Well you can kiss oil goodbye that is for sure. Even the most optimistic forecasts by the talking heads on the idiot-tube (TV) have oil running out in less than sixty years. Give Twilight in the Desert a read and visit theoildrum.com. Oil will be finished very soon, probably within two decades on the outside. The Arctic is a bit of a wild card, but the odds are that most of the world's oil has already been found. All of the oil that was easy to get to has already been used up.
The problem of oil depletion is much worse than not being able to gas up our SUVs cheaply. All of the world's developed nations depend heavily on oil as a key ingredient for their fertilizer, and that these same nations have abused their soil with unsustainable practices. Not to mention all the oil-dependent farm machinery and transportation infrastructure. As the oil goes into decline food production will follow.
Perhaps we can all take up fishing. Or not. As we can see in this post the oceans are in big, big trouble. Some examples: in the last 50 years the population of large fish is down ninety percent. The population of a popular species of cod off British Columbia is now three percent of what is was 100 years ago, and this is typical of most commercial fish population. More than half of all fish species are in danger of extinction.
You might think governments would wake up to the problems in our oceans and do something. And they are. They're trying to grab as much of what's left for themselves while they still can. It is human greed and stupidity at its finest. Europeans are even dumping their nuclear waste into the oceans, how is that for good fisheries management. Nothing like giving the work of nuclear waste disposal to the lowest bidder. Nice job assholes.
Maybe we can all take up hunting to find food. Except mammal populations are (you guessed it) in steep decline. Down almost thirty percent in the just 30 years. If everyone took up hunting there would be nothing left to hunt after only a few years.
Much of the world is running out of water. Thanks to global warming glaciers, which are a major source of water for both drinking and farming are disappearing. The water table in much of India, the Middle East, Africa, Asia and the United States is dropping faster than the replenishment rate. In places like India and the Middle East it is dropping so fast they are turning to oil drilling equipment to go deeper and deeper in search of water. Half of all the electricity in some parts of India is used for pumping water.
After centuries of gains, the volumes in global food production for such staples as wheat, corn and rice is now shrinking. The United Nations estimates human population in 2050 at just under 9 billion, almost 50% higher than today.
The Rwandan Genocide wasn't about politics, people don't kill each other over how they vote when their basic needs are met. Rwanda was the most densely populated country in Africa. The land could not longer provide enough food to maintain basic needs. The people divided along tribal (political) lines, but it was a war over basic resources.
After centuries of gains, the volumes in global food production for such staples as wheat, corn and rice is now shrinking. The United Nations estimates human population in 2050 at just under 9 billion, almost 50% higher than today.
The Rwandan Genocide wasn't about politics, people don't kill each other over how they vote when their basic needs are met. Rwanda was the most densely populated country in Africa. The land could not longer provide enough food to maintain basic needs. The people divided along tribal (political) lines, but it was a war over basic resources.
In Plan B 3.0 Mr. Brown outlines a lot of solutions, but he misses some important issues entirely. What to do about the power that corporations yield in our world, with their selfish and short-term thinking. What to do about corrupt politicians (the majority of politicians have offshore bank accounts to hide their ill-gotten-gains and to cheat on taxes). And finally what to do about the corporate media, who have perfected their role in keeping the people ignorant.
What is the likely result of less food, less water, less energy and an exponentially growing population? War and famine. The question is not if it will happen, the question is when. Will it be in your lifetime?
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"Preventing the collapse of human civilization requires nothing less than a wholesale transformation of dominant cultural patterns. This transformation would reject consumerism... and establish in its place a new cultural framework centred on sustainability"
-- State of the World 2010, Worldwatch Institute
