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Getting Together

Geoffrey Tolle — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 12:45:18 -0800

Hey folks,

Finally got around to joining after seeing Anita recently. What do you all say to getting together for dinner sometime and figuring out what we can do for Columbus and Central Ohio?

Geoffrey Tolle

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Solar Columbus

Geoffrey Tolle — Mon, 13 Mar 2006 17:08:01 -0800

I'd like to suggest a project for this outpost and/or the Simply Living Peak Oil Group. I call it Solar Columbus. This would be a proposal to take to Schwarzwalder and could help kick-start solar net-metering in Columbus.

The essence of the project is to put together a packet of ~12 home/small business photovoltaic systems. These would include everything from the panels to the net-metering inverters and/or battery storage arrays. They would represent systems available from, say, three different companies and four different power ranges (e.g., 1, 3, 5, and 10 kwatts). The systems would be carefully chosen for compatability with the local AEP system.

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Proposal for Solar Columbus

Geoffrey Tolle — Sun, 19 Mar 2006 14:48:22 -0800

Folks,

I have written the basic proposal for the Solar Columbus program. I'd like some feed-back and, then, I'd like to schedule a meeting with Schwartzwald to put the proposal to him. I still have to contact Green Energy Ohio and have them assemble a packet of information on the "12" PV energy systems. If they are on-board with this proposal, then it shouldn't take them very long to put the packet together.

I'd like to invite several other area organizations to sign on as backing this proposal. I think Community Solution (even though they are in Yellow Springs) and the local Sierra Club chapter are good organizations to contact and I can do that this week. Can anyone think of any other groups that might like to back the proposal?

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Monetary Issues and Community Economics

Tadit Anderson — Fri, 14 Apr 2006 08:24:03 -0700

Monetary History and Community Economics
This is a topic area in which there are really no short cuts. The connection to the peaking of oil production is that the centralization of the monetary systems is a large part of why we have become so dependent upon a fuel source such as petroleum. It is a given that to restructure our economics away from dependence on oil and natural gas is going to require a restructuring of national economies in favor of local economies. Part of that restructuring is going require a restructuring of the national monetary and banking systems, in effect to install a balance principle in favor of local economies.

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Kuntsler's recent interview regarding the necessity to rebuild America's rail system.

Anita Laurin — Thu, 18 May 2006 09:09:11 -0700

Has the Long Peak-Oil Emergency Begun?

http://www.alternet.org/wiretap/36308/

By Ben Adler, Campus Progress. Posted May 17, 2006.

Interview: Writer and urbanist James Kunstler talks about America's auto-dependent culture, urban sprawl and what he sees beyond our dependence on oil.

(Eds. note: this article originally appeared on CampusProgress.org.)

The record high price of gasoline has been all over the news in recent weeks. While Americans were smart enough not to fall for the congressional Republicans' ham-handed effort to buy votes with a $100 rebate, polls show that Americans are worried about gas prices, and are beginning to think about changing their energy devouring ways. All of this makes novelist James Howard Kunstler look very prescient.

In 1993, James Kunstler revolutionized the way Americans think about their landscape when he released his first non-fiction book, The Geography of Nowhere: The Rise and Decline of America's Man-Made Landscape. The New York Times described it as "an impassioned rant against suburbia, shopping malls, cheap disposable architecture and the fragmentation of communities fostered by an increasingly mobile, car-oriented culture." He has continued this crusade with articles in a wide range of publications and in his most recent book, The Long Emergency: Surviving the End of the Oil Age, Climate Change, and Other Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-first Century. (Check out excerpts in Rolling Stone here.)

In this book, Kunstler argues that the world will soon pass "peak oil," the point at which more than half the world's recoverable oil supplies have been used. According to Kunstler, America 's auto-dependent culture and landscape will make this transition to a post-oil economy extremely painful. He predicts potential wars over dwindling oil supplies, massive abandonment of suburban sprawl areas, and, ultimately, a return to the time when people ate locally grown produce and did not commute dozens of miles to work each day.

We caught up with Kunstler to chat about the intersection of urban planning and progressive politics, and what the future will look like if, as he predicts, oil prices just keep rising.

Ben Adler:
In your new book, The Long Emergency, you lay out this very, very pessimistic vision of the near American future

James Kunstler:
Well, it's only pessimistic if you think that living in Plano, Texas, is the world's greatest thing, you know?

BA:
Well -- okay, that's a fair point -- I guess some of us would say that if Las Vegas really becomes a ghost town as you predict, that would be a good thing.

JK:
That would be good for us in many ways -- not least of which is because Las Vegas is the holy shrine of a very pernicious religion -- which is the religion of getting something for nothing; the religion of unearned riches -- which is an idea that is extremely destructive and insidious and has now spread throughout our culture and has given people the idea that earnest efforts are not required to have good outcomes.

BA:
Nonetheless, you lay out a vision that is very stark and extreme in what is going to happen to vast swaths of the country -- the South; the Southwest in particular. How do you respond to people who say the laws of supply and demand will dictate that as oil prices go up, the market will move to new kinds of energy and that some market correction will make these circumstances much less dire than you predict?

JK:
Well, I wouldn't try to denounce them or anything. There's no question that as a society we are going to be doing some things differently, including some things that will surprise us. And not all of them will be terrible. Some of them will be beneficial. But I think on the whole, that there's a great deal of wishful thinking involved in believing that both the "market" and "technology" will bring some rescue remedy to stave off the discontinuities that we face.

BA:
Tell us about your seminal work The Geography of Nowhere, in which you laid out the history of suburban sprawl and its negative effects on the American economy, culture, and landscape. What compelled you to tackle this subject?

JK:
I was a young newspaper reporter during the OPEC oil embargo of 1973, and I was working in this brand new building out on this heroic suburban boulevard of commerce -- filled with the big box stores, and all the new malls, and the muffler shops, and all the other accessories of the world's highest standard of living. And so we went through this energy crisis, and it made quite an impression on me. Especially how dysfunctional our suburban living arrangements could become if anything went wrong. And so, I went on to do other things: I worked for Rolling Stone magazine and then I quit that, and kind of retreated to upstate New York to write novels. And after a while, I got back into journalism, focused on our living arrangements in America and land development. Well, we're basically destroying our country and also probably destroying our economy and our future by developing this economy based on the never-ending construction of more and more suburban sprawl. And so I wanted to explore exactly what the nature of this problem was as well as its most visible manifestations -- you know, the endless vistas of nauseating crap that we've smeared all over the landscape.

BA:
In the years since it's been published, would you say that you've seen an improvement in the way new communities are being planned, or is it continuing to get worse?

JK:
Well, in general, it's continuing to get worse. I was associated over the past 12 years or so with the reform group called the Congress for the New Urbanism which is made up of architects, planners, and some developers, who were trying to do something better -- trying to really revive the idea of a town. However, their work represented a tiny fraction of one percent of all the development done in America, or redevelopment of existing neighborhoods and districts. We have still done incredible damage over the last decade or so to the landscape -- and what's probably worse is that in the absence of having an economy that really produces things of enduring value, we have shifted insidiously to an economy that is based almost solely now on the housing bubble, and all of the activities associated with it like, you know, the creation of more strip malls, and big box stores, and stuff like that. So, the damage out there continues, and is putting us in ever more of a hazardous position.

BA:
There have been studies that show the exurbs (far-flung suburbs), where mega-churches often serve as the main source of community, are trending very conservative politically. Do you see any connection between the rise in Christianist Fundamentalism and suburbanization?

JK:
I do think that the preoccupation with evangelical religion has, to some degree, been a substitute for the destruction of public life in general, which has followed the destruction of public space. And the thing that's ironic and sort of paradoxical about it is that the whole Christian Fundamentalist sector employs the methods of big box chain retail in order to do their thing -- it all takes place on a massive scale which is rather defeating to the idea of belonging to any kind of comprehensible unit of anything.

BA:
For young progressives who want to slow the rate of global warming and want to strengthen American communities following the principles of new urbanism, it seems like such a colossal problem to tackle. What can our readers do on the local and national level to change this pattern of development?

