The Oil Drum

97 comments on A gesture is sometimes important...

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Stoneleigh on November 22, 2005 - 5:47pm

It wasn't so long ago that a small amount of window glass would have been a luxury, let alone mirrors. In Shakespeare's time, ordinary folk lucky enough to have had a house at all would have had windows made of boiled horn. They let in a little light and kept out the worst of the drafts, but that was all. You couldn't see through them.

It's only in very recent times that a substantial middle class has gained access to relative luxuries and peak oil is likely to reverse that trend sharply.

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GeoPoet on November 23, 2005 - 9:29am

stoneleigh -

The clock isn't turning back but going forward. Glass is no longer something enigmatic and valuable, but something ubiquitous and even a significant part of our waste stream. I know you have seen the house built of coke bottles on TV probably. Point being, glass is no longer what it was - now it is everywhere. Unless it is total collapse, glassmaking will continue to go on at a relatively cheap price, because all it requires is heat from ANY source...

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Leanan on November 23, 2005 - 10:37am

It's the heat that's the problem, not the "mystery."

People have been making glass for 5,000 years. The problem is the heat it takes to work it. The ingredients are relatively cheap, it's working it that is expensive.

Getting enough fuel (firewood, dung, etc.) to cook and heat with was a neverending struggle before we discovered fossil fuels. It still is, for much of the undeveloped world. The fuel cost required to heat glass to 2000 degrees is what made it expensive, not the "mystery."

This is what I mean when I say we're like fish trying to imagine the desert. We assume that ancient peoples didn't do what we do because they didn't know how to do it. The idea that they knew how to do it but it was too energy-intensive is hard for us to understand.

Of course we have lots of scrap now. Plastic, aluminum, steel, glass. However, it will take a lot of energy - heat - to work into new uses. This might be a good temporary solution. If we do it with the knowledge that we are just cushioning the drop and it is not sustainable, I'd be all for it. But it's not a long-term solution.

IOW...yes, glassmaking will most certainly go on. But not at a "cheap" price.

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copperweaver on November 23, 2005 - 11:44am

I don't see materials goods being much of an issue in a post peek world. Photovoltaic panels and other solid state devices will not be easy and probably imposable to manufacture, but we defiantly have tons of material goods to scavenge. Food and medicine will be the scarce commodities. There are lots of wonderful medicinal plants, but you have to know where to find them and how to use them. I often wonder how humans will adapt to all of the toxins that are currently in our bodies and the environment. I think we already see many of the effects of these toxins via cancer, infertility, and other diseases. Health care will be a huge issue in a post peek world....