The long emergency

I recently read The Long Emergency by James Howard Kunstler. The basic premise of the book is that Kunstler believes that "peak oil" - meaning the time when we have removed half of the available oil from the Earth - has already happened or is due to happen in the next few years, and the result is that we will no longer be able to continue our current lifestyle.

Kunstler is pretty dramatic in his descriptions, so much so that a lot of people would probably dismiss him as another y2k doomsday preacher. When he leaves the discussion of oil and starts talking about things like bird flu or global warming, it only furthers the impression that he is intent on the idea that we are all doomed.

However, contained in this book are some very interesting and important points. While the book as a whole may not be the best reading, I think that the ideas in this book are important enough that everyone should be made aware of them.

In particular, the following ideas really stood out to me:

• In the past 150 years, our world has changed so fast. People are able to fly across the world whereas 150 years ago they had to ride a horse to get anywhere far. But people have grown to believe that this sort of technology will always exist, that we will never have to go back to the way things were.
  
• Alternative energy sources such as solar power are effective in limited amounts. However, their main draw back is that they require significant energy to make energy. Kunstler does not consider hydrogen-fuel cells a valid alternative energy source because hydrogen molecules do not exist on their own on Earth - instead a different energy source must be used to seperate the hydrogen. For wind turbines or solar panels, energy must be used to create these structures and maintain these structures. For things like bio-diesel, currently much of our nation's fertilizer is created by oil-based procedures.
  
• America is heavily invested in the ideal of suburbia. Unfortunately, suburbia requires large amounts of energy to operate. Without constant energy sources, suburbia cannot exist.
  
• Along with suburbia, America is heavily invested in the ideal of WalMart-like stores. These stores can only exist when there are large amounts of cheap-energy available such that they can transport their goods around. Without cheap-energy, these stores collapse, but unfortunately, as these stores take over America, they are also putting out of business many of the small businesses that could help our country get through an energy crisis.
  
• It is possible that we will figure out a way to power our world post-oil, but there still might be an awkward low-energy transition period while we figure out how to do this.
  
• As a result of oil being so valuable, America and other nations did many questionable things in areas of high oil reserves. These actions continue to have side effects to this day, and as "peak oil" occurs, the political relationships between nations will be stressed.
  

For me, I tend to fall under the group of people that hold on to the hope that technology will find a solution to our energy crisis - a group that Kunstler seriously despises. However, the book is opening my eyes to the idea that at some day in the future I may have to live much closer to the way people lived 100 years ago until we enter a new technological era.

There's so much more to discuss in this book, such as the history of oil and war, or how the climate changing may effect our energy sources, or how different areas of our country will survive an energy crisis. The book itself may not be a masterpiece, by the ideas presented in this book are important enough to think about, discuss, and act on.