Bill Clinton on Energy?
Mar. 9th, 2007 12:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
helwenYes, even Bill Clinton is speaking about peak oil.
Full article here: http://www.themercury.com/news/article.aspx?articleId=d9d80fa9fea446da90916977c643253d
He gave speech on energy Friday, March 2, at Kansas State University, called Five Questions for the 21st Century.
Some interesting tidbits:
They (communities, teams, group associations) have shared opportunities to participate, shared responsibilities for the welfare of the whole, and a sense of genuine belonging. That is if you're part of one related to all the other members in the unit you think that your differences are interesting but your common humanity, your common membership, matters more. This is very, very important. [emphasis mine]
...But if you look at the modern world we have no choice but to try to move from interdependence to integration cause the world we live in today is we can't keep going this way. We can't keep going with half the people left out of it economically. It's unequal. It's also unstable.
...The third thing I want to say about it is that it is unsustainable because of climate change and because in addition to climate change because of resource depletion. Matthew Simmons, a distinguished petroleum investor who is no liberal Democrat tree-hugger like me, he is one of the Bush family's close friends. He's a conservative Republican. He says we have 35 years of recoverable oil left. The Saudis and Exxon say no, no we've probably got 100 years. Now the oldest city in civilization according to carbon dating that we know about today is Jericho in the Middle East, 10,000 years old. That means that the real happy talk people are saying we have a hundred years out of 10,000, one percent of the whole history of civilization, left to burn oil. [emphasis mine]
*** end snipped bits ***
The Saudis and Exxon say we have at least one hundred years of oil left. Whoo. And how much progress has been made in creating successful alternative fuels in the past 30-40 years?
My stepson Z isn't necessarily counting on the fuel being there forever, I know that for sure. His mom's involved in a local CSA, so I know he has awareness of the wisdom of being able to do stuff on your own. Of course being a young man who's girlfriend lives a little ways away, he'd like a car, but meantime he's gotten pretty good with the bike. He watches little or no tv (they only have one for watching videos/dvds at home, so any tv he sees is at someone else's house), and cheered when we got rid of cable.
THE GOVERNMENT:
Myself, I grew up not expecting Social Security will still be there when I'm old enough to collect my pittance. The gov't has been borrowing against SS and abusing it for years, then there's the companies last year that were telling people their pensions are going away, but no compensation for monies already put in from their earnings. So, it's really best to pay one's debts down and do what one can to plan for the future without counting on big gov't. Thank goodness we have a lot of local community stuff going on here in the valley - CSAs, local support groups, community gardens, etc. There could be more, of course, much more. But in general our area is headed in the right direction, and has been for some time.
I still have some worry that I'm not moving fast enough, but there are limits on what can be done in any given year...
Full article here: http://www.themercury.com/news/article.aspx?articleId=d9d80fa9fea446da90916977c643253d
He gave speech on energy Friday, March 2, at Kansas State University, called Five Questions for the 21st Century.
Some interesting tidbits:
They (communities, teams, group associations) have shared opportunities to participate, shared responsibilities for the welfare of the whole, and a sense of genuine belonging. That is if you're part of one related to all the other members in the unit you think that your differences are interesting but your common humanity, your common membership, matters more. This is very, very important. [emphasis mine]
...But if you look at the modern world we have no choice but to try to move from interdependence to integration cause the world we live in today is we can't keep going this way. We can't keep going with half the people left out of it economically. It's unequal. It's also unstable.
...The third thing I want to say about it is that it is unsustainable because of climate change and because in addition to climate change because of resource depletion. Matthew Simmons, a distinguished petroleum investor who is no liberal Democrat tree-hugger like me, he is one of the Bush family's close friends. He's a conservative Republican. He says we have 35 years of recoverable oil left. The Saudis and Exxon say no, no we've probably got 100 years. Now the oldest city in civilization according to carbon dating that we know about today is Jericho in the Middle East, 10,000 years old. That means that the real happy talk people are saying we have a hundred years out of 10,000, one percent of the whole history of civilization, left to burn oil. [emphasis mine]
*** end snipped bits ***
The Saudis and Exxon say we have at least one hundred years of oil left. Whoo. And how much progress has been made in creating successful alternative fuels in the past 30-40 years?
My stepson Z isn't necessarily counting on the fuel being there forever, I know that for sure. His mom's involved in a local CSA, so I know he has awareness of the wisdom of being able to do stuff on your own. Of course being a young man who's girlfriend lives a little ways away, he'd like a car, but meantime he's gotten pretty good with the bike. He watches little or no tv (they only have one for watching videos/dvds at home, so any tv he sees is at someone else's house), and cheered when we got rid of cable.
THE GOVERNMENT:
Myself, I grew up not expecting Social Security will still be there when I'm old enough to collect my pittance. The gov't has been borrowing against SS and abusing it for years, then there's the companies last year that were telling people their pensions are going away, but no compensation for monies already put in from their earnings. So, it's really best to pay one's debts down and do what one can to plan for the future without counting on big gov't. Thank goodness we have a lot of local community stuff going on here in the valley - CSAs, local support groups, community gardens, etc. There could be more, of course, much more. But in general our area is headed in the right direction, and has been for some time.
I still have some worry that I'm not moving fast enough, but there are limits on what can be done in any given year...
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-03-09 07:05 pm (UTC)Even capping the smokestacks in China will make a tremendous difference in terms of air quality; people were so shocked by the difference in Pittsburgh during the 1930s and 1940s (they needed to have the streetlights on all day because the sun never broke through the smog) and the 1950s after the smokestacks were capped (completely normal) that it became known as the Renaissance City.
Should be interesting to see what happens next, especially if the Chinese get serious about air quality and find a way to scrub the coal emissions....
no subject
Date: 2007-03-09 07:21 pm (UTC)China does seem to be serious about trying to be greener. Energybulletin.net has links to some articles on China:
http://www.energybulletin.net/26833.html (big date says Feb. 5, but it was really put out on Mar. 5)
We'll see if they succeed. If they can, that would be major stuff, considering how big the country is.