Category Archives: 3) Fast Crash

The case for a fast, rather than a slow one. Most societies crashed in 20 years or less. There has never been or will be again a crash like ours, where the world of 7 billion people became utterly dependent on a non-renewable source of energy — fossil fuels.

Refrigeration uses up to 30% of world electricity

Posted on May 1, 2025 by

Preface. This is a book review of Twilley’s 2024 book Frostbite: How Refrigeration Changed Our Food, Our Planet, and Ourselves. It is a really great book, highly recommended. Refrigeration plays a much larger role in our lives than people realize. … Continue reading →

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Peak food production happened, how will we feed 2-3 billion more?

Posted on April 10, 2025 by

Preface. Also see related article Limits to Growth? 2016 United Nations report provides best evidence yet. Nichols (2015) below shows that climate change is already affecting harvests of the world’s top 10 crops that comprise 83% of our calories: barley, … Continue reading →

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Chemical industrial farming does not work: Pests evolve immunity quickly

Posted on April 3, 2025 by

Pesticides, herbicides, and insecticides destroy soil and ecosystems. Yet a third of crops are lost to pests just as in the many millennia of farming before chemicals Preface. This is a book review of Dyer’s “Chasing the Red Queen”, and … Continue reading →

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Trump & Project 2025 want to destroy energy efficiency & raise your utility bills

Posted on March 26, 2025 by

Source: (NYT 2017, LBL 2025) The Department of energy (DOE) under Chris Wright is proposing to get rid of energy efficiency standards that have saved consumers over 1.5 trillion dollars (CFA 2017). The average American home saves $321 a year … Continue reading →

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The only congressional hearing on Peak Oil was in 2005

Posted on March 20, 2025 by

Preface. This U.S. House hearing happened 20 years ago, but it is still a good introduction to why oil is so important to society. At this hearing scientific experts spoke, warning that we will reach peak oil within decades (which … Continue reading →

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Tom Murphy Stubborn Expectations (on population)

Posted on March 13, 2025 by

U.N.Total fertility rate projections Preface. Tom Murphy has one of the best blogs on limits to growth, energy resources and more in his blog Do The Math. He is a professor emeritus of the departments of Physics and Astronomy & … Continue reading →

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Telling others about peak oil and limits to growth

Posted on February 20, 2025 by

Preface. Obviously the planet is finite.  World crude oil production peaked in 2018, and been on a plateau since 2008.  Other resources, such as food, are peaking while the polycrisis depletes fisheries, forests, groundwater and more. Yet this reality is … Continue reading →

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Escape to Mars after we’ve trashed the Earth?

Posted on January 23, 2025 by

Preface. The idea that we can go to Mars is touted by NASA, Elon Musk, and so many others that this dream seems just around the corner.  If we destroy our planet with climate change, pollution, biodiversity loss, soil erosion, … Continue reading →

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Spermageddon: Sperm is declining around the world

Posted on January 16, 2025 by

The rate sperm concentration is falling globally from samples collected from 1972 to 2000 (orange) and since 2000 (red) Source: Davies 2022 Preface. I’ve been seeing this issue in science news for years now. Scientific data has accumulated long enough … Continue reading →

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Who Killed the Electric Car & more importantly, the Electric Truck?

Posted on January 1, 2025 by

Preface. Who cares about electric cars? Civilization ends when trucks stop running. Trucks can’t run on batteries because they’re too heavy, with 63 times less energy density than diesel. If all U.S. transportation were to be electrified, the existing electric … Continue reading →

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