According to an article in the online British paper The Independent, peak oil will happen in just four short years.  What does this mean?

Peak oil is a theory. The definition of peak oil is the date when the peak of the world’s conventional oil production is reached.  After this point production enters a step decline.  The result is obvious.  Catastrophic shortages, soaring prices, and devastated economies are just some of the results.

Pushing this point further, I would state that we are already beyond peak oil in a purer since of the idea.  In the United States, we currently consume more gas than we refine.  Simply logic dictates that we only have a matter of time before price escalates to an unbearable level.  Gas prices force a downturn in the U.S. economy which in turn has a ripple effect through out the  world.

I haven’t been impressed with the solutions I am seeing in the press.  Ethanol as a substitute for gasoline seems to only move the problem momentarily from gas to fresh water.  Where are the scientific minds on this one.  What happened to the fuel cell drive, highly affordable electric cars?  When was the last time we have had a life changing advance in the science of batteries?

It doesn’t matter when we reach peak oil, four years or forty years. We need to stop worrying about the money and start coming up with solutions that can be mainstreamed soon.  I hope industry isn’t waiting on government or the consumer to wake up to an oil drained planet.  One is to worried about the war in Iraq, the other is to worried about getting a tan, to worry about the future.  I will let you decide who is worried about what.

Life for most of us is complex and stressful.  Technology is taking over our lives, yet I wouldn’t give it up.  Most of us are neck deep in debt and we worry more about how we can continue to finance our excesses than we do about the quality of our lives.

MSNBC is running a story today about a man in Buffalo, N.Y. who live in a self-made underground bunker.  Don’t let that fool you.  He isn’t homeless or down-on-his-luck.  He is just living a simple life and he enjoys it.

Now like most people when I read this the first thing that came to mind was pity.  I pitied this man for not having all the things in life I take for granted.  Once I watched the video my attitude changed.  I no longer felt pity, but now I was somewhat envious of his simplified life.  His simplicity was a choice he made not a choice made for him because of his socioeconomic status.

After thinking about it for a while I realize that in addition to feeling envious of this man, I was feeling a little angry at him.  It turns out that he is a very brave man following the life that he wants to live in a simply unobtrusive manner.  Meanwhile I realize that his bravery is a spotlight lighting up my, and societies, cowardice.  We complain about complexity and stress but we are to afraid to change our circumstances the way this man has done.

I sat to watch the local morning news today, as I often do, for a few minutes before heading to work.  I like to catch the weather and get the highlights of what is hot on the national scene to start my day.  I thought I would see something about the monumental tech event of Gates and Jobs on stage together, a historic event of two tech giants.  Not a word.

Well maybe we would hear about recent remarks made by the NASA administrator.  His comments were thought provoking, if not controversial, about global warming.  How he was throwing ethics into the discussion and forcing us to think about how magnanimous we must feel toward other generations, both future and past, now that we have determined that our climate is the perfect one and must be preserved.  No, they didn’t report on this either.

Instead we had the breaking story - racing helicopter deep in searching of a fugitive.  The high distant camera shot of a helicopter scouring the tree line looking for a fugitive.  A regular criminal mastermind.  Police were out in drove’s, at least four different police organizations were involved in the manhunt.  The manhunt had zig zagged  investigators across the state as they hunted desperately for the fugitive since early April.  They finally had him after being spotted on county road U (we letter our county roads in wisconsin).  This violent offender had hijacked a snow plow at gun point back in April.  Somehow managing to elude authorities for nearly two months while crossing the state with his new found prize.  A perilous trek from Hobart to Eau Claire in his pilfered, not so inconspicuous, snow plow.

Onlookers were interviewed as they watched the dramatic events.  The consensus being - “Will he still be able to do my snow plowing?”

Case solved!

Link

This is the most creative way I have seen someone get the message out on environmental issues.

Passed by the U.S. House of Representatives back in April, the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) will outlaw corporate prejudice based on genes according to a New Scientist article.  Expected to pass without issue in the U.S. Senate, GINA will open the door for Americans to seek genetic testing to determine if they are genetically predisposed to inherited diseases without fear of being denied insurance.

Smells like the precursor to GATTACA to me.  I don’t know why having this law doesn’t make me rest any easier.

Tried going exclusively to using a social network for my blog.  I chose Yahoo! 360, but I looked at most of them.  At this point they all leave something to be desired.

Now I’m back.