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Recent Posts
- Electrifying freight trains in the U.S. is a bad idea
- Why Nuclear Power can’t replace fossil fuels
- Energy, Water, & Climate Change are interdependent
- Why fusion power is Forever Away
- Climate Change dominates news coverage at expense of other existential planetary boundaries
- Excerpt from “The Geopolitics of Resource Wars”
- Homes & Buildings
- Book Review “The Outlawed Ocean” by Ian Urbina
- Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future
- Motherboards: too complicated to make after oil
- “More and More and More” one of the best books on energy ever written
- The staggering destruction of knowledge by Christians in the Roman Empire
- Why the R/P Reserves to Production ratio does not show when oil will run out
- Catton on Collapse “Bottleneck: Humanity’s Impending Impasse”
- Book Review of Grain Brain: Extraordinary claim not backed up by evidence
Category Archives: Infrastructure
Theo Henckens: do we need mining quotas to prevent mineral depletion?
Preface: Ugo Bardi writes: “Currently, the problem of resource depletion is completely missing from the political debate. There has to be some reason why some problems tend to disappear from the public’s radar as they become worse. Unfortunately, the depletion … Continue reading
Posted in Mining
Tagged antimony, limits to growth, molybdenum, peak minerals, zinc
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70 million people may need emergency food in 2017
Emergency food assistance needs unprecedented as Famine threatens four countries. January 25, 2017. Famine Early Warnings systems network (fews.net) The Famine Early Warning Systems Network is a leading provider of early warning and analysis on food insecurity. Created by USAID … Continue reading
Anyone who whines about airplanes should have to take the Oregon Trail
Source: Book cover of “Oregon Or Bust: True Short Stories from the Descendants of Oregon Trail Pioneers, Prospectors, Trappers, and Settlers in the Great Northwest Hardcover” by Gentry Ward Cutsforth (2012), XLibris. Preface. Also listen to the Louis CK rant … Continue reading
Posted in Airplanes, Lithium-ion, Transportation What To Do
Tagged airplane, battery, oregon trail, transportation
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Electromagnetic Pulse weapons & cyberattacks can bring down the electric grid
Preface. At some point of energy decline the electric grid will fail, and civilization will take a giant step downward (financial systems gone, knowledge stored gone, computers / phones inoperable) and so on. Vaclav Smil (2015) in his book Energy … Continue reading
Plant more prairies to save topsoil and prevent pollution runoff
[ A program to plant more prairies to enrich the soil, keep topsoil from blowing and washing away, and provide a bio-diverse habitat for hundreds of species is receiving little funding or farmer participation, even though it would save farmers … Continue reading
Posted in Farming & Ranching, Peak Topsoil
Tagged agriculture, food, peak soil, prairie
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Climate change may corrode concrete even faster
[ I’ve paraphrased and shortened this article about how climate change will corrode concrete faster in the future from increasing carbon dioxide levels, and in coastal cities, from the chloride ions in sea spray. After that is the introduction section … Continue reading
Limits to Growth? 2016 United Nations report provides best evidence yet
Preface. This is a summary of a United Nations report that ought to scare the pants off of anyone who understands exponential growth. Here are a few examples what that means: If 2 grams of gold grew at a 5% … Continue reading
The electromagnetic pulse EMP Threat: House of Representatives hearing 2005
[ Related articles: Russian hackers suspected in attack that blacked out parts of Ukraine How the weapon works (pdf): CRASHOVERRIDE Analyzing the Threat to Electric Grid Operations The EMP Commission estimates a nationwide blackout lasting one year could kill up … Continue reading