For a note of cheer (if that is not off-brand in climate journalism) the same fracking technology that got repeated millions of times, creating a wealth of people who know just how to do it, may be the key to ending oil and gas.
Fervo Energy, from climate-villain (and my home town) Calgary, AB, has demonstrated that fracking techniques can create a geothermal well that pays back, in locations that are not special geothermal hot-spots.
So you can create 7x24 energy almost anywhere. Even if it is somewhat expensive electricity, it can "balance out" the output of wind+solar.
Their competitors, Eavor in Houston, have shown something far more dramatic: that they can pump water pressure into the well, and use the earth to store energy; that really, really would make a lot more wind+solar possible.
Fervo has a commercial plant under construction in Germany, and if it flies, it'll change a lot.
You are correct, fracking technology can apply absolutely to geothermal. I'm unaware of Fervo, but aware of Eavor. Pretty sure I have articles saved on Eavor. As I recall, Eavor is trying to go very deep, challenging the limits of drilling in search of a big solution, not just for heating homes and buildings, but to drive turbines for electricity. This seems like a great idea. Clicking on their website, they claim no fracking, no water use, not what I recall, I'll have to look again. I'm not against big projects, but tend to think myriad, decentralized small ones have a place as well, resiliency by comparison and the potential to free the average person from the tyranny of energy giants. Who wouldn't love being off the grid? I'll check out Fervo and love the potential of geothermal. Thanks for the comment and thoughts, appreciated.
I have confused Eavor and Fervo on the fracking; apologies. But, the comment still has some validity, as I doubt that Eavor could do its own tech were it not for the an oil industry that could fill a warehouse with 3-ring-binders on “how to drill in every rock”, and literally, a town with geophysicists and geologists and drillers.
It’s nice, really: when coal mining ended, they were just 100% out of work; advising drillers that they are desperately needed to drill hundreds of thousands of geothermal wells in every corner of the globe, is bound to cheer them up as their dying employers dispose of them like so much Kleenex.
No worries, it's good you reminded me of Eavor, and my recall is that the technology they were using was fracking, so I'm surprised they're claiming no water and no earthquakes. I have to look again as time allows. Workers losing jobs in dying industries is a real problem. If coal miner's skills could be put to use in geothermal, that would be wonderful.
For the last three years, I have educated myself about climate change in an effort to bridge the gap between dry science and public communication, so devoid in mainstream news. Geothermal seems to be a benign way to harvest energy, but I'm no expert. I have to feel thoroughly informed before I write. It's a responsibility. Every week of publishing involves research and learning. I've written on battery technology and the desperation of SAI. Geothermal merits attention as I can get to it. There are so many issues to address and communicate.
It will be interesting to see how we run our shipping fleets on geothermal energy. Not to mention the tractors that work to feed 8 billion people and give us the excess of anything to ship in the first place.
Very interesting article…the major problem the world is facing. To me, solar is the key, but a long way off..we are running against the clock and don’t seem to be winning.
I find passive solar, geothermal and smart design most interesting. An earth berm house situated with glass on only the south wall would be incredibly efficient. Coupled with geothermal and minimal active solar, energy use could extremely low. Of course, the problem is, we have to deal with buildings and urban areas that are poorly designed and inefficient. Solar coupled with battery storage becomes problematic with the serious issues mining brings, and vast acres of solar development take wildlife habitat, already a major contributor to unprecedented extinction rates, and could compete with farmland. I believe decentralized, tailored micro solutions would be best, and embracing that we need to and will live smaller, one way or another. Nothing will replace the brief life of fossil fuels. Indeed, the clock is ticking.
It's interesting how folks break down into camps here. Those who are thinking "how will i heat my home?" start talking about geothermal. Those who think continuing to have a personal vehicle is our #1 priority are all over the electricity production end of things. Neither of which will address our root predicament, which is how you keep up food production, resource extraction and shipping in the absence of oil, and not just keep it going, but keep it going at scale such that 8 billion people aren't starving to death. I fail to see for instance how geothermal or having access to a Hyundai Kona is going to do this.
Oh, I agree. In the big picture of things, forced migration away from the equator, displacement from flood, fires, droughts and diminished agriculture are going to drive everything. Also, the inevitable diminishing return and ultimate end of oil, which has created this bubble about to burst. Geothermal and earth berm houses, the abolishment of the automobile and numerous other things should have been implemented en masse 50 years ago to be effective. Bottom line, we should have been looking for ways to live efficiently, modestly, and use as little energy as possible all along. But that's not what animals do. Every "successful" species eventually outstrips its environment and collapses. That's how it works.