JK:
Okay, I will give you a very specific answer to that. And I preface it by saying that the political progressive wing of American politics really ought to be ashamed for being as feckless and foolish as it's been in the last several years by not paying attention to any of these issues. And, one of the signs of that is what I'm gonna say next. We have a railroad system in America that the Bolivians would be ashamed of. There isn't one thing we could do in this country that would have a greater impact on our oil use than restoring the American rail system to something like a European level of service. It's something that we know how to do, the infrastructure is laying out there waiting to be fixed and re-used, and the Democrats are not even talking about it -- and I'm a registered Democrat -- and it ticks me off. I would like to see the politically progressive kids out there start militating to restore the American railroad system. The fact that we're not even talking about that shows me how un-serious we are.

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Rail Tranportation for Columbus and Ohio

Seppo Korpela — Sat, 24 Jun 2006 18:07:40 -0700

A talk given at the Columbus Community Festival, June 23, 2006

Seppo A. Korpela, Central Ohio Relocalization Effort, CORE

I. Introduction and Oil Depletion

I represent a group called Central Ohio Relocalization Effort, or CORE for short. It is a chapter of an organization which understands that because we in the United States passed the peak of our oil production in 1970 and our natural gas production in 1973, and thus are forced to import today over 60% of our oil and 16 % of our natural gas, we cannot continue to live a life of high energy consumption. Although we have been able to import sufficient quantities of oil so far, this possibility is coming to an end owing to global oil production turning down soon, perhaps already this year, but most likely before the end of this decade.

Americans live in suburbs and are utterly dependent on their cars. The car and light truck population now numbers 220 vehicles and they consume 67% of the oil which we extract from our aging fields, or import from Middle East and elsewhere. That the world oil production will soon begin its terminal decline is beginning to show up in the high gasoline prices. And when the supply can no longer keep up with demand, prices will rise even higher and we will be in a scramble to get by. Of course, demand will have to come down in order to meet the diminished supply and the decisions we need to make today must recognize the fix we are in.

Since oil depletion is basically a transportation issue, the question we must ask is, what are the best policies that we can put into action today to get ourselves out of this corner into which we have painted ourselves? Our half serious thinking will take us to strengthening of the CAFE standards and this way extend the time for motoring. Then we will buy hybrid cars with the hope that we can still keep our suburban life in the form to which we have become accustomed. Next we will start converting biomass to motor fuels, as we are already doing, to keep our precious cars filled up, and this way tie irreversibly the food costs to cost of fuel; a bad idea, just keep our tanks filled up.

II. Ecological Crisis and Economic Growth

The subtext of all this reasoning is that we will try our best to hang on to our dysfunctional suburbs as long as we can, rather than take the necessary steps today to avert a larger crisis that is looming in the near future. As the energy, mineral, and biological resources of the world diminish, we will have squandered the true capital which makes the transition to more sane form of living possible and we may face a crisis of the kind already apparent in the third world countries today. I spent about five months last fall in India and I have seen first hand, and from discussions there, that it seems to be impossible for India to pull itself by its bootstraps to a sustainable form of life.

The same is true in many other parts of the world. Lester Brown of the Earth Policy Institute was on Ohio State campus this winter and from his lecture, which was based on his book Plan B 2.0, we learned of the impossible ecological crises that have thrown people in various parts of the world into desperation. Local fisherman of Senegal can no longer get their sustenance from the sea, as huge fishing vessels from Japan and elsewhere empty that part of the ocean of fish.

All of us, who have read about the ecological destruction taking place around the world, have come to the realization that we are living at the end of the growth economy which began with the industrial revolution. Today’s New York Times has an article on how dire the situation is for the people in the Shanxi province of China as a result of the massive coal mining operations. In that province more coal is burned in mine fires than Japan uses in its industry. Similar sights are closer at home right here in West Virginia where mountain tops are filling valleys to uncover the coal below and acid mine draining leaves the streams polluted for the future.

So if the root cause is the kind of economic growth we have been accustomed to, then the answer must be to change our thinking. This change must not just be to re-label old dysfunctional policies and make them sound good, for “smart growth

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Daily Updates from (Association for the Study of Peak Oil) ASPO - 5

Anita Laurin — Wed, 19 Jul 2006 08:20:49 -0700

These folks have gone to Italy for ASPO-5 and provide a daily synopsis of the world's most important conference.

Here is their website:
http://www.oilposter.org/blog/aspoblog.html

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Local Responses to Peak Oil and Sustainability

Anita Laurin — Mon, 31 Jul 2006 10:39:38 -0700

Below is a list of communities working on addressing sustainability in light of oil depletion and global warming. They have used different approaches to get the attention of their local governments.

Also, the website Energy Awareness is a very good site for municilities to get ideas and or assistance. Their organization helps municipalities and businesses improve their energy preparedness, improve their security, and thereby maintain their viability. David Room, Founder, played a key role in many aspects of Post Carbon Institute’s emergence. He is an interviewer for Global Public Media and co-author of the forthcoming Relocalize Now! Getting Ready for Climate Change and the End of Cheap Oil. Mr Room has a Masters in Engineering Economic Systems and a B.S, in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.
http://www.energypreparedness.net/

LIST OF MUNICIPALITIES
Franklin, NY - http://energypreparedness.net/resolutions/franklin
Portland, OR - http://energypreparedness.net/resolutions/portland
San Francisco, CA - http://energypreparedness.net/resolutions/sanfrancisco
Bloomington, IN - http://energypreparedness.net/resolutions/bloomington
Hamilton, Ontario - http://www.raisethehammer.org/index.asp?id=285
and http://www.raisethehammer.org/index.asp?issue=2006/05/05
Ithica, NY - http://www.ibiblio.org/tcrp/doc/project.htm
Salisbury, MD - http://www.delmarvanow.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060730/NEWS01/60...
Willits, CA - http://www.willitseconomiclocalization.org/JointStatement.pdf
Ottawa, Ontario - http://www.crudeawakening.net/

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Pending Oil Crisis and the CERA Report

Anita Laurin — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 06:08:20 -0800

Initially I dismissed the significance of the recently released CERA report: "PEAK OIL THEORY – 'WORLD RUNNING OUT OF OIL SOON' – IS FAULTY; COULD DISTORT POLICY & ENERGY DEBATE".

Myself and others who have spent many many hours reading about Peak Oil already knew CERA as the "detractor" - just as there are still a few global warming detractors. Those of us who are advocating for our children and grandchildren's future, learn to accept and ignore the folks determined to grab attention (or earn a profit) by challenging overwhelming scientific consensus. Unfortunately the CERA report is a classic case of misrepresentation of the facts for profit. The clients who paid $1000 for this report now have an excuse to continue business as usual as they have "cover" from this miserable report. Should their stockholders complain when energy prices start skyrocketing, they will merely blame CERA (bad intelligence) who has been paid a lot of money to "take the fall" so to speak. However, Jan Lundberg (whose presentation I heard in Yellow Springs at Community Solution's 2nd US Conference on Peak Oil) as a former petroleum industry analyst is far more qualified to respond to the CERA Report than I. Here is his (and others) responses.

Anita Laurin, Coordinator
Central Ohio Relocalization Effort
http://www.relocalize.net/groups/columbus
614-459-8112

*******************************************************
A DISERVICE TO THE WORLD: CERA DENIES PEAK OIL
http://www.energybulletin.net/22482.html
by Jan Lundberg

Published on 14 Nov 2006

Culture Change Editor's note: Congressman Roscoe Bartlett's office asked for our reaction to the new report from Cambridge Energy Research Associates, Inc. (CERA) that seeks to refute the increasingly accepted belief that global oil extraction is peaking now or in the near future. Bartlett, a Republican representing western Maryland, is a co-founder of the Peak Oil Caucus.

The following letter was sent immediately, and was shared with Dow Jones News which interviewed us and covered the story. As the nation is at a crossroads of either waking up to its tragic errors of war on Iraq and failing to rein in energy waste that distorts the Earth's climate, or, persisting in undermining humanity and the web of life, the CERA report is a gross disservice to the nation and the planet -- if the report is believed with the aid of irresponsible news media coverage. But, if an information-campaign to counter CERA succeeds, this dispute is beneficial. At the bottom of this page is the Peak Oil Caucus response to the CERA report.

