Talking with Wally Wight of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas last night at the Transition The Grove’s Energy Subgroup monthly meeting. He had brought along a lovely big coloured chart of the peaking curves of all the different hydrocarbon fuels. Ordinary (he didn’t use that word and I’ve been trying to remember the word he did use) oil peaked in 2005! Other lesser quality or harder to extract oils & hydrocarbons are rapidly coming to peak now. He talks of a steep cliff in 2017 that is real end game stuff. Looked like a great “ski slope” on the chart – smooth and straight down like a New Zealand volcanic ski slope.
We ended up in a ‘black humour’ discussion about whether we should all be going on ocean liner cruises to fill up the last five years of the great flurry of human civilisation and use up the last of the oil quicker ploughing around the ocean.
The US is clearly grappling with the issue more and more desperately. Obama is making regular pronouncements about it. The link I saw is no longer live but here is quite a good one. http://www.theoildrum.com/node/8981?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+theoildrum+%28The+Oil+Drum%29