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Drill baby drill all you want we have reached peak oil
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Our political leaders are all working under a delusion that we have loads of time to begin developing alternative sources of energy. While some believe Peak Oil Theory is a mistaken theory others believe we have already reached peak oil. We live on a finite planet with finite resources so whether you choose to believe in this theory or not oil depletion at some point is inevitable.
The term peak oil is used to describe the point at which the earth's supply of oil will no longer be able to meet demand. The problem for America initially, is not running out of oil. It is that we won't have enough oil to keep our economy going.
In the U. K. Guardian newspaper on Nov. 9, 2009, two members of the International Energy Agency came forward as whistleblowers to claim that we have entered the peak oil stage. Another official from IEA told the paper that he believes the situation is really bad. The world is apparently much closer to running out of oil than many officials will admit.
It is alledged that the United States played a very influential role in encouraging the watch dog agency to underplay the rate of oil decline to keep the markets from becoming panicky. The problem is that the IEA reports accuracy are now completely suspect. A number of nations including the British, use this agencies reports to plan and guide energy and climate change policies. Instead of having time to respond time may have just about run out.
Some experts have predicted in the past that we would go into the peak oil phase in 2030 or 2020 at the earliest. The allegations that these estimates may be fudged may mean that we are unable to respond adequately with real alternatives and would cause the whole world to go into a huge energy crunch in just a decade. However, others say we are already in the peak oil phase now instead of 2020. There is severe economic hardship coming on a global scale.
In any event there are repeated warnings that the end of cheap oil is upon us and that prices may rise by astronomical amounts on the order of 550% because of the increasing demand and the decreasing supply. This also poses a severe national security problem for America. For all the talk we have done very little to develop energy independance from oil and import huge amounts.
It is not just as simple as if gas prices go way up I just won't drive as much. Many things like agricultural fertilizers to plastic are made from petroleum. There is almost no aspect of our economy that would not be severly impacted by the rising price of oil. This would cause prices across the board to go way up in price pushing many more businesses and people into bankruptcy.
John Hess the chairman of the independant producer Hess states that a," Devastating oil crisis looms unless action is taken." His solution is more drilling however. But drilling for what? We are now into the place where drilling itself is going to become much much more expensive thus making even American petroleum much more costly putting pressure on economic stability even more.
Going back to my article last night on outsourcing green technology jobs with 22,000 lost since just Jan. 1, 2009, coupled with the failure to begin creating jobs and now the prospect that our oil based economy will be stressed by demand, it is way past time to rethink the direction of our whole economic policy. Global Capitalism is an abject failure and is now a major impediment to solving this huge energy crisis.
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