I started reading the news release and immediately my strong feelings started to bubble up, prompting me to give a general reaction (1) before I subject myself to the rest of CERA's Big-Oil propaganda in its report. Then I'll give a more detailed reaction, (2). I invite you to use my text as you wish. As you may guess, I would like to testify in Congress on the nation's oil reality and what might be pursued as doable mitigation (considering the realities made clear by Roscoe Bartlett, Robert Hirsch, Matt Simmons and others).

(1) It is inevitable that peak oil "theory" be attacked just as CERA and its clients are doing, precisely because peak oil is gaining credibility and cheap oil is gone forever. It is vital to keep in mind that oil prices are far, far higher than the apparent levels we've seen to date because of massive subsidies (direct and hidden). CERA's report comes at a time of relative lull in the volatile oil and energy market, when crude prices have not yet returned to or surpassed $70-plus levels.

CERA's idea of oil's role being too important to question, as to oil's [implied] infinite longevity and reliability, is tantamount to a "Stay the course" attachment to nonsensical overdependence on petroleum that IS dwindling rapidly and inexorably daily. Reserves are not really increasing, and when anyone tries to portray this otherwise, such persons are seen to not be dealing with hard data or reliable sources of information. It is an unfortunate distraction for CERA to throw their questionable analysis into the public arena just when the citizenry should find convergence to deal with petroleum issues such as the agriculture sector's vulnerability to dwindling [petroleum] supply and growth of population.

The role of petroleum in warming the globe is of course not part of CERA's concerns, as if life itself is an ancillary aspect of existence. Big business's blinders involve the specialization of disciplines, such as petrochemistry and mega projects of engineering, to keep the world industrial economy humming, while CERA forgoes the systems-approach of considering the environment and physical limits of resources.

Smaller-scale economics that revolves around local communities' sustainable ecological endowment of their region is, by inference, CERA's and Big Oil's foe. CERA, with its position negating peak oil, is automatically against conservation on any level that would harm profit-maximization from shrinking the demand pie. (I know how the oil industry acts and thinks, from long-time first hand experience.) Thus, CERA is against any mitigating strategy to deal with a serious shortage any time in the future. To deny a possible shortage up ahead relating to supply constraints -- even as we see conventional oil starting to dry up from easily accessed fields, and oil discoveries lag extraction by more and more -- is tantamount to betrayal of the nation and humanity, and belongs in the dustbin of rigid Free Market ideological faith. The religion of "growth" no matter what the facts or consequences are is similar to the old belief in a flat Earth.

(2) The specious reasoning that just because past warnings of shortage and total depletion did not pan out already, is not valid evidence that today's knowledge of trends and oil fields is faulty. Moreover, we have seen massive growth in demand that is unprecedented. To ignore today's situation and point instead to the possibility or fantasy of continued growth for growth's sake is much like the climate-change naysayers' pathetic logic who cannot admit that global warming from human activity is upon us. Nor do the peak-oil and climate-change naysayers even admit that a reasonable "insurance policy" is called for, even if it would offer added benefits.

In CERA's statement, "it (post-peak depletion curve) will be asymmetrical - with the slope of decline more gradual and not mirroring the rapid rate of increase -- and strongly skewed past the geometric peak. It will be an undulating plateau that may well last for decades.", denial is evident, regarding the industry's and the economy's inability to function in any way other than endless growth. In my analysis of the advent of peak and its implications and impacts, based on my former career of analyzing supply and shortage, I hold a diametrically opposite view to CERA's about the looming energy descent. But, I agree that it will "not (be) mirroring the rapid rate of increase" that CERA cites is going to occur; the trend line will not be in CERA's hoped-for slower fall of production, but rather as a much faster and precipitous fall (as indicated by Robert Hirsch's findings on nations' post-peak oil extraction rates).

When CERA tries to back off from claiming that conventional liquid fuels will meet demand, by pointing to technology's potential for unconventional fuels, this unscientific and unproven view does not acknowledge the concept of net energy return on energy invested. Instead, like other proponents of alternative energy (renewable as well as nonrenewable), CERA shamefully tries to obfuscate the issues by implying that one form of energy is just like another (e.g., cheap oil and liquified coal) -- something the average member of the public knows little about.

CERA's critique of Hubbert analysis of peak is weak and grasps at straws. Hubbert was still correct in general, and to say otherwise reveals a seriously flawed orientation to short-term thinking. A ten-year error and an eight-year error by Hubbert, for example, as cited by CERA, is "but a pip" in human history, as Hubbert said about fossil fuels use in general.

[Professor Seppo Korpela (who is on the Advisory Board of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil - USA) wrote an article earlier this year, that was recently published in a scientific journal. In it he refutes - point by point - CERA's objections to Hubbert's methodolgy. http://mecheng.osu.edu/~korpela/KorpelaCurrentScience.pdf]

It should be obvious that CERA is simply adhering to the philosophy of the corporate bottom line that cares nothing about the longer term, even if massive unemployment in the petroleum sector and worse is written on the wall.

The chart of reserves for the main sources of oil both conventional and unconventional looks padded, as anyone familiar with the ill advisability of oil shale production already knows, when the numbers, technologies, and sources are considered.

"The peak argument is an incomplete and therefore misleading analysis because it ignores the role of development (vs exploration) projects in expanding reserves..." My response: although there is some truth in this, the fact that field production is also being massively propped up for short-term considerations -- losing the longer-term potential though deliberate mismanagement, as reported by knowldedgable industry observers -- more than offsets the strident faith in technology and growth that CERA relies upon (to keep enjoying its profitable business and energy-intensive lifestyles of the personnel).

Finally, in my personal experience, Daniel Yergin, like another oil cheerleader who now runs my former firm Lundberg Survey, was once a more honorable, innocent and idealistic analyst in the 1970s when there was more widespread openness about the need to conserve energy and develop alternatives to fossil fuels and nuclear power. But, after decades of serving the master of Big Oil and seeing no end to "growth" of the industrial and economic system, Yergin and Lundberg Survey have become more rabid and reactionary. They have lost their souls, and so the American people and the planet suffer the consequences of such intellectual dishonesty that props up a destructive, rigid market-system that cannot endure much longer in its present form of wasteful practice.

Respectfully,

Jan Lundberg
petroleum industry analyst
Culture Change
San Francisco, California
www.culturechange.org

Congressional Peak Oil Caucus Responds to CERA Report - http://www.energybulletin.net/22396.html

____________________________________________________________
Some of the other responses challenging the CERA report:
Resource Forecasting for the Geologically Challenged - http://www.energybulletin.net/22878.html
Peak Oil at West Point - http://www.energybulletin.net/22991.html
The Peak Oil Crisis: Picking the Peak - http://www.energybulletin.net/22772.html
Does the Oil Drum Threaten CERA's Market Share? - http://www.energybulletin.net/22696.html
CERA Peak Oil Report - http://www.energybulletin.net/22666.html
Kunstler on the CERA Report - http://www.energybulletin.net/22633.html
A World Awash in Oil - http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/articles/061115/15oil.htm
Attempt to Discredit Theory Falls Short of Making it's Case - http://www.pennlive.com/editorials/patriotnews/index.ssf?/base/opinion/1...
Association for the Debunking of Peak Oil, Part 1 - http://www.energybulletin.net/22458.html
Association for the Debunking of Peak Oil, Part 2 - http://www.energybulletin.net/22533.html
Oil Drum; Our Response to CERA - http://www.energybulletin.net/22522.html
Peddling PetroProzac - http://www.energybulletin.net/22442.html
Peak Oil: The Last Skeptics - http://www.energybulletin.net/22466.html
CERA Says Peak Oil Theory is Faulty - http://www.energybulletin.net/22381.html

Government Reports Discrediting CERA's conclusions:
http://www.mnforsustain.org/_peaking_of_world_oil_production_study_hirsc...
http://www.globalpolicy.org/empire/challenges/overstretch/2005/09energyt...

