That’s interesting about your scale model. Got any photos?

The U.S. produces about 1/3 of its electricity from natural gas! So once natural gas peaks, if it hasn’t already, electricity will definitely be affected. By comparison, France produces about 80% of its electricity from nuclear power, so it should be much better off, electricity-wise.

I don’t think nuclear power offers much of a solution globally for the simple reason that uranium is a rare material. If we start building nuclear power plants willy-nilly, will we then have to start talking about peak uranium? Then, of course, there is the fact that we still haven’t figured out a safe way to store the radioactive waste essentially forever. Then there’s the fact that it takes a long time to get a nuclear power plant constructed, after which they have a relatively short operating life.

Large-scale solar, hydro and wind power probably cannot offset the loss of natural gas for producing electricity. Since the U.S. does have abundant coal reserves, my guess is that by process of elimination – less oil, less gas, less uranium, insufficient solar, hydro and wind – we’re going to have to use more coal to produce electricity in the future.

Of course, we can also reduce our consumption of electricity, and I think we will have to do that as well.

The ideal solution, albeit a somewhat expensive and long-term solution, is to make houses electricity self-sufficient to the extent possible, primarily by relying on solar energy. If we could improve the efficiency of small-scale solar electricity production and improve the energy storage mechanism, then equip house rooftops with these improved solar technologies, houses could be nearly self-sufficient and independent of a shaky electrical grid. Now, as my cynical little mind examines this idea from the perspective of the people running our system today, it appears most unappealing because it would cut government and corporations right out of the electricity-delivering loop! I’m convinced that if we were to invest a fraction of the funds we spend on fossil fuel exploration and development on improving solar electricity that we could greatly improve the efficiency and lower the cost, but it will not happen because there’s no profit incentive for the people in charge.

Dave

Dr Wirth gives warnning now, in his written report I beleive, that it is actually too late to produce any meanningfull alternitives to head off the comming crisis. I am in agreement although I admit I possess no qualifications to give any competent rational for my agreement. Since first becomming aware of the peak oil and gas situation, I’ve not yet to date, read any exceptible rebutal, in fact, I’ve read NO rebutal. All I hear from the right is we have trillions of untapped BBL”S of crude in the Gulf of Mexico, and elsewhere in the CONUS. Thats a feel good response that I personally feel has no meaningfull merit.

I think DR Wirth’s written report is as factually accurate as it gets. There we have a glimpse, into the near future.

Yep, it is sort of alarming when you lose some infrastructure that you’ve been taking for granted. Where I live, I get to experience outages of all kinds pretty frequently: water, electricity, telephone, but not gas, yet.

This is how it will start. A brief shortage here or there, gradually occurring with more frequency and lasting for longer durations. We will get accustomed to them and cope, as I have done. The other day we had an electricity outage for an hour in the morning – thank goodness it wasn’t a cold morning like today – while I was using my computer. There was really nothing to do but go back to bed since it was still dark. So that’s what I did, that’s how I coped.

Since the outage probably occurred as a result of a fierce wind storm that day, I figured it might be out for hours. So I decided that after it got light, if the power didn’t come on within a couple of hours I was going to get out my electric generator. Fortunately, the power came on again just after it got light – great timing.

Actually, although we have frequent service interruptions here, the people who work on these things get them fixed pretty swiftly – I’ll give them that.

Anyway, your experience underscores the need to have alternatives. For instance, my wood burning stove can also double as a cooktop. And I have a standalone electric hotplate that can be powered from my electric generator as well, although that’s not the most efficient way to cook. But it’s intended to be an emergency backup. I also have propane heaters in the house for emergency heat.

We definitely need to become more aware of our own survival needs in the future. We’ve enjoyed a highly reliable system up until now, but I think that’s going to change and we’re going to have to become more self-reliant.

There are other services and systems, the failures of which may catch people off guard. For instance, what if gas stations run out of gasoline? What if food stores can’t restock the shelves quickly enough and the shelves empty out? What if your internet connection goes out for days on end?

I fear all of these things are likely to occur.

Dave

I was cooking, on the stove. suddenly, the cooking stopped. I noted there was no fire. I messed with the knob, but nothing. I then turned it to activate the ignition. nothing. I then noted the absense of the sound of the gas. Once I established there was no gas to the stove, I then proceded to the thermostat, and activated the furnace. I went to where it is, and waited for the purge motor to cycle, and for the electric ignition to ignite. upon hearing this cycle, I noted no ignition of gas, meanning, no gas. I then went immediatly outside to determine if there was any gas smell, or noise of escaping gas. There was none.
I went back inside and turned the stove knob again, nothing. The gas line presure was zero!