Sadly, our clever hands have allowed us to construct our own demise, governed by instincts that are no better than the animals we ironically regard as savage beasts.
My approach in writing these articles varies from being fairly brutal and direct at times, to allowing people to reach conclusions at their own pace, so I'm okay with talking about things like geothermal, which in its own container is a reasonable topic to me. Thank you for the comment, I get where you're coming from.
"But that's not what animals do. Every 'successful' species eventually outstrips its environment and collapses. That's how it works." Amen, and here is your answer as to where this is all headed, simply because it cannot and will not and never does head anywhere else, ultimately. Our work today then, as individuals, is not to try to find some 'solution' here as most would have it, cos there is none. Rather, our work is to try to negotiate the chaos, as individuals, as families, maybe as communities but that's about as much control as we can expect to have, that last, and probably too much. If more of us could just accept this, we'd be more at peace and less prone to waste our time and resources and efforts on endless lines of conjecture and doomed experiment. It's interesting being a spectator today, everyone you listen to with regards to our stage of the trajectory is at some stage of Kubler Ross's five stages of grief. Most are in the bargaining stage. 'Renewables' and all that. Many are also still in the denial stage. Very few have made it to the acceptance stage. It's refreshing, encouraging, the ones who understand. The rest of them trying to be so 'optimistic' just depress the hell out of me.
When I started this a few years ago, it was from becoming acquainted with climate scientists on Twitter. I felt to comment with any legitimacy I needed to educate myself better, and that I could perhaps communicate our situation better than most scientists. My gut said we're tipped beyond redemption, and unfortunately nothing I've read in the last three years has given me cause to feel differently. Now and then I get an angry comment about how useless what I'm doing is and that we doomers are all the same. I understand the perspective, but my modest readership tells me a different story. Many people are looking for the truth and trying to understand. We don't necessarily get that community in our immediate lives. This is a way of dealing with the grief and hopefully finding some space of peace, at least for some of us. That said, I'll keep fighting for what I can. Getting Harris-Walz elected averts accelerated disaster and finishing under fascism for the next four years. I want them to acknowledge the crisis and marshal everything they can against all odds. National common purpose against this beast would be better for all of us. Yeah, I know I'm dreaming.
The people who say the truth is useless are 1) in the denial and 2) do not understand the vital nature of truth where our survival is concerned. Oil has given us such a glut of excess everything we’ve been allowed - great numbers of us at least - to get away with taking an ever further wandering break from truth. But that luxury period is ending. So what we’re doing is doing them a favor, cos there is ALWAYS something to be done, even if only in our own heads. But people who haven’t reached the acceptance stage are not ready for the truth about today. You’re dreaming where big P politics is concerned, for sure. Harris might not be the dictator Trump may be - or she may, the problem with the Left being they have ready subterfuge for their true motives the Right lacks - but she may well prolong our Cold WWIII indefinitately aiding Ukraine, as Biden would have done. And how good is a protracted war for the climate, the ecology? The threat of turning the place into an ashtray overnight, which is also very real? I want to see Trump end that, if he can, though i’ve always loathed the man. I couldn’t care less whose flag flies over the Ukraine nor do i buy the hackneyed good guy/bad guy narrative being beaten beyond death here. But anyways, this is all just a sideshow, entertainment, it’s all going away.
Thank you so much for the research you are doing and the information you are sharing. We can no longer rely on mainstream media to tell us what is really going on. Your work needs a wider audience.
I appreciate your encouragement. The research is constant, hundreds of carefully organized folders with thousands of links, I really can't guess at the numbers now. The corporate media is untrustworthy. Even the better outlets suffer from gaping sins of omission, emphasis and consistency. My inspiration came before I left Twitter from getting acquainted with climate scientists and a world view of our climate, ecological and extinction crises. It's not being communicated, and a visionary, galvanizing emergency plan isn't being proposed, although there is one out there, degrowth, which I summarized in an article. It's a concept that dates to 1970 I believe, and a complete anathema to our political and economic structures that are running our life support systems into the ground. https://geoffreydeihl.substack.com/p/degrowth-the-vision-we-must-demand
It's hard to think society has any kind of future at present rates of energy consumption, much less growing rates of energy consumption. With oil and natural gas set to be exhausted (or economically unfeasible) before the end of the century, it's difficult to imagine we could completely retool to renewable sources without creating the same issue with rare earth metals, for which demand has been increasing consistenly 10% year over year. At that rate, we'd be out of those too by the mid 22nd century.