President of the world's largest energy investment company, Matthew Simmons, recent comment's on the peaking of oil and natural gas:
http://www.financialsense.com/Experts/2006/Simmons.html

Professor Korpela's website on World Oil Crisis:
http://rclsgi.eng.ohio-state.edu/~korpela

Founder of House of Representatives Peak Oil Caucus, Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD):
http://www.relocalize.net/files/Bartlett_PeakOilisComing.pdf

International and Local responses to Peak Oil:
http://www.relocalize.net/files/PeakOil-Responses_0.pdf

Post Carbon Institute's Peak Oil Fact Sheet:
http://www.postcarbon.org/files/PeakOilFactSheet.pdf

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Congress is currently working on the 2007 Farm Bill and contemplating CONTINUING THE CORN SUBSIDIES

Anita Laurin — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 13:48:47 -0700

The Congressional Research Service's March 2007 report on biofuels (http://collinpeterson.house.gov/PDF/ethanol.pdf) and the Clean Cities, August 2007 Fact Sheet (http://www.eere.energy.gov/cleancities/pdfs/41834.pdf) reveal some alarming facts and a lot of good information.

Clean Cities is a program of the Department of Energy, which was launched in 1993 in response to the Energy Policy Act of 1992. This program's primary mission is to "displace petroleum" and they are avidly promoting corn ethanol. Our tax dollars are being distributed through this program. There are almost 90 groups across the country who have become Clean Cities Coalitions including Clean Fuels Ohio. They are granted a 501 (3) c nonprofit status making donations to the organization tax deductable. This program was never set up as a response to either peak oil/gas or global warming - there was little awareness in Washington in 1992 of either problem.

According to the Congressional Research Service report, the "total annual U.S. ethanol production capacity in existence or under construction as of February 2, 2007, was 11.7 billion gallons. This production capacity is well in excess of the 7.5 billion gallon supply required in 2012 by the Renewable Fuel Standard (Energy Policy Act of 2005 [P.L. 109-58])." That is 4.2 billion gallons annually MORE than Congress mandated.

And according to the Clean Cities Fact Sheet, their goal is to displace 2.5 billion gallons of petroleum annually by 2020. That goal has already been exceeded by 368% - 13 years before their target.

Last year we subsidized the corn industry (and related government programs and trade organizations) with $6 billion. The Congressional Research Service found that corn ethanol for most of 2006 was profitable, making these subsidies unnecessary. We are depleting our soil and contaminating our water for this corn frenzy and there is no end in sight as long as subsidies are available. When you realize that the Ohio Corn Marketing Program gets $$$ from each bushel sold (check-off program), you begin to realize the more corn sold the more $$$ they receive to promote corn ethanol.

There is no mechanism in place, as the above figures reveal, to put the brakes on corn ethanol production.

If we want to reduce food miles and move toward sustainable agriculture, we have to STOP Congress from the continuation of corn subsidies. In Washington they are currently working on melding the House and the Senate's versions of what will become the 2007 Farm Bill. Now is the time to contact our Senators and Representatives and request that they

* Discontinue corn subsidies and tax credits - biofuels are not the answer and corn ethanol is bankruptring the soil for our children's future
* Allocate monies to reestablish our passenger rail system - Amtrak
* As we are currently engaged in deficit spending, we should ask that they stop funding programs that have achieved their goals, such as the Clean Cities Program (who has exceeded their goal by 368%)
* Remind them that they represent the interests of Ohio citizens - not corporations like ADM or any other corn industry lobbyist

They are more apt to listen to a polite and respectfully expressed message, I have been told. Contact information:

Senator George Voinovich
Phone: 202-224-3353
Fax: 202-228-1382

Senator Sherrod Brown
Phone: 202-224-2315
Fax: 202-228-6321

Representative Patrick J. Tiberi
Phone: 202-225-5355
Fax: 202-226-4523

Representative Deborah Pryce
Phone: 202-225-2015
Fax: 202-225-3529

If your representative is not listed, you can locate his/hers contact information at: http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/

This could be a really important call, as groups like 25x25 are currently lobbying very hard to expand federal subsidies and corn ethanol production. The current rise in the cost of food is one of the many "unintended" but predicted consequences of the rapid expansion of corn ethanol production. And, the Greek Islands are a good example of crop subsidies contributing to soil depletion.
http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_politics_100010_04/02/2006...

Anita Laurin, Coordinator
Central Ohio Relocalization Effort

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

The Nature of The Jevons Paradox

Tadit Anderson — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 10:16:33 -0800

by Tadit Anderson ideasinc@ee.net

“The Jevons Paradox” should be important to the advocates of recognizing the coming effects of the peaking of natural and oil production. Usually those who claim that The Jevons Paradox is valid as identifying a particular pattern of economic behavior use its 'observations' as support against energy efficiency in the use of fossil fuels. Thereby it also is used against proposals to reduce and reverse contributions of carbon dioxide to the global warming process. The conventional economic wisdom associated with The Jevons Paradox declares that efficiency strategies produce contradictory results and asserts that market based “solutions” will always be the best solutions. This use of neo-classical economics and its heirs adds additional obstacles by also being reductive by taking environmental, geological, and engineering problems and recasting them into the terms of conventional economic wisdom. Conventional economic wisdom has the strategic advantages of being both counter intuitive and financially well supported. A third advantage of conventional economic wisdom is that most of its critics are by choice ill prepared to evaluate and respond. Examining The Jevons Paradox should lead at least to the conclusion that economics as a field of interest should not be abandoned to the current practitioners of predatory economism. Along the way there will be reasons enough to question the nature of anti-inductive approach to social science and the too often faith based nature of the cultural critiques favoring societal change. Typically those who advocate for the change of related energy policies and dependencies are poorly prepared to defend their sense of realism against conventional economic 'wisdom.'

A further reason to examine the use of free market economics is that our economic systems are largely centralized and sustained by fossil fuels. Understanding The Jevons Paradox is thereby pivotal to the restructuring of our economic practices toward relocalization. Given that the majority of the remaining reserves of oil and natural gas are outside of the United States, this examination will reveal the motivations and objectives of what is applied as the basis of much of neo-colonial foreign policy. In summary, examining The Jevons Paradox leads us straight into our current tangle of societal and cultural problems. It is effectively a cusp point of several important threads.

Jevons by Jevons
William Stanley Jevons (1835-1882) was a British economist who is noted as one of the pioneers of neoclassical economic analysis. Jevons is credited with three contributions to the history of economic ideas. The adjective "neo-classical economics" references Adam Smith, David Ricardo, and others of the 18th century as the classical "free market" economists. The current nominal "neo-liberal" economists which are dominant among mainstream academic economists and conventional policy advocates are the current heirs to the "free market" legacy. One of Jevons's contributions was his declaration that subjective value theory is rooted in the concept of marginal utility. For Jevons, the utility or value to a consumer of an additional unit of a product is inversely related to the number of units of that product they already own, at least beyond some critical quantity. To translate this into more common terms, each additional widget or unit of something will have less value for a consumer when it is collected in a pile of like widgets and units. His second contribution is noted as having recognized the applicability of mathematics to economics. He isacknowledged as a precursor to "modern" mathematical economics by his publication of General Mathematical Theory of Political Economy in 1862. In this book he outlined his marginal utility theory of value as well as asserting the mathematical nature of economics.

Jevons's third book was The Coal Question published in 1865 and first brought him wider public recognition. In this book he observed that the consumption of coal as a fuel did not follow the marginal utility theory of value. He declared that the increased efficiency in the production of a natural resource such as coal resulted in the increased demand for coal not a reduction in its use. Based upon this he declared that that Great Britain would in time deplete its coal resources. On this point Jevons is seen as a predecessor to the analysts who today predict the peaking of the production and distribution of oil and natural gas. Jevons defined a causal linkage from the improvement of the steam engine by James Watt, to its use to increase the efficiency of coal mining, to the reduction of the cost of mining coal, to the rapid increase in the market for coal, to the eventual depletion of Great Britain's coal reserves. Thereby Jevon declared that "It is wholly a confusion of ideas." This is Jevons third contribution to the history of economic ideas and what is commonly described as “The Jevons Paradox.”

