Suvivor's Guide to the Energy Crisis

Published on Thursday, October 13, 2005 by the Boston Globe
Suvivor's Guide to the Energy Crisis
by Jeremy Rifkin

Panic has set in. With the price of oil hovering at more than $60 a barrel on world markets and forecasters predicting that we will soon see oil selling for $100 a barrel or more as worldwide oil reserves dwindle, politicians and business leaders are running scared. The global economy is beginning to slow, and there is talk about a new and sustained long-term global recession -- some economists are even talking about a global depression -- that could last for decades.

We are quickly waking up to the fact that the whole world runs by oil. We are an oil civilization. We grow our food with the help of petrochemical fertilizers and pesticides. Our plastics, pharmaceutical products, and clothes are for the most part derived from oil. Our transport, power, heat, electricity, and light are all dependent on oil.

President Bush has called upon Americans to drive their automobiles less -- more than half of the cars in the country are gas-guzzling SUVs -- to save precious fuel. The White House has also asked federal employees to cut down on all but essential travel, to carpool, and to use public transportation. In addition, the president ordered White House thermostats to be turned to 72 degrees Fahrenheit to save energy.

Incredibly, at the same time Bush was proclaiming his newfound conversion to energy efficiency, the White House and Senate Republicans were working quietly behind the scenes to scuttle the remaining six Department of Energy regional energy efficiency field offices responsible for helping low-income families, the business community, and local, state, and federal government to implement energy efficiency measures.

It appears that the president and his team do not understand the enormity of the energy crisis facing the United States and the world. The White House clearly needs guidance. The president should download the just published European Union Green Paper on Energy Efficiency (europa.eu.int/comm/energy/efficiency/index_en.htm). The paper lays out a detailed survivor's guide, a roadmap of what every individual, family, community, and country -- including the United States -- can do to cushion the cost shock of rising oil prices.


http://www.commondreams.org/cgi-bin/print.cgi?file=/views05/1013-20.htm

govt initiatives that would be smart:


tax credits for energy effcient renovations -- create incentives for homeowners to upgrade insulation, install solar panels, geo-therm and passive solar additions that benefit the whole house.

expanded tax credits for hybrid cars -- trade in that SUV and be rewarded; end credits for extra-large SUVs

tax credits to small biz for telecommuting -- provide incentives for biz to offer this and you will decrease cars on the road, improve air quality, and support healthy families with parents being able to stay with children during the day.

easy ability to sell extra energy back to grid -- could be water generated, geo-therm, solar, wind, etc.


anyone have other ideas?

An incredible amount of fuel is spent farming as well as petroleum based fertilizers, pesticides.

All heavily hydrocarbon based and going nowere but up in price.
(And crappy food, too.)

At the moment it is still stuck on stupid

http://www.financialsense.com/stormwatch/2005/1014.html