Conservation HAS to be part of the thinking. Whatever happened to that word? There is so much waste. I was deeply disappointed Biden didn't communicate a national vision of where we need to go, because the truth is we're looking at a contraction in energy in any scenario (barring a breakthrough in fusion, or rapid build out of nuclear).
You're correct, so-called renewable resources will run out, too, and in exploiting them will create new environmental disasters and hasten the destruction of the shrinking natural world, increasing the never seen before extinction rate we're witnessing as well. Even if we had endless minerals and metals, without fossil fuels they can't be extracted, processed, manufactured, transported, or maintained.
We have a slim chance to recognize reality and to move to a low energy world and try to make the contraction as fair and equitable as possible, which is why I favor degrowth, but it is possible we are too late. I think the closest tipping points have likely been exceeded, particularly the Arctic and Amazon. It looks like Trump is going to implode. I hope Harris-Walz recognize the immediacy of our situation. Radical action is needed. not nibbling at the edges.
What's unfortunate is that conservation can't be enshrined in a system that demands perpetual growth at the cost of everything else. Planned obsolescence and shrinkflation are two examples of this pitfall - where immense waste is created by the ever-increasing demand for higher profit margins. Smaller product sizes and products that are designed not to last beyond a few years virtually ensure more waste ends up in our landfills, oceans, forests and waterways, or in toxic e-waste piles.
I agree with you regarding degrowth - but have faced the realization that such a thing will never be a popular proposal or win at any ballot box, especially in a society where we are taught from a young age that "standard of living" is directly correlated to the quantity and speed at which we can conspicuously consume. Those in "poverty" currently living around the fringes of the system without secure housing, surviving off dumpster diving and consuming only what they need to survive - are upheld as moral failures, examples of what you don't want your life to look like. The rude awakening that's coming is that degrowth is inevitable for a system that demands infinite growth using finite resources.
I don't see Harris-Walz, or any major political party facing this challenge earnestly. It would be akin to political suicide. How many political victories have been scored on the tired old tagline of championing more growth, more jobs, more consumption? A party that comes out and tells people they'll have to make do with less is going to face the full weight of socioculturally embedded denial... and we already have far too many people deep into delusion who think climate change is a hoax.
Regardless, the Democratic establishment, if anything, has simply used the GOP's shift towards extreme right-wing fascism to shift even further to the right; regardless, both parties serve at the behest of the billionaire class, not common working people, or the environment - and that class is dead-set on keeping the music playing as long as possible while they build their apocalypse compounds. Decades of "voting for the lesser of two evils" has led us here, and is a great reminder of the challenges faced by countries in the Global South who have had to face brutal histories of imperial control and colonization; like Vietnam - they did not obtain their independence from those bloodthirsty, resource-hungry regimes at the ballot box.
Looks like we see things similarly. I agree, degrowth is highly unlikely to even be mentioned, let alone become a strategy. I think Harris-Walz could be stronger on climate and environment, but of course we need the House and Senate, too. The Democrats have gone far to the right in my lifetime. Sanders to me is what a Democrat should look like. I believe he would have beaten Trump, but Clinton was preordained.
Yeah, growth is all people want to hear, and a different message is political suicide, but degrowth is already happening. It's been disguised by a financial shell game. Ultimately, the entire economy comes back to energy, and sometime relatively soon the amount of energy expended to extract oil will exceed what can be a harvested. Then it's game up for renewables, too. We're facing at best an incredibly difficult future if handled well. If it's not handled well, it's going to be a horror show.
"degrowth is already happening. It's been disguised by a financial shell game. Ultimately, the entire economy comes back to energy, and sometime relatively soon the amount of energy expended to extract oil will exceed what can be a harvested."
