Download or read book The World After Cheap Oil written by Rauli Partanen and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-10-24 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Substantial evidence suggests that we are currently living at the peak of oil production with few prospects for cheap oil ever returning. Yet the media, politicians and regular people have hardly started to talk about what this means. Oil literally runs our societies from transportation to food production to economic activity. Without oil, everything stops. There are powerful arguments that if we fail to increase oil production, we will also fail to grow our economy as a whole. For oil importing western nations the news is bleak; higher oil prices seem to put a glass ceiling on their economic growth, making current debt problems worse no matter what monetary and economic policies we might choose. The World After Cheap Oil offers a thorough package of information about oil; its uses and its role in our society’s important sectors. It presents the most prominent substitutes and alternatives, and their limits and promises. It also delves deep into the many risks, problems and mechanisms that can make the world after cheap oil a much more unstable place for nations and humanity as a whole. The book also explains why there has been so little public debate on the subject, and what the future might look like after oil production starts its final, terminal decline.
Download or read book Wld After Oil written by Bruce Nussbaum and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 1984-06-29 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From Simon & Schuster, The World After Oil is Bruce Nussbaum's exploration of the shifting axis of power wealth. As Bruce Nussbaum describes, in the race for the future, as the book makes clear, only those nations most capable of meeting the demands of the new age will realize its promise of wealth and power.
Download or read book Why Your World Is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller written by Jeff Rubin and published by Random House. This book was released on 2009-05-19 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An internationally renowned energy expert has written a book essential for every American–a galvanizing account of how the rising price and diminishing availability of oil are going to radically change our lives. Why Your World Is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller is a powerful and provocative book that explores what the new global economy will look like and what it will mean for all of us. In a compelling and accessible style, Jeff Rubin reveals that despite the recent recessionary dip, oil prices will skyrocket again once the economy recovers. The fact is, worldwide oil reserves are disappearing for good. Consequently, the amount of food and other goods we get from abroad will be curtailed; long-distance driving will become a luxury and international travel rare. Globalization as we know it will reverse. The near future will be a time that, in its physical limits, may resemble the distant past. But Why Your World Is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller is a hopeful work about how we can benefit–personally, politically, and economically–from this new reality. American industries such as steel and agriculture, for instance, will be revitalized. As well, Rubin prescribes priorities for President Obama and other leaders, from imposing carbon tariffs that will increase competition and productivity, to investing in mass transit instead of car-clogged highways, to forging “green” alliances between labor and management that will be good for both business and the air we breathe. Most passionately, Rubin recommends ways every citizen can secure this better life for himself, actions that will end our enslavement to chain-store taste and strengthen our communities and timeless human values.
Download or read book Hubbert s Peak written by Kenneth S. Deffeyes and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2008-09-29 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 2001, Kenneth Deffeyes made a grim prediction: world oil production would reach a peak within the next decade--and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it. Deffeyes's claim echoed the work of geophysicist M. King Hubbert, who in 1956 predicted that U.S. oil production would reach its highest level in the early 1970s. Though roundly criticized by oil experts and economists, Hubbert's prediction came true in 1970. In this updated edition of Hubbert's Peak, Deffeyes explains the crisis that few now deny we are headed toward. Using geology and economics, he shows how everything from the rising price of groceries to the subprime mortgage crisis has been exacerbated by the shrinking supply--and growing price--of oil. Although there is no easy solution to these problems, Deffeyes argues that the first step is understanding the trouble that we are in.
Download or read book The Party s Over written by Richard Heinberg and published by New Society Publishers. This book was released on 2005-08-01 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The world is about to run out of cheap oil and change dramatically. Within the next few years, global production will peak. Thereafter, even if industrial societies begin to switch to alternative energy sources, they will have less net energy each year to do all the work essential to the survival of complex societies. We are entering a new era, as different from the industrial era as the latter was from medieval times. In The Party's Over , Richard Heinberg places this momentous transition in historical context, showing how industrialism arose from the harnessing of fossil fuels, how competition to control access to oil shaped the geopolitics of the 20th century, and how contention for dwindling energy resources in the 21st century will lead to resource wars in the Middle East, Central Asia, and South America. He describes the likely impacts of oil depletion, and all of the energy alternatives. Predicting chaos unless the U.S. -- the world's foremost oil consumer -- is willing to join with other countries to implement a global program of resource conservation and sharing, he also recommends a "managed collapse" that might make way for a slower-paced, low-energy, sustainable society in the future. More readable than other accounts of this issue, with fuller discussion of the context, social implications, and recommendations for personal, community, national, and global action, Heinberg's updated book is a riveting wake-up call for humankind as the oil era winds down, and a critical tool for understanding and influencing current U.S. foreign policy. Listen to an interview with Richard Heinberg from WRPI.
