Peak Oil Media: Matt Simmons gets more pessimistic on CNBC, Heinberg, and others...
Posted by Prof. Goose on July 13, 2008 - 7:00pm
Topic: Demand/Consumption
Tags: andre angelantoni, david bell, janaia donaldson, kris can, matthew simmons, original, peak oil, peak oil media, phil hart, richard heinberg [list all tags]
Under the fold, more from Richard Heinberg with a great review of accelerating events, Phil Hart talks peak oil on Aussie TV, KrisCan interviews Andre Angelantoni about post-peak life, and David Bell of ASPO-Oz appears on Bloomberg.
An interview with TOD's own Phil Hart on ABC Stateline TV in Victoria (Australia).
KrisCan speaks with Andre Angelantoni (you might recognize him as aangel!) at San Francisco's hybrid and electric car service Luscious Garage where they chat about how to prepare for life after Peak Oil. (2 parts)
David Bell, convenor at the Australian Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas, talks with Bloomberg's Bernard Lo from Sydney about the outlook for crude oil supply and demand, and the impact of rising prices on business.
Finally here's a link to a World Energy Television (an energy industry site, I think) has a long interview with Matt Simmons: http://www.worldenergysource.com/wetv/energycrisis/. It's not embeddable, so you have to slog over there yourself.
Who wouldn't get doomerish reading the articles on this website - the amount of fear mongering and lack of positive imput is a tragedy. Peak oil by nature is a concept only - of course gasoline is going to run out but the attitude with which you approach it can make a huge difference. The general attitude here is depressing if not condesending, and is continuely in a state of proving itself rather then researching solutions and showing people how to live a natural lifestyle.
Fearmongering? Lack of positive input?
So, no, we shouldn't attempt to understand the scope of the problems we face so that we can then understand which set of band-aids to attempt to apply?
Surely you are joking.
Let's triage the patient without diagnosing the problem! What would you do if you walked into a hospital near death and was told "Sir, you have blood all over you, here's a band-aid for that itty bitty cut on your forehead." You would likely not recover from your wounds.
If you haven't looked around lately and seen what is going on in the world, that is exactly the approach you are advocating.
We offer up hopeful, large scale solutions around here all of the time. We just embrace them as the panaceas that they are not, neither do we embrace individual and government inaction and complacency. Kinda different from your standard media fare, eh?
The general attitude here is clinical and empirical with a graceful touch of concern for humanity thrown in for flavor. It is not condescending: it is educated. It is critical. It is academic. And it is certainly not for everyone.
I take no joy in the success of this site, nor do I take joy in the massive resource inflation we are witnessing--other than that it may be the one thing that could spur alternative fuel and method development. I really want the community writ large to be wrong about all of this. I beg for it every single day, sir.
That's why we started this site: to learn as much as we could, to assemble as much knowledge as we could, in an empirical caring way, and to try to facilitate conversations about these complex, nasty problems.
The people here have learned the facts, and we don't sugar coat them. Frankly, I am immensely proud of this community and its approach to the real problems we face. There are a lot of smart people here thinking hard about what's coming.
Someone has to talk about it, someone needs to do the hard thinking, and someone needs to worry about the effects, especially on those who have less of a voice in our society--the poor, the indigent, the folks who are going to bear the brunt of this first wave of transition. I can't speak for others, but that's why I do this.
I am in a relatively safe seat to watch all of this go down--at least in the early innings. However, ask those increasingly hungry people in Pakistan how they are feeling right about now about ethanol. Ask the people who won't have heat this winter what they think of the resource premium.
This is a human tragedy already.
Prof: Congrats on a great site. I realize what the first poster said is very unpopular, however I feel he made a good point. TOD is unlikely to fix the planet-possibly the focus could shift more towards opportunity rather than defeatism. Still a great site-just a minor suggestion, not a criticism.
None of us aspire to "fix the planet." No single person, website, or entity for that matter could do so.
However, every single person we educate about our energy situation is another person who has the choice to a) learn, b) prepare according to their own perceptions, and c) educate others.
Do you really think that I keep harping on all of you to spread this site around for my own ego or personal gain? Hell no. It's about facilitating education and conversation for as many as we can.
You see, that's what many do not get: TOD is not about defeatism, instead, TOD is already about opportunity! The opportunity to facilitate as many people as possible making a difference through nontraditional and traditional means.
It needs to happen. The more people learn, the better off we will be. It's that simple.
I would rate Prof. Goose up, but the arrows aren't working.
Prof. Goose 2008!
Oh p*** off those silly arrows, they are just being used here to show agree/disagree, in contravention of their declared purpose! Just reading the posts takes enough time without getting into gradings.
