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The evidence suggests that we're nowhere near hitting "Peak Oil." Not only are there vast untapped deposits (and probably vast additional deposits we haven't even discovered yet), but our ability to extract oil and convert it to wealth keeps improving.

We can look forward to more accidents like [the Gulf BP spill].

All energy sources have environmental costs. Citing a cost of one particular source (risk of underwater oil spills) doesn't help us make a rational decision about energy policy. You have to look at the total mix of costs and benefits.

But the Chinese and Indians (and many other countries) are using exponentially more energy.

China and India are developing countries that are rapidly industrializing, so they have very high growth rates at present. Those growth rates will not continue indefinitely into the future. Naive extrapolations of historical patterns have been the cause of many failed predictions of resource shortages and other problems. See Thomas Malthus and the Club of Rome for some examples.

The more people in cities, or close in burbs, with access to transit, or just biking, or walking, the better.

There is no realistic prospect of achieving large-scale benefits through densification and substituting transit or biking or walking for car travel over any reasonable time frame. We've been sprawling and suburbanizing for sixty years. Our transportation system is overwhelmingly dominated by automobiles. We have trillions and trillions of dollars of sunk cost in low-density, car-oriented urban forms. We're not going to give that up and start living and getting around like people did a hundred years ago.

by Bertie on Jul 13, 2012 8:30 pm • link • report