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Bulletin, Progressive, Record, Reporter Wednesday, April 27, 2011 1B
REGI(D N.
Peak oil, climate change drive Transition movement
Coal & gas to liquids
Relaxed drilling regs
Massively scaled
biofuels
Tar sends & non-
conventional oils
Resource nationalism
& stockpiling
• Tradable enorg
quotas
• Dexmtrallzl eneri
infrmuure
• The Great Re-SMiling
Localized food
preduction
Energy descent
planning
Local currencies
Local medicinal
capacity
Climate engineering
Carbon capture &
storage
Tree-based carbon
offsets
International
emissions trading
• Climate adaptation
• Improved
transportation
logistics
Nuclear power
Courtesy Dr. Darla DeRuiter; "Source: The Transition Handbook"
tr
2,
i'i i;
30
20
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1930 1940 lgl 1NO 1970 191M" tMlO 200€
As originally suggested by M. King Hubbert in 1956, peak oil production lags behind discovery
(in blue). Anticipated discoveries (in yellow) will be insufficient to meet ever-growing demand.
Courtesy Dr. Darla DeRuiter; source: "The Transition Handbook"
"Climate change
says we should change,
whereas peak oii
says we wilt be '
forced to change."
Rob Hopkins
Transition Network
Mona Hill
Staff Writer
mhill@plumasnews.com
While building a sustain-
able and resilient community
was the focus of Dr. Darla
DeRuiter's Current Environ-
ment Issues class at Feather
River College, the force be-
hind all the talk is a pair of
concepts: peak oil and climate
change. DeRuiter discussed
these topics in the April 12
evening session. During the weekend sessions
April 15 - 17, the class tackled what to do
about it- the subject of next week's article.
B Oil production yett0 peak
Peak oil
The world's oil supply was created between
90 and 150 billion years ago. Estimates
indicate humans use about 1,000 barrels or
55,000 gallons per second. In short, the supply
is finite.
Simply put, in 1956, geoscientist M. King
Hubbert, working in a Shell research facility,
posited that peak oil production arrives 25 -
40 years following peak oil discoveries. Re-
sulting in what is known as the Hubbert
curve, his research indicated we would expe-
rience peak production beginning in the
1990s. (See accompanying graph and map).
Widely discredited at the time, other
researchers at Shell concluded that there
wasn't enough oil shortly before the 1973 oil
embargo.
Experts generally agree the best quality
oil and that easiest to access have been dis-
covered. While plenty of oil lies beneath
Peak oil
Oil is special stuff --
everything we have depends
on it now.
One gallon contains about 98
tons of the original algae that
sank to the bottom of the
oceans 90 - 150 million years
ago.
We are burning it at a rate of
more than 1,000 barrels per
second.
A tank of gas equals four years
of human manual labor.
Global peak discovery occurred
in 1965.
Peak production in oil-
producing nations typically
follows about 40 years after
peak discovery.
At least 63 oil-producing
countries (of 98) are past peak
production (2009).
Seems trifling, but global
average temperature has risen
by 0.8 degree C (1.5 degrees F)
above pre-industrial levels. The
results of this:
Widespread glacial retreat
Arctic ice sheets melting
Heavier monsoons
Encroaching drought and
deserts
Increasing frequency of
tropical storms
Sea level rise ... and that's
before we even hit 1 degree C!
I Oil production has already peaked
ocean floors or in tar sands, it is harder to
reach and of poorer quality, making it much
more expensive and inefficient to recover.
In the United States, the largest oil-
consuming human activity is food production
at 10 barrels of oil per capita. Each person in
America uses 550 gallons of oil per year just
to eat. That figure includes food production,
transport and preparation.
Transportation, including commercial and
personal vehicles, uses eight barrels per
person per year and housing consumes seven
barrels.
Climate change
In a politically charged and highly contro-
versial theory, most mainstream scientists
accept that globally, the Earth's climate is
changing. Globally, the Earth's average tem-
perature has risen 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit
above pre-industrial levels.
Indicators of that change include:
Widespread glacial retreat
Arctic ice sheets melting
Heavier monsoons
Encroaching drought and deserts
Increasing frequency of
tropical storms
Rising sea levels
The debate stems from what
is causing it and what to do
about it.
Causes aside, the combina-
tion of climate change and
peak oil poses significant
challenges globally. (See
related chart.)
