Surviving Capitalism (Not) : Preparing for Life in a Peak Oil World

We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Preparing for Life in a Peak Oil World

by Gail Tverberg from Oil Price. (Gail Tverberg is a writer and speaker about energy issues. She is especially known for her work with financial issues associated with peak oil. Prior to getting involved with energy issues, Ms. Tverberg worked as an actuarial consultant. This work involved performing insurance-related analyses and forecasts.)

On her website I found a further explanation regarding this article:

[1/17/2011] For a few days, I am working on an academic article. Since I don’t have time to do research and write something new, I thought I would post an article I wrote in 2007 on how to prepare for the impacts of peak oil, together with a few updates for 2011. This article was previously posted on The Oil Drum and was a chapter in what I called a Peak Oil booklet (found here).

I have followed her articles for a number of years on the Oil Drum website, and have always had a lot of respect for her judgment regarding energy issues. In this article she offers some sound tips on creating a lifestyle to help people cope with coming age of energy scarcity.

As I was reading the article, I was about to fault her for not mentioning any type of political activism, when she offered this disclaimer:

It would also be helpful to make changes at higher levels of government, but these are beyond the scope of the discussion in this chapter.