I agree, we have to think in "food chains" of companies. If I was Richard Rainwater, I would purchase a whole ecology around wind power, and co-locate them. A construction company. A blade and turbine manufacturer. Fields for bio diesel. Etc. Such an ecology could survive (or still have growth) while the rest of the economy declines. It might not be profitable at first, but in true OPEC fashion, when you are the last provider standing, you can name the price.

But I don't think you have to be a billionaire to form the relationships needed post peak. Some are very close to existing. A coal power plant could help pay to electrify the rail lines from the mine to the coal plant. The coal plant could work with local farmers coop's to implement a B20 program for the mine machinery in exchange for a non-interruptible contract on the grain silo's (or something like that).

Hospital administration could work to get a combined heat and power plant sited near the hospital. I am sure there are many ways. It just needs work and effort that was not needed before.

In the "collapse Gap" Orlov points out that the Soviet Industries that best survived the collapse were those that had created mini-economies. They were mostly self sufficient.

In my own reading of annual reports of companies that provide nat gas related drilling products, those that are vertically integrated are better surviving the high prices of steel and other commodities.

Excellent, NZ. The part about Murphy's Law is brilliant.

Though, strictly speaking, civilization is not a stable complex system. Examples of stable, self-organized complex systems would be the human body, or a tribe of humans.

Civilization is an unstable chaotic system. Its instability is continually and increasingly shored-up through the taking of resources outside of civilization, through the appropriation of resources not yet under human domination and exploitation. First we dominated the plants and animals for food production. Then the natural resources like trees for wood. Then the minerals and ores, and later fossil fuels. And all along the way, we were attempting to exploit each other.

The cacophony of civilization is chaos incarnate. It is inherently unstable and will collapse in a rather magnificent and decimating way.

An understanding of complex systems will be useful in rebuilding a self-organized and stable society post-collapse. This will be a neat magic trick, given that people currently don't understand self-organized complexity while we're still all awash in cheap energy.

Why don't we understand complex systems? Here is only a partial answer which is, in and of itself, complex.
1. Vanity. Chaos and complexity stand in stark defiance to (a) the illusion of human control and (b) the illusion of human independence from the system in which we reside.

2. Being overwhelmed. Understanding chaos and complexity requires a great deal of time to take long looks into the bowels of the universe. Time which we don't have, because (a) we're too busy addressing current crises created by our previous linear and incomplete "solutions" and (b) too tired after the 8-, 10-, and 12-hour workdays during which we implement the solutions which don't work.

3. Functional isolation. On many levels, the cohesion of civilization is an illusion, because the cohesion is not self-organized along evolved tribal lines of family, shared environments, or shared experiences. We lack connection with our fellow humans and with the living environments around us. If you live in a metropolitan area, what I call an ecological dead zone, there are almost no opportunities to connect with other non-human living things besides disease vectors like birds, rodents, and insects. The structure of civilization is held together by (a) increasing flows of food, resources, and increasingly cheaper energy, (b) the illusion of money, and (c) incomplete social relationships and distractions a.k.a. "synthetic entertainment and plastic crap".

If I weren't too tired and overwhelmed myself, I would now flesh this out and begin to string this unstable chaotic system together through our illusions and our environmental exploitation. Maybe later. For now, though, maybe this is enough for other complex system thinkers to chew on. :)