The Jevons Paradox actually has two parts. First, to Jevons the effects of efficiency technologies, as they effected economic behavior related the early 19th century English coal industry, seemed contrary to his understanding of the marginal utility theory of value. His expectation was that each additional unit would have less value. Instead it seemed that the value of a unit of coal increased increased even if the price of that unit went down. A less simplistic interpretation would have identified coal as a commodity having strategic utility in the powering of an economy and for providing ongoing comfort. Jevon's second observation is that by the accelerating use of coal as a energy resource it would be depleted sooner. The resulting 'positive' effect is declared to be the increase in immediate profits as well as the production of new capital toward producing new products, which is a form of “trickle down” economic rationalization.

Support, Corollaries, and Presumptions
There are several contemporary examples that are applied as evidence in support of The Jevons Paradox. One is a result of the oil embargo by OPEC in October 1973 against countries that were supporting Israel's Yom Kippur War against Syria and Egypt. Even though OPEC was a marginal supplier, its embargo resulted in the cost of gasoline increasing throughout the world by real and apparent shortages. Suddenly large gas guzzling cars were avoided in favor of more energy-efficient vehicles. This conservation strategy was soon followed by a gradual increase in the demand for fuel because driving increased and the number of cars on the road soon doubled. Similarly, technological improvements in refrigeration have led to more and larger refrigerators. The same tendencies are in effect within industry, independent of household consumption. The same pattern has been reflected in the past 15 or so years in the rising popularity of the super sized "McMansion" housing developments, where energy efficiency technologies have been used to control the operating costs of houses so that the square footage of the houses can be significantly increased. All are also examples of the escalation of the expectations of consumption. The conventional interpretation is that efficiency technologies often result in the expansion of consumption patterns by individuals rather than actually conserving energy. Thereby the advocates of “free market” economics argue against policies favoring efficiency and conservation.

The examples confirming The Jevons Paradox alongside the speculations of new energy technologies are frequently used to “prove” the futility of advocating increased efficiencies or of the reduction of fuel consumption. So, by applying this reasoning to energy efficiency as related to oil and natural gas use, we are told that we will actually stimulate the growth of oil and natural gas consumption and accelerate their depletion rates. Part of this economic prediction is based upon the assumption of an elasticity of demand, that there is an often latent demand that is revealed upon the drop in the cost of energy or of other commodities.

Under present conventional economcs The Jevons Paradox is only seen as a paradox relative to Jevons's own expectations. The offered amendment to the theory of marginal utility is that a change in the efficiency or expense of obtaining a product may cause changes in the price of that commodity to the consumer. This basic approach also defines the fuel used to produce a product to be a marginal cost of that production. The issue of depletion of a resource, including fossil fuels, has been rated by conventional economists as a non-issue. One underlying assumption is that when a particular resource is depleted or becomes too expensive to use, then with the proper capital incentives a substitution will be found, with the intervention of capital and the magic of the “invisible hand.” This is the “free market” replacement assumption. By extension, when a fossil fuel is depleted or becomes too expensive, then by providing subsidies and other incentives a new energy source will be created to replace the prior primary energy source. By the nature of the substitution process, fuels, even high energy fossil fuels, are regarded as no different that any other economic commodity.

This capital based replacement assumption involves a simultaneous faith in the supernatural nature of the invisible hand of the “free market” alongside presentations featuring allusions to “scientific logic.” By this presumed omnipotence a natural science and engineering problem is reduced to a variable within conventional economic analysis and thereby policy making without considering the scientific and engineering obstacles involved. This extension is also the assumption of technology as savior, and effectively ignores the real problems of real natural science, making conventional economics seem rather “un-natural.” Ethanol, bio-diesel fuels, and nuclear energy are the current examples. All along the way little attention is given to the actual effects of the centralized and corporatized macro economic systems, their vulnerabilities, and the collateral effects that these priorities and structures sustain. By the shear concentrated dependency upon an unusually energy rich fossil fuel the lack of diversity alone describes the incapacity to adapt to change.

Bio-sourced ethanol seems to be the running favorite replacement fuel, which qualifies for only a very limited definition of a “clean” fuel. This application of the replacement assumption seems to indicate that although conventional economists often boast of great facility with the use of mathematical models, they also seem to have a few problems with arithmetic. The first is the net energy yield of production of ethanol both requires the use of a fuel itself and the net gain of the return of energy used as compared to the energy content produced is only weakly positive. The second problem is that the total amount of available arable land is substantially less than the amount of land that would be needed to grow both food for our population and crops for ethanol production for our economies and transportation. Even so, politicians are also advocating that the public has an obligation to make these speculative investments in ethanol processing plants “successful.” This in turn implies that additional subsidies will be required from the public to make those investments profitable. The collateral damage of starvation and global warming are not even admitted entry into the actual calculations being indulged. Alternative fuels which have levels of energy returned for the related energy invested roughly equivalent to oil and natural gas still remain to be discovered. The primary attraction of the proposed replacement fuels seems to be that by prioritizing the maintenance of a particular economic order. The expectation is then that the supporting societal structures and values won't be required to change. As an alternative energy source, conservation and energy efficiency has been largely been considered only as it serves the expansion of consumption, profits, and as an affirmation of The Jevons Paradox.

Counter Examples and Economic Illogic
There are at least two easy counter examples to The Jevons Paradox. The first is the mass transit in the US as it historically existed prior to its dismantling by the US auto related industry. The efficient use of energy was by design reduced to increase both consumption and corporate profits. This advocacy of a New American Dream was accompanied by a massive public relations campaign which inflated racism and elitism. The second example is mass transit as it currently exists in Europe. It is difficult to not identify mass transit as an energy efficiency technology. In the presence of effective regulatory institutions or alternatives, and of the treatment of fuel as a strategic economic utility The Jevons Paradox does not seem to have any basis. The anomalous behaviors as described by The Jevons Paradox are produced by additional institutional factors, including governance, economic, and societal. The Jevons Paradox is simply a product of a particular set of economic ideas and assumptions.

In effect economic security and political institutions have been reverse engineered to serve corporate wealth. As an example, related industries have acted to oppose the increasing of the standards of residential insulation for new residential construction in order to preserve their profits. Efficiency in production caused by inefficiency in the use of resources The obstruction of mass transit in the US has been used to expand profits more than serving the interests of the population. Energy efficiency strategies applicable to industry, transportation, and buildings have been available for a long time, at least decades, and with certain exceptions have attracted only limited attention.

The concentrated control of strategic economic sectors has not only enjoyed unregulated profits it has also generally not contributed a proportionate to support of commons infrastructure and has also constrained the choices of other industrial sectors. The assumption of economies of scale is based upon having access to high energy fuels by which the distribution of goods over a wider consumption base can be supported. Without this variety of high energy content fuels this centralization would not be possible. In these terms as the real net energy cost of distribution increases, then centralization should be reversed toward greater localization. The points here are that we can ill afford to dismiss the importance of community economics or the details of what it is intended in the advocacy for the relocalization of communities. We also need to recognize that attempting to maintain the current implicit priorities will cause great harm to our communities. If the analysts and advocates who recognize the likely effects of the peaking of the production and distribution of oil and natural gas concentrate primarily upon technological energy efficiency we are likely to leave in place the incumbent economic and societal conventions.

If there are any paradoxes at all embodied in The Jevons Paradox, then the contradictions can be found among the assumptions of “free market” economics and as it is applied to real time societal needs and priorities. One contradiction is the assumption that the thinly “naturalistic science” perspective is at all adequate to model social phenomena. Another is the assumption that economic growth will not be limited by the availability of natural resources both strategic and general. Another contradiction is the assumption that energy sources such as natural gas and petroleum are replaceable as strategic economic commodities. Another is that the unregulated distribution of surplus value as the invisible hand theology promotes is in the best interest of the general population. Also, to reject the domain of economics carte blanc and its contribution to solutions, also tacitly accepts the current mainstream assumptions as the default paradigm.

