Welcome to Plan B-Preparations for Petrocollapse and Climate Distortion

[sintax]

Preparations and policies for petrocollapse and climate distortion



Written by Jan Lundberg   
Culture Change Letter #104 - July 8, 2005

Welcome to Plan B
The determination to explore and act on the impacts of peak oil and climate change is a big start toward lessening damage to countless lives and our fragile ecosystem. There are some key areas to concentrate on, notably food supply and transport. But one mustn't think this is all up to government officials. Individuals and households, and then neighborhood communities, need to take matters into their hands now to prepare for major upheaval ahead and to build a sustainable society.

<snip>

Land use and community gardening

Pollution-free zones in urban areas need to be identified and created for the purpose of readying land to support a de-petrolized public with local food and drinkable water. Readily available land includes vacant lots, parks and school yards. None of those areas produce food, and may not even be maximized for assimilating rain water. Storm water run off is not only a waste, but is a system-problem that uses resources.

<snip>

"The increasing demands placed on the global water supply threaten biodiversity and the supply of water for food production and other vital human needs. Water shortages already exist in many regions, with more than one billion people without adequate drinking water. In addition, 90% of the infectious diseases in developing countries are transmitted from polluted water. Agriculture consumes about 70% of fresh water worldwide; for example, approximately 1000 liters (L) of water are required to produce 1 kilogram (kg) of cereal grain, and 43,000 L to produce 1 kg of beef. New water supplies are likely to result from conservation, recycling, and improved water-use efficiency rather than from large development projects." (the Summary)

<snip>

t is too late to attempt a more efficient train and bus system, for the lead time and the non-renewable energy required. And, once petrocollapse hits -- leveling the economy, thereby creating a permanent shortage -- there will not be the energy and other resources to build large new transportation systems. There may not be energy and other resources to build even smaller-scale power systems of any kind. The future is unknown, but an honest picture is being attempted from the signs people are seeing regarding energy availability and the ability of large populations to be sustained when the costs of petroleum dependence are finally paid.

http://www.culturechange.org/cms/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=17&Itemid=2

[Dogmudgeon]

1. There will be PLENTY of power ...

... to sustain a North American population of, say, 25-50 million. And in a world where the population has fallen from 7 billion down to maybe 500 million, there will be plenty of oil, too.

Happy Days will be just around the corner. For those who survive. And to help with the after-effects of watching the death of so much of the world, there will be plenty of anti-depressant and anti-psychotic medication no more than a year or two out of it's use-by date.

--p!

[moodforaday]

3. Okay now

...I'm wearing my tinfoil hat tight. I'm a LIHOP-er going MIHOP. I've read a lot before, am reading "Crossing the Rubicon" right now, and all the Peak Oil analysis makes sense. But when Ruppert and others talk of depopulating the world, down to a billion or so, how could this be, you know, effected?

[Dogmudgeon]

6. Depopulation

I'm not certain that there will be a planned depopulation myself, but if we decided to close our eyes to the problems we face, we're doomed.

First, a series of pandemics could easily kill >90% of the population. It would take more than one such plague, but whether it's the result of deliberate planning or Mother Nature, we wouldn't be the first species decimated by disease. As the number of organisms in an "eco-niche" increases, the likelihood of pandemic disease grows, and it's not a linear growth rate, although it's not quite geometric.

Second, almost all large-scale agriculture depends on petroleum-derived ammonium nitrate and other nitrogen-containing compounds. They are by-products of natural gas formation, and the natural gas peak will be less than five years behind the oil peak.

Then, third, a huge amount of mechanical energy is used in agriculture, just about all of it provided by gasoline and diesel fuel. For every calorie of food energy we grow, we put five calories or more into working the land and growing the crops. And that's just for raising plants. Animal husbandry can be quite fuel-efficient in "traditional" ecologies, but in the Factory Farm economy, it's horrendously wasteful.

