Should we find tomorrow an inexhaustible new supply of oil that would feed all the world's forecasted energy needs far into the future, we're still going to find ourselves with other factors that will likely put a halt to the wasteful, energy hungry, consumer driven North American lifestyle we have all come to know and love and which the rest of the world seems to be doing it's best to emulate. There's a couple more resources even more fundamental to our survival than oil, and that's good agricultural land (topsoil) and water. Should we suddenly find an unlimited supply of new energy available to us, it's quite likely we'd just use that energy to further exploit the rest of the world's finite resources into depletion at an even more rapid rate than we're doing already.
See for example the article by Dale Pfeiffer,
Eating Fossil Fuels. He makes the point that thanks to the energy intensive Green Revolution over the last 40 years the world has been able to massively increase crop yields by massively increasing energy inputs. However that increase in crop yields has also come at the cost of degrading topsoil and water resources and as we are now also confronted with increasing urban sprawl we are in danger of running out of good quality agricultural land and water more quickly than we might think.
Should the early onset of Peak Oil be valid (as Pfeiffer believes), it's fairly clear we will face a crisis in agriculture as our current factory farming, industrial approach to agriculture is heavily dependent on inputs from oil and other hydrocarbons to sustain its productivity in the face of the continuous loss of fertility in our soils. Even as the world's population is increasing rapidly we have already reached the point of marginal returns where addition inputs of energy do not produce corresponding increases in crop production. However, even if we have cheap energy freely available, we are using up our topsoil and underground aquifers at such an alarming rate we will likely face a crisis anyway when we can no longer grow the food we need to support the world's population. And that could happen within the next 50 years.
Eating Fossil Fuels
by Dale Allen Pfeiffer
© Copyright 2004, From The Wilderness Publications, www.copvcia.com. All Rights Reserved. May be reprinted, distributed or posted on an Internet web site for non-profit purposes only.
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Modern intensive agriculture is unsustainable. Technologically-enhanced agriculture has augmented soil erosion, polluted and overdrawn groundwater and surface water, and even (largely due to increased pesticide use) caused serious public health and environmental problems. Soil erosion, overtaxed cropland and water resource overdraft in turn lead to even greater use of fossil fuels and hydrocarbon products. More hydrocarbon-based fertilizers must be applied, along with more pesticides; irrigation water requires more energy to pump; and fossil fuels are used to process polluted water.
It takes 500 years to replace 1 inch of topsoil.21 In a natural environment, topsoil is built up by decaying plant matter and weathering rock, and it is protected from erosion by growing plants. In soil made susceptible by agriculture, erosion is reducing productivity up to 65% each year.22 Former prairie lands, which constitute the bread basket of the United States, have lost one half of their topsoil after farming for about 100 years. This soil is eroding 30 times faster than the natural formation rate.23 Food crops are much hungrier than the natural grasses that once covered the Great Plains. As a result, the remaining topsoil is increasingly depleted of nutrients. Soil erosion and mineral depletion removes about $20 billion worth of plant nutrients from U.S. agricultural soils every year.24 Much of the soil in the Great Plains is little more than a sponge into which we must pour hydrocarbon-based fertilizers in order to produce crops.
Every year in the U.S., more than 2 million acres of cropland are lost to erosion, salinization and water logging. On top of this, urbanization, road building, and industry claim another 1 million acres annually from farmland.24 Approximately three-quarters of the land area in the United States is devoted to agriculture and commercial forestry.25 The expanding human population is putting increasing pressure on land availability. Incidentally, only a small portion of U.S. land area remains available for the solar energy technologies necessary to support a solar energy-based economy. The land area for harvesting biomass is likewise limited. For this reason, the development of solar energy or biomass must be at the expense of agriculture.
Modern agriculture also places a strain on our water resources. Agriculture consumes fully 85% of all U.S. freshwater resources.26 Overdraft is occurring from many surface water resources, especially in the west and south. The typical example is the Colorado River, which is diverted to a trickle by the time it reaches the Pacific. Yet surface water only supplies 60% of the water used in irrigation. The remainder, and in some places the majority of water for irrigation, comes from ground water aquifers. Ground water is recharged slowly by the percolation of rainwater through the earth's crust. Less than 0.1% of the stored ground water mined annually is replaced by rainfall.27 The great Ogallala aquifer that supplies agriculture, industry and home use in much of the southern and central plains states has an annual overdraft up to 160% above its recharge rate. The Ogallala aquifer will become unproductive in a matter of decades.28
We can illustrate the demand that modern agriculture places on water resources by looking at a farmland producing corn. A corn crop that produces 118 bushels/acre/year requires more than 500,000 gallons/acre of water during the growing season. The production of 1 pound of maize requires 1,400 pounds (or 175 gallons) of water.29 Unless something is done to lower these consumption rates, modern agriculture will help to propel the United States into a water crisis.
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Our prosperity is built on the principal of exhausting the world's resources as quickly as possible, without any thought to our neighbors, all the other life on this planet, or our children. (my emphasis /jc)
Population & Sustainability
Considering a growth rate of 1.1% per year, the U.S. population is projected to double by 2050. As the population expands, an estimated one acre of land will be lost for every person added to the U.S. population. Currently, there are 1.8 acres of farmland available to grow food for each U.S. citizen. By 2050, this will decrease to 0.6 acres. 1.2 acres per person is required in order to maintain current dietary standards.40
Presently, only two nations on the planet are major exporters of grain: the United States and Canada.41 By 2025, it is expected that the U.S. will cease to be a food exporter due to domestic demand. The impact on the U.S. economy could be devastating, as food exports earn $40 billion for the U.S. annually. More importantly, millions of people around the world could starve to death without U.S. food exports.42 www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/100303_eating_oil.html
Note to mods. Quoted more than the standard 4 paragraphs because the author gives permission to reproduce article for non-profit purposes.
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