2005 Series 3 Number 6 p 22
Can Industrial Civilization Survive the Age of Oil.
Andrew AD Clarke (editor of the Proceedings at the time) wrote this six-age essay about the impending decline of fossil fuel supplies and the discontinuity that would entail. The author provided quite a bit of detail about production and use of the fossil fuels over the last century and a half. The author was particularly concerned about the arrival of Peak Oil, but was unaware that unconventional oil sources were about to extend the life of the industry considerably. Indeed, the author thought Canada’s bitumen resources would not play a major role in worldwide supplies, but they are now doing so, as are supplies from offshore and oilshales.
The author touched briefly and various renewable energy sources, hydrogen, and on nuclear energy.
The author concluded with two questions and several responses.
- How can the world’s dwindling energy supplies be fairly distributed?
- In the absence of a practical alternative to oil, in particular, and facing civilizational collapse as a result, what new political/economic order could emerge to bring civilization to a steady state?
The author proposed no country ought to produce oil above its current depletion rate, each importing country ought to reduce its imports to the current global depletion rate, and there should be international agreement on categories of oil.
[Of course, oil is distributed in markets, not fairly. Whoever has the money to get what he/she needs will get as much as he/she desires. Ed.]
Link to | Can Industrial Civilization Survive the Age of Oil.
Leave a Reply