Unequivocally agree. I think we're already seeing how the system will handle that unintentional and inevitable degrowth, though, and it's similar to how Weimar Germany responded to its own post-war depression and the ensuing global depression; fascistic forces consolidated around stories that could scapegoat the most vulnerable as being the ones responsible for everyone's misfortune - to devastating effect. Look at modern-day discourse about immigration and immigrants (in both the GOP and the Democratic Party) and how much racism, xenophobia and chauvinism is spilling out into the open now and you can imagine how things might deteriorate further as "standard of living" becomes increasingly scarce for most. They'll be looking for someone, or something, to blame, and lacking the necessary political consciousness and education, they'll be ready to crucify whatever scapegoats their chosen talking heads tell them to.
Absolutely. Fascist movements are increasing in many countries, and racism and intolerance of all kinds manifest when times get tough. It certainly never died in the US, but when there was relative economic equality (never achieved for all, of course) those tendencies were relatively mollified. I'm 62, so if I kick tomorrow, I won't complain, but my daughter is in her early 20s. The depression of so many younger people is widespread and well justified. The future is extremely frightening for those of us with our eyes open.
It's very true, want to look like a fool in terms of your larger scale predictions, just start giving in to the temptation to put timelines on things. That said, Hubbert was amazing, calling conventional oil the way he did. The principles behind the failed timeline predictions at any rate still apply, as you say, and the problem of peak oil - conventional oil, the oil our model was built to run on - is still a thing, it's just a different thing at this point than many thought it would be. As for the fracking of tight oil making a lot of money, i'm not sure that's so true. It produced an ocean of oil indeed, but the profits for the investors were not great. Why banks are very cautious about this stuff now. At any rate, oil demand will not fall on account of 'renewables' taking over. Oil demand will fall for the other reasons you mention, mostly, it will not be economic to recover, this will send bigger and bigger shockwaves through our already teetering economies, and it will grind to an end along with the renewables it supports. With the oil will go this civilization, and much of the 8 billion population oil created and sustains. The only lifeform not breathing a huge sigh of relief at that point will be ours.
Yes, Hubbert was prescient, except with factoring in fracking. That's why I pointed out the technology was developed in the late 40s. I'm curious as to why he didn't factor that in. It kicked the can down the road, and now we're in far more trouble than 2005.
Unfortunately, we're taking down many of those lifeforms that don't deserve this fate with us.
Maybe Hubbert did factor fracking in, but didn't think it would make much difference. As you say, wells have been fracked for a long time. As for the other species, sickening to witness, yes. But such dieoffs are not unusual, it's just unusual for them to be caused in a sweeping effect of some single other species. The earth meanwhile has billions of years left and it will explode back to life as it has before in the aftermaths. But right now? Sickening yes. As it is recognizing that humanity is just a mindless yeast as a body in its entirety. Such a glorious species, ourselves, to be so utterly underwhelming in total.
Fracking hadn't happened at a significant scale in Hubbert's life, so maybe he didn't anticipate its scale. Also, probably most of those fracking fields hadn't been mapped yet. We're a frustrating species. Perhaps without the discovery of oil we could have come closer to our potential, although we had plenty of behavioral problems before it as well. And yeah, life will continue and evolve without us here. Will the next dominant, clever species be wiser?
I know of someone n Northeast Ohio, who has a geothermal residential energy system, running throughout acres of wooded property he owns. Way ahead of his times, it has been in place for over two decades and is touted to continue for another two decades, as long as annual maintenance is performed. This can be outsourced and is overall a low maintenance, cost savings approach. Initial capital investment is higher but well worth it. I would like your insight into a community approach to defraying the large capital investment required. Does this concept already exist?
Hi Pam, I meant to answer this yesterday, but ran out of steam. It seems to me (without researching it) community approaches to surviving this situation, if we can survive it, are critical. The challenges are immense. It takes a critical mass of people thinking well beyond the status quo, willing to defy rules and laws in recognition the system we're living in is taking us over the cliff. My friend from writing here Margi who lost everything in the 2019-2020 Black Summer in Australia is working on building an independent community of diverse skills that can endure and survive collapse. This company, Eavor is working on large scale geothermal, but I'm not sure, we have time for large scale solutions. Working on local and regional resiliency may be a better approach, ultimately. It sounds like your NE Ohio neighbor is ahead of the curve and worth talking to.
Feoff: Thank you for your article and the stimulus to thought it provokes.
For a note of cheer (if that is not off-brand in climate journalism) the same fracking technology that got repeated millions of times, creating a wealth of people who know just how to do it, may be the key to ending oil and gas.
