Peak Oil -- Peak Ignorance

I see it thusly -- We need to focus on long-term solutions, but we also need a short-term fix, and we need it very quickly.

What we don't realize is how bad it really is -- fuel prices in Europe are outrageous, but thanks to things like Oil-or-Your-Lives programs, we're perpetuating the illusion of cheap petroleum-based fuel. That bubble needs to be burst before people will ever realize how low on oil the we really are. We've already sucked out all the easy to get to stuff -- now we're pumping water and such into wells in order to get to the hard-to-reach oil thats still left. Thats a bad sign!

What I see as a path to the future is this: A massive tax on petroleum-based fuels, something along the lines of $.50 /gal for gasoline. Tax money that goes no where else but one place -- governemt funding for both long-term energy solutions and short-term fixes. People would wake up and notice then.

Things like Ethanol are a good start -- but there needs to be a greater incentive for people to buy cars that use it (and for stations to carry it -- if its everywhere, people will be more likely to use it). Heck, even place a tax on low-performance cars (your Hummers, etc.) that goes right back into a gov't subsidy on alternate-fuel cars.

Not that any of that will happen, seeing as the institution that needs to take that action (Gov't) is the same thing thats perpetrating the illusion.

But cars isn't just it -- nope. We need to move away from any petroleum product in our energy system too. Oil plans, nat gas plants, even old coal plants need to go. Clean Coal is one short-term solution, but I see fusion as being the Energy of the Future. Nuclear is too hazardous to warrant the construction of many more plants now (not that any new ones have been built in the last 30 years or so) but its a heckuva step up from oil.

But peak oil doesn't end on those 2 facets -- think about all the petroleum products used every day. Recycling is one option, but it isnt viable for all products. Reusing is a big step -- one that needs to be better implemented. But the biggest step that needs to be done is Reducing. Everything comes in a cardboard (recyclable) box, and then individually wrapped in little baggies of petroleum-based polymer. How are we going to eat our sanitzed food when theres nothing to wrap it in, eh?

And I'm done for now.