Download or read book The Coming Oil Crisis written by Colin John Campbell and published by Multi-Science Publishing Company. This book was released on 1997 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book is about the world's endowment of oil. It is a very important subject, considering that cheap oil-based energy has been the lifeblood of the world's economy over the best part of this century." -- P. 5.
Download or read book The End of Oil written by Paul Roberts and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2005-04-05 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A stunning piece of work—perhaps the best single book ever produced about our energy economy and its environmental implications” (Bill McHibbon, The New York Review of Books). Petroleum is so deeply entrenched in our economy, politics, and daily lives that even modest efforts to phase it out are fought tooth and nail. Companies and governments depend on oil revenues. Developing nations see oil as their only means to industrial success. And the Western middle class refuses to modify its energy-dependent lifestyle. But even by conservative estimates, we will have burned through most of the world’s accessible oil within mere decades. What will we use in its place to maintain a global economy and political system that are entirely reliant on cheap, readily available energy? In The End of Oil, journalist Paul Roberts talks to both oil optimists and pessimists around the world. He delves deep into the economics and politics, considers the promises and pitfalls of oil alternatives, and shows that—even though the world energy system has begun its epochal transition—we need to take a more proactive stance to avoid catastrophic disruption and dislocation.
Download or read book The Oil Age Is Over written by Matthew David Savinar and published by . This book was released on 2004-01-01 with total page 126 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Oil Power and War written by Matthieu Auzanneau and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2020-02-20 with total page 674 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The story of oil is one of hubris, fortune, betrayal, and destruction. It is the story of a resource that has been undeniably central to the creation of our modern culture, and ever-present during the darkest exploits of empire the world over. For the past 150 years, oil has become the most essential ingredient for economic, military, and political power. And it has brought us to our present moment in which political leaders and the fossil-fuel industry consider extraordinary, and extraordinarily dangerous, policy on a world stage marked by shifting power bases. Upending the conventional wisdom by crafting a “people’s history,” award-winning journalist Matthieu Auzanneau deftly traces how oil became a national and then global addiction, outlines the enormous consequences of that addiction, sheds new light on major historical and contemporary figures, and raises new questions about stories we thought we knew well: What really sparked the oil crises in the 1970s, the shift away from the gold standard at Bretton Woods, or even the financial crash of 2008? How has oil shaped the events that have defined our times: two world wars, the Cold War, the Great Depression, ongoing wars in the Middle East, the advent of neoliberalism, and the Great Recession, among them? With brutal clarity, Oil, Power, and War exposes the heavy hand oil has had in all of our lives—and illustrates how much heavier that hand could get during the increasingly desperate race to control the last of the world’s easily and cheaply extractable reserves.
Download or read book The Powers That Be written by Scott L. Montgomery and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-07-15 with total page 366 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Thirty years ago, our global energy landscape did not look remarkably different from what it does today. Three or four decades from now, it certainly will: dwindling oil reserves will clash with skyrocketing demand, as developing nations around the world lead their citizens into the modern energy economy, and all the while, the grave threat of catastrophic climate change looms ever larger. Energy worries are at an all-time high—just how will we power our future? With The Powers That Be, Scott L. Montgomery cuts through the hype, alarmism, and confusion to give us a straightforward, informed account of where we are now, and a map of where we’re going. Starting with the inescapable fact of our current dependence on fossil fuels—which supply 80% of all our energy needs today—Montgomery clearly and carefully lays out the many alternative energy options available, ranging from the familiar, like water and solar, to such nascent but promising sources as hydrogen and geothermal power. What is crucial, Montgomery explains, is understanding that our future will depend not on some single, wondrous breakthrough; instead, we should focus on developing a more diverse, adaptable energy future, one that draws on a variety of sources—and is thus less vulnerable to disruption or failure. An admirably evenhanded and always realistic guide, Montgomery enables readers to understand the implications of energy funding, research, and politics at a global scale. At the same time, he doesn’t neglect the ultimate connection between those decisions and the average citizen flipping a light switch or sliding behind the wheel of a car, making The Powers That Be indispensible for our ever-more energy conscious age.