We now consume about four
barrels of oil for every one we
discover.
Twentieth-century growth
was fueled by cheap energy,
especially fossil fuels.
Anthropogenic greenhouse
gases make up about 30
percent of total emissions,
but enough to tip a delicate
balance.
Our societal dependencies
on oil, coal and gas make us
enormously vulnerable.
As fossil fuels decline, con-
sumption will contract, and the
global economy will shrink.
The Transition Initiative
Experts last week began
predicting the cost of gasoline
People are often only able
to conceive two scales of
response:
1) Individuals doing things in
their own homes, or
2) The government acting on
a national scale.
The Transition Initiative model
explores the ground between
these two: What could be
achieved at a community level.
Proven oil reserves
Courtesy Dr. Darla DeRuiter;
source:
• "'The,ClAFactbook, 2009"
would pass $6 per gallon by the end of this
summer, leading to higher prices for con-
sumer goods, power and services.
Modern society depends on petroleum for
everything: the factories and freight carriers
that manufacture and deliver food, clothing,
appliances, furniture and housing -- every-
thing we use and do.
The high cost of gas will inevitably lead to
the higher cost of food. The cost of a gallon of
milk in Hawaii -- more than $7 -- and a
generic, poor quality loaf of white bread, $3,
clearly demonstrates the impact of trans-
portation costs on food.
Several agencies in Plumas County have
been working toward creating sustainable
and resilient communities that can help resi-
dents withstand higher costs through plan-
ning. Among them, Transition Quincy is the
newest and perhaps the most overarching.
Pamela Noel, one of several co-founders,
spoke to DeRuiter's class about this move-
ment, which began in the U.K. with Rob
Hopkins.
In 2004, Hopkins, who lives in Totnes,
Devon, recognized the challenges of peak oil
and began to apply his background in perma-
culture to provide responses to those chal-
lenges. The result was Transition Town
Totnes.
The idea behind the drive for sustainable
communities is one of preparedness for those
high prices to maintain quality of life
through:
Localized energy production
Rethinking healthcare
Rediscovering local building materials
Rethinking waste management
Rebuilding local agriculture and food
production
Currently, there are Transition Towns
With each person in the circle choosing one part of the college's oak woodland
ecosystem, students use string to illustrate the interconnections between them,
whether obvious or obscure. Photo by Mona Hill
Definitions
Climate change: Long-term
change in statistical distribu-
tion of weather patterns over
periods ranging from decades
to millions of years, whether a
change in the average weather
conditions or a change in the
distribution of weather events
with respect to an average;
usually refers to changes in
modern climate.
Community asset mapping:
A capacity-focused way of
identifying organic, green,
sustainable or resilient com-
modities and services within a
community.
Peak oil: The point of maxi-
mum global petroleum extrac-
tion. Often confused with oil
depletion; peak oil is the point
of maximum production while
depletion refers to a period of
falling reserves and supply.
Resilience: The ability of a
community to hold together
and function in the face of change and shocks
from the outside.
Sustainability: The potential for long-
term maintenance of well-being, which
has environmental, economic and social
dimensions; the capacity to endure through
self-sufficiency.
Time banking: A reciprocal service exchange
that uses units of time as currency, always
valued at an hour's worth of any person's
services for labor or time.
Transition Initiative: An environmental and
social movement based on the concepts of
permaculture, sustainability and resilience,
which aims to equip communities for the dual
challenges of climate change and peak oil.
worldwide, most in North America, the
U.K., Australia and New Zealand, but also in
Scandinavia, Europe, Chile and Japan.
Noel said Transition Quincy's mission is to
"strengthen community bonds, resilience and
sustainability, given an uncertain economic,
geo-political and energy future."
The group's goal is one of community build-
ing to increase awareness of the risks arising
from oil dependence and how they affect
Quincy and Plumas County.
Alongside that work, Transition Quincy
is collaborating with local organizations
to increase awareness of their work toward a
resilient and sustainable community.
For more information about the Transition
Initiative, visit transitionculture.org, or visit
Transition Quincy on Facebook.
Next week: DeRuiter's students get to work
in the community.
"By taking a proactive response
rather than a reactive one,
we can still shape and form
(our) future, within the rapidly
changing energy context,
in such a way that it ends
up preferable to the present."
Rob Hopkins
Transition Network