Category Archives: ! PEAK EVERYTHING

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

Plants are sucking streams dry thanks to more CO2

Slezak, M. October 24, 2015. Carbon emissions make Earth greener but are also drying it out. NewScientist. Source: Ukkola, A. M., et al. October 19, 2015 Reduced streamflow in water-stressed climates consistent with CO2 effects on vegetation. Nature Climate Change 6, … Continue reading

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China consumes mind-boggling amounts of raw materials

September 10, 2015. China Consumes Mind-Boggling Amounts of Raw Materials. Visual Capitalist.           Over the last 20 years, the world economy has relied on the Chinese economic growth engine more than it would like to admit. … Continue reading

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Coal plants are causing water shortages in China

Wong, E. March 22, 2016. Report Ties Coal Plants to Water Shortage in Northern China. New York Times. China’s consumption of coal, a major contributor to climate change and the country’s horrific air pollution, is worsening a severe water shortage … Continue reading

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Former President Bill Clinton on Peak Oil, Peak Soil, and other depleting resources

Former President Bill Clinton. May 4, 2007. The Looming Crisis; Can We Act in Time? Harvard Kennedy School. Excerpts from Keynote Address by Former President William Jefferson Clinton Kennedy School Spring Conference – Cambridge, MA I think it is highly … Continue reading

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Peak Aquifers: Very little Ground water is renewable, perhaps only 1.5%

Gleeson, Tom, et al. November 2015. The global volume and distribution of modern groundwater. Nature Geoscience. The water in aquifers and wells billions of people depend upon is mostly a non-renewable resource that could run out. Underground water is renewed … Continue reading

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Peak fossil fuels limits climate change to low-to-medium outcomes in IPCC report

Excerpts from 24 page:  Höök, M., Tang, X. 2013. Depletion of fossil fuels and anthropogenic climate change: a review. Energy Policy, 52: 797-809 Conclusion of paper: Fossil fuel constraints will limit anthropogenic climate impact towards the low-medium outcomes presented by … Continue reading

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A third of Nuclear Reactors are going to die of old age in the next 10-20 years

70% of reactors are over 25 years old, 23% are over 35 years old, so within 10 to 20 years about a third will have to be decommissioned, far more than the 63 under construction.  Some are bound to fail … Continue reading

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Michael Dittmar, Institute of Particle Physics: Peak Uranium 2015

The End of Cheap Uranium June 17, 2011. Michael Dittmar, Institute of Particle Physics,   Zurich, Switzerland Journal: Science of the Total Environment This paper concludes that “the end of the cheap uranium supply will result in a chaotic phase-out … Continue reading

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Energy Watch Group. Peak Uranium 2020-2035

Energy Watch Group. March 2013. Fossil and Nuclear Fuels – the Supply Outlook (172 pages) Uranium production peaks for the same reasons as oil, coal, and natural gas: the depletion of easy and cheap to develop mines.  EWG’s guess is … Continue reading

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Writing on the wall for prime farmland. Years of irrigation have taken toll on San Joaquin Valley.

Carolyn Lochhead. March 24, 2014. Writing on the wall for prime farmland. Years of irrigation have taken toll on San Joaquin Valley. San Francisco Chronicle. Decades of irrigation have leached salts and toxic minerals from the soil [in the San … Continue reading

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