Category Archives: ! PEAK EVERYTHING

Food, topsoil, aquifers, phosphorus, rare metals essential to microchip fabrication, windmills, solar, and other products; sand; oil; natural gas

California’s central valley aquifers may be gone in 2030s, Ogallala 2050-2070

Posted on April 6, 2019 by

Preface. Clearly the human population isn’t going to reach 10 billion or more. California grows one-third of the nation’s food, the 10 high-plains states over the Ogallala about a quarter of the nations food, and exports a great deal of … Continue reading →

Posted in Groundwater, Peak Water, Water Infrastructure | Tagged , , , , , | Comments Off on California’s central valley aquifers may be gone in 2030s, Ogallala 2050-2070

Rare: The High-Stakes Race to Satisfy Our Need for the Scarcest Metals on Earth by Keith Veronese

Posted on March 31, 2019 by

Preface.  This is a book review of Keith Veronese’s book “The High-stakes race to satisfy our need for the scarcest metals on earth” (well, the kindle notes, so a bit disjointed). Capitalism believes there’s a solution for everything due to … Continue reading →

Posted in Infrastructure Books, Mining, Peak Critical Elements, Peak Platinum Group Elements, Peak Precious Elements, Peak Rare Earth Elements, Peak Resources | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Book review of Heinberg’s “Afterburn: society beyond fossil fuels”

Posted on March 25, 2019 by

Preface. This book has 15 essays Heinberg wrote from 2011 to 2014, many of them available for free online.  These are some of my Kindle notes of parts that interested me, so to you it will be disjointed and perhaps … Continue reading →

Posted in Energy Books, Peak Oil, Richard Heinberg | Tagged , , | 9 Comments

Why and how Jellyfish are taking over the world

Posted on March 19, 2019 by

Preface.  The more climate change kicks in, the more we over-fish, pollute, acidify and warm the ocean, create vast dead zones, and trawl ocean bottoms, the better the jellyfish do. It is quite possible that the ocean ecosystem will shift … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Extinction Books, Fisheries, Jellyfish, Peak Food | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

Book review of Dirt: the erosion of civilization

Posted on March 16, 2019 by

Preface. On average civilizations collapsed after 800 to 2,000 years because they’d destroyed their topsoil, some of it caused by deforestation to grow more food, make metals, ceramics, glass and other objects requiring high heat, which fossils provide today. Today, … Continue reading →

Posted in Agriculture, Peak Food, Soil | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments

IEA 2018 World Energy Outlook: Peak oil is here, oil crunch by 2023

Posted on March 10, 2019 by

Preface. Excerpts from the cleantechnica article below make it clear why there is likely to be a supply crunch as soon as the early 2020s, and the investment implications. Here’s what I’ve gleaned from other summaries of the report. Although … Continue reading →

Posted in Investment, Oil & Gas Fracked, Peak Oil | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Science magazine on Peak Sand 2017 and 2018

Posted on January 18, 2019 by

[ Sand is essential to make concrete, glass, silicon for computer chips, and many other products (longer list in Peak Sand), so no wonder top journal “Science” has had two articles on this topic. Sand mining also ruins ecosystems, lessens … Continue reading →

Posted in Peak Sand, Tsunami | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments

Lakes run dry from too much water extraction and climate change

Posted on January 8, 2019 by

Preface.   I think that declining oil will be the main cause of civilization to collapse, since it is the energy that makes all other activities possible, but there are so many other contenders I wonder if scholars in the future … Continue reading →

Posted in Air, Drought & Collapse, Overpopulation, Peak Water, Water Infrastructure | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Lakes run dry from too much water extraction and climate change

Deep-sea trawling harms biodiversity and carbon storage

Posted on January 5, 2019 by

Preface. Overfishing has eliminated 90% of the world’s large predatory fishes and is devastating marine ecosystems. Bottom trawling is one of the most devastating ways our oceans are being overfished, degraded and biodiversity destroyed .  This industry tossed 437 million … Continue reading →

Posted in Biodiversity Loss, Climate Change, Fisheries, Fishery destruction, Peak Food | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Deep-sea trawling harms biodiversity and carbon storage

75% of Earth’s land is degraded threatening 3.2 billion people

Posted on December 1, 2018 by

  Preface. By 2050 95% of Earth’s land could be degraded and reducing or even preventing food production, forcing hundreds of millions to migrate. More than 75% of our planet has been altered by humans, a figure that will likely … Continue reading →

Posted in Biodiversity Loss, Limits To Growth, Peak Food | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on 75% of Earth’s land is degraded threatening 3.2 billion people