Download or read book The First Half of the Age of Oil written by Charles A. S. Hall and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-05 with total page 136 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: According to the conventional wisdom, we live in a post-industrial information age. This book, however, paints a different picture: We live in the age of oil. Petroleum fuels and feedstocks are responsible for much of what we take for granted in modern society, from chemical products such as fertilizer and plastics, to the energy that moves people and goods in a global economy. Oil is a nearly perfect fuel: Energy dense, safe to store, easy to transport, and mostly environmentally benign. Most importantly, oil has been cheap and abundant during the past 150 years. In 1998, two respected geologists, Colin Campbell and Jean Laherrère, published a detailed article announcing that the “end of cheap oil” would happen before 2010, which meant that the world would face a peak, or at least a plateau, in global daily oil production in the first decade of the new millennium. Today, two billion people under the age of 14 have lived the majority of their lives past the point when this century-long growth in oil supplies came to an end, which also marks the end of the first half of the age of oil. This transition has ushered in a new reality of high oil prices, stagnating oil supplies, and sluggish economies. In this book, a leading authority on energy explores the contributions and continuing legacy of Colin Campbell and Jean Laherrère, the two geologists who modified the terms of the debate about oil. The book provides a unique perspective and state-of-the-art overview of today’s energy reality and its enormous economic and social implications. - Covers a topic that eclipses climate change as the most important but least understood challenge for contemporary society - Explores the works of Colin Campbell and Jean Laherrère, the leading authorities in the field of Peak Oil, authors of “The End of Cheap Oil” (Scientific American, 1998), and founding members of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas - Addresses a broad audience of scientists, engineers, and economists in a format that is accessible to the general public - Provides a complete overview of the basic geological, chemical, physical, economic and historical concepts that every oil consumer should understand - Presents the latest information on oil production, reserves, discoveries, prices, and fields in easy-to-understand graphs and plots
Download or read book Oil Money written by David M. Wight and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2021-07-15 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Oil Money, David M. Wight offers a new framework for understanding the course of Middle East–US relations during the 1970s and 1980s: the transformation of the US global empire by Middle East petrodollars. During these two decades, American, Arab, and Iranian elites reconstituted the primary role of the Middle East within the global system of US power from a supplier of cheap crude oil to a source of abundant petrodollars, the revenues earned from the export of oil. In the 1970s, the United States and allied monarchies, including the House of Pahlavi in Iran and the House of Saud in Saudi Arabia, utilized petrodollars to undertake myriad joint initiatives for mutual economic and geopolitical benefit. These petrodollar projects were often unprecedented in scope and included multibillion-dollar development projects, arms sales, purchases of US Treasury securities, and funds for the mujahedin in Afghanistan. Although petrodollar ties often augmented the power of the United States and its Middle East allies, Wight argues they also fostered economic disruptions and state-sponsored violence that drove many Americans, Arabs, and Iranians to resist Middle East–US interdependence, most dramatically during the Iranian Revolution of 1979. Deftly integrating diplomatic, transnational, economic, and cultural analysis, Wight utilizes extensive declassified records from the Nixon, Ford, Carter, and Reagan administrations, the IMF, the World Bank, Saddam Hussein's regime, and private collections to make plain the political economy of US power. Oil Money is an expansive yet judicious investigation of the wide-ranging and contradictory effects of petrodollars on Middle East–US relations and the geopolitics of globalization.
Download or read book Profit from the Peak written by Brian Hicks and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2008-06-02 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Profit from the Peak contains the information you need to successfully navigate the end of our oil-based economy. It takes a hard look at the future of oil and gas, examines how you can effectively invest in these resources, and profit from energy alternatives that are poised to power the years ahead. Along the way, this book also explores the potential, and possible limitations, of each major energy source, while carefully cover the investing angles of each one.
