Since I submitted "priceof fuel" on Jan 3 fuel oil in these parts has risen
from about a dollar to up to 1.90$ a gallon. I asked a postal worker
yesterday
how his woodshed was holding out and he smilingly said he had filled his
1000 gallon fuel tank at 65 cents a gallon last summer. So the increase
is rather dramitic but the price of gasoline has held steady. We already
have had speculation why on this list. After one of my posts Jeff
mentioned
www.dieoff.org which I of course have perused. For those of you not
familiar
it is a collection of over 100 papers by a chap Jay Hanson residing on the
beach in Hawaii which attempts to prove that do to energy and environmental
problems the collapse of civilization is highly likely within 20 to 50
years. I have also found a site by oposite viewpoint
www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/ by John McCarthy, a computer science prof at
Stanford, who attempts to prove that given opportunity technology can easily
support 15 billion by the turn of the next century at a US level of
consumption and no pollution problems.. I suspect a debate between the two
would be as productive the
pro-con abortion "discussions". Perhaps I am weakminded but I see some
truth in each argument and have been wrestling for a synthesis and to see
errors in asumption and logic on each side. Both agree wild energy price
fluctuations are lurking.a oil production peaks and declines and soceity
adjusts.
One major break in their line of arguments is that while John believes as
the huge mideast pools are sucked dry we can easily turn to oil shale and
sand, Jay says that the return on oil expended in seach and recovery to
oil produced has dropped from 1 to 50 to 1to 6 in 50 years and is driopping
rapidly and when it approaches 1 to 1 the party will be over..( Despite 25
including petroleum geology courses in the far off past I have no idea to
the answer of that). How does this shake down in small town NH at present?
Price of dry firewood is rising rapidly, not too srprisingly. More
inteeresting to me is that if the price holds , what will happen to the
price of California produce in the local markets which is supposedly 90 to
95 % energy. At 3$ retail a head for lettuce a resourceful local low teck
grower could easily compete. We had 330 years (1620 to 1950) of nearly self
sufficient agriculture and are known for frugality and resourcefulness.
By the way, thank you all , I have found so many interesting sites through
this list.
