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.

Without a Trace ‘The Sixth Extinction,’ by Elizabeth Kolbert

Posted on March 21, 2014 by

Review by Al Gore Feb 10, 2014. New York Times. Over the past decade, Elizabeth Kolbert has established herself as one of our very best science writers. She has developed a distinctive and eloquent voice of conscience on issues arising … Continue reading →

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People are devouring the earth: 83% of land, 60% freshwater runoff, 40% of plants, 35% of productivity of oceanic shelf, 98% of land that can grow rice, wheat, corn

Posted on March 14, 2014 by

Hillary Mayell. October 25, 2002. Human “Footprint” Seen on 83 Percent of Earth’s Land. National Geographic News. There is little debate in scientific circles about the importance of human influence on ecosystems. According to scientists’ reports: Humans use 83% of … Continue reading →

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We’ve taken over too much of the planet for pasture and crops

Posted on February 6, 2014 by

In the article “Primeval planet: What if humans had never existed?” by Christopher Kemp in NewScientist, these charts of increasing intensity of pasture and crop land from 5000 BC (18,000,000 population) until 2000 (6,150,000,000 people) show that humans are laying … Continue reading →

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Phytoplankton have declined 40%: they provide food and oxygen for all creatures on Earth

Posted on July 13, 2013 by

This article from NewScientist discusses how phytoplankton are disappearing — and they provide half of the food animals both in the ocean and on land depend on, plus produce a great deal of the oxygen we breathe. Throw in overfishing, … Continue reading →

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Why we might not go extinct from fossil fuel emissions

Posted on May 3, 2013 by

Peak Fossils means Peak Emissions and the lowest to medium IPCC projections at worst This is an overview, other posts in this category contain peer-reviewed papers that show why this is true.  The heart of the problem is that the … Continue reading →

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Peak Coal already happened or likely soon, so worst IPCC scenarios may never happen

Posted on January 8, 2013 by

[ The good news is that The IPCC has greatly exaggerated the amount of coal reserves we actually have The scientists below find that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has greatly exaggerated coal reserves, so the IPCC scenario … Continue reading →

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20% of Invertebrate species threatened with extinction.

Posted on September 4, 2012 by

Brendan Borrell. Sep 3, 2012. One Fifth of Invertebrate Species at Risk of Extinction. Freshwater snails and reef-building corals are among the threatened groups. Nature & Scientific American. One in five of the world’s invertebrate species are threatened with extinction, … Continue reading →

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Methane’s potential for another major extinction event

Posted on July 17, 2012 by

June 22, 2016. As Alaska warms, methane emissions appear stable, study finds. phys.org. Excerpts: One reason no increase has been seen may be that “Bacteria that produce methane and bacteria that consume methane will both become more active as temperatures … Continue reading →

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Biodiversity loss impact on ecosystem worse than climate change and pollution

Posted on May 3, 2012 by

David U. Hooper, et al. A global synthesis reveals biodiversity loss as a major driver of ecosystem change. Nature, 2012; DOI: 10.1038/nature11118 “This analysis establishes that reduced biodiversity affects ecosystems at levels comparable to those of global warming or air … Continue reading →

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Fungi destroy bees, bats, amphibians, trees, etc

Posted on April 11, 2012 by

Attack of the Killer Fungi: Rising Threat Worries Scientists Wynne Parry, LiveScience   11 April 2012 An unprecedented number of diseases caused by fungi have been causing some of the most severe die-offs and extinctions ever witnessed in wild species and … Continue reading →

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