Fervo Energy, from climate-villain (and my home town) Calgary, AB, has demonstrated that fracking techniques can create a geothermal well that pays back, in locations that are not special geothermal hot-spots.
So you can create 7x24 energy almost anywhere. Even if it is somewhat expensive electricity, it can "balance out" the output of wind+solar.
Their competitors, Eavor in Houston, have shown something far more dramatic: that they can pump water pressure into the well, and use the earth to store energy; that really, really would make a lot more wind+solar possible.
Fervo has a commercial plant under construction in Germany, and if it flies, it'll change a lot.
You are correct, fracking technology can apply absolutely to geothermal. I'm unaware of Fervo, but aware of Eavor. Pretty sure I have articles saved on Eavor. As I recall, Eavor is trying to go very deep, challenging the limits of drilling in search of a big solution, not just for heating homes and buildings, but to drive turbines for electricity. This seems like a great idea. Clicking on their website, they claim no fracking, no water use, not what I recall, I'll have to look again. I'm not against big projects, but tend to think myriad, decentralized small ones have a place as well, resiliency by comparison and the potential to free the average person from the tyranny of energy giants. Who wouldn't love being off the grid? I'll check out Fervo and love the potential of geothermal. Thanks for the comment and thoughts, appreciated.
I have confused Eavor and Fervo on the fracking; apologies. But, the comment still has some validity, as I doubt that Eavor could do its own tech were it not for the an oil industry that could fill a warehouse with 3-ring-binders on “how to drill in every rock”, and literally, a town with geophysicists and geologists and drillers.
It’s nice, really: when coal mining ended, they were just 100% out of work; advising drillers that they are desperately needed to drill hundreds of thousands of geothermal wells in every corner of the globe, is bound to cheer them up as their dying employers dispose of them like so much Kleenex.
No worries, it's good you reminded me of Eavor, and my recall is that the technology they were using was fracking, so I'm surprised they're claiming no water and no earthquakes. I have to look again as time allows. Workers losing jobs in dying industries is a real problem. If coal miner's skills could be put to use in geothermal, that would be wonderful.
For the last three years, I have educated myself about climate change in an effort to bridge the gap between dry science and public communication, so devoid in mainstream news. Geothermal seems to be a benign way to harvest energy, but I'm no expert. I have to feel thoroughly informed before I write. It's a responsibility. Every week of publishing involves research and learning. I've written on battery technology and the desperation of SAI. Geothermal merits attention as I can get to it. There are so many issues to address and communicate.
It will be interesting to see how we run our shipping fleets on geothermal energy. Not to mention the tractors that work to feed 8 billion people and give us the excess of anything to ship in the first place.
Very interesting article…the major problem the world is facing. To me, solar is the key, but a long way off..we are running against the clock and don’t seem to be winning.
I find passive solar, geothermal and smart design most interesting. An earth berm house situated with glass on only the south wall would be incredibly efficient. Coupled with geothermal and minimal active solar, energy use could extremely low. Of course, the problem is, we have to deal with buildings and urban areas that are poorly designed and inefficient. Solar coupled with battery storage becomes problematic with the serious issues mining brings, and vast acres of solar development take wildlife habitat, already a major contributor to unprecedented extinction rates, and could compete with farmland. I believe decentralized, tailored micro solutions would be best, and embracing that we need to and will live smaller, one way or another. Nothing will replace the brief life of fossil fuels. Indeed, the clock is ticking.
It's interesting how folks break down into camps here. Those who are thinking "how will i heat my home?" start talking about geothermal. Those who think continuing to have a personal vehicle is our #1 priority are all over the electricity production end of things. Neither of which will address our root predicament, which is how you keep up food production, resource extraction and shipping in the absence of oil, and not just keep it going, but keep it going at scale such that 8 billion people aren't starving to death. I fail to see for instance how geothermal or having access to a Hyundai Kona is going to do this.
Oh, I agree. In the big picture of things, forced migration away from the equator, displacement from flood, fires, droughts and diminished agriculture are going to drive everything. Also, the inevitable diminishing return and ultimate end of oil, which has created this bubble about to burst. Geothermal and earth berm houses, the abolishment of the automobile and numerous other things should have been implemented en masse 50 years ago to be effective. Bottom line, we should have been looking for ways to live efficiently, modestly, and use as little energy as possible all along. But that's not what animals do. Every "successful" species eventually outstrips its environment and collapses. That's how it works.
