Food Price Riots Popping Up Around The World

[vern_humphrey]

From post # 53:

“What I think would be a shame would be if the growing awareness of global warming and petroleum decline fails to serve as a wakeup call. Suppose we are wrong about oil,and the peak is actually twenty years out, rather than in 2012? For heaven’s sake, let’s not squander these two decades with more growth in population and consumption. Rather, let’s use them as a grace period in which (1) to convert agriculture to a post-oil model; (2) to restructure our living patterns so that people live close to where they work, and no longer make costly commutes; (3) to build safe nuclear power plants as fast as we can as a stopgap measure to prevent people from freezing in the winter and dying of heat stroke in the summer; (4) to commit ourselves to electric high-speed inter-city rail, and intra-city light rail networks; and (5) to bring down the population gradually through smaller families until we reach a level where billions won’t starve to death. As Catholics (and others), I think we ought to begin to regard these five points as essential to the project of saving civilization.”

Good words, but how are they to be put into action?

For example, how do we “restructure our living patterns so that people live close to where they work, and no longer make costly commutes?” We’ll have to build new cities, with the huge expenditure of energy that implies. We’ll have to abandon rural areas and small towns. How will people who are today self-supporting on their farms, or in their small towns be retrained so they can continue to support themselves?

Another point: we have not built a nuclear power plant in 30 years, and the NRC has said they will not license another one until the Yucca Mountain storage site is operational. The ranking majority member on the senate has vowed Yucca Mountain will never open.

How is this “bring(ing) down the population gradually through smaller families” going to work? Is the Pope to reverse himself?

I am reminded when I was a little tyke and climbed waaaay up a tree. My mother came out and looked up at me and said, “Don’t fall!!”

And I said, “Thank you for that wise adevice, Mother dear. But could you give me some specifics about how not to fall?”

 

[drpmjhess]

Good words, but how are they to be put into action?

With prayer, patience, imagination, cooperation, ingenuity, and sharing of ideas, and by reaching across political and cultural and gender and racial and religious and generational divides. The common goal: protecting what we can of the project of civilization. To me the alternative is unthinkable, but possible.

 

[vern_humphrey]

With prayer, patience, imagination, cooperation, ingenuity, and sharing of ideas, and by reaching across political and cultural and gender and racial and religious and generational divides. The common goal: protecting what we can of the project of civilization. To me the alternative is unthinkable, but possible.

Again, good words. But how do we pursuade the senate majority leader to allow us to open Yucca Mountain? How we build those new cities and transplant a couple of hundred million people into them, retrain them, and make them productive? And do it without drastically increasing our energy useage in the process?

 

[drpmjhess]

Again, good words. But how do we pursuade the senate majority leader to allow us to open Yucca Mountain? How we build those new cities and transplant a couple of hundred million people into them, retrain them, and make them productive? And do it without drastically increasing our energy useage in the process?

Good questions. But what’s the alternative to trying, other than sitting by watching as gasoline and diesel go up to $12.00 per gallon and letting the chips fall where they may?

Some books:

Darley, Julian, and David Room and Celine Rich. Relocalize Now! Getting Ready for Climate Change and the End of Cheap Oil. New Society Publishers, 2005. ISBN: 0865715459. This guide proposes a plan for the global relocalization of our way of life, presenting programs to create local money, energy, transportation, governance, and food systems designed to help communities become self-reliant right now.

Heinberg, Richard. Peak Everything: Waking Up to the Century of Declines. Gabriola Island, B.C.: New Society Publishers, 2007. ISBN-13: 978-0865715981. This book tells how we might make the transition from The Age of Excess to the Era of Modesty with grace and satisfaction, while preserving the best of our collective achievements.

McBay, Aric. Peak Oil Survival: Preparation for Life After Gridcrash. The Lyons Press, 2006. ISBN: 1592281273.
Shows readers how to plan for the future: how to survive and thrive when the food, transport, and energy industries sputter out. An essential crash course in how to live comfortably off the grid, complete with clear, simple instructions and easy-to-read diagrams.

