Friday, February 13, 2009




In 1912, Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty, made a fateful decision that oil, rather than coal, would thereafter fuel the ships of the Royal Navy. This had far-reaching consequences because it meant a dependence on foreign oil supplies rather than Welsh coal. It led, through government involvement, to the rapid growth of the Anglo-Persian oil company, later to become British Petroleum (BP). The rest of the great powers rapidly followed suit. Conventional, easily extractable oil now provides ~40% of the world’s energy supply. We depend on oil not only for most long-distant transport (cars, trucks, trains, ships, planes) but also as a chemical feedstock for plastics, and for fertilisers and pesticides integral to modern agriculture. Economic growth involving increased industrial and agricultural production over the past century has been inextricably linked to increased oil usage. Growth through globalisation, in particular, depends on cheap long-haul transport which, in turn, is based on an enormous and complex world-wide infrastructure for extraction and distribution of oil. Within the developed world we have become particularly addicted to cheap air travel based on an abundant supply of conventional oil.

... e' ora di convertire al nucleare ...
... la flotta mercantile e militare ...
... il piu' rapidamente possibile ...
... ed e' ora di ripristinare ...
... i canali navigabili ...
... direi che c'e non piu' ...
... di un anno e mezzo di tempo ...



# posted by intcoex : 8:28 PM




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