Megan Quinn Bachman
11/2/2008 9:00am

“The Long Dark Night Ahead”

There was intention of having the 5th Peak Oil Conference over the Halloween Weekend. Halloween is a time on the calendar that is the ending of a year’s cycle – a beginning to winter and all that it signifies. The financial melt-down starting this summer could be understood as the end of Globalization. As of this moment, shipping cargotainers used to transport products from Asia to the United States are empty and sitting idly at docks on the East and West Coasts. The news is reporting that 25% of Chinese shipping businesses are bankrupt. A working definition of “crisis” is when “The past has the least hold on the present – and when the present has great affect on the future”.

The twin crises now happening are energy (Peaking of the world’s oil production/availability) and climate change. The current ideas surrounding “Sustainability” may not solve our problems since sustainability involves doing things that meets our current and future needs. This will prove impossible due to the role that petroleum had played in creating our lifestyles. We can’t maintain our present way of life with the lifestyles we now enjoy and have to be dramatically reduced. One gallon of gasoline equals approximately 6 weeks of steady human labor. This liquid energy is responsible for the greatest majority of goods and services provided to the world and the gasoline is running out – no drop-in replacement in sight. We all must share in the decline that must come. For anyone to try to improve his condition means that those resources will be taken from another; therefore continuing the inequity which must lead to suffering and violence.

During this declining process, we can expect traditional social services to be destroyed with the collapse. We can presently see the collapse of the Industrial Capitalism model as we saw the collapse of the Industrial Socialist model – both failed economic systems.

Communities, by design share risks among members and therefore share opportunities and skills. Strong communities keep people from turning on each other for survival. Resilient communities will have a foundation of wealth based upon needs rather than consumption. Since money is a symbol of wealth, strong communities should have less wealth and greater cooperation among members to meet member needs. Credit Unions, Community Supported Agriculture are two examples of community wealth. The investment in communities will be made in people (with skills development and capacity building) and habitat. To rebuild the infrastructure, people with skills will be needed. Money cannot rebuild infrastructure at this time since the loaning of money is under tremendous constraint. It will soon be apparent that the present monetary system will be ill-equipped to address the challenges related to Peak Oil. The monetary system of the 1930’s was also ill equipped to handle the challenges of the Great Depression.

The western society has evolved from a respect/reverence toward Wisdom to Knowledge to Information. The information contained in the figures of the nation’s Gross National Product (GNP) does not count the negatives happening within the nation. Jails, Court Systems, Police and Drug Abuse centers all add to the numbers in the GNP. Another scale determining national wealth – the GPI (General Progress Indicator?) could be used to gauge national wealth.

There is plenty of advertising on the media about purchasing and supporting “green” but not much is being presented about having “green” agriculture. Presently, the industrial agricultural model being used in the U.S. uses around 60 (?) calories to produce 1 (?) calorie of food.

We are seeing a birth of a new way of life for the world. With natural birth, the mother experiences great pain during the process – it should not be any different with the process that everyone is finding themselves in. There is much news about the political campaigns – much talk about Republicans and Democrats. Perhaps there should be the start of a new National Party – the Community Party. A political party entirely grass-roots, local in character and not beholding to foreign influence.


Michael Brownlee
11/2/2008 10:00am
http://www.transitioncolorado.ning.com

Transition as a Movement

Many communities in the United States are finding their positions at the end of a very fragile supply chain. Disruptions in energy, food and medical supplies can easily devastate communities in very short periods of time. With the “perfect storm” (Peak Oil, Climate Change and Economic Collapse), the question becomes how do we create communities that will allow us to survive and increase our quality of life. We can see that traditional communities are ill-prepared to address these problems or find solutions in traditional manners. This summer, we find that the world’s economy has literally hit the wall. The questions become how do we make a graceful and ethical decent?

This may prove to be the transition from our species as adolescents to our species as adults. Now is the time to pause, ponder about our present course and plan our transition to whatever is going to come. As everyone understands, it takes inexpensive energy to maintain current levels of lifestyles. As we shift away from petroleum energy (something that must happen based upon oil production figures), we have a chance to recreate the communities we want to live in. Relocalize is the term being used – everything on the local level first. Part of any relocalization plan should include Food, Energy and Goods/Services. Indicators of relocalization advancement could include: Food being produced locally, the number of businesses servicing the locality, building materials being manufactured locally, employment in local businesses for supplying local needs.

