Thank you Luis for your chronicles! I am glad you enjoyed your stay in Barcelona (although the locals can be very critic with our own town!

Indeed, this year's ASPO conference was a special one. Were the conference had been take place in June or July, the expectations would have been very different.

I think there are two themes here. One is the unpredictability of the "above ground events" (in that sense we choose a good motto for the conferences) that led to the fall of oil prices this year's fall. Another, very different one, is the strategy ASPO should take to accomplish its goals.

I have heard many times that we should be putting forward solutions, and stop talking about gloomy scenarios. Personally, I think that if you don't know what your problem is, you can't also find suitable solutions. You are just delaying the problem. In that sense, not all ASPO organisations are the same. We at ASPO Spain think that peak oil is just another limit we are reaching to the limits of growth, and that we have to understand first that the problem is the growth paradigm itself. But that is just our take on the problem, and surely can be enhanced with other points of view.

Regarding the communication between ASPO and society in general, we in Spain have had mixed results. We haven't been able to influence much the Spanish government, but we have been more successful with the regional governments (in Catalonia, where I live, and in the Canary Islands). Peak oil is even recognised in the Catalonian Energy Plan, and some technicians in the catalonian administration are fully aware and regularly informed (by us) about all of the developments in the oil and gas market.

Maybe the problem is that all energy issues are viewed as a supply side problems: if there is a energy shortage (perceived or real ), just pump more, produce more, stopping growth in consumption is not a possibility. Also, economic growth, even the kind that leads to more problems in the future (as the real market bubble and subprime mortgages has caused) is the number one priority.

All those things make our work more difficult, at least if an ASPO organisation wants to go a bit further from the "we are running out of oil capacity" issue. So maybe there is the need to redefine the boundaries of our actions.

Speaking about the ASPO conferences, and regarding the nature of the ASPO national organisations (mostly non profit with small budgets), I understand very well why some of them didn't come this year. I had my doubts last year, whether should I go to Cork or not, we didn't have money, we knew more or less what we will hear there, etc. But every group of people that share a purpose need to see each other from time to time, so at the end, the social aspect of ASPO gatherings had its importance. But at the same time, we have to prepare for a low energy world, where travel arrangements like these are a luxury, and ASPO should give example. Maybe the future of ASPO conferences lies in videoconferencing. Personally, I think that we should concentrate in national and regional preparation, while at the same time keeping a lively and constant contact with worldwide ASPO organisations. Maybe it would be more practical to have a South Mediterranean ASPO conferences than to attend a worldwide ASPO conference...

Another important issue for me is that ASPO shouldn't be afraid of laying bridges with other organisations. The IEA is one of such organisations. We have to understand the role that the IEA has had until 2005: they were just calculating demand and assuming that demand would be satisfied no matter what. Yes, in the past the IEA didn't help us, but know they are practically in our side. ASPO is no longer in the fringe camp, but as James Schlesinger said in Cork, "we should be gracious in victory", and work together with every organism that shares at least part of our worries.

Personally, I think that the biggest problem now is assuring the needed investment in the energy sector, and assuring that we burn the high quality fossil fuels left with the most efficient goals in mind: building future renewable capacity. And at the same time, engage in a discussion about whether our current economic thinking is really connected to the physical reality of our finite planet.

(Peaknik, also known as Daniel Gómez is president of ASPO Spain and co-editor of the Crisis Energética website, a 5 years old peak oil website in Spanish)