Bill Clinton: "We may be at a point of peak oil production."

[robertpaulsen]

Thanks to loindelrio for posting this in the Peak Oil Group forum. Just thought I'd crosspost here to see what everyone thinks of this:


The Indians and Chinese are in this huge fight now to see who can get the most oil. We may be at a point of peak oil production. You may see $100 a barrel oil in the next two or three years, but what still is driving this globalization is the idea that is you cannot possibly get rich, stay rich and get richer; if you don’t release more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. That was true in the industrial era; it is simply factually not true.

http://www.egovmonitor.com/node/5728

[motocicleta]

1. Good that people in the mainstream are thinking about it, anyway.

not that it gives me a ton of hope, but a daily reminder that somebody powerful cares is good.

[Nordmadr]

2. So we've got multiple "ex" presidents proclaiming this (Clinton, Carter)

along with geologists, other scientists, etc. and yet we do very little about it. I just don't understand it. Our leaders seem to think:

1) Business as usual will get it done

2) They don't want to be the ones to bring this to the public attention

3) They think there is nothing they can do about it anyway, so help the rich and screw the rest of us

4) They don't care

5) They figure God will sort it all out

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem, as a Nation or society, that we are learning the lesson or getting the point.

Olafr

[robertpaulsen]

6. Wow! Did Carter say something about Peak Oil recently?

Or are you referring to this:

Carter Tried To Stop Bush's Energy Disasters - 28 Years Ago
by Thom Hartmann

In his recent news conference, George Bush Jr. suggested that our nation's "problem" with high gasoline prices was caused by the lack of a national energy policy, and tried to blame it all on Bill Clinton. First, Junior said, "This is a problem that's been a long time in coming. We haven't had an energy policy in this country."

This was followed by, "That's exactly what I've been saying to the American people -- 10 years ago if we'd had an energy strategy, we would be able to diversify away from foreign dependence. And -- but we haven't done that. And now we find ourselves in the fix we're in." As is so often the case, Bush was lying.

Consider President Jimmy Carter's April 18, 1977 speech. Since it was given nearly three decades ago, when many of the reporters in Bush's White House were children, it's understandable that they don't remember it. But it's inexcusable that Bush and the mainstream media (which, after all, has the ability to do research) would completely ignore it. It was the speech that established the strategic petroleum reserve, birthed the modern solar power industry, led to the insulation of millions of American homes, and established America's first national energy policy. "With the exception of preventing war," said Jimmy Carter, a man of peace, "this is the greatest challenge our country will face during our lifetimes."

He added: "It is a problem we will not solve in the next few years, and it is likely to get progressively worse through the rest of this century. "We must not be selfish or timid if we hope to have a decent world for our children and grandchildren.

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0503-22.htm

[Nordmadr]

10. I was more in general referencing energy ideas he has discussed in

the past. Your reference works nicely to highlight that.

Olafr

[robertpaulsen]

14. Thanks Olafr. Here's more from JC.

Jimmy Carter (1977) on our oil problems and energy.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x1017073

[The2ndWheel]

7. #1 will happen

Be it with oil, or slaves(and we have a lot more potential slaves today then ever before), business will get done.

[NJCher]

8. our "leaders" don't get it

But that doesn't mean change can't come from the grassroots. And indeed, it is. Mike Ruppert, who is perennially gloomy on this topic, recently said that the bright spot in all this is that Americans do know the truth about energy and they are out there doing all kinds of energy projects to get themselves off the grid. Ruppert said this after a nationwide speaking tour.

Accordingly, just this morning I received an e-mail from my brother. He has been building a windmill and told me about this site:

http://www.thebackshed.com/windmill/Photos.asp

This site shows that people are doing these independent projects on their own, experimenting, failing, succeeding, and using the Internet to tell others about their results.

This speech of Clinton's is actually not new--he's been saying this about the unorganized nature of alternative energy for years. As I pointed out to my father, who is cynical about whether we can ever have reliable sources of energy without some big energy company collecting for it, perhaps it is better that these technologies evolve on the grassroots level. If there are dozens of paths to the same end--solar energy, for example--it is less likely that one large energy company can come in an dominate that market.




