Museletter

This month's issue is a compilation of several recent short writings. The last of these, a set of frequently asked questions about Peak Oil, is a work in progress that will appear in expanded form at www.postcarbon.org. Museletter #198.

For coal, the future of both extraction and consumption depends on new technology. If successfully deployed, innovative technologies could enable the use of coal that is unminable by gasifying it underground; reduce coal's carbon emissions; or allow coal to take the place of natural gas or petroleum. Without them, coal simply may not have much of a future. Are these technologies close to development? Are they economical? Will they work? Museletter #197.

Recent reports on global coal reserves, surveyed in previous chapters, generally point to the likelihood of supply limits appearing relatively soon—within the next two decades (a contrary view is represented solely by the BGR report ["Lignite and Hard Coal: Energy Suppliers for World Needs until the Year 2100 – An Outlook," 2007]). According to this near-consensus, coal output in China, the world's foremost producer, could begin to decline within just a few years. MuseLetter 196.

China is the world's foremost coal producer and consumer, surpassing the United States by a factor of two on both scores and accounting for 40 percent of total world production. Museletter #195.

The United States has the world's largest coal reserves. With energy prices constantly rising and coal considered a "cheap" alternative, Richard Heinberg's survey of the literature on coal reserves is important reading. There's reason to believe that reserves are being overestimated, as they have been through the industry's history. Museletter #194.

In this month's MuseLetter, Heinberg shares some material from his upcoming book on coal. Also included are his May column for The Ecologist magazine ("What Car do You Drive?"), a Foreword that he wrote for the new edition of Mat Stein’s brilliant book When Technology Fails, and a brief blog for the Post Carbon Institute website.

The following is a proposal to help make communities better able to respond to the coming economic shocks from resource depletion, beginning with Peak Oil, and perhaps also to shocks from other causes (such as the ongoing subprime mortgage and credit collapse). Making existing petroleum-reliant communities truly sustainable is a huge task. Virtually every system must be redesigned—from transport to food, sanitation, health care, and manufacturing.

This MuseLetter, and several more during the next few months, will be chapters for a forthcoming book on coal, to be published by Post Carbon Press. This month's issue is the book's Introduction. The world appears poised for a headlong sprint toward greater dependence on coal. This book's purpose is to examine one crucial question that will shape this next great coal rush: How much is left?

It's becoming increasingly clear that 2008 will be a catastrophic year for the US economy, and therefore probably for that of the world as a whole. The reasons boil down to two: continuing and snowballing fallout from the subprime mortgage fiasco (exacerbated by an orgy of debt-leveraging), and record-high, continuously advancing oil prices. This brief portion of the February Museletter is so topical it bears immediate posting.

This morning I was awakened at 6:30 by a robot; - not a wheeled electronic valet named "Robbie" bringing me orange juice and toast, but an automated fax machine dialing my phone number and beeping expectantly into my answering machine, hoping to provide me with some helpful advertisement. While I won't go so far as to say the experience ruined my day, it nevertheless cost me some sleep and provoked me to reflect somewhat darkly on our species' present and future relationship with technology.