Winter, Mick. Peak Oil Prep: Prepare for Peak Oil, Climate Change and Economic Collapse. Westsong Publishing, 2007. ISBN-13: 978-0965900041. “A superb manual containing the basics of preparation for a world which seems both inevitable and not that far in the future.”

 

[vern_humphrey]

Good questions. But what’s the alternative to trying, other than sitting by watching as gasoline and diesel go up to $12.00 per gallon and letting the chips fall where they may?

There are many alternatives, including opening up the huge areas in this country that are closed to drilling.

 

[drpmjhess]

There are many alternatives, including opening up the huge areas in this country that are closed to drilling.

Of course. And when that oil is gone and the global population stands at nine billion?

 

[vern_humphrey]

Of course. And when that oil is gone and the global population stands at nine billion?

If we go after all the oil, and utilize it efficiently, we will have time to solve those problems.

As it is, I am reminded of Will Rogers.

During WWI, German submarines were sinking ships off the Atlantic coast. Will met an Admiral at a party and told him he had the solution to the problem – “Boil the ocean.”

When the Admiral asked “How the %$#@ can we boil the ocean??!?”, Will said, “I gave you the answer. But you’re going to have to work out the details for yourself.”

I see these wonderful suggestions as the modern-day equivallent of “boil the ocean.” They’re not implementable.

Right now, we have the oil – we just can’t drill for it.

 

[drpmjhess]

If we go after all the oil, and utilize it efficiently, we will have time to solve those problems.

That won’t solve the population problem. Even if we go full-bore for nuclear there will likely be a gap of several decades between the rapid decline of conventional oil and nuclear-power-enabled unconventional oil to be developed.

Can you politely ask the Chinese and Indians to stop developing their economies?

 

[Doug50]

If we go after all the oil, and utilize it efficiently, we will have time to solve those problems.

As it is, I am reminded of Will Rogers.

During WWI, German submarines were sinking ships off the Atlantic coast. Will met an Admiral at a party and told him he had the solution to the problem – “Boil the ocean.”

When the Admiral asked “How the %$#@ can we boil the ocean??!?”, Will said, “I gave you the answer. But you’re going to have to work out the details for yourself.”

I see these wonderful suggestions as the modern-day equivallent of “boil the ocean.” They’re not implementable.

Right now, we have the oil – we just can’t drill for it.

Your argument, Vern, is the equivolent of saying humans have no free will to override their biology…we are slaves to instinctive biology. It’s very difficult to solve a problem if people refuse to admit one even exists.

You know what I fear for humanity, Petrus? That the choice too many people will make is to see lack of food and starvation as an insurmountable problem and then become jaded by the social situation of it…much like they have for abortion today.

 

[vern_humphrey]

That won’t solve the population problem. Even if we go full-bore for nuclear there will likely be a gap of several decades between the rapid decline of conventional oil and nuclear-power-enabled unconventional oil to be developed.

Can you politely ask the Chinese and Indians to stop developing their economies?

How is there a population problem?

What is bad about human life?

 

[Al_Masetti]

Testimony today, May 21, 2008

Shell Oil CEO John Hofmeister. Here is response number one to Senator Leahy.

HOFMEISTER: In the United States, access to our own oil and gas resources has been limited for the last 30 years, prohibiting companies such as Shell from exploring and developing resources for the benefit of the American people. It is not a free market. According to the Department of the Interior, 62% of all on-shore federal lands are off limits to oil and gas developments, with restrictions applying to 92% of all federal lands. The Argonne National Laboratory did a report in 2004 that identified 40 specific federal policy areas that halt, limit, delay, or restrict natural gas projects. The problem of access can be solved in this country by the same government that has prohibited it. Congress could have chose to lift some or all of the current restrictions on exploration and production of oil and gas. Congress could provide national policy to reverse the persistent decline of domestically secure natural resource development.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Your argument, Vern, is the equivolent of saying humans have no free will to override their biology…we are slaves to instinctive biology. It’s very difficult to solve a problem if people refuse to admit one even exists.

