Here in SA fuel is almost at epidemic prices. Yet we have the same problem as America-go into a wealthy suburb and you will see large bakkies(pick up trucks) being driven by woman to do the shopping. And the Hummer H2 landed on our shores a few months ago. Some people have too much money and not enough education.

This has been a soapbox of mine for a long time.  There are so many individual things that could be done, but just one of them wouldn't really help much.  The scope of the change necessary to actually reduce (not reduce the growth of) our emissions is virtually impossible.  It is certainly depressing.

In a country that was actually trying to help the environment, not only would hummers be illegal, but only with a relevant business permit would you be allowed to buy any kind of full sized truck.  Cars would have a maximum of 60mph.  All cars.  Auto racing would be illegal.  If you didn't have a family, you'd only be allowed to buy a compact, and drivers' licenses would cost several thousand dollars.  Public transit would be the standard way to get around for anyone who needed to go farther than they could bicycle. 

Sadly, businesses would not be able to afford the kind of delivery schedule they can now, so places like Walmart wouldn't be able to keep anything you wanted in stock at 4AM on Sunday.  We might have to eat more regional produce, and forgo our passion fruit shipped in from the tropics.  The economy would be in shambles. 

It's a bad mess.  It's actually a shame there isn't a god.  It'll take one to fix what we've done.

Wait until gas gets really expensive. You're going to see a lot of bike riding and local community action. Also, fewer highways. Suburbia is ready for a fall anyway - what has it been, 60 years? C'mon. Suburbia can't live forever, it's too much of a terrible monster.

It isn't just laziness. Our whole infrastructure's built around suburbia now. How do you realistically change that? My area is a good example. I'm 5 miles from a decent shopping center and many areas have no sidewalks or bike lanes or street lights. It would be dangerous to ride a bike or walk on many of our streets, especially at night. No, I can't afford to move to the city, and all of suburbia can't fit there anyway. I don't know how you could change the way existing communities work. It's not like you can just raze our whole city and redesign it for pedestrian living. The best we can do at this point is to stop building more suburbs like this and make everyone drive small cars. Outlaw gas guzzlers!

America builds out, while most countries build up. The consequences of this are multifaceted, but the major one is that driving 20 miles to work and 5 miles to the store is normal. There has to be a redefinition of the coming impact that fossil fuel consumption will unleash in not only economical or environmental terms, but overreaching cultural terms.

I saw this thing on the science channel the other day about the future of oil shortages and the reactions to our culture. It would require a fundamental change of how people plan cities, suburbs, etc.  Growing up with consumer freedom and ideas of individualism, there are a few things that it is hard for me to wrap my head around. The ideas that we can start banning cars that consume more gas than others, along with all forms of auto racing makes me reject them from a gut level. I fully comprehend the effects of oil dependence, fossil fuel pollution, and its contribution to global climate change are harming our world, but these ideas are anathema to most Americans, even left leaning progressives. I am not saying they wouldn't result in first steps to addressing a ubiquitous problem, but rather I think things such as the implementation of banning auto racing or hummers are literally impossible until oil is consumed for only subsistence(ie Heating your home). Hopefully, large scale green energy programs will have been instituted before we get to that point.

The funniest thing about it is that I'm suggesting that this will be the only problem I can think of that will actually solve itself.

Consider America operating on $300 a barrel for oil, like a lot of the world does right now. That's what, $10 a gallon for gasoline? Good luck with that, everyone. What about when it hits $400?

Suburbia will die based on resource prices, not a desire for change. Our own turbo-foolishness is actually going to save us from sprawl, overfishing, polluting, and mechanized war. But I have a feeling it's going to get a lot uglier before it calms down, since it's often difficult for individuals to suddenly be faced with their own impotence.

The Amish! Hahahaha, too true.

BUT, if the suburbanites built their own self-sustaining communities, they'd be fine. There's plenty of land out there to farm, right? I think those enclaves would then be called villages. They're all over Europe.

Uh-huh. When was the last time you saw a suburbanite on a farm? Also, since chemical-based fertilizers will rise in price along with the gasoline/diesel that's used in tractors, the only reference we have to old-school farming is organic farmers. Oh, and the Amish.

I personally don't expect people to adapt very quickly. We already know that Saudi Arabia can't increase production of oil, and most of the countries in the world can't produce any more light crude. So the phrase "peak oil" is now even being used by Shell executives (of course, in their case, it's a great way to explain the price hikes - cha-ching!).

Denial is powerful. It may take four or five years for people to figure out they can't afford their lifestyle any more.

What is it with you and the Amish?

Frankly, I'm hoping that I can sell both my businesses in the next five years before shipping gets prohibitively expensive.  At that point, I'll probably figure out a way to relocate to someplace less... um... American.

Even though the air pollution here is sometimes appalling, I will stick up for my city (Hong Kong). We have the best public transport in the world. No-one drives their own car. I've lived in Hong Kong for twelve years and have never driven a single mile. Then when I went to the US for six days I drove 4,260km. Unbelievable. I've really got to tell you, the American lifestyle is completely unsustainable. Suburban areas are completely unsustainable. People who live in the "exburbs" should be shot. We often criticize big cities for their environmental impact, but its really the suburbs that are the worst and most unsustainable areas. In the future (if there is to be a future), instead of having massive cities which have tentacles of conurban and suburban outreaches for hundreds of square miles, there will be smaller communities which link up with each other, high-tech versions of villages, so to speak. If it were up to me, Zoning laws would not permit conurban environments or highway commuting culture. There is no God. We did this to ourselves. Nonetheless, I disagree with the extreme nature of Hamby's pessimism. I understand it, because he is American, and lives in the US. Hell, if I lived in the US, I'd probably share it (4,260km...un-fucking-believable), but I don't. It does seem the Americans are as a nation, slow to catch up since they are used to SUVs and suburban houses, just the amount of consumption that occurs in the US is nothing short of mind-blowing, and the per-capita is horrifying. The only reason I so enjoyed my visit to the US was that I was staying at some of the best tertiary institutes for science on the face of the earth.