By definition a scientific theory has to be adequate to the field of phenomena that it is established to predict. If this is not the case, then what is proposed is more on the order of an ideology than a scientific theory. To rephrase, statements of theory must adapt to the reality of the behavior it proposes to predict. Conforming real behavior into supposed theories for the sake of a standard of falsifiability, seems simply backwards. Paradoxes arise only when a field of phenomena does not conform to a proposed theory and its assumptions, both explicit and tacit. The problem identified by a 'paradox' lies in the applied explanatory theories and ideologies. When organizations and communities hit an economic crisis, real or imagined, without a useful alternative economic analysis the default choice will remain the conventional economic wisdom and the posturing of fiscal conservatism reigns in place of insight.

The Inelasticities of Demand
It is not really a surprise or a paradox that under a higher priority for the conservation of energy or under a marked increase in the efficiency in producing any product that a new population of people might be able to afford to live in the manner that they have been aspiring to for decades if not longer. This is a product of class structure, advancing standards of consumption, direct usury, and complicit usury. It is not the result of a “black box” mystery unless these aspects of economic life are ignored. The default model of production is structured to maximize wealth extraction and then consumption as it serves the wealth extraction process. It is pretty much a fact that low income people are strongly interested in sharing the middle class standard of consumption. That former colonies should also be expected to have as a goal some level of economic self sufficiency and parity of consumption is also not a surprise. What is also rarely admitted is that the aspirations represented by the concept of the elasticity of demand might be realized by alternative strategies as well. That human cultures have the capacity to adapt though often unwillingly, unpracticed, and supported by short attention spans. The implications of the fact that the reserves of fossil fuels are declining and of the very likely economic implosions does not seem to be even on the general cultural radar. While this pattern demonstrates typical forms of the elasticity of demand relative to certain products, it does not address the often assumed nature of that demand.

That the effects of the depletion of fossil fuels, global warming, and systemic economic collapse will be primarily economic in nature is certain. That low income people will be hit first, foremost, and hardest by these economic effects is also certain. The increasing economic calamities are likely to be experienced as simply an increase in the already existing social inequities and hardships. Occasionally individual experience of being reduced within the commons to wide spread tragedy. Scarcities will create demand for products which were once easily available. The priorities evident in the impact and long lasting effects of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, both in the deliberate lack of prevention and in the failure to respond in a humane and unprejudiced manner afterwards, should remain emblematic. The devastation caused to southern Louisiana and east Texas, and the indifferent response to this damage to low income communities has been taken as a clear message to all low income people of what the priority of their needs represents with the incumbent process of governance. Additionally, given the current and accelerating extraction of wealth from our communities and natural resources, the population that has been defined as low income and working poor is growing rapidly primarily by the addition of formerly middle class families losing their positions in the class order.

Historically when a middle class has lost its identifying assets and opportunities for mobility they tend to be intent upon restoring those assets and opportunities, particularly when more constructive choices are not made available. In effect they tend to choose inelasticity of their demands over elasticity and alternatives. When technologies remain the same and do not increase their efficiency significantly, but the economic and cultural patterns are shifted toward reduced consumption, people will attempt to restore their levels of consumption by whatever plausible means. In this context there is also an incentive for the stewards of corporatized economies to promote various schemes to divide including racial scapegoating and imperial forays. This also is a reversal of The Jevons Paradox, that is the increase in consumption by avoiding more energy efficient technologies for the sake of the centralization of profit and authority. This reversal further validates the importance of the changing of the societal and cultural patterns.

Cuba's experience with the sudden cutback in the availability of oil in the 1990's was met with numerous challenges, innovations and accommodations, which has allowed it as a nation to successfully adapt. The primary structure of interest should therefore be societal structures and values contributing to the elastic nature of demand to increase and to the inelastic resistance to decreasing demand. Current declarations from the US that Cuba should “modernize” its economy is really about re-establishing the structures of wealth extraction there against the interests of the Cuban communities. The point here is that cultures and societal structures can adapt to extreme stress, thereby nullifying The Jevons Paradox and the capital based replacement assumption.

Another Economics Is Possible
Cultural and institutional change is usually the last item on most change agendas. In part societal and institutional order is often operationalized as a basis for power and an avoidance of change. It is understandable because it is often a more difficult process, particularly when diverse organizational forms and choices do not co-exist. The first choice is usually to change the occupancy of the dominant structures of authority rather than changing those institutions. Parallel to this is that there are developing countries who have an interest in developing their own economic self sufficiency, apart from being strongly controlled from international banking centers. Often that process seems by default to result in building those economies based upon a reliance upon oil and natural gas as the convention. For all of its real limitations the uniquely high energy concentration of natural gas and oil as fossil fuels will make them attractive as choices when the cost is low relative to the energy value embodied. Fossil fuel nationalism will thereby become an increasing factor in the international struggle for the control of strategic resources. As the consumption of the remaining oil and natural gas reserves accelerates, sustainability will depend upon energy diversification and the restructuring of economic priorities.

Dismissing economics has been a major part of the response to the pending collapse of unregulated, speculative, and centralized economics and to its contributions to both the peaking of oil and natural gas production and of the geo-climatic effects of their combustion. The primary attraction for this dismissal seems to be reactionary, and that it erases any responsibility to develop an actual alternative economic analysis and and a related practical agenda. Similarly the repetition of the word “community,” lacking specification and in its various forms, has been used as a basis for pressing for conformity of a different nature. This repetition is used as a substitution for a more intentional analysis of our economic priorities and societal patterns by those who advocate strongly for alternative technologies. The social justice, environmental, and anti-war contingents seem to take a similarly critical, uninformed, and unconstructive position. It is in effect also a faith based approach of a political philosophy with equal failings.

While the criticism of faith based economics is appropriate, the abandonment of economics as a field of knowledge is not. The prejudice against economics in total is dangerous because lacking an alternative analysis it leaves in place the incumbent paradigm. The institutionalization of usury routinely exploits both societal and public relationships, including the commons, and personal relationships. Social reality is complexity piled upon complexity. If faith is to be admitted anywhere in this process as as other than blind, it needs to be by continual adaptation and the use of open imagination, problems can be solved and alternatives can be proposed. The result of the conveniences of academic domains has been to introduce more confusion into the project of societal change than to support it. It has been the centralized and privatized economic paradigm which has afflicted many problems. The accelerating depletion of fossil resources and natural resources generally has been driven by this same system of political economics.

Not only is another world possible, but also another way of doing economics is possible. The goal here is not to turn peak oil technophiles into economists or turn democratic socialists into engineers. The goal is to develop a broad re-interpretation of our societal, economic, and environmental possibilities. Living in community is a lot more complicated than repeating the word “community.” If we can't work and discourse in community with people with interests in other knowledge areas, then the whole project of societal change is not going to advance. There is plenty of work for each set of willing hands, and the adequate solution is likely to be a bit beyond the expertise and capacity of any would be celebrity. It is also a matter of simple respect that those versed in specific areas try to curb their grandiose statements from those areas where they lack an appropriate knowledge base. The Jevons Paradox as it is used to resist institutional change is essentially part of a complex fraud. Conventional economic wisdom is more about the manipulation of symbols and promoting economic mythologies, than it is about democratizing our economic communities.

See also "Neo-Liberalism's Ultimate Failure" by a different author with a similar analysis at http://www.resourceinvestor.com/pebble.asp?relid=37694

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Mayor's Climate Protection Agreement and Peak Oil Resolutions

Anita Laurin — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 10:58:10 -0800

Many groups are actively supporting local initiatives regarding two very pressing issues impacting society in the United States: global warming and the peaking of global oil production. The Post Carbon Institute's Relocalization Network is focused on helping municipalities prepare for the impact of fossil fuel depletion and to mitigate its effect on their community. Two organizations, Stop Global Warming.org and the Sierra Club, are actively promoting the Mayor's Climate Protection Agreement as a plan to reduce greenhouse gasses emitted by municipalities across the country. The Relocalization Network is promoting efforts to help cities and bioregions become more locally self-reliant and much less consumptive; thereby reducing much of the need to burn depleting petroleum supplies. We believe that proposals regarding relocalization will (and must) reduce local CO2 emissions, but that the Mayor's Climate Protection Agreement does not take into consideration the serious impact depleting petroleum supplies is likely to have on our community.