No, it’s the equivallent to saying that huge population shifts, with people moved out of farms, small towns and suburbs will create more problems than it will solve.

Some of the other things on the list make sense – such as more nuclear power, more rail, and so on – but first we have to over-ride the power structure in Washington. Right now, more people believe it’s all a plot by “Big Oil” than understand how the goverment has boxed us in so we can’t access much of the energy we have.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Testimony today, May 21, 2008

Shell Oil CEO John Hofmeister. Here is response number one to Senator Leahy.

HOFMEISTER: In the United States, access to our own oil and gas resources has been limited for the last 30 years, prohibiting companies such as Shell from exploring and developing resources for the benefit of the American people. It is not a free market. According to the Department of the Interior, 62% of all on-shore federal lands are off limits to oil and gas developments, with restrictions applying to 92% of all federal lands. The Argonne National Laboratory did a report in 2004 that identified 40 specific federal policy areas that halt, limit, delay, or restrict natural gas projects. The problem of access can be solved in this country by the same government that has prohibited it. Congress could have chose to lift some or all of the current restrictions on exploration and production of oil and gas. Congress could provide national policy to reverse the persistent decline of domestically secure natural resource development.

Amen. Congress caused the problem, and only Congress can correct it.

The bad news is we’ll be on short commons until the new sources come on line. The good news is, it won’t take huge government programs – private industry will do it on its own.

 

[Al_Masetti]

Let’s Drill
There’s oil in them thar hills.
by Fred Barnes
05/26/2008, Volume 013, Issue 35

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid stumbled onto the truth last week. He discovered the law of supply and demand. “We want to put [more oil] on the market to increase supply and lower prices,” Reid said. “With oil and gas prices continuing to break record highs every day, much more needs to be done.”

Indeed it does. But Reid won’t allow it.

Reid and his party are committed to suppressing increased oil production in this country, as they wait for that magical day when fossil fuels are no longer needed to supply the nation’s energy needs.

That day may come in 50, 60, 70 years–or never. In the meantime, America needs oil, and the good news is we’re awash in the stuff. If the oil reserves miles off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and in federally owned lands in the West and Alaska were tapped, our dependence on foreign oil could begin to be reversed. In 10 years, half of America’s oil could be produced at home (up from 40 percent), with more coming from increased exports from Canada.

So more oil production would strengthen America’s national security. By increasing the supply of oil, it would reduce the price, or at least ease the pressure on price from rising world demand. And the mere commitment to boosting production would have a soothing effect on a world market easily spooked by threats to supply.

But there’s a problem: Eighty-five percent of the untapped domestic sources of oil have been put off-limits. There’s a federally mandated moratorium on drilling offshore, and huge roadblocks to exploiting the oil on the vast federal lands have been erected.

“What keeps these areas closed are exaggerated environmental fears, strong prejudice against oil companies and sheer stupidity,” wrote Robert Samuelson recently. Lifting the moratorium requires action by Congress and the White House. So don’t hold your breath. The Democratic Congress is a wholly owned subsidiary of the environmental lobby, which regards oil exploration, much less drilling, as a sin against nature.

Advances in technology, however, make serious offshore oil spills a thing of the past. One hundred eight platforms were destroyed and hundreds more damaged in the Gulf of Mexico by hurricanes Rita and Katrina without a single major spill. Californians may remember the damaging spill off Santa Barbara, but that was 40 years ago and was the result of ancient technology.

New technology also means the coastlines would not be marred by unsightly oil platforms. Drilling now goes miles deeper to capture oil once out of reach–and much farther offshore. The moratorium doesn’t take this into account. It blindly bars drilling for 200 miles off the Atlantic and Pacific shores.

