<DrumBeat: March 14, 2007 The Oil Drum Energize America, DailyKos and Congress - and now The Oil Drum>

119 comments on The Cassandra of Toledo: A Requiem For Mitigation

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toilforoil on March 14, 2007 - 8:52pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Are you mixing amphetamines with your marijuana? Paranoid and speedy at the same time.

Relax.

There's plenty of time to transition to a sustainable food production system. In the meantime, the importance of agriculture to the US economy will ensure it's continued access to the small percentage of overall oil/gas consumption that it uses to actually produce and distribute food. Of course the amount needed to produce and distribute real food, as opposed to say, Cheeze Whiz, is even smaller.

The good professor cited above appears to miss at least one important point. And that is that the important part of the peak oil event, declining eroi, has been underway for sometime, has already driven up the price of liquid fuel as the marginal production cost per barrel has increased, and that fuel saving adjustments are already being made in the economy.

Even as the US economy slows, as evidenced in declining freight transportation, the number of containers transported by rail is increasing. This process will continue and eventually the fuel savings from this change alone will keep the current food production model humming.

Mind you, slowly and inexorably the permaculture system will come to dominate food production. it will be a market driven, and, sooner or later, public policy supported, process. What you and others of the same frame of mind seem intent on not understanding is that the increase in food production over the past century was wealth driven and is not dependent on fossil fuels. The adoption of fossil energy inputs was a market, and public policy, driven process. With the fossil fuel resource declining, the market, and public policy, will change tacks. The relevant social question has to do with the distribution of wealth. But make no mistake, people will hitchhike and move in with others, before they forego food.

Elsewhere, the number of vacant houses in tax arrears will increase. Painful, yes. But not without opportunity for scavengers, urban farmers and so on. The density per household will increase. As will the density per passenger vehicle, as more cars sit idle in driveways or in used car lots.

In general, people are no where near as stupid, or as selfish, as you appear to think.

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The Chimp Who Can Drive on March 14, 2007 - 10:24pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

people are no where near as stupid, or as selfish, as you appear to think

Do the words "Blackwater", "Halliburton" and "the Bush administration" ring a bell for you? Apparently not.

If your statement were based an a realistic appraisal of the facts - instead of wishful thinking - we would not be in the situation we are in now. Nor would Bush have been elected (twice), nor would the the U.S. have invaded Iraq or launched a global, perpetual war for oil .. . I could go on but hopefully you get the point.

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toilforoil on March 15, 2007 - 5:16pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

It should not be forgotten that the situation the US (and not only the US) is in now has been made possible by rising, pre-peak oil production/consumption. Post-peak, the legitimacy of the current regime faces erosion. Some can scamper away in fear of the results of this loss of legitimacy. The brave will stand and fight for a better way of doing things.

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ANewLand on March 15, 2007 - 12:52am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

I do agree that the people post-peak will have their mush and gruel and occasional greens. To suggest this will be a pleasure is naive.

What you may consider permaculture is more dependent on fossil fuel imputs then 'conventionial' aggriculture for inter- and intrafarm transport of compost, manure, rock phosphate, calcium, etc. This stuff is now carted around the world for the convenience and pleasure of the organic consumer.

Actual localized bioregional agriculture does not in fact exist in the United States and though it might use less fuel, it is much more dependent on physical labor, recycled human wastes, and especially solar and water access that is not available in dense cities and suburbs.

You believe that folks will simply 'change tacks' That is virutally impossible in places like Phoenix Arizona, Denver Colorado, or Long Island New York where rich bottomlands do not exist. People would need to migrate to the farmlands to create a permaculture paradise. Would the farmer like this? Probably not. Land redistribution is usually resisted by landowners and has usually led to riot, revolution, fascist takeover.

Peter

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daniel morris on March 15, 2007 - 1:45am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Continually watching life get poorer for ones self, and more emotionally for ones children, is hard to take. One the other hand, I could live on a tenth the wealth I now have. Yeah, very little health care, no long trips, lots of vegetables and little meat - oh well - what a sacrifice. Perhaps our greatest pleasures will once again be time and conversation with the ones we love. It is genetically programmed to be that way, even if the distractions and ego trips of modern society seem to suggest otherwise. Unless we decide to kill each other, a not unlikely outcome to resource depletion, I have no doubt we can live on much less energy than Americans currently do.

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Bytesmiths on March 15, 2007 - 4:04pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

What you may consider permaculture is more dependent on fossil fuel imputs then 'conventionial' aggriculture...

(You can always tell when someone knows what they're saying about "Permaculture" when they capitalize it -- it's a registered trade mark, and thus, a proper noun. Trade-marking was done, not to make money, but to rule out people saying things like "what you may consider" in regard to Permaculture. If you have an opinion about Permaculture and have not earned at least a Permaculture Design Certificate, please refer to "organic farming" or anything else instead.)

Have you actually read Mollison or Holmgren? I didn't think so!

Permaculture is not at all dependent on fossil fuel, although the wise investment of non-renewable resources is not ruled out.

Before you start to argue, let me note that I am a Permaculture Instructor, and have studied under David Holmgren.

:::: Jan Steinman, Communication Steward, EcoReality http://www.EcoReality.org ::::

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toilforoil on March 15, 2007 - 5:34pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

You don't appear to know how to cook. Onions, garlic, basil, wine vinegar, vegetable oil, chicken stock, a few ounces of meat, canned tomatoes, rutabaga, parsnip, lentils, a bit of cabbage, water, salt, and pepper made a great soup for my grandma in the 19th century, my folks in the twentieth, me now, and will be easily assembled five centuries from now, by my descendants, assuming they don't move to another part of the world where substitutes would be made.

One third of meals in the US today are fast-food take out, mostly tasteless reformulated industrial corn, sandwiched between nutrient deficient processed flour. One in five meals is eaten in the car, usually on the go.

Peak oil. Bring it on.

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desiderata on March 16, 2007 - 12:18am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

7% of caloric intake is from pop. Corn sweetner is our largest single source of calories.

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119 comments on The Cassandra of Toledo: A Requiem For Mitigation

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