Here is a comparison of the two initiatives. The purpose is to advance understanding regarding their similarities and differences.

http://www.relocalize.net/files/MayorClimateAgreement_PeakOilResolution....

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

The Graham School

erica05973 — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 10:33:13 -0700

Hey guys,

My name is Erica Botley and I go to a school called Graham. In one of my classes called global warming we are to do an assignment to make our school a more earth friendly place. I was woundering if anyone knew where I could find an awareness group/speaker to come in and talk to my school about global warming in/near to columbus ohio?

thanks,
erica

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Global Warming Speaker

Anita Laurin — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 14:47:05 -0700

Folks,

We are lucky enough to have speaker in our community that was trained by the Al Gore team. Here are the details:

Synopsis of presentation, "The Climate Crisis: Time to Rise" Through the medium of a Power Point (Keynote) presentation, Robinson outlines 1) the basic science of global warming, 2) the emerging signs and potential dangers of climate change, 3) a description of the factors that are combining to cause the problem, and 4) a basic exploration of the technological, social, and moral resources available to successfully meet this challenge. Based on the presentation delivered by Al Gore in “An Inconvenient Truth,” additional up-to-date information is provided regarding both the science of current climate change and steps being taken—political, commercial, and technological—to address the problem. The specific emphasis and content of message may be tailored for specific audiences, e.g., business/commerce, governmental, faith-based, etc. Time of presentation is variable, from 30 to 90 minutes (with additional time for discussion), depending on the venue and audience. Being a public service, there is no charge for the presentation.

Bio of presenter: David W. Robinson, Ph.D., recently trained by The Climate Project (http://www.theclimateproject.org/) to deliver public presentations on the emerging climate crisis, is currently Marketing Director of Marcy Enterprises, Inc., a Columbus-based manufacturing company. In addition to his business experience in marketing and business development, Robinson (BSBA, OSU, ‘84) has earned degrees from Chicago Theological Seminary (MA, Theological Studies, ‘91), and Emory University (PhD, Theology and Psychology,‘02). Recently authoring Conscience and Jung’s Moral Vision (Paulist Press, ’05), his earlier environmentally-oriented essays include “Freedom and Global Wealth in an Age of Environmental Interdependence,” and “Image and Commission: An Integral Reading of Genesis 1:27-28.” Robinson was raised in Columbus and currently resides in the Short North area. Best reached at drobinson@vistaglow.com.

David W. Robinson

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Corn ethanol in Ohio and Nebraska

Anita Laurin — Wed, 30 May 2007 07:36:20 -0700

Here are two blog entries from a Nebraska and a Ohio farmer sharing their concerns about growing corn-on-corn. How can we mitigate global warming when they are removing trees to grow more corn for ethanol? This Ohio farmer's obervations are not very reassuring when you think about increasing local food production. Also, the Ohio farmer states that the new jobs promised did not matierialize.

"At some point in time when we realize we need to feed humans not corn with the land and resources we have, we will have a very difficult time producing anything worth eating for the mineral base in the ground will be nonexsistant and the nutrient level of the food will be very low."
AL

http://www.alternet.org/story/52073?page=2

The devastation---seen with my own eyes, from a farmer
Posted by: zooeyhall on May 25, 2007 6:38 AM

I am a farmer in Nebraska, where I farm 160 acres of corn (a "small" farmer by any standard). I have lived on my farm for 50 years. I wish people could see up close the devastation to the local countryside that this ethanol frenzy has brought---and is going on as we speak. Landowners are ripping-out beautiful windbreaks and tree stands of cottonwoods and elms, these were windbreaks that were planted by the CCC back in the New Deal days, and getting the land ready to grow corn. This past winter, a factory hog farm came in and purchased a neighbor's farm. This farm was a beautiful piece of property with a grand 100 year old home and excellent buildings. They outbid all of the local farmers who wanted to buy it. Within 2 months they had completely stripped everything away--it's all gone. It just broke my 88 year-old dad's heart to see it. Other farmers around me are busy plowing-up grass pastures for corn production, land so hilly and highly erodable I never would have thought it could be used for growing row crops.

This corn-for-fuel thing has everyone in my area plowing-up their alfalfa fields. Alfalfa is an excellent low-input crop. Once it is established it pretty much takes care of itself, doesn't need any fertilizer or herbicides. It produces alot of protein and naturally enriches the soil. It takes a good two years after planting to get a crop from alfalfa, so with the dissappearance of these fields I don't care to think about the long term effect it is going to have on dairy farmers in my area, who need lots of locally grown hay.

I'm just a farmer and not good at writing, but I hope I have given Alternet's readers some idea about what is happening "out here". I wish I could post some pictures I have taken of the devastation.

New-built and proposed ethanol plants are going-up in the cities around me. No matter that they require enormous amounts of water in an area that is experiencing growing water shortages. The Platte River, which is about 10 miles from where I live, is a major gathering place for birds migrating to Canada. It has completely dried up in the summer months the past several years.

Our senators Nelson (D) and Hagel (R) beat the drum for ethanol production with every speech they make. But that is probably because Monsanto and ADM were big contributors to their campaigns.

**************************************

Not only in Nebraska...
Posted by: Farmertim on May 25, 2007 7:31 AM

Here in southwest Ohio our local ethenol plant is going up funded by a Iowa firm and local supporters complete with pickups with slogans of feel good ethenol running around to local hardware stores for the ocassional screwdriver, not anything more local than that for it is all shipped in. The workers are all from out of state and the only thing locally produced for the plant is the cement, 30,000 yards of it.

2.2 million gallons of water will be used per day at the plant and when they ran the test for the well to supply the plant people within a half mile lost there water pressure for 3 days yet it was still approved.

Long range plans are to move dairies and feedlots close to the plant to feed the remainder of the process and rebirthing the swill dairys of the 19th century that killed unknown numbers of infants due to the quality of the milk from that byproduct.

The corn base here has grown by at least 45 % and the only ones planting beans are the farmers who have long term contract to do so.

Alphalfa here is dissapearing under the spray boom and notilled into corn at a high rate, and there wasn't much to start with and hay prices are begining to show response to that.

As a biological Consultant for organic and conventional farmers and the test results from area soils around here putting corn on corn is the worst thing that could be done right now and will create a larger problem of production in the future.

At some point in time when we realize we need to feed humans not corn with the land and resources we have, we will have a very difficult time producing anything worth eating for the mineral base in the ground will be nonexsistant and the nutrient level of the food will be very low.

I have been to your state and cannot imagine the damage now being done to the fragile soils of Nebraska. How soon we forget when the old ones die off and we begin to make the mistakes of the past all over again. They might chew our ass and we feel it is not their place but we shall soon see what they meant and wish we would have listened.
Farmer Tim

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Ethanol Transparency Project

Anita Laurin — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 15:01:35 -0700

The president of the Agribusiness Council in Washington, D.C. has launched an effort, the Ethanol Transparency Project.
http://www.agribusinesscouncil.org/Ethanol.htm

To get politicians to wake up to the problems currently being created by the pursuit of the petroleum-intensive unsustainable biofuel corn ethanol (soil depletion, soil erosion, water depletion, well contamination, etc.) is a great goal and we support his efforts.

We also applaud the efforts of the folks from the San Francisco Post Carbon Outpost who are currently working on a video, The Myths of Biofuels. This video (when it is completed) could be a useful tool for all. You can view the trailer at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OriWEUW_TZI

One of the makers of this video told me recently that they plan on making the video available to the general public - hopefully sometime in September.

Coordinator HUB

New DVD - The Myths of Biofuels

Anita Laurin — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 13:03:49 -0700

The folks from the peak oil group in San Francisco made an excellent video called The Myths of Biofuels. It is quite scientific, but easy to understand. They are charging $7 for the video and give permission to duplicate it. If only we could get all of the US legislators to watch it . . .

The Santa Clara weekly ran a story describing David's excellent presentation that was the basis for the DVD. http://www.santaclaraweekly.com/453.html

Here is an interview with David Fridley about the consequences and logistics of attempting to make liquid fuels from plant matter to displace petroleum: http://www.globalpublicmedia.org/the_reality_report_the_myths_of_biofuel...