The United States is virtually alone in treating offshore production as taboo. Great Britain and Norway drill off their coasts without polluting the North Sea. Brazil has achieved energy independence not only by ethanol use but also by expanded offshore oil production. China is now drilling at Cuba’s behest in waters halfway to the coast of Florida.

There’s another compelling reason to boost domestic production. Oil from current sites is gradually being depleted. Unless new sources come on line in the next few years, America will produce less oil at home and become even more dependent on oil from abroad, the Middle East in particular.

Reid and Democrats, OPEC’s best friends, aren’t noticeably concerned. Their next step is to remove tax incentives to explore and drill for more oil. And Senator Hillary Clinton is eager to impose a new windfall profits tax on oil revenues. These measures have no purpose other than to punish oil companies. They are counterproductive.

When you remove incentives to produce something and when you slap higher taxes on its producers, one thing happens: You get less of the product. In the case of oil, we need more of it and will for the foreseeable future. The oil is there for the getting. But it won’t come out of the ground on its own.

–Fred Barnes, for the Editors

© Copyright 2008, News Corporation, Weekly Standard, All Rights Reserve

Full text:

weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/015/104oiivq.asp

 

[Doug50]

No, it’s the equivallent to saying that huge population shifts, with people moved out of farms, small towns and suburbs will create more problems than it will solve.

Some of the other things on the list make sense – such as more nuclear power, more rail, and so on – but first we have to over-ride the power structure in Washington. Right now, more people believe it’s all a plot by “Big Oil” than understand how the goverment has boxed us in so we can’t access much of the energy we have.

what if people move out of the city onto farms to do manual labor or go hungry? It’s been done before
http://z.about.com/d/americanhistory/1/0/j/1/farming5.jpg

Has the industry been hampered? Sure. Would it make a lot of difference at this point? No, because the volumes demanded to keep GDPs growing are outstripping the ability to supply that demand even if the reserves are there. There simply isn’t enough rigs and service infrastructure, and, more importantly, enough experenced help to do the job even if the rigs were available. It takes years to get that experience. And aside from all that everyone (and I mean everyone) in the know on both sides of the peak oil debate all agree that when it comes to oil supplies America will never be independent again at the volumes it demands. the extra oil will have to come from the middle east.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Excellent post, Al. It seems the elites are married to the notion that they should be the only ones with access to resources, which they use with wild abandon. Environmentalists, it really does seem, simply hate human beings and want to give the world to grizzly bears. I remember a post in a forum (perhaps it was even this one) in which was cited some environmentalist pronouncement that human beings are “a disease” of the earth.

Unfortunately, those who are most responsible for the oil problems we have, have successfully persuaded people that they are the solution.

The nation, it seems, is prepared to vote itself off an economic cliff.

 

[Ridgerunner]

My consortium is in favor of working toward the soft landing of a steadily decreasing population, rather than encouraging large families only to see them starve and be butchered in tribal rivalries over declining resources.

Petrus

So what’s the name of your consortium? What is the membership? Why should we believe them?

 

[ribozyme]

Excellent post, Al. It seems the elites are married to the notion that they should be the only ones with access to resources, which they use with wild abandon. Environmentalists, it really does seem, simply hate human beings and want to give the world to grizzly bears. I remember a post in a forum (perhaps it was even this one) in which was cited some environmentalist pronouncement that human beings are “a disease” of the earth.

Unfortunately, those who are most responsible for the oil problems we have, have successfully persuaded people that they are the solution.

The nation, it seems, is prepared to vote itself off an economic cliff.

Regarding the current candidates, is there any one that would not lead to that? You do not have to mention anyone specific.

 

[Ridgerunner]

It appears Congress is going to override Bush’s veto of the new Farm Bill which provides, among other things, for more money to take farm land out of production.

 

[vern_humphrey]

It appears Congress is going to override Bush’s veto of the new Farm Bill which provides, among other things, for more money to take farm land out of production.

Well, that makes sense. Heaven sakes, the last thing we need is more food.:whacky: