The issue of oil shortage impacts is getting more media attention. Below, the reporter describes some of the projected outcomes of declining oil on life as we now know it. The writer focusses on gasoline shortages, but there are lots more impacts that we will have to adjust to. Any ideas?
Falls Church News-Press - The Peak Oil Crisis: A Message from Houston Written by Tom Whipple
Thursday, 25 October 2007
Quote:
Peak production of conventional oil came 30 months ago ....
........
This clearly means that major oil importers will face a shortfall in their ability to obtain oil many months or years sooner than they had been anticipating. ......... When world oil exports fall, if they have not started doing so already, effects are likely to sharp and painful.
The problem is that most have no concept as to how soon the transformation will start and how much their lives are going to change. The President, his government, the Congress, the oil companies, and indeed the media have left us with the impression that we have the transformation to an alternative fuel future well in hand. .....
The peak oil problem is not that most of us don’t recognize a transition is coming – ...... – it is that we don’t recognize that the transition will come soon and will inflict more economic pain and social dislocation on the American people than we have experienced since the Civil War or perhaps ever.
Thus the message from Houston was “it will be soon and it will be bad, very bad,” much sooner and much worse than 99 percent of the American people realize.
........
...... it is not hard to figure out what would happen when the government gets around to prioritizing uses.
Food production and distribution would come first, then public health (clean water, sewage, sanitation, medical services), then public safety including the armed forces, and finally some level of economic activity that uses petroleum products.
Thirty seconds of pondering this situation should leave you with the idea that there will be very little gasoline available for your gas station to sell to you. For sure, there will be a lot fewer gas stations around ten years from now and you are not going to like the prices.
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