Top 10 Energy Stories Of 2008
Posted by Sonja Ebron
From where I sit, it’s very difficult to distinguish energy from foreign policy, especially when your country uses more energy than any other country. So here, in no particular order, are my picks for the most significant energy-related stories this year:
- Iran’s proposal for an OPEC-like consortium of the major natural gas producers
- Russia’s threat to the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline during its short war with Georgia
- The 10-week scramble for gasoline in the southeast following Hurricanes Gustav and Ike
- The massive increase in disconnections of utility services in deregulated areas
- The $100 swing in oil prices, with gasoline dropping from $4.00 to $1.50 in six months
- The promise of Barack Obama’s Green Team and some new thinking on energy
- Mass awareness — but no real debate — of T. Boone Pickens’ plan to sell lots of natural gas
- Iraqi journalist throws shoes at outgoing U.S. president Bush
- U.S. failure to find African host country for AfriCom
- Expulsion of U.S. diplomats from energy-rich Venezuela and Bolivia
There’s only one thing left to say –> Happy New Year!
Obama Discovers A New Form Of Energy
Posted by Sonja Ebron
Barack Obama will be the first post-peak oil president of the most oil-hungry country on the planet. The Financial Times, London’s best daily, just previewed an International Energy Agency report that estimates global oil production is now falling 9 percent per year. To be clear, excess oil is the ‘capital’ in capitalism, and it no longer exists. We will see capitalist economies (are there any others?) shrink by at least the rate of oil decline, so we are in for a societal transformation much different than the turn of an economic cycle. Economic activity based on carbon (is there any other?) needs to shrink even faster than oil decline. A recent World Wildlife Fund report suggests our globe is warming five times faster than predicted, and the pace is accelerating. Change is necessary to address the twin crises of peak oil and climate change.
A Change Is Gonna Come
Posted by Sonja Ebron
Thank you, Madelyn Dunham. This Sam Cooke classic is for you:
