Expert: Energy crisis here, climate change on the horizon
By Ben Aaronson/Staff Writer
Thu Feb 21, 2008, 08:57 AM EST
Lincoln -
For many, the prospect of global warming — an issue rooted in science — has become a matter of belief. Scientists and environmental activists continue to warn that climate change could have catastrophic repercussions for life on Earth, but most political leaders and the populace at large have remained skeptical of the magnitude and urgency of the problem.
While several key government agencies and industry sources have rejected the notion that a global energy crisis is imminent, others in the field believe the crisis is already upon us.
“I think the crisis is really happening now. It’s less visible to us in North America because we’re not seeing the same fallout that is happening in other countries,” said Richard Lawrence, director and co-founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas-USA (ASPO-USA), a nonprofit and non-partisan research and public education initiative.
Lawrence, who lives in Hudson, gave a talk at the Lincoln Public Library on Jan. 30, entitled, “Converging Storms: Peak Oil and Climate Change.” His message: An energy crisis is much closer than people think as energy in all forms is becoming less available and therefore, more expensive.
The basic problem, Lawrence said, is that there is a fundamental mismatch between supply and demand. World population growth is rising exponentially, while available oil and other fossil fuel resources are rising at best linearly, if not declining, he said.
All living creatures on Earth grow within a carrying capacity – natural limits on population growth in balance with their ecosystem. But the availability of cheap energy has enabled human beings to artificially increase their carrying capacity to a level that could not be supported naturally, Lawrence said.
The current world population is estimated at more than 6.5 billion and counting. But without abundant and cheap energy, the capacity for human beings would probably be somewhere between 500 million and 2 billion, Lawrence said.
“Unless we can find equivalent substitutes for current fossil fuels, we’re in for some very tough times, and potentially, you might say, a pruning of the Earth’s population,” he said.
According to Lawrence, petroleum constitutes 40 percent of the global energy supply, but supplies of the fossil fuel are dwindling. Lawrence predicted world oil supply would reach a peak in the next three to four years, if it hasn’t already.
Lawrence said world governments will face both short- and long-term consequences of the diminishing oil supply, including supply shortages, price shocks, spikes in the cost of personal travel and home heating, and disruptions of food delivery and health services.
In addition, as growing nations compete for scarce resources, poorer countries will be priced out of the market and tensions between world powers will heighten. Already more than 30 countries are being priced out of the oil market and are experiencing blackouts and energy rationing, Lawrence said.
But with so much at stake, why aren’t more people talking about the energy problem?
Lawrence said peak oil and climate change have become controversial topics because many people either don’t want to listen or “naively expect technology to bail us out.” Lawrence said the current population has grown up in the age of oil and has taken for granted that energy will always be available. When we want to go somewhere, we get in our cars; when we want light, we flick a switch; and when we want water, we simply turn the faucet.
“We cannot conceive very easily of the world being different than that,” he said. “We’ve grown up in a universe of our own construction. We’ve never faced geological constraints to the availability of cheap energy.”
Lawrence said the assumption that quality of life gets better with each successive generation is also deeply engrained in the American psyche.
“That’s something that’s almost inherent in American culture,” he said.
Lawrence said government agencies and industry sources are perpetuating false hopes about the future of fossil fuels. The Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs (EOEA) has been consistently wrong and falsely positive with oil forecasts, Lawrence said. The problem, he said, is that they don’t ask the hard questions and take information at face value.
Lawrence said the government should be skeptical of reserve statements from OPEC nations who stand to gain financially by artificially inflating supply.
“The OPEC nations keep releasing statements of increased reserves with no announcements of new discovery. I think it’s a mirage,” he said.
According to Lawrence, energy consulting groups like Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA) are also contributing to the flow of misinformation with overly optimistic pronouncements. In fact, Lawrence and his colleagues at ASPO-USA are so dubious of CERA’s forecasts; they have decided to put their money where their mouths are, issuing a $100,000 wager challenging CERA’s prediction.
“It isn’t about the money. It’s about doing something that will bring attention and get people asking good questions,” Lawrence said.
Transitioning to a less oil-dependent society will require action across government, industry and individual consumers, Lawrence said.
Rep. Tom Conroy, D-Wayland, said the United States and Massachusetts have to lead by example in order to effect change.
“We can experiment. All that we need is some entrepreneurs and some capital to get that going. We can all get on board with this,” said Conroy, who introduced Lawrence at his talk in Lincoln.
Conroy said the Legislature is on the verge of passing a bill that sets renewable energy goals for 2020, demonstrating a long-term commitment to reducing dependency on oil.
But Lawrence said the only way to bring down the price of energy is to consciously and deliberately reduce consumption.
“We have the potential to reduce our consumption by a factor of two without a huge effort,” he said.
Lawrence said change could be painful as simple economics may force consumers to change their behavior. While the price of housing has caused people to move further away from where they work, fuel costs could force them to start moving back or find an alternate mode of transportation.
The price of food could be another major driver. With the increasing industrialization of agriculture and the decline of local farming, the source of our food is getting further and further away, he said.
“Where we get our food from needs to get closer to our plates. We need to bring farming back to New England,” Lawrence said. “When you’re belly’s empty, feeding yourself becomes your highest priority … People can choose to drive a car [or not]. They can’t choose not to eat.”
Lawrence said lawmakers are finally starting to recognize the need to reduce consumption. Connecticut was the first state to hold a peak oil caucus in October. Massachusetts is also planning to hold a Legislative caucus and other states won’t be far behind, he said.
Lawrence said he plans to offer his talk on peak oil and climate change to other towns across the state. For more information, visit www.aspo-usa.org.
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