Sadly, our clever hands have allowed us to construct our own demise, governed by instincts that are no better than the animals we ironically regard as savage beasts.
My approach in writing these articles varies from being fairly brutal and direct at times, to allowing people to reach conclusions at their own pace, so I'm okay with talking about things like geothermal, which in its own container is a reasonable topic to me. Thank you for the comment, I get where you're coming from.
"But that's not what animals do. Every 'successful' species eventually outstrips its environment and collapses. That's how it works." Amen, and here is your answer as to where this is all headed, simply because it cannot and will not and never does head anywhere else, ultimately. Our work today then, as individuals, is not to try to find some 'solution' here as most would have it, cos there is none. Rather, our work is to try to negotiate the chaos, as individuals, as families, maybe as communities but that's about as much control as we can expect to have, that last, and probably too much. If more of us could just accept this, we'd be more at peace and less prone to waste our time and resources and efforts on endless lines of conjecture and doomed experiment. It's interesting being a spectator today, everyone you listen to with regards to our stage of the trajectory is at some stage of Kubler Ross's five stages of grief. Most are in the bargaining stage. 'Renewables' and all that. Many are also still in the denial stage. Very few have made it to the acceptance stage. It's refreshing, encouraging, the ones who understand. The rest of them trying to be so 'optimistic' just depress the hell out of me.
When I started this a few years ago, it was from becoming acquainted with climate scientists on Twitter. I felt to comment with any legitimacy I needed to educate myself better, and that I could perhaps communicate our situation better than most scientists. My gut said we're tipped beyond redemption, and unfortunately nothing I've read in the last three years has given me cause to feel differently. Now and then I get an angry comment about how useless what I'm doing is and that we doomers are all the same. I understand the perspective, but my modest readership tells me a different story. Many people are looking for the truth and trying to understand. We don't necessarily get that community in our immediate lives. This is a way of dealing with the grief and hopefully finding some space of peace, at least for some of us. That said, I'll keep fighting for what I can. Getting Harris-Walz elected averts accelerated disaster and finishing under fascism for the next four years. I want them to acknowledge the crisis and marshal everything they can against all odds. National common purpose against this beast would be better for all of us. Yeah, I know I'm dreaming.
The people who say the truth is useless are 1) in the denial and 2) do not understand the vital nature of truth where our survival is concerned. Oil has given us such a glut of excess everything we’ve been allowed - great numbers of us at least - to get away with taking an ever further wandering break from truth. But that luxury period is ending. So what we’re doing is doing them a favor, cos there is ALWAYS something to be done, even if only in our own heads. But people who haven’t reached the acceptance stage are not ready for the truth about today. You’re dreaming where big P politics is concerned, for sure. Harris might not be the dictator Trump may be - or she may, the problem with the Left being they have ready subterfuge for their true motives the Right lacks - but she may well prolong our Cold WWIII indefinitately aiding Ukraine, as Biden would have done. And how good is a protracted war for the climate, the ecology? The threat of turning the place into an ashtray overnight, which is also very real? I want to see Trump end that, if he can, though i’ve always loathed the man. I couldn’t care less whose flag flies over the Ukraine nor do i buy the hackneyed good guy/bad guy narrative being beaten beyond death here. But anyways, this is all just a sideshow, entertainment, it’s all going away.
Thank you so much for the research you are doing and the information you are sharing. We can no longer rely on mainstream media to tell us what is really going on. Your work needs a wider audience.
I appreciate your encouragement. The research is constant, hundreds of carefully organized folders with thousands of links, I really can't guess at the numbers now. The corporate media is untrustworthy. Even the better outlets suffer from gaping sins of omission, emphasis and consistency. My inspiration came before I left Twitter from getting acquainted with climate scientists and a world view of our climate, ecological and extinction crises. It's not being communicated, and a visionary, galvanizing emergency plan isn't being proposed, although there is one out there, degrowth, which I summarized in an article. It's a concept that dates to 1970 I believe, and a complete anathema to our political and economic structures that are running our life support systems into the ground. https://geoffreydeihl.substack.com/p/degrowth-the-vision-we-must-demand
It's hard to think society has any kind of future at present rates of energy consumption, much less growing rates of energy consumption. With oil and natural gas set to be exhausted (or economically unfeasible) before the end of the century, it's difficult to imagine we could completely retool to renewable sources without creating the same issue with rare earth metals, for which demand has been increasing consistenly 10% year over year. At that rate, we'd be out of those too by the mid 22nd century.
