Overshoot

Global peak energy:
Implications for future human populations

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The fact that the amount of energy available to human beings is subject to a limit—global peak energy—has profound implications for future human population levels and living standards.

The following analysis represents my initial attempt to understand the issue; the primary conclusions are unsettling, but clear.

  • Based on publicly available data, global peak energy will probably occur between the years 2025 and 2030; total available energy will decline continuously thereafter.
  • The maximum supportable worldwide human population level will peak between the years 2025 and 2030 as well, and decline continuously thereafter.

Can ecologists save the ecosphere?

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Whenever ecologists gather, we might expect them to be screaming at the top of their lungs (or at least doing what passes for this in academic circles) about the imminent peril in which we humans find ourselves. But at a recent annual meeting of the Ecological Society of America (ESA), those figurative screams could only be rated as somewhere between muffled and nonexistent.

Museletter #185: Peak Everything

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This issue is an edited version of the Introduction to Peak Everything: Waking Up to the Century of Declines.This book is not an introduction to the subject of Peak Oil; …Instead it addresses the social and historical context in which the event is occurring, and explores how we can reorganize our thinking and action in several critical areas in order to better navigate this perilous time.

Peak phosphorus – the bottom line

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What is new and controversial in the article is the assertion that we have passed the point of “Peak phosphorus” – the point of maximum production and consumption of phosphorus. This would mean that over time phosphorus will become more difficult to obtain, and more expensive. This would be a major problem for society, since without sufficient supplies of phosphorus we will have difficulty feeding ourselves.