Climate change is also a big factor. Already desertification has intensified and quickened. Any time there is climatic change, water gets redistributed rapidly, driven by new heat distributions. And in a climate flip-flop scenario, where a quickly-spreading ice age comes from a period of abnormal warming, the dessication of the atmosphere would be much worse.

The heat of global warming is also conducive to the evolution of new pathogens (see my first point), and the cold of a ice-age onset flip-over would destroy an already struggling agricultural system. Cold, starving people do not resist the flu and other winter illnesses very well.

As for the kinds of deadly mischief human beings make, take your pick -- a desparate, last-ditch attempt to reduce population by nuking several hundred cities is not out of the question, either, though I think it is among the lower-probability disasters. Major asteroid and comet impacts, supervolcano eruptions, local supernovae, and massive solar disruptions also can't be ruled out, but I would be surprised if any of these things happened during the next century.

Perversely, if you've read my previous writing here, you'll see that I'm actually an optimist. We CAN overcome these problems, but not without a common, determined effort. I just don't see that happening until people start dying by the tens of thousands in the USA and Europe, and in the millions in "other" parts of the world. The large numbers of people dying of the heat in France in the summer of 2003 is about the lower limit for public consciousness. You had to have really kept up with the news to have seen what was happening -- even most of the French people were unaware of it until Granmere or Granpere turned up in the clinic or morgue.

The combination of climate change, disease, hunger, energy shortages, economic ruin, and possibly war will make a die-off scenario inevitable -- unless we start planning immediately for big changes in the way the world's peoples do things. I am optimistic in the lng run, but in the short run, I think there will be a lot of unnecessary death.

--p!

[Paranoid Pessimist]

8. It will take care of itself

The free-for-all shoot-em-up bloodbath that all the videogamers have been practicing for should get things started, especially here in gun happy America. Unfortunately the good people, such as nearly everyone who posts here, are at kind of a disadvantage in that sort of social setting.

After that, the pandemics should kick in.

[WhiteTara]

13. aids is killing millions

drought and heat will kill hundreds of thousands, the bird flu virus may kill several more millions. It is sort of like the stolen election...a few hundred here, dozens more there and soon you have just what you need. All they have to do is be patient and the water wars will definitely kill many many many more.
BTW welcome to DU :hi:

[Hope springs eternal]

2. Not really...

I don't think it's gonna be that bad. Electricty is a must and will stay on. I also believe that trains will become the way of the future.

Cars, and the communties built around them, will completely collapse. Sadly, if you thought 1970's South Bronx abandonment was bad, this will be on a grander scale.

Large popualtions are sustainable, just not spread out...

[moodforaday]

4. Transportation is only one part of it

There's also plastics. Medicines. Electronics. It's all oil-based. But most of all, electricity. You don't *have* to drive a car, but you need light and heat. The internet? Forget it. Your electricity bill will go sky high, and so will hosting bills - those servers guzzle power like mad.

[Dogmudgeon]

7. Some of this I don't think will happen

Solid-state electronic devices, for instance, require relatively little petroleum, and recycling for plastic synthesis is probably cheaper in the long run. Plastic synthesis from oil does not require much oil relative to fuel, and it will be a long time before it is more expensive to take it from the ground than it's worth.

The Internet is likely to survive, too, since computer technology does not require a lot of energy. Even though most desktop computers draw 200-300 watts, and CRT monitors another 75-150, this is unnecessary and wasteful. Within a few years, laptop computers may be less expensive than desktop computers. The Internet will be the strong link in the world's communication systems as our ability to service satellites lags badly during the slide. An energy-efficient Internet will probably become extremely important as most other forms of broadcast and communication suffer breakdowns.

Incidentally, I've thought long and hard about the survival of the Internet, since I enjoy using it. But it's not so much the entertainment value I'm looking at as the survival value. The Internet was designed to survive things like large-scale nuclear warfare, so surviving a die-off will not be a major problem for such a network. And the strength of maintaining communication with most inhabited areas will allow us to see problems coming before they arrive, whether it's disease, Mad Max style post-apocalypse punk-rock neo-Berserkers (probability: low), or opportunistic invading countries.

