Oil hits record above $US99
ALT TV/Fleet FM Breakfast News Comment
Oil hits record above $US99
Oil has soared to record highs, drawing within a hair's breadth of the $US100 milestone as the US dollar plumbed new lows and the onset of cold US weather stirred anxiety over winter supplies. We are going to have to start thinking about a world where oil is $100 per barrel PLUS, the rising middle classes in China and India want their Western lifestyle whether we like it or not, add to this the peak oil factors and we have a 19th century technology that has no future in the 21st. The absolute denial we seem to have on this issue is only matched by our denial on global warming, and when I say denial, I don’t mean ‘awareness’ – everyone is ‘aware’ of the issues, we refuse to do anything about it, we have no government who will stand up and make the calls necessary to tackle our oil addiction, so dig deeper into those pockets. I love the fact I don’t own a car.
posted by Bomber @ 6:29 am
6 comments
6 Comments:
No you dont you use Taxis and Busses ARRRRRR dont they use oil.
mass transport is a much better use of our oil - and I only use a taxi or a bus maybe once a week?
ah well..the V8-gas-guzzling-squandering-fossil fuels circus is coming to a town mear you soon. so you can drive down in your gas guzzling V8 and watch idiots with more money than brains drive around and around and around and around and around in circles for 2 or 3 days - fiddlin while rome burns - fuckin greedy dinosaurs the lot of them.
yeah and i cant wait,go the v8's!
Bomber, here are some really good resources you may or may not know about.
http://www.theoildrum.com/
A lot of good discussions in here from many different points of view.
http://www.financialarmageddon.com/
Finance bores me a little, but a lot of good stuff surrounding the financial system unwinding. (Tightly US focused, but still worth reading).
http://www.kunstler.com/
Kunstler's thoughtful musings pull different strands of the drama together eloquently. Especially check out Clusterfuck Nation a little way down the page. It's an essential weekly read...
So yeah, back on topic - I think we are witnessing the slow-motion train wreck of the unwinding of 'continual growth capitalism'. The energy requirements of the developed nations *WILL NOT* be met in the future.
There is an oft-repeated analysis that a barrel of oil is equivalent to 25,000 man hours of labour. So in terms of substitutes, there are none that match fossil fuels for the quantity of energy that can be tapped. (I can't even be bothered anticipating objections by people to this point. Ok I will, nuclear is of course energy-rich, but uranium is a finite resource and plants cost $US billions to bring online).
This is basically the end of cheap energy.
It will simply become more and more unaffordable, with the consequent flow-on to such things as transported food prices, and all non-muscle-powered methods of personal transportation. Also, not a lot of people realise that synthetic fertiliser is a petroleum product.
The developed nations are pretty much facing a 'world of shit', and we are on the cusp of it right now.
Probably around the middle of next year, the Joe Six-Packs are gonna start going "what is this? What's happening here? Why is there a crisis all of a sudden?"...
Wow I got a bit off topic really. Petrol prices:
Driving to work? At what point does it become unsustainable.
Mass transit? The price will surely rise to cover fuel costs. Capacity issues with increased demand.
Food? Transported by trucks.
Way-of-life upheaval? Probably.
Chaos? Maybe, if a swag of lower-means workers cannot realistically transport themselves to work.
Economic recession? Quite possibly.
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