Amen.
The CNBC video is a prime example of the juxtaposition of peoples time horizons and boundaries. Simmons eloquently outlined the bigger picture of that society is facing dramatic institutional and structural change, and then the conversation was brought directly back to short term profits. June highs mean july lows, etc.
The reason there is no international, national, or regional body looking at WIDE boundary SYSTEMS analysis is that there is no money in it. If the markets are designed to produce profits measured in dollars, how will the markets solve problems of the global commons? How can the viewers/guests on CNBC even begin to analyze the depth of this problem beyond how higher oil prices affect their portfolio allocations? There will come a day when a 'paradigm allocation' will leapfrog modern financial portfolio allocation. Thats why the quizzical looks on those guests faces - energy and ecology are not topics ingrained in most traders pattern recognition banks.
I can only hope that our next crop of national leaders surround themselves by wide bounary thinkers - to surround themselves by the current crop of salespeople will lessen our chances dramatically.
And I agree with PG - this is difficult to do - to present facts about the situation as best as possible while remaining positive. What if the situation is worse than even some of the pessimists predict? The sooner we close off avenues that are dead ends, the better we can save high quality resources.
Well done by Matt Simmons.
Agreed. It's very difficult to convey the complexity of the peak-oil issue in a venue like CNBC's "Fast Money", which thrives on 30-second sound bites, whereas comprehending the reality of our energy predicament takes weeks or months of reading and study to sink in. Matt Simmons has been able to penetrate the mass-media "white noise" about as well as anyone...
At least half my research time (which isn't much) is spent here, asking simple questions on a subject that's a little daunting afterall - indeed, it seems a heck of lot more urgent to my kid's immediate future than recent discussions on climate change.
For the most part, I've been delighted with the replies here, which are often in great detail. And I do agree with you, Robin on the rating thing TOD is trialling and would rather see a "snap-to" function somewhere, so I can easily find any responses to my Average Joe questions (some stories generate 400+ comments).
Regards, Matt B
PS. Does anyone think buying a cheap, road-worthy motorbike from China at the moment is a bad thing? (Passed my learner's last week).
Hi Joe,
Just thought I'd say Hi, though it's OT. I'm glad to see you here and asking questions.
My bias on motorized bikes is that of people I've known personally, I've never known a motor-biker who was not involved in a serious crash. But that's just my own observation. Anyway, do be careful.
Giddaye Aniya,
You sound like my mum, my sister, my wife (and her mum and sister), neighbours wives and all the ladies at the local tennis courts!
:+)
I live in an area where backstreets and 40 to 50 km/hr limits abound. To that end, I work from home, so the licence is mainly for local errands. And I'm 42, so should have a bit of sense out there... Besides, if current trends continue, ten years from now cars and trucks may be few and far between (which may not be a bad thing).
Regards, Matt B
PS. Testing for their motorbike license last week (ten in our group) were: Dad and I, two ladies in their early sixties, one lass mid-twenties, another mid-thirties, a fellow my age, another slightly younger and two 18-year-old lads. Guess which two failed the prac test? Hint: Young male testosterone!
Good question Joe. Don't buy Chinese anything by the way. Buy local. It is dangerous to ride motorcycles but it has provided me with a lucrative living for a long time. I am a physician who works in the operating room and the bulk of our organ donors are young male motorcycle riders so if more people buy cycles and motorbikes we will have a lot more hearts and kidneys and livers for the market. Interestingly not that many victims are bicyclists and our real growth business seems to be bullet bikers. Get a bicycle Joe and keep your organs for your own use.
My brother notes that in his town they're unofficially called "donorcycles". Good to keep in mind.
The real danger, of course, is the dang cars that'll kill you. I had an old italian motorcycle in my teen years and by staying away from traffic, never had even a close call. I'm actively looking to buy one in the 125-250cc range just to park in the garage for future use during gasoline scarcity... then I'd look forward to rationing.
The problem with motorcycles is cars.
Greenish, my experiences exactly.
As a young man I owned a motorcycle in a rural area and also never had even a close call. When I moved to the big city, I gave it up because car drivers just didn't pay attention (and this was BEFORE cellphones!).
And I too am shopping for a simple 4-stroke bike to store away till most of the cars are off the streets...
Errol in Miami
Hi Joe,
Caveat - I'm a cyclist not a motorbiker but have lots of friends who also ride motorbikes and scooters in and around London and on race tracks. First i would say get yourself some good gear, when (not if) you come off then jeans just get cut through immediately and so does your skin, don't skimp on a helmet how much is your head worth? Some of my friends have come off at well over 100 mph and just got up because they were wearing good kit and didn't hit anything. Next, look ahead and ride defensively, if a car hits you it will hurt you more and it doesn't matter if it's not your fault it still hurts. Try and watch out for parked cars opening their doors without looking.
