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Global oil peak has the potential to shake if not destroy the
foundations of global industrial economy and culture. Climate change
has the potential to rearrange the biosphere more radically than the
last ice age. Each limits the effective options for responses to the
other.

The strategies for mitigating the adverse effects and/or
adapting to the consequences of Climate Change have mostly been
considered and discussed in isolation from those relevant to Peak
Oil. While awareness of Peak Oil, or at least energy crisis, is
increasing, understanding of how these two problems might interact to
generate quite different futures, is still at an early state.

It does not happen often that I agree with the American Enterprise Institute but Steven Hayward’s analysis of the “real cost of tackling climate change” in the Wall Street Journal of 28 April is spot on: an 80% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 will have dramatic implications for our way of life.

Hayward has at least the courage (which cannot be said for our politicians) to tell the public what this 80% cut will mean for citizens’ daily lives. In not one political document have I ever seen a serious impact assessment of the 80% target. The fear of being the bearer of bad news is one which characterises all policymakers (even the ones who know that the climate crisis will hit hard).

The three primary, longer-term objectives for the nation's energy policy should be:






1. reduce greenhouse gas emissions to a level consistent with a world-wide goal of global climate stabilization (assumes curbing U.S. CO2 emissions by 60-80% from current levels by mid-century);


2. eliminate U.S. energy imports (i.e., oil and natural gas - now 58% and 15% respectively), while reducing overall use of oil and natural gas;


3. phase out the current generation of nuclear power while substantially curbing the production and consumption of fossil fuels, by increasing the use of energy efficiency and making a transition to sustainable, environmentally safer renewable energy sources.