Future without oil looks bleak
Toolbox
By DAVID VAN VLECK - Published: November 19, 2006
I worry about my grandchildren's world as our population grows, oil disappears and our climate changes.
When I was born, 2 billion people lived on earth; now there are 6.5 billion. We will add another billion in 13 years. So, if I live to 90, I will see the world's population almost quadruple.
It took all of time until 1850 to reach the first billion people. The second billion arrived 80 years later in 1930, the third billion arrived 30 years later in 1960 and the fourth billion in 1974. It took 12 years to add the most recent billion.
These numbers are scary by themselves, but they are even scarier if we consider what allowed this rapid growth, and then ask two questions, can this growth continue? Do we want it to continue?
Population growth accelerated beginning in 1850. Why did this happen? The answer is simple: Oil was discovered in 1859 in Pennsylvania, and soon we began to use oil for almost everything. At present, we use oil for what we make, wear, grow and drive.
More oil production allowed us to grow more food, which allowed more of us to live longer and to have more children. These children grew up to use more oil than did their parents; they wanted more cars, airplanes, school buses, tanks, tractors, trucks, trains, houses, bridges, concrete, asphalt, fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, shoes, clothes and many other things, all of which use oil.
Biologists use the term "carrying capacity" to mean the maximum population that can be supported by an area at a given standard of living – forever. The carrying capacity of your flower garden will decrease if you don't fertilize and water it. Similarly, the carrying capacity of the Earth will decline drastically when food production ceases.
Or when we run out of any one of many natural resources, such as water, soil, lumber and steel, our ability to build homes, highways, schools, hospitals or jobs will slow down and stop. We are using more oil annually just when our production is going down.
The bottom line is that when oil becomes scarce, our quality of life will decrease markedly. Many people think that oil will be around for a long time. They are right and wrong. The world will not run out for 80 to 120 years, depending on many factors. However, long before they export their last drop, the OPEC nations will realize that their affluence will decline when their last drop disappears; at that moment they will stop exporting in order to hoard oil to preserve their own standards of living. That could occur in 40 or 50 years. The United States, with 5 percent of the world's population, uses 35 percent of the resources, so the first signs of severe oil shortages will occur then. What will be the reaction of China, Japan, the United States and other oil-importing nations at that time? Will we invade Saudi Arabia to get their oil? Time will tell.
Again, the bottom line is that as oil production decreases, most aspects of the world's societies that depend on oil will decrease and finally disappear. Airlines will disappear because planes run on oil. However, travel by train and ship and generation of electricity can use coal and nuclear energy. Power from hydro, wind and solar will increase. Life in Vermont will change. Farming will depend increasingly on horses instead of tractors. Modern homes will be small and built near town centers and railroad stations. Yellow school buses will disappear, as union schools give way to local schools to which students can walk or bike.
Another problem that humans have ignored is global warming. As we burn increasing amounts of petrochemicals, we produce increasing amounts of carbon dioxide, a primary gas that causes global warming. Even though this warming seems to be slow, it is already causing changes in climate. Polar bears are starving and dying. As ice melts, rising ocean levels will displace millions, maybe billions, of people from their coastal homes. Enlarged deserts, destroyed estuaries and crazy weather changes will decrease the global carrying capacity, the ability to support growing populations. Global warming and oil depletion will combine to decrease the ability of our earth to support our present population, let alone future increased populations.
As oil production decreases to zero, world food production will decline, worldwide starvation will occur and world population will decrease markedly. Peak oil production occurred in the United States in 1970 and is occurring globally now. Peak oil means that half our oil is gone and that we are using more than we are discovering. Decreasing food, population and living standards will lag behind decreasing oil, but they will follow just as surely as night follows day.
The big question is: Should Vermonters and our politicians begin to discuss how we can prepare for this approaching world? Shouldn't our schools, colleges and leaders begin to plan for this future scenario, because today's teenagers are going to live there? Don't we owe something to future generations, even though they never did anything for us?
David Van Vleck lives in Middlebury.
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