Good luck.
Hey joe. I ride a Lifan 200 cc enduro. It's a cheap chinese knockof of a honda bike. They are NOT low maintenance. The chinese bikes are constantly in need of low-level repairs, however, at least in the case of a lifan, the engines and transmissions are good, and the bike gets 80+mpg.
I have wrecked it many times off-road, but never had a problem on-road, nor have almost any of my many friends that ride. Frankly, most of the bike wrecks are horsepower on the brain rather than inherent to motorcycles. Yes, if you drive at 120mph, you gonna die. But how many reasonable car drivers do you know that have never wrecked? How do the motorcycle statistics compare to say... ferraris driven by 22 year olds? I'd be a little hesitant to ride much in dense traffic, having tried that for a while before.
Matt:
It's a bad thing if it's a two-stroke: loud and smelly, two-strokes are highly polluting!
Also, be sure to seek out and and take a training class before becoming a regular rider, even (especially) if it means taking a class intended for "real" motorcycles. Two-wheeled motorized vehicles have some counter-intuitive characteristics, which mean that your years of driving cars and bicycles are likely to cause you to do exactly the wrong things! Motorcycle training classes are easy and enjoyable and will give you a new set of motor-skills that are likely to save your life...
Larry
In general I'd say yes it's a bad thing.
Spend a little bit more for a Honda, Yamaha, or Suzuki (we could add Vespa and Aprila to the list if you are considering a scooter) even if it means buying a used bike rather than new, and you won't have to worry about build quality, reliability, or parts availability issues and the bike will hold it's resale value much better, plus if it already has a scratch or two you won't cry so much the first time you drop it, which most new riders do sometime in the first year or so. There are buckets full of low mileage nearly new bikes out there, the best value and you'll have lots of choice.
Things not to "try at home", shows a lot about what wearing all the gear will let you walk away from...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8oGW8c2vTA&feature=related
and just plain fun too :-)
Congrats and enjoy the ride!
Ride safe!
Thanks John (and to all others above). I very much appreciate the advice.
Perhaps I'll regret it, but...
Bought the Chinese bike this morning; 150cc, $2,490(Aus) ride away. The thinking; twelve months of 40, 50, 60km/hr backstreets, off-peak, for local errands only, upgrade to a brand-name bike after that. Petrol saved by this time next year (versus not using the Aussie-built VY); 220 litres, or around $340(Aus) - based on a mere 2000km.
I promise to be careful.
Regards, Matt B
Now, I'm off to arrange those bunches of flowers I just picked up for the wife...
Buying a Motorcycle? Thats a great idea... Indian and Chinese Motorbikes are strong, ruff-&-tuff, and snappy. An average 200cc bike will easily give a 150+ miles per gallon. I suggest "Pulsar DTSi 200"
GauharJK,
150+ mpg is a bit much I think. A 200 cc bike would do somewhere between 50-75 mpg.
Still much better than the average car, but not that good.
btw, a normal car that does better than 50 mpg can be bought now. No hybrid, just an ordinary ICE.
This one does somewhere between 50mpg and 60mpg. The secret is: It weights only 720 kg and has a 1 liter 3 cylinder engine.
Thats very interesting... :) Cars are very important for the way of life to continue in some way. My parents are getting old, and they may not be able to drive a two-wheeler in a decade.
Generally, my 125cc bike (Bajaj XCD 125) gives a mileage of about 85 kilometers per liter, so I believe a 200cc bike would give arund 60 kmpl.
What arrows? Oh, THOSE arrows... I filter them out. Firefox + AdBlockPlus + AdBlockPlus Element Hider. Then add this element hiding rule that some other kind TODder created:
theoildrum.com#DIV(class=extra_voting_forms karma_3_big)
Voila! No more annoying (and mostly useless) arrows!
Karma, got an error message from this site earlier "karma error", now I see this word again. Interesting word to find floating round in TOD subspace.
It's the new form of education. The teachers let their pupils present ideas, then they vote on their classmates ideas. The most popular ideas - I mean the best ideas - win. Democracy and the market system have worked so well in organising society, it's logical to apply it to learning as well.
If "None of us here aspire to "fix the planet"", why then the question: ask someone in Pakistan what he thinks about ethanol? TOD does indeed try to fix the planet and is notorious for global think. Just check out the daily items on Drum Beat. Most are foreign related.