Conservation HAS to be part of the thinking. Whatever happened to that word? There is so much waste. I was deeply disappointed Biden didn't communicate a national vision of where we need to go, because the truth is we're looking at a contraction in energy in any scenario (barring a breakthrough in fusion, or rapid build out of nuclear).
You're correct, so-called renewable resources will run out, too, and in exploiting them will create new environmental disasters and hasten the destruction of the shrinking natural world, increasing the never seen before extinction rate we're witnessing as well. Even if we had endless minerals and metals, without fossil fuels they can't be extracted, processed, manufactured, transported, or maintained.
We have a slim chance to recognize reality and to move to a low energy world and try to make the contraction as fair and equitable as possible, which is why I favor degrowth, but it is possible we are too late. I think the closest tipping points have likely been exceeded, particularly the Arctic and Amazon. It looks like Trump is going to implode. I hope Harris-Walz recognize the immediacy of our situation. Radical action is needed. not nibbling at the edges.
Can't disagree with anything you said.
What's unfortunate is that conservation can't be enshrined in a system that demands perpetual growth at the cost of everything else. Planned obsolescence and shrinkflation are two examples of this pitfall - where immense waste is created by the ever-increasing demand for higher profit margins. Smaller product sizes and products that are designed not to last beyond a few years virtually ensure more waste ends up in our landfills, oceans, forests and waterways, or in toxic e-waste piles.
I agree with you regarding degrowth - but have faced the realization that such a thing will never be a popular proposal or win at any ballot box, especially in a society where we are taught from a young age that "standard of living" is directly correlated to the quantity and speed at which we can conspicuously consume. Those in "poverty" currently living around the fringes of the system without secure housing, surviving off dumpster diving and consuming only what they need to survive - are upheld as moral failures, examples of what you don't want your life to look like. The rude awakening that's coming is that degrowth is inevitable for a system that demands infinite growth using finite resources.
I don't see Harris-Walz, or any major political party facing this challenge earnestly. It would be akin to political suicide. How many political victories have been scored on the tired old tagline of championing more growth, more jobs, more consumption? A party that comes out and tells people they'll have to make do with less is going to face the full weight of socioculturally embedded denial... and we already have far too many people deep into delusion who think climate change is a hoax.
Regardless, the Democratic establishment, if anything, has simply used the GOP's shift towards extreme right-wing fascism to shift even further to the right; regardless, both parties serve at the behest of the billionaire class, not common working people, or the environment - and that class is dead-set on keeping the music playing as long as possible while they build their apocalypse compounds. Decades of "voting for the lesser of two evils" has led us here, and is a great reminder of the challenges faced by countries in the Global South who have had to face brutal histories of imperial control and colonization; like Vietnam - they did not obtain their independence from those bloodthirsty, resource-hungry regimes at the ballot box.
Looks like we see things similarly. I agree, degrowth is highly unlikely to even be mentioned, let alone become a strategy. I think Harris-Walz could be stronger on climate and environment, but of course we need the House and Senate, too. The Democrats have gone far to the right in my lifetime. Sanders to me is what a Democrat should look like. I believe he would have beaten Trump, but Clinton was preordained.
Yeah, growth is all people want to hear, and a different message is political suicide, but degrowth is already happening. It's been disguised by a financial shell game. Ultimately, the entire economy comes back to energy, and sometime relatively soon the amount of energy expended to extract oil will exceed what can be a harvested. Then it's game up for renewables, too. We're facing at best an incredibly difficult future if handled well. If it's not handled well, it's going to be a horror show.
https://geoffreydeihl.substack.com/p/the-end-of-oil
"degrowth is already happening. It's been disguised by a financial shell game. Ultimately, the entire economy comes back to energy, and sometime relatively soon the amount of energy expended to extract oil will exceed what can be a harvested."
