 2008
How to prepare for peak oil and global warming:
0) Have fewer children
The lower the global population, the better off we will be,
especially in developing nations. Have fewer children than
you think you can afford, because rough economic times are coming.
1) Conserve energy
a Drive less, bike more, get a hybrid car (mine gets 51mpg).
b Live in efficient housing (better insulated, compact, solar heated)
power your house with renewable electricity (wind, solar)
c Eat less energy intensive food, home grown, local, organic, no
meat or dairy from CAFOs, no bottled water. Cook at home.
d Avoid wasteful consumerism, especially bulky products shipped
long distances. Buy durable products and repair them.
e Recycle glass, metal, plastic and paper. Compost organic waste.
Conserve water.
2) Build social networks
a Meet local farmers and ranchers and patronize them.
b Befriend your neighbors, trade skills and food with them.
c Join local organizations that encourage sustainable practices -
public transit, food and utility assistance for the poor,
and job training programs to ease economic changes.
d Vote for politicians who comprehend the major issues of
overpopulation, peak oil and global warming and support
meaningful action.
3) Prepare for difficult economic times
a Save as much money as possible, pay off all debts.
b Invest in land as well as US and international stocks and bonds.
c Invest in efficient housing and transportation.
d Develop skills that don't depend on the global economy (like
construction, sewing, gardening, hunting, repair services).
As you can tell, my list is for non-vegetarian
human beings who live in a low enough population
density that hunting is reasonable. Rural areas
like ours also require personal transportation,
because there are not enough people to support
public transportation. I drive to work, in
support of goal 3, and I am going to keep doing
that as long as possible, but I've cut down the
fuel devoted to driving as much as possible. I
know that I have no ability to predict the future.
But all the things on this list are fine to do no
matter what. Some people think that the stock
market is down for good, we have entered a new
economic era and all economic growth will end. I
doubt this, which is why I still invest, but I
have invested in a solar house an hybrid car too.
If this downturn is comparable to the great
depression, I'll be fine.
Cheers,
Susanna
Permalink
hapa Posted 7:18 am
24 Dec 2008
Permalink
VoorTrekker Posted 8:57 am
25 Dec 2008
Permalink
VoorTrekker Posted 9:12 am
25 Dec 2008
Permalink