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Recent Posts
- Peak Lithium
- Trump eliminates birth control abroad
- In a world without people, how long would NYC last?
- Network States to replace democratic governments with billionaire Silicon Valley CEO dictators & Republicans
- Why the kerogen in oil shale will never fill up your tank
- ‘The oil we eat’. Following the food chain back to iraq
- Vanishing open spaces: population growth and sprawl in America
- Admiral Rickover 1957: Energy Resources & Our Future
- The Green New Deal is not a solution for the real problem: Overshoot
- A transition from fossil fuels to renewables could take a century – if it ever happens
- 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
Category Archives: What to do
Medicare for All?
Preface. This is a 3-page review of a 34-page overview Congressional Budget Office report requested by congress on establishing a single-payer health care system. IMHO, I don’t see how this can possibly happen. How can a dysfunctional congress deal with … Continue reading
So you want to start a vertical farm?
Preface. Vertical farms sound even more impossible than rooftop farms, which at least can use free sunshine. And they use massive amounts of energy to heat, cool, ventilate, light, and so on, not a good direction to go given energy … Continue reading
Why we must get rid of pesticides
Preface. France is one of the few nations trying to use fewer pesticides. This is the direction we must go to prepare for the end of the fossil age, since pesticides are made out of finite petroleum. Also, we are running … Continue reading
Posted in Farming & Ranching, Pesticides
Tagged agriculture, pesticides
Comments Off on Why we must get rid of pesticides
We evolved to exercise and need high levels of physical activity to be healthy
Preface. This is a summary of Herman Pontzer’s 2019 “Humans evolved to exercise. Unlike our ape cousins, humans require high levels of physical activity to be healthy” in Scientific American. As fossils decline, it’s almost guaranteed you’ll use more muscle … Continue reading
Rare Earth: Why complex life is uncommon in the universe
Preface. So much research on why complex life is rare in the universe has come out since this book I’ve created another post: Rare Earth updates: recent research on why intelligent life is probably rare in the Universe. And intelligent … Continue reading
Book review of Mikhail’s “The beekeeper: rescuing the stolen women of Iraq”
Preface. This is a gruesome post you may want to skip. My main interest in this book was what will happen to the hundreds of millions forced to flee in the future because of the crash of civilization as oil … Continue reading
Posted in Collapse of Civilizations, Mass migrations, Middle East, Refugee Camps, Social Disorder, Terrorism
Tagged collapse, Iraq, refugees
8 Comments
Book review: the stranger in the woods. The extraordinary story of the last true hermit
Preface. On March 16, 2020 it was announced that the residents of most San Francisco Bay Area counties were expected to shelter in place for a few weeks to stop the Covid-19 pandemic. Three weeks? You can do it, Christopher … Continue reading
Replacing diesel tractors with horses or oxen – what will that be like?
Preface. Since fossil fuels are finite, at some point increasing numbers of farmers with diesel vehicles and equipment will want to replace them with horses, which can do the work of six people. Below is what energy expert Vaclav Smil … Continue reading
Posted in Farming & Ranching, Life Before Oil, Muscle Power, Peak Food, Vaclav Smil
Tagged agriculture, horsepower, muscle power, oxen
1 Comment
Book review of Wrigley’s “Energy and the English Industrial revolution”
Preface. I’ve made a strong case in my book “When trucks stop running” and this energyskeptic website that we will eventually return to wood and a 14th century lifestyle after fossil fuels are depleted. So if you’re curious about what … Continue reading
Posted in Agriculture, Energy Books, Farming & Ranching, Life Before Oil, Limits To Growth
Tagged coal, industrial revolution, land, wood
5 Comments
From Horsepower to Horse Power. When Trucks stop, Horses start.
Preface. Before the industrial revolution there were only four sources of mechanical power of any economic significance. They were human labor, animal labor, water power (near flowing streams) and wind power. Work done by animals, especially on farms, was still … Continue reading