The most exciting movement world wide concerning relocalization is “Transition Towns”. Starting in Great Britain, towns have organized around its citizens, developed a new locally-based economy, created their own arts centers and became their own community leaders. Bob Hopkins, a community college instructor at Kinsale Further Education College, developed a project for his students that would allow them to study and propose a plan that a community could use to advance themselves. The student project “Kinsale 2021 V.1 2005 was proposed by the students, adopted by the citizens of Totnes, Ireland which lead to a type of community transformation. The project allows replication to any community wanting their own transformation. Michael Brownlee represents Transition Towns, Bolder Colorado in the U.S. There are presently over 900 Transition Towns in the world and now just coming to the U.S.

Since we can expect less energy and less money, Transition Towns is acting on developing plans for community rebuilding of local economies, agricultural systems, self-reliance and advancement of the arts. The Transition Town processes include: 1. Form groups of interested people, 2. Raise Awareness, 3. Lay a collaborative foundation among other groups, 4. Officially start the campaign 5. Form working task groups 6. Explore all ideas involving creative processes 7. Visually imagine projects 8. Facilitate re-skilling of members 9. Build bridges and work with governmental officials 10. Engage the elderly 11. Do not provide for constraints as projects evolve 12. Actually create the energy decent action plan.

It works because it is rooted in a type of Permaculture philosophy, exists in a positive visioning perspective, trusts people to imagine and decide what is best, enables sharing of resources and ideas, is a grass-roots oriented activity, provides a replicable model for others to follow, is scalable to size, develops synergy among members, provides for an optimism for members.


Richard Heinberg
11/2/2008 11:00am

Powering Down via Webcast with WebEX

The focus of this presentation will be to suggest strategic thinking on the critically points affecting us today. It will be made clear by the International Energy Agency that the world has peaked in Oil production in July, 2008 – Natural Gas and Coal are not that far behind according to best analysis. Russia, the largest Non-OPEC country presently is in oil production decline. According to The Oil Drum (www.theoldrum.com) all liquid fuels peaked in 2008. With the declining U.S. dollar, we still are experiencing tighter supplies – supply levels of petroleum have not changed. Gasoline prices are low because of demand destruction. With gasoline prices low, oil companies cannot justify drilling in new areas because of the return of their investments. The U.S. government can open up ANWAR to drillers but they will not drill because there is no money in it.

With the present demand for petroleum, the world needs 1 new Saudi Arabian oil field to be discovered every 18 months and that is not happening. The quantities of oil now being found are significantly less and in harder to get areas guaranteeing that the energy will be more expensive. We may have petroleum to use but will General Motors and Ford be around to make the cars to use them? Who wants to invest $100/bbl in a process that would only bring $60/bbl?

The consequences of this will be severe. We will see the end of affordable airplane travel. Already the CEO of Boeing is concerned about his organization in light of these energy costs and future energy projections (Peak Oil). Some are saying that coal is our future for cars – liquefied coal can be used in internal combustion engines. But that process uses tremendous amounts of water which is scarce and becoming scarcer. Hydrogen energy foundations have been taken off the table of discussion because of Energy Returned on Energy Invested – Hydrogen has been taken off the table of discussion because it is a poor deal.

With the current Climate Change process affecting the globe and the shortages of Petroleum with declining monetary systems, the only answer for people is to power down and to power down now. Peak Oil will represent the end of the Economic World as we know it. This is already being understood since traditional ways of doing business is no longer working. This crisis will be a great motivator similar to what was experienced with Cuba, The Great Depression and World War II. Resilient communities would be well positioned to absorb the shocks that must come. The time to develop community plans must come now.

The need today is not in more industrial training – the foundation of the modern industrial society is being deprived of the very thing that it needs – energy. Economies should be redesigned to a steady-state mode. Progress and wealth need to be redefined. Perhaps to turn ourselves away from the consumer society, advertising should be outlawed. We see that corporations are being thrown off balance with current conditions. We can expect a receptive audience to our ideas, prognostications and solutions since nothing else is working. Form working groups, work with organizations, ask for participation, coordinate with disaster relief organizations, create and communicate coherent plans, obtain funding, implement plans, expand plans and share plans with others. We’re all in this one together and need each other.

Some of the important first steps would include: FOOD: Move away from food supplies that rely on fossil fuels – instead develop local agricultural systems and supply networks. ELECTRICITY: Rebuild the national electric grid to accommodate renewable energy generator resources. RETROFIT: existing building to greater energy conservation standards. TRANSPORT: Rebuild rail and public transportation systems.

END OF CONFERENCE