There is an enormous lack of understanding by US politicians regarding EROEI (energy return on energy invested) regarding both corn ethanol and cellulosic ethanol. Some of the misunderstanding stems from serious false assumptions in a report for the Department of Energy and the Department of Agriculture referred to as the "Billion Ton Study". David has reviewed this report thoroughly and discusses these assumptions. He also explains why neither corn ethanol nor cellulosic ethanol are sustainable and their negative impact on the environment.

Attached is an order form for The Myths of Biofuels.

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Oil and Population

Anita Laurin — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 13:01:05 -0800

Most folks who are aware of peak oil are also aware that the surge in population the oil age brought is a big part of the challenges that face us.
However, it is difficult to explain to proponents of perpetual "growth" why it can't (and shouldn't) continue.

Attached is a chart that shows the relationship with population and oil.
Perhaps some will find it useful when engaged in discussions regarding resource depletion issues and economic growth.

Anita Laurin

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

The Story of Stuff

Anita Laurin — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 12:30:28 -0800

There is a fabulous video out called The Story of Stuff by Anne Leonard.
http://www.storyofstuff.com/

You can watch if free on the internet or order a DVD version for only $10. The video starts with her unplugging her ipod. In an interview with Terrence McNally from Alternet http://www.alternet.org/story/72568/ , she discusses some of the environmental issues with the ipod and our consumptive lifestyles.

Another story, China is Our Ewaste Dumping Ground, reveals that much of our "recycled" technological gizmos and doodads end up creating horrific pollution for communities in China. http://www.alternet.org/environment/72529/

It would be great if schools started showing The Story of Stuff in their classrooms as our children are currently being indoctrinated into consumerism by TV shows and Disney movies.

A Laurin

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Moratorium on Agrofuels

Anita Laurin — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 10:06:34 -0800

From the Rainforest Action Network:

Call for an immediate moratorium on U.S. incentives for agrofuels, U.S. agroenergy monocultures and global trade in agrofuels
http://ga3.org/campaign/agrofuelsmoratorium

The undersigned call for an immediate moratorium on U.S. incentives for agrofuels and agroenergy from large-scale monocultures and a moratorium on global trade of such agrofuels. This includes the immediate suspension of all congressionally mandated targets and incentives such as tax breaks, tariffs and subsidies that benefit and promote agrofuels from large-scale industrial monocultures, including financing through carbon trading mechanisms, international development aid or loans from international finance organizations.

Groups that have already signed on:
Altropico Foundation, Ecuador
Amazon Watch
American Jewish World Service
A SEED Europe, Netherlands
ATTAC, Germany
BASE-Investigaciones Sociales, Paraguay
Biofuelwatch, UK
Biowatch South Africa
Border Agricultural Workers Project
Brazilian Association for Agroecology
Carbon Trade Watch, Europe
Centre for Sustainable Agriculture
Climate Action Coalition, Bulgaria
Concerned Citizens of Newport
Cornucopia Institute
Corporate Watch, Europe
Dogwood Alliance
EasySweet Farm
Ecological Society of the Phillipines
Ecologistas en Accion, Spain
Energy Justice Network
EPIC (Environmental Protection Information Center)
ETC Group
FIAN (Food First Information and Action Network), Netherlands
Food and Water Watch
Food for Maine's Future
Foreign Policy in Focus
Friends of the Earth International
Friends of the Earth, Brazil
Friends of the Earth, Sierra Leone
Friends of the Earth, Sweden
Global Exchange
Global Forest Coalition
Grupo de Reflexion Rural, Argentina
IFG (International Forum on Globalization)
Institute for Production and Investigation of Tropical Agriculture (IPIAT)
International Society for Ecology and Culture
Institute for Social Ecology Biotechnology Project
Land Action Research Network
Life of the Land
Mesa Global de Guatemala
Mother Earth Foundation, Philippines
Movimento das Mulheres Camponesas, Brazil
NOAH/Friends of the Earth, Denmark
Northwest Resistance Against Genetic Engineering
Organic Consumers Association
Regenwald-Institut, Germany
Rising Tide North America
Sustainable Agriculture of Louisville
Small Planet Institute
Small Producers Movement (MPA)
Third World Network
UNAC - Mozambique Farmers' Union
WALHI/Friends of the Earth, Indonesia
World Hunger Year
World Rainforest Movement

Coordinator HUB

Globalization Efforts of the Bush Administration

Anita Laurin — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 18:01:15 -0700

Here is a link to a speech Ohio's Representative Marcy Kaptur recently gave in Washington. She exposes the Bush plan called the Security and Prosperity Partnership and discusses the challenges it represents to our Democracy. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVFfDVk6OoU

One author, Jerome Corsi, agrees with Rep Kaptur that this plan is being carried out behind the scenes by the Executive Branch and is part of a proposed super highway (as Rep Kaptur demonstrated) to advance the agenda of elite globalists. Corsi's article, Bush Administration Erases U.S. Borders With Mexico and Canada, is at http://wwwhumanevents.com/article.php?id=15809

In response to Rep Kaptur, I have written and faxed a letter to my own Representative and both Ohio Senators. Attached is a copy. If others recognize the need to appeal to Congress to protect the Constitution of the United States, the FAX numbers of Federal Legislators can be located at: http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/

The message sent to our Federal Legislators could be as simple as:

Please stop Bush's North American Union plan and protect our Constitution from the Bush Administration and elite globalists.

Anita L

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

David Fridley addresses the San Francisco Peak Oil Task Force

Anita Laurin — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:57:24 -0700

On June 17, 2008 David Fridley, Staff Scientist, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, gave a presentation to the San Francisco Peak Oil Task Force called: Scalability, Timing and Alternatives. David Fridley and the San Francisco Peak Oil Task Force were the producers of video, The Myths of Biofuels, which can be viewed on your computer at this web site: http://www.archive.org/details/Myths_of_Biofuels

Attached also is a chart depicting the amount of various biofuel stocks that can be produced per acre of land.

We are fortunate to have friends in San Francisco Oil Awareness willing to share their Peak Oil Task Force Efforts.

A Laurin

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio

Adaptation

Anita Laurin — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 08:51:03 -0700

Several recent articles seem to be indicating a societal adaptation to the increase in the cost of oil.

WHY THE HYPE ABOUT LOCAL FOOD MAY BE MORE THAN JUST A TREND
"It is tempting to dismiss locally grown food as just another elite fashion, but its merits may mean it will be a long-term phenomenon."
Full article: http://www.alternet.org/environment/93652/why_the_hype_about_local_food_...

WILL AN ORGANIC REVIVAL OVERTHROW THE GREEN REVOLUTION?
"In places like India, backlash is increasing against the chemical-dependent farming techniques of the Green Revolution."
Full article: http://www.alternet.org/environment/91200/will_an_organic_revival_overth...

SHIPPING COSTS START TO CRIMP GLOBALIZATION
"When Tesla Motors, a pioneer in electric-powered cars, set out to make a luxury roadster for the American market, it had the global supply chain in mind. Tesla planned to manufacture 1,000-pound battery packs in Thailand, ship them to Britain for installation, then bring the mostly assembled cars back to the United States.

But when it began production this spring, the company decided to make the batteries and assemble the cars near its home base in California, cutting more than 5,000 miles from the shipping bill for each vehicle.

The cost of shipping a 40-foot container from Shanghai to the United States has risen to $8,000, compared with $3,000 early in the decade, according to a recent study of transportation costs. Big container ships, the pack mules of the 21st-century economy, have shaved their top speed by nearly 20 percent to save on fuel costs, substantially slowing shipping times."
Full article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/03/business/worldbusiness/03global.html?p...

COTA BUS RIDERSHIP CONTINUES UPSWING
"As gasoline prices are the highest Central Ohio residents have seen in recent memory, and more cyclists hit the road and trails, COTA ridership continues to increase."
Full article:
http://www.columbusunderground.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=13090

A Laurin

Central Ohio Relocalization Effort (CORE), Columbus, Ohio