Fossil fuels running out, so why keep fighting about climate change?

Updated 9/28/09

Since fossil fuels are, in fact, running out, it seems senseless to keep arguing about climate change. The point is, whether or not you care to believe the evidence under our noses, what we need to be concentrating on is finding new, clean, renewable, eco-friendly energy sources.

Not arguing endlessly about conspiracies and taxes.

Notice I didn't say 'Why worry about climate change?' I said 'Why fight about it?' because, by becoming bogged down in debate and dissent, we are getting nowhere fast, becoming polarized and losing a valuable window of opportunity to perfect truly eco-and-wildlife-friendly forms of energy.

I was amazed by the vehement defense made by some people for blowing up the Appalachians when I posted my article on Mountain-top removal coal mining.

The only possible reason I can come up with to make otherwise rational and intelligent people bury their heads in the sand and refuse to acknowledge that we need to re-think our way of life, is fear; fear of change; fear of inconvenience; fear of having to take responsibility; fear of having less money. Mostly, though, fear of facing the truth.

Whether or not you believe that climate change is happening or that it is caused by man (and our use of fossil fuels) the undeniable truth is that fossil fuels are running out.

Period.

Easily accessible oil, coal, and natural gas reserves are exhausted. What is left will be ever harder to reach, more environmentally damaging to extract, less efficient and more expensive.

Read this report for the sobering truth.

Think about it. Why else would coal companies be resorting to defacing and utterly destroying some of the most scenic, majestic places on Earth, the gorgeous Appalachian Mountains?

Why would they resort to literally blowing the tops off these peaks, forever sacrificing them and all the forests, wildlife, communities, watersheds and streams they encompass?

Why are they trying to extract oil from the tar sands of Canada’s beaches? Why pump steam into underground chambers trying to break shale and release the gas within? Why infiltrate the last unspoiled sacred Arctic wildernesses and attempt to drill into oil fields below miles of rock below miles of ocean?

None of these methods are sustainable; in fact they are ‘last ditch’ and very expensive. And will help for only a short time.

Fossil fuels are running out.

Yet pursue them we do, no matter what the cost.

Sadly these extraordinary measures aren’t really being done solely for the good of your family, your comfort, your lifestyle. They are being done so that the coal companies can stay in the coal business and the oil companies in the oil business, no matter what the cost to the environment, poor communities, the beautiful tourist areas and our most endangered species.

But even all these drastic and irreversibly destructive practices will only buy us a few years.

This is like using your entire house for firewood just to get one week’s worth of heat.

What happens next week?

We need to really think, not just frantically react.

One challenge has been finding finding alternative energies that don’t do more harm than good. Wind power is rapidly losing proponents because it is very damaging to wildlife and the environment (in its current incarnation) and even impacting human health. People are fighting ugly solar arrays, and nuclear power got a bad rap long ago.

Then what is the answer?

The first answer may be to rethink how we LIVE. Industrialized nations are addicted to the power-hungry lifestyle we’ve built, (yet humans did manage to be happy before electricity or gasoline.) Everything, including the computer you’re reading this on, is hogging electricity. Unless you walk or ride a bike, you’re hogging gas. Home heating and cooling, business, sports, everything, it seems, now requires an underpinning of fossil fuels. And, really, most people just don’t feel like cutting back, unless they have, to save money. If they can afford it, the lights stay on, and the AC, the heat, the TV, and the computer, and the SUV stays full of gas, and they take that weekend trip to Florida or take their motor boat out for a day on the lake.

We are ALL part of the problem. We have all been funneled into a dependency on coal and oil by business, society and industry.

More and more people, more and more toys, more and more demand.

At some point, something’s got to give.

People don’t want to even consider giving up anything they have. That’s understandable, but it will soon be beyond our control. Once the coal and oil is gone, it’s gone.

We’d better have something else in place before then.

With our population skyrocketing, that may be sooner than we think.

Do you see the real dilemma here?

Our population is increasing far beyond the planets’ ability to provide for us. In the natural world, plagues, famine, predation, disease, natural disasters etc., would knock down any species which would reproduce beyond the planet’s ability to support it. Predators never outnumber prey; predators starve if the prey is decimated. There is, therefore, always balance in nature.

Humans, clever beings that we are, have found ways around this natural order, even to the extent of keeping individuals alive when there is no longer any consciousness, nor quality of life. We help the infertile have babies, keep newborns alive that can never be functional, and we cure diseases and extend the lives of the elderly by, sometimes, decades.

Understand that I am very much for living. I don’t believe in playing God, and resist the idea of euthanasia, even for an old dog, unless it is in unbearable pain. To me, where there is life, there is hope, and possibilities.

But we might want to consider that continuing to reproduce so prodigiously may have a downside. And continuing to reproduce so prodigiously while guaranteeing everyone a comfy single-family home, plentiful food, an SUV, flat-screen TV and an iPod may be just plain impossible.

We are literally eating our planet out from under us in terms of energy needs. Unless we can devise a fresh, Earth-friendly, renewable energy supply, we’re all in for some very tough times ahead.

So I propose a challenge to everyone.

So far, all our ‘alternative energies’ like wind farms and solar farms, are being built in wild, environmentally sensitive, scenic or ‘open’ spaces, at tremendous expense to wildlife and landscapes. That contradicts the definition of ‘eco-friendly’.

Let’s start to THINK. This audience is bright and passionate. Let’s think outside the box, put our partisan differences aside and open our imaginations. We don’t have to be scientists; someone here may have the answer, or maybe we can come up with one together.

Here’s a starting point: There are countless vacant city lots, abandoned industrial parks, miles of city roof tops, roads, airport runways -- why can’t THESE areas, already paved over, already devoid of wildlife, already essentially man-made no-life zones – be used for energy production? They are already close to where people need the energy, so the millions of dollars needed to run infrastructure and transmission lines from the energy source to the users won’t have to be built. Since they’re already leveled and paved or graveled, they won’t be harming sensitive habitats through additional clearing or dredging.

Why not?

Let’s use every inch of what we already have. Keep our power close to our cities. Stay out of what’s left of nature and leave it alone. Can we produce our energy without the ‘energy sprawl’ that’s threatening our remaining wild places?

The world needs beauty. Even if nature isn’t important to you, it is important to others. We all have a right to have nature, to preserve beauty, wildlife, peace. And in doing so, we preserve a world of possibilities for everyone. Think about it; without nature, without a healthy, vital, living planet, all our possibilities will be gone.

It doesn’t have to be a choice between ‘nature’ or ‘us’. It must be nature AND us.

I challenge my readers to come up with truly sustainable energy solutions that can be centered in already-paved urban or industrial areas, that will have the least negative impact on the environment, pose the least threat to wildlife and be cost-efficient.

OK, that's my jumping off point; now what are YOUR ideas?

Let’s brain-storm!

Copyright Cathy Taibbi 2009

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