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"The perfect storm" is a gathering group of ominous and related trends. We have no choice but to use less energy per capita and to get our energy from renewable sources, because:
1) The world's remaining oil and natural gas will become increasingly expensive, and, increasingly, they will sometimes simply not be available. We have already burned most of the easy-to-find, easy-to-pump, easy-to-refine oil. Most experts agree that within a decade, world oil production will begin its permanent downward trend.
3) The economy of the U.S. and the economies of other nations depend on oil. The U.S., with less than 5% of the world's population, uses 25% of the world's oil. If we seek to maintain this status, we will become less secure as individuals and as a nation.
4) China, India and other developing nations are rapidly increasing their per-capita use of oil. Competition among nations for oil is becoming more intense. Competition for oil was a factor in both world wars and it is a factor in world poverty and in recent and current wars in the Mid-East. Worldwide adoption of energy efficiency and renewable energy is a prerequisite for world peace and a prerequisite for continuing prosperity in the developed nations and new prosperity in the developing nations.
5) As oil and natural gas become more expensive, more coal will be burned, and there will be pressure to build nuclear power plants so we can continue our energy intensive economy and way of life. Coal, unfortunately, contributes much more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere than oil or gas. (And it is the main cause of rising mercury levels in fish and in humans who eat fish.) Nuclear power is more expensive than renewable energy, and nuclear waste and proliferation of nuclear technology pose a major security threat for coming generations. We will pay dearly for nuclear plants through federal taxes, after which we will continue to pay monthly bills to the large energy corporations who will own them. Coal and nuclear plants require huge quantities of water to dissipate waste heat. Water conservation and healthy aquatic ecosystems are increasingly important to humans.
6) The carbon dioxide level in the atmosphere is directly related to global warming. Our burning of fossil fuels has raised the carbon dioxide level to a point much higher than at any time in the last 600,000 years, and carbon dioxide emissions are accelerating. This is already causing global warming and loss of species. It may trigger catastrophic climate change.
7) Modern agriculture and food distribution are heavily dependent on oil. Both energy shortages and the drought and flooding associated with global warming will contribute to food shortages that are likely to become both chronic and severe.
8) Around the world, dependence on centralized energy sources is bad for local economies, the middle class, and democracy. By using less energy in the future, communities, families and small businesses could become energy self-sufficient, capturing all the energy they need from sun, wind, water and earth. A large portion of our monthly energy payments can go to improving our net worth and our communities instead of going to giant oil companies, the despots who rule many of the oil-producing nations, and the out-of-community shareholders who own utilities.
It's quite remarkable, isn't it? World peace and food security depend on finding alternatives to oil. For our own freedom, health, prosperity and security in the next decade, we must do exactly exactly the same things we must do to ensure our children's and grandchildren's future freedom, health, and prosperity and, quite possibly, their survival. And these are the same things we must do to prevent dramatic loss of species in coming decades and a possible cataclysmic heating of the Earth's surface in the century after this one. The biggest risk in the coming energy transition is that we will not make the transition fast enough.
So, we will do what we can do. There is really no hope unless we work together on a grand scale, which means on a local scale around the world.
Lance McKee
President
YourEnergyOptions, Inc.
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