Download or read book The Oil Curse written by Michael L. Ross and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-09-08 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Countries that are rich in petroleum have less democracy, less economic stability, and more frequent civil wars than countries without oil. What explains this oil curse? And can it be fixed? In this groundbreaking analysis, Michael L. Ross looks at how developing nations are shaped by their mineral wealth--and how they can turn oil from a curse into a blessing. Ross traces the oil curse to the upheaval of the 1970s, when oil prices soared and governments across the developing world seized control of their countries' oil industries. Before nationalization, the oil-rich countries looked much like the rest of the world; today, they are 50 percent more likely to be ruled by autocrats--and twice as likely to descend into civil war--than countries without oil. The Oil Curse shows why oil wealth typically creates less economic growth than it should; why it produces jobs for men but not women; and why it creates more problems in poor states than in rich ones. It also warns that the global thirst for petroleum is causing companies to drill in increasingly poor nations, which could further spread the oil curse. This landmark book explains why good geology often leads to bad governance, and how this can be changed.
Download or read book The Prize written by Daniel Yergin and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-09-11 with total page 928 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Prize recounts the panoramic history of oil -- and the struggle for wealth power that has always surrounded oil. This struggle has shaken the world economy, dictated the outcome of wars, and transformed the destiny of men and nations. The Prize is as much a history of the twentieth century as of the oil industry itself. The canvas of this history is enormous -- from the drilling of the first well in Pennsylvania through two great world wars to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and Operation Desert Storm. The cast extends from wildcatters and rogues to oil tycoons, and from Winston Churchill and Ibn Saud to George Bush and Saddam Hussein. The definitive work on the subject of oil and a major contribution to understanding our century, The Prize is a book of extraordinary breadth, riveting excitement -- and great importance.
Download or read book Singapore the Energy Economy written by Weng Hoong Ng and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-24 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Singapore might not have survived the 1960s and prospered thereafter had it not built its economy on the foundations of oil refining, trading and support for oil and gas exploration and production. Cheap oil, sound policies and strong government combined to produce the Singapore economic miracle in its first 50 years of self-rule/independence. With the end of cheap oil, how will Singapore fare and what is the relevance of its model of development for other countries? Singapore’s successful launch coincided with a golden period of cheap energy, and a pro-globalization and free trade environment. These three elements are now under threat from rising energy prices and the global financial crisis which started in 2007 that will leave a lasting impact on the world's political and economic landscape. If the Singapore model is reaching or has reached its peak, what could take its place? This book poses questions for not just for Singapore planners, but also for anyone interested in modern economics and trade beyond the current era. The book also looks into the numerous subsectors within Singapore’s broad energy sector and examines the energy sector’s links with the other pillars of its economy: trade, financial, offshore/marine operations, manufacturing and transportation. It considers possible threats and challenges: Singapore’s rising energy intensity, its vulnerability to energy supply cut-offs, the likely impact of peak oil, terrorism and environmental / climate issues. It also looks at China’s growing investment and role in Singapore’s oil and gas industry. The book is a must-read for an excellent insight into Singapore’s energy economy, filled with data, information, interviews and analyses previously not available to the public.
Download or read book Confronting Collapse written by Michael C. Ruppert and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2009-12-15 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book that inspired the movie Collapse. The world is running short of energy-especially cheap, easy-to-find oil. Shortages, along with resulting price increases, threaten industrialized civilization, the global economy, and our entire way of life. In Confronting Collapse, author Michael C. Ruppert, a former LAPD narcotics officer turned investigative journalist, details the intricate connections between money and energy, including the ways in which oil shortages and price spikes triggered the economic crash that began in September 2008. Given the 96 percent correlation between economic growth and greenhouse gas emissions and the unlikelihood of economic growth without a spike in energy use, Ruppert argues that we are not, in fact, on the verge of economic recovery, but on the verge of complete collapse. Ruppert's truth is not merely inconvenient. It is utterly devastating. But there is still hope. Ruppert outlines a 25-point plan of action, including the creation of a second strategic petroleum reserve for the use of state and local governments, the immediate implementation of a national Feed-in Tariff mandating that electric utilities pay 3 percent above market rates for all surplus electricity generated from renewable sources, a thorough assessment of soil conditions nationwide, and an emergency action plan for soil restoration and sustainable agriculture.