Unequivocally agree. I think we're already seeing how the system will handle that unintentional and inevitable degrowth, though, and it's similar to how Weimar Germany responded to its own post-war depression and the ensuing global depression; fascistic forces consolidated around stories that could scapegoat the most vulnerable as being the ones responsible for everyone's misfortune - to devastating effect. Look at modern-day discourse about immigration and immigrants (in both the GOP and the Democratic Party) and how much racism, xenophobia and chauvinism is spilling out into the open now and you can imagine how things might deteriorate further as "standard of living" becomes increasingly scarce for most. They'll be looking for someone, or something, to blame, and lacking the necessary political consciousness and education, they'll be ready to crucify whatever scapegoats their chosen talking heads tell them to.
Absolutely. Fascist movements are increasing in many countries, and racism and intolerance of all kinds manifest when times get tough. It certainly never died in the US, but when there was relative economic equality (never achieved for all, of course) those tendencies were relatively mollified. I'm 62, so if I kick tomorrow, I won't complain, but my daughter is in her early 20s. The depression of so many younger people is widespread and well justified. The future is extremely frightening for those of us with our eyes open.
Great article! Thanks Geoff
I appreciate the positive feedback, thank you. I know you know how that feels.
Geoff is better:)
It's very true, want to look like a fool in terms of your larger scale predictions, just start giving in to the temptation to put timelines on things. That said, Hubbert was amazing, calling conventional oil the way he did. The principles behind the failed timeline predictions at any rate still apply, as you say, and the problem of peak oil - conventional oil, the oil our model was built to run on - is still a thing, it's just a different thing at this point than many thought it would be. As for the fracking of tight oil making a lot of money, i'm not sure that's so true. It produced an ocean of oil indeed, but the profits for the investors were not great. Why banks are very cautious about this stuff now. At any rate, oil demand will not fall on account of 'renewables' taking over. Oil demand will fall for the other reasons you mention, mostly, it will not be economic to recover, this will send bigger and bigger shockwaves through our already teetering economies, and it will grind to an end along with the renewables it supports. With the oil will go this civilization, and much of the 8 billion population oil created and sustains. The only lifeform not breathing a huge sigh of relief at that point will be ours.
You may also wish to read The Honest Sorcerer, who I find to have a realistic take on the inevitable decline and end of oil.
https://thehonestsorcerer.substack.com/p/downslope
Yes, Hubbert was prescient, except with factoring in fracking. That's why I pointed out the technology was developed in the late 40s. I'm curious as to why he didn't factor that in. It kicked the can down the road, and now we're in far more trouble than 2005.
Unfortunately, we're taking down many of those lifeforms that don't deserve this fate with us.
Maybe Hubbert did factor fracking in, but didn't think it would make much difference. As you say, wells have been fracked for a long time. As for the other species, sickening to witness, yes. But such dieoffs are not unusual, it's just unusual for them to be caused in a sweeping effect of some single other species. The earth meanwhile has billions of years left and it will explode back to life as it has before in the aftermaths. But right now? Sickening yes. As it is recognizing that humanity is just a mindless yeast as a body in its entirety. Such a glorious species, ourselves, to be so utterly underwhelming in total.
Fracking hadn't happened at a significant scale in Hubbert's life, so maybe he didn't anticipate its scale. Also, probably most of those fracking fields hadn't been mapped yet. We're a frustrating species. Perhaps without the discovery of oil we could have come closer to our potential, although we had plenty of behavioral problems before it as well. And yeah, life will continue and evolve without us here. Will the next dominant, clever species be wiser?
I know of someone n Northeast Ohio, who has a geothermal residential energy system, running throughout acres of wooded property he owns. Way ahead of his times, it has been in place for over two decades and is touted to continue for another two decades, as long as annual maintenance is performed. This can be outsourced and is overall a low maintenance, cost savings approach. Initial capital investment is higher but well worth it. I would like your insight into a community approach to defraying the large capital investment required. Does this concept already exist?
Hi Pam, I meant to answer this yesterday, but ran out of steam. It seems to me (without researching it) community approaches to surviving this situation, if we can survive it, are critical. The challenges are immense. It takes a critical mass of people thinking well beyond the status quo, willing to defy rules and laws in recognition the system we're living in is taking us over the cliff. My friend from writing here Margi who lost everything in the 2019-2020 Black Summer in Australia is working on building an independent community of diverse skills that can endure and survive collapse. This company, Eavor is working on large scale geothermal, but I'm not sure, we have time for large scale solutions. Working on local and regional resiliency may be a better approach, ultimately. It sounds like your NE Ohio neighbor is ahead of the curve and worth talking to.