The truth is that some things that mitigate Peak Oil like ethanol benefit one country more than another. The idea that Americans should make economic and energy choices based on the dire situations in the Third World is every day fare at TOD.
Third world countries like Haiti, Pakistan and Bangladesh got themselves into the situation they are in without American help. Now Americans are suppose to make unsound economic and energy choices to bail them out according to many who post on TOD.
The result will be that we all descend to the lower economic level that these third world countries have already achieved. This will not sell except in those countries who reap the largess of American stupidity. They have nothing to pay for grain. They make little effort to control their ever rising populations. They have no better plans to deal with Peak Oil than we do. And if they could they would gladly slip into the U.S. and increase our own population stress which is happening even now in the case of Mexico.
X: Good point. However, your argument is "Fix the USA". IMO the USA isn't going to be fixed, probably a % of Americans will come through this thing okay. I don't think there is room for 300 million in the lifeboats-I could be wrong.
Sir or Madam: your credibility crashes to zero when you make claims like "countries like Haiti, Pakistan and Bangladesh got themselves into the situation they are in without American help." Before you ever post anything more about other countries around the world and the history of American involvement with them, please read (a lot) of books. Start with researching our involvement in Haiti over the past century or so. I think you'll wish you could take that post back.
Actually, when the US fully occupied Haiti for almost 20 years in the early part of the 20th century and ran the place it improved. Since then our involvement has been much more limited, too limited to turn the place around.
As for countries getting themselves into sad shape without US assistance: That is far more often the case than it isn't.
I bet none of the people giving me negative ratings on my comments about Haiti have read about just how well the 1915-1934 period in Haiti compares to what came afterward.
Poster "x" report to room 101 immediately for politically correct reeducation.
Exactly. The USA is singelehandledly responsible for every instance of shiftlessness, sloth, stupidity, savagery, and cruelty that ever occurred on Planet Earth - since millennia before it was even formed.
100% agree.
The group think on this site can mock the Catholic Pope, make evangelicals out to be flat earth rednecks and label Israeli's as racist. BUT don't point out that Haitians, Indians, Arabs etc have f*cked their countries up with massive birth rates and now threaten to increase the overpopulation in the US, Europe etc otherwise you will be labelled racist.
Pointing out flaws in other cultures/countries isn't always racist but realist.
Please don't count Pakistan in third world countries. We have a very large agricultural base, live in the most naturally fertile deltas, been home to the oldest civilization (mehrgarh) in world that predate egypt and sumeria. We have large reserves of natural gas and coal (200 billion tons out of 1000 billion tons total coal reserves in world).
Our 60 million arable acres SUSTAINABLY produce enough food for 300 million people, we are large exporters of rice, mango etc in food items, textiles and sports goods in industrial products and softwares and customer care in services.
Our govt put no taxes on working class, it only tax the big businesses. We have health and education free.
We have the fourth largest army in world. We are a nuclear power. We make almost all of advanced weapons of today's warfare in our own factories, rifles, tanks, air crafts, sea crafts etc.
We have excellent relations with china for whom we are the only friend. We also ofcourse have more than friendly and actually brotherly relations with highly rich and surplus in wealth nations of middle east, iran etc.
Usa "help" done only one thing to our economy...damage.
Wisdom, are there problems with food supplies in Pakistan.
Nope, as I said Pakistan produce enough food for 300 million people. Our population is about 160 million. So we grow almost double than what we need.
Looking at particular food items, we have a high surplus of rice which we still export in a world where leading exporters vietnam, thailand etc had cut their exports to almost nothing and india another major exporter cut exports 80 to 90 percent. We grow enough wheat to satisfy more than 90% of our wheat needs, in better crops it exceed 100% so we become exporters of wheat for short periods of time. About mango we are the biggest exporter.
We do import large amount of tea from kenya. Our own tea production is zero and since we were formerly part of british empire we have a great consumption of tea. We also import tobacco, a little of coffee etc.
Dear WisdomfromPakistan,
As a native of what is sometimes called a third world country, namely Brazil, I think I understand your reaction and desire to point out all of the great and good things about ones native history and culture.
I have also been a citizen of the United States for over 40 years and will be the first one to admit that this country has a lot things to explain on the global stage and that, is to put it very mildly. However I am also of the opinion that one must very carefully examine the minute splinters in ones own eyes before making blanket statements about the motes in the eyes of others.
Respectfully,
Fernando Magyar
Fernando, Could you please e-mail me re: Brazil? I'm very interested in your native country. Just link my name to get email info. Thanks.
Don
dropped you a line