Category Archives: Extinction

Our system is so interdependent that a electromagnetic pulse from the sun or nuclear weapon that knocks out the grid also knocks out transportation and the financial system. Oil decline will eventually lead to the end of transportation and fall of civilization as I explain in my book “When Trucks stop running: Energy and the Future of Transportation (Springer 2016). When you add in declining resources (especially phosphorous which is essential for agriculture), corrosion of infrastructure, climate change caused food reduction and rising oceans plus all the other factors in decline and collapse, it wouldn’t take much to turn a gradual into a fast collapse. My gut feeling is that there will be a fast crash that would take years at worst (EMP or nuclear war), and decade(s) at best. Certainly not centuries.

The nine boundaries we must not cross or we may go extinct

Posted on November 4, 2022 by

Preface. This post has excerpts from the famous paper by Rockström et al (2009) as well as a more recent proposal by Running (2012) on an easier measure of how close we’re coming to rendering the planet uninhabitable. The media … Continue reading →

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Jellyfish in the news

Posted on February 16, 2022 by

Preface.  As we overfish, eutrophy and acidify the ocean with fertilizer and pesticides we risk a tipping point where jellyfish dominate the oceans and fish are scarce. Related: Why and how Jellyfish are taking over the world Alice Friedemann  www.energyskeptic.com  … Continue reading →

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Freshwater fish under threat of extinction

Posted on December 20, 2021 by

Preface. A third of freshwater fish are under threat from pollution, over fishing, dams, non-native species, climate change, disruption of river ecology and more.  Alice Friedemann  www.energyskeptic.com  Author of Life After Fossil Fuels: A Reality Check on Alternative Energy; When … Continue reading →

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Not enough fossil fuels left to trigger another mass extinction

Posted on September 11, 2021 by

Preface. Since both conventional and unconventional oil peaked in 2018, we clearly won’t be burning fossils at exponentially increasing rates until 2400 as the IPCC expected. Quite the opposite, currently the decline rate of oil is 8% a year, which … Continue reading →

Posted in But not from climate change: Peak Fossil Fuels, CO2 and Methane, Global Warming, Mass Extinction, Planetary Boundaries, Runaway Greenhouse | Tagged , , | 6 Comments

We’ve wiped out two-thirds of wildlife in just 50 years

Posted on April 11, 2021 by

Last updated 2022-4-28 Preface.  Human over-consumption is driving extinction far more than climate change. Humans  began reducing biodiversity 4 million years ago, when large carnivores in Africa began disappearing (Faurby, S., et al. 2020. Brain expansion in early hominins predicts … Continue reading →

Posted in Biodiversity Loss, Extinction, Food production, Scientists Warnings to Humanity | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Scientists’ warning to humanity on insect extinctions

Posted on September 30, 2020 by

Preface. Below are excerpts from two articles on why the extinction of insects could lead to our own extinction, not to mention all the other species on earth. Though if peak oil did happen in 2018 (citations chapter 2 of … Continue reading →

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Nuclear winter could kill 2 to 5 billion people

Posted on August 24, 2020 by

Preface. Carl Sagan introduced the idea of a “nuclear winter”, which helped to end the cold war.  The smoke from fires started by bombs would absorb so much sun the earth wold grow cold, dry, and dark, killing plants on … Continue reading →

Posted in Extinction, Farming & Ranching, Fisheries, Nuclear War, Nuclear Winter | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

World’s Oceans are losing Oxygen rapidly

Posted on May 25, 2020 by

Preface. Yikes, add deoxygenization to your list of worries. Oxygen levels in the world’s oceans declined by roughly 2% from 1960 and 2010. The decline was largely due to climate change, though other human activities such as nutrient runoff from … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate Change, Extinction, Mass Extinction, Planetary Boundaries | Tagged , , | 7 Comments

One million plant & animal species at risk of extinction

Posted on August 31, 2019 by

As usual, no mention of birth control or carrying capacity. Related: 2019-9 Huge decline in songbirds linked to common insecticide (neo nicotinoids). National Geographic. Alice Friedemann   www.energyskeptic.com  author of “When Trucks Stop Running: Energy and the Future of Transportation”, 2015, … Continue reading →

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Global wildlife populations have fallen 60% in just 40 years

Posted on August 28, 2019 by

Below is a summary of the World Wildlife Fund report. Alice Friedemann   www.energyskeptic.com  author of “When Trucks Stop Running: Energy and the Future of Transportation”, 2015, Springer and “Crunch! Whole Grain Artisan Chips and Crackers”. Podcasts: Derrick Jensen, Practical Prepping, … Continue reading →

Posted in Biodiversity Loss, Extinction | 1 Comment