My main concern is not the effect of peaking itself--that is, the 2-3% or so decline in production per year that would follow the peak. As several people on this forum have commented, there is a lot of fat in the West's energy budget. Even a sudden disruption like the fall of Saudi Arabia could still be absorbed, amid much hardship, simply because our consumption habits are SO overblown.

My concern is how people will react to it. There appear to be a LOT of people out there whose reaction to any hardship is to blame someone else. The degree of venom I'm seeing on these blogs is appalling.

Historically, the United States' response to the 1970's oil crises were basically to elect Reagan and start dismantling the New Deal. The fact that, twenty-six years later, lots of people who would otherwise have benefited from the New Deal are still applauding this, does not bode well for the U.S.' ability to deal with hardship or to learn from mistakes.

We can say "humanity will adapt" but that adaptation can take a lot of different forms and unfortunately, I have seen very little in recent American history to suggest to me that people will accept any solution that requires them to cut back on their own consumption. And this goes for those on the left as well as those on the right--although those on the right tend to be more loudmouthed and personally aggressive about the issue, those on the left are much more prone to wishful thinking vis-a-vis the possibilities of alternative fuels.

The (okay, not the, but a) defining element of North American history has been the abundance of resources. Basically a whole continent, sparsely populated, by cultures that had no use for petroleum or much of the other wealth that was here. Then they conveniently keel over and die when Europeans come over and cough on them. Probably never has such a huge amount of wealth been inherited so quickly. So, no wonder we think the world is inexhaustible, and those parts of it that aren't, at least replaceable. For the entirety of North American history, it has been true. Our culture has developed around that assumption and is ill-prepared to confront the possibility that it is not true.

This is why biodiesel disturbs me. No doubt, some cars will be able to be kept running on biodiesel. But that biodiesel will be labour-intensive without pesticides and fertilizers to keep the industrial agriculture model running. I can EASILY see car-addicted people coming up with justifications for why a bunch of people should be plantation serfs so that he can keep driving his car. Hey, he worked hard and went to school, right? Got a good job. Those other people should have made some smarter investments. People choose to be serfs; not his problem.

Back in the 70s I read a book "Muddeling Towards Frugality" that laid out a scenario for adapting to a more expensive energy world. Over the past 30 years, energy prices either got cheaper or stayed similar, so the adjustments called for were not needed. soon, they probably will be. But thinking we are all "going back to the 13th century" of need to find less hot parts of hell are not helpful ways to think about this. There are a lot of adjusments we can and should and will make as prices go up (likely in spikes, then settling down a bit, then spiking again). We are intelligent beings, and have a lot to work with. I tend to agree with Amory Lvins assessment, that we are fully capable of adjusting, and need not panic. But we certainly need to challenge those who deny the problem exists.

Please, tone down the "end of the world" talk. Keep cool, buy, live, and vote smart. Go to Europe or Japan and see how very prosperous societies live on 1/2 of our energy consumption. Chill.

I don't know which is worse: The Peak Oil Jeremiahs or the (too) many lunkheads posting to this letters page, arguing that there's nothing or very little to worry about. "Common sense"?? There is almost none on either side.

"Peak Oilers" do indeed seem to relish the abolition of modern cilization which is, when one stops to think about it, an utterly repugnant point of view. On the other hand, those "debunkers" who would put us all back to sleep are not doing us any favors.

I'm sorry, but the truth is that (as one cogent poster put it up-thread) the looting and other lawlessness after Katrina is but a hint of what will come when (as another cogent poster put it up-thread) people have no:

1. Jobs

3. Money

2. Food

3. Shelter

When they begin to see their children die, when their spouses likewise pass away because of a lack of this or that medication or other medical service, when they witness friends and/or relatives being murdered by (the inevitable) roving gangs of killers, they will descend on those who are now carefully preparing like a pack of hungry wolves. There is no mercy with hungry wolves, no compromise either, so people who ARE prepared will have to look inwards and decide whether they are prepared to kill - probably in large numbers - other people who maraud their communities. I don't know about you, but I'm not prepared to be Yul Brynner in "The Magnificent Seven" and I don't know anyone who is, either skill-wise or morally.

And yet, on the other hand...

People are resilient and innovative. Corporations will step and and create new technologies to try to make money from the troubles, and thereby ameliorate them if only by accident. Many people shall choose another way, working together to solve their problems.

But those of you here who argue that alternative energy will save us - or "merely" send us back to 1931 (good GOD, could my grandmother give you an earful on that one) I say this: You are fools and tools. Those four trillion barrels of oil shale in Alberta? Better to think of them as an energy black hole, because it will probably cost about two barrels of energy to extract every barrel of that "oil." Ditto ethanol, solar, wind and so on. Some dummy even talked about how "computers" would provide relief via telecommuting...with no word as to how all those computers would operate without electricity, or with electricity curtailed to subsistence level. Forget the Internet; like modern Russia, access will cost a premium and we will all pay by the e-mail.

There are a variety of problems facing us, and we need to find someone other than cassandras and ostriches to help us find a way to the solutions. In other words, we need people with genuine common sense.

Where is Tom Paine when we need him??

Oh and Pissed-Off Brit? I'm a patriot, so please suck my cock.