Thoughts of peak natural gas memories, went through my head.
All my border neighbors were gone so i could not determine if they too were effected.

Because I knew I was in perfect standing with my gas provider, I surmised the problem was not related to me. I wondered if this was isolated to just me, or if the whole area was effected. Again, thougts of peak natural gas ran through my head. I was on the verge of a panic. I haden’t expected the shortage so soon but there it possibly was. I suddenly could hear the sound of three fire trucks, in the distance from their sirens and horns. I thought, my god whats happened.

I called 911 and reported that my residense had a drop to zero in my gas line presure, but that I had determined “I” had no leackage. The 911 operator seemed in a highly excited state. I could hear a lot of excitment in the background. My intent in calling actually, was to see if i could extract any information. I could not, and did not get any information. I finally called the service dept of the gas provider. Talked to a live person, explained that I had a drop to zero in my gas line presure. These are always treated as open line situations until proven otherwise.

After this call, I then went back and messed with the stove knob and guess what!? I had gas presure again. I kicked on the furnace and cranked it up. Everything related to gas, seemed normal, again. Less that 5 minites had elapsed from when this began,

t took an hr and a half until a truck arrived. It was a long hour and a half. I explained to the guy what had occured which was, that I had experienced a total loss of gas line presure for approx 5 minutes, but the presure had restored to normal.
The guy raised an eyebrow as I explained what had occured.

He walked around with a gas sniffer device, but no gas leak was detected anywhere on my spot. He then went to the meter, and observed it appeared to be functioning normally. He loosened the fittings to the meter, and noted nothing unusual.

This was the original meter installed back in 1981, and he said what ever had caused the drop to zero, was probably related to the meter. So he said if this event reoccures, They will put a new meter in.

Subsequently, this event gave me a preliminary experience to what it will be like when the effects of peak natural gas start occuring.
It will probably be during an extreemly cold snap, when demand is high. My plan was to evacuate to family, but in a regional loss of gas, this will effect everyone and there will be no where to go to escape.

All of this was on my mind, yesterday.

I have seen the beast. (shaking my head) Its frightning.

I looked at your site and it appears you’ve been giving voting a great deal of thought. But is the Canadian system pertinent to the U.S. system? It seems quite different.

In any case, the biggest problem with elections in the U.S. is not the voting process, even though it’s becoming notoriously corrupt, like that in a so-called banana republic. The biggest problem is that campaigns are financed by private contributors – it is legalized bribery, plain and simple. The U.S. Supreme Court equates campaign contributions with free speech, and to some extent I agree. But the damage caused by this legalized bribery is so egregious, we must make an exception in this case. Oh, and which “contributors” have the most money to spend on political campaigns? Corporations! Is it any wonder corporations are getting their every wish fulfilled these days. The Supreme Court helped out there again, by making the preposterous declaration that corporations are “persons,” entitled to all the protections of the Constitution, including that of free speech – i.e. campaign contributions! Sweet racket!

Until we end private campaign contributions and use tax money to finance campaigns, there is utterly no hope of fixing anything or making any progress. I doubt such drastic reforms will occur, a claim that can be reinforced by a simple metaphor: picture a bunch of fat pigs grunting and feeding at a food trough … actually, that’s a cruel metaphor because I like pigs.

Speaking for myself – others must do what they think is right – I’m not going to wait around for “someone” to reform the system. That could be a long wait. I’m moving on and trying to create my own system, hopefully in conjunction with like-minded fellows, of which there are many, and live life. This is a central theme in much of what I write: that one doesn’t have to wait for someone else to solve the problems. One can take control and create a life for oneself, turning their back on the old system if necessary, and let it fade into irrelevance. That’s the path I’ve gone down.

Dave

After reading Chris Hedges “Party to Murder” your post caught my attention, with greater interest as I believe democratic discourse must be between real people.

I like a part of your approach as it speaks to a positive assertion of self without aggression.

If you review the above url, you will also find there is a way for us to assert ourselves democratically and not be divided and conquered by the elites. Would welcome your review. From there you can also make direct contact.

Eduard