Other high-tech innovations, like hydroponics, may also become important parts of survival. In order to completely lose civilization, we would have to have a die-off of nearly all of humanity; say, 99% or greater. And that's just not likely.

Possible, yes. Likely, no.

--p!

[newswolf56]

5. Not true about large populations, the sustainment of which requires...

adequate harvest. With the collapse of the petroleum-based economy, there will be famine on a scale hitherto unimaginable simply because of the inability of farmers to plant, harvest and transport their crops without fuel for the internal combustion engines that power all agricultural machinery today. The worst hit will be the most technologically dependent; the least (and the people with the best chances of survival) will be in places like Asia (where the rice harvest is still accomplished as it was thousands of years ago, by hand and with draft animals).

Somewhere years ago when environmentalists first began looking at these realities -- this to the accompaniment of wholesale jeering from the public (and not just the far right) -- I remember reading that it would take approximately 50 years just to breed the horse and mule population back to the point it was at in 1890 -- merely adequate to serve the U.S. population at the time. In other words, our dependence on oil has inescapably doomed us to an apocalypse the magnitude of which is impossible to imagine.

[HereSince1628]

10. 23 million horses and mules needed, estimated to take 10 years

http://www.landinstitute.org/vnews/display.v/ART/2000/12/15/3df6412ab088c

From the same article, these animals would require about 11% of total agricultural land in the US, which is considerably better than the roughly 20% that would be required to produce ethanol for mechanical traction power on farms.

To me it looks like farms are going to be smaller, and the traction power is going back to animal power. Even if productivity can remain high (equivalent to 123 bu of maize per acre) an 11% loss in farm export is going to force a population reduction.

The conversion to animal power will require not only the breeding of draft animals, but also the production of farm implements that are appropriate for use with animals. The production of these implements will also have energy costs, and will require time for a shift.

Trying to run the US farms system on ethanol would result in losses approaching 25% of farm production.

It seems to me that the loss in population will be somehow proportionate to the loss in available productivity shifted from food to energy. Assuming no changes in caloric requirements per person, I am guessing a 11% loss in productivity would mean a loss of close to 11% of the population that agriculture is currently supporting somewhere. If not in US population then in populations elsewhere that depend on US food exports.

[GliderGuider]

11. My big concern is the banking system

I'm a PO doom-and-gloomer, and I think a major dieoff is in our immediate future. One of the things I think will tip us over the edge, that hasn't had the attention it deserves, is the total collapse of the global banking system. From a net article, here's the problem in a nutshell:

"The central problem, and it is a huge one, arises as a result of how closely economic growth is tied to oil and gas and not any oil and gas but inexpensive oil and gas. This leads directly to the even greater problem that the stability of our monetary system, fractional reserve banking, and hence our very societies is predicated on economic growth. Compounding this enormously destabilizing fact is the added problem that many of the safety nets that were put in place after the crash of 1929 to compensate for poor growth have largely been taken away over the last twenty five years."

Fractional reserve banking depends for its very existence on continuous economic growth - that's where the ability to pay interest comes from. If our oil-driven growth turns into a contraction, and people suddenly realize the contraction is permanent, what happens? Think of 1929 with no possibility of recovery in either the short, medium or long term. Do banks lend money with no hope of even recovering the full principal, let alone making interest? What happens to the outstanding loans? What happens when people want to reclaim their money from the banks? We are talking about a world-wide default, and the result is a sudden inability to use fiat money as a medium of exchange.

For me, the combination of increasing transportation energy costs, decreasing food supply and a banking system collapse is the Perfect Storm that will trigger the dieoff. I hate feeling like this, but I see no way out.

[sintax]

12. For further

reading on what you are suggesting go to
www.communitysolution.org

and look at article: Peak Oil- Peak Economy

[wli]

9. utopian fantasy

Guns and money will decide it as they always have.