Cher

[Nordmadr]

11. That is a cool site. I need to read through it more.

I have been gardening now for two years on my little one acre I call home. Looking to buy a piece of property that is significantly larger, where I could put in a windmill too.

Sustainability and Homesteading are my plans, as best as I can manage.

Olafr

[robertpaulsen]

12. Speaking of Mike, here's his link to New Zealand PM on Peak Oil.

He's really on top of this stuff:

Prime Minister out of Closet on Peak Oil

by Steve McKinlay
PowerLess NZ
Friday, April 21, 2006
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO0604/S00169.htm

As the price of oil hangs at record heights, unmoving, like a pall threatening to choke economies and festering the sore that is inflation (October delivery contracts on the NYMEX are over US$75 a barrel), the cattle-class as well as the impotent media transfixed by daily trivialities and titillations by and large continue to remain clueless as to why we are paying almost $1.80 a litre at the pump.

Economists and “analysts” roll out the usual suspects whenever the price moves skyward, security worries in Nigeria, “weapons of mass destruction” in Iran, or was that Iraq, hurricanes in the gulf. The point today is any minor supply concern that results in a few thousand-barrel production cutback translates into a several dollar bull-run on oil on the mercantile exchange which is never clawed back. To say that “the end of cheap oil” is here is to merely state the bleeding obvious.

Matt Simmons energy investment banker and Peak Oil advocate argued that 2006 would be the year Peak Oil would be absorbed into the public consciousness as much as climate change and it seems he may be right. This week Helen Clark, New Zealand’s Prime Minister joined a rapidly growing but exclusive club, the penny has obviously dropped – she openly admitted the real reasons behind high oil prices, “because we're probably not too far short of peak production, if we're not already there” <1>.

This watershed statement, which incidentally went over the heads of most of the media turkeys in attendance, has enormous economic and social implications. Firstly it absolves Trevor Mallard (acting Minister of Energy) from having to regurgitate International Energy Agency nonsense that Peak Oil is at least 30 years away. “Not too far short of peak production, if not already there” surely can’t mean the same thing as 30 years away. The minister can now base policy in geological reality rather than the flawed economic “business as usual” fantasy that has cheap abundant oil production growing alongside the economy for all eternity.

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/042506_world_stories.shtml#0

[Strelnikov_]

15. Does Not Surprise Me, Considering 'That Of Which We Shall Not Speak'

(aka Peak Oil) awareness is also a grassroots internet phenomena.

[Strelnikov_]

16. 6) There Is A Lot Of Money To Be Made In The Initial Stages

of that of which we shall not speak, some of which will not be made if the 'consumers' catch wind of the unmentionable, and begin to make other economic and political arrangements.

[PDX Bara]

3. Speech

Sure makes one long for a president with intelligence and real compassion. To call Bush a train wreck is a major insult to trains...

[jsamuel]

4. "may" - he is speculating

[robertpaulsen]

13. Which is a lot more proactive than our current ostrich/chimp-in-chief.

If Clinton is speculating that it "may" be happening now, then we definitely should be preparing now for the eventuality of it. Unfortunately our current government remains in denial of Peak Oil, "addicted to oil" quotes don't address the issue head-on.

[MadHound]

5. Well, I suppose better late than never

Sorry, but Clinton could and should have seen this coming. He was almost as deep into oil politics as Bushco is. Yet instead of pushing policies that would have eased our transition off of oil relatively painlessly, he instead just kept letting this shitstorm roll right along, and now here we are, going right over that cliff.

[AValdoux]

9. Peak Oil is the issue

The first country that accepts this theory will be the ones who make it through the upcoming crisis. Cheap gas is OVER. Oil resources WILL run out one day. We need a national effort to come up with alternative energy & conservation. We can't leave it up to oil companies or private enterprise.

Instead of whining about high gas prices, what would we be doing if something catastrophic happens and the oil flow is interrupted, TOMORROW?


AValdoux