Unfortunately I don't have to wait.  My old '82 Mercedes sits in my driveway because diesel is already in excess of $4.00 a gallon.  

Perhaps I should try and purchase a used Space Shuttle from NASA, the operating costs are probably cheaper ! 

I think the thing that keeps me from getting any hopes up is the number of ways we can potentially fuck ourselves.  I just watched an episode of Mythbusters, and one of the commercials was asking for donations to a fund for scientists studying the growing number of honeybee deaths in the U.S.  If honeybees go extinct... wow.  That would fuck up a LOT of things. 

In the DC area, there's a fish from your part of the world, the snakehead, that has no natural predators here, and is taking over the Potomac.  It's also been spotted in California.  It's just one of hundreds of animals and plants that are being introduced and killing off native species.

Water pollution is a big, big problem.  Not only are we overfishing the oceans, we're polluting them so that the creatures who don't get caught are developing lesions and growing third eyes.

Basically, I don't think that any one problem is completely beyond hope of solution, but every time I start researching one ecological threat, I discover five more I didn't even know existed.

I am so excited!  IAGAY, your coherency level has been on the rise of late.  Are you drinking less?

Assuming I understand your point, I'd just like to point out that the manufacture of humvees will not last long if people can own them but aren't allowed to drive them.  Kind of defeats the whole purpose. 

I really don't get this. What is the purpose of this strange regulation?

To keep college students out of the neighborhood.  The regulations have been challenged, and the city is hesitant to pursue legal action against anyone.  The thing is, five of six students will go together on rent and move into a four or five bedroom house.  Older residents don't like having parties in the neighborhoods, so instead of enforcing noise ordinances, etc, they pushed through legislation to keep students out of the neighborhood entirely.

When?

At least here in Chicago, the price of food has probably doubled since I was a kid. I remember when we'd have family over or throw a large party. We fill two shopping carts with food and run up a $200 bill at the grocery store, which seemed really expensive to me when I was 8 or 9. Nowadays, the same two carts of food are closer to $400 (and the large parties are less frequent, haha). Now that I'm living on my own and shopping for myself, I cringe at some of the prices, and am stunned that I can spend $50 to $70 per week on just myself.

Well, I'm either a right wing extremist or a communist because I take rational positions instead of repeating political dogma. I'm against taxes per se, everything should basically be user fees. If you extract oil and pollute, you need to pay a high user fee for this privilege. One should only be taxed only when on receives a benefit. So, if people are willing to pay high fees for nice roads and access to oil reserves, that is their business.

I'm against government subsidies for things like Ethanol. Technology and free markets can solve the problems.

No, I believe in paying a user fee to solve the problems your lifestyle creates. If your lifestyle causes pollution and traffic, you need to pay to fix it. Every human activity  needs to have a value assigned to it as to how much environmental and social damage it causes, then taxed(user fees) appropriately.

Problem is government under democracy is not done in this rational way. In our democracy, whoever whines the most and loudest gets what they want. If you labor in silence, you get fucked. So, we are turning in a society of whiners instead of workers and problem solvers. And the sad thing is most people know this, but just accept the mediocrity being bred.

I spend that just on beer.

Probably a good way to operate. Dogma isn't one of my favourite things. I was just teasing anyway.

Yeah, instead of getting the golden handshake from the government. That would be nice.

Or not, as the case may be. The only problem with technology is that it tends to need an energy source.

Ah, assigning value. That looks like a job for the market. Only without the subsidy chain to make it look as though cars and gas are cheap.

To a certain extent. Oil money is big money, so they get what they want (tax dollars included). That's not so much "whining" as it is "weaseling", but your point stands. It's a difficult problem to assign value given a government responsible to people who don't know what they really value unless put into a market environment.

I'm surprised that no one has brought up the plug-in hybrid technology.  I feel that it's the most promising solution to this problem.

It's basically an electric car with a small internal combustion engine.  Some designs can run on batteries for 60 - 80 miles which would satisfy the vast majority of daily commuter use.  When the batteries get low the engine kicks in to run a generator to charge them, so range is not an issue.   The small internal combustion engine that is installed can be designed to run on gas, e85, diesel or bio-diesel, or alternatively, it can be replaced with a fuel cell if that technology becomes piratical.

Such a vehicle, charged at home by solar panels (either directly during the day, or at night by electricity stored in a battery bank) and/or a small wind turbine, would go a long way to solving or current crisis.  Also, when you are not charging your car, the electricity can help power you home.  In addition, the hybrid car can be used as an emergency generator for your home if the power goes out.

Congress just needs to pass two laws to make this a reality:

1) Increase the corporate average fuel economy to a much greater degree.  Hybrid technology is the only practical way that the car companies could meet this in the near future.

2) A law such as they have in Germany that requires electric companies to buy back home generated electricity at a guaranteed fixed price high enough to encourage people to invest in solar for their homes.  Under this law, solar panels are becoming very popular in Germany.  People are paying neighbors to rent their roof space to install panels.  Farmers are installing solar panels in some of their fields instead of crops.

There are other solutions out there, however I feel no one solution can make as dramatic impact as the plug-in hybrid/home energy solution. 

Their imposters! no where on their site do they advertise about the giant lightning cannons that their company is famous for!

*ponders tesla cannon on a sports car...* Muahaha

I would absoutely love it if this were true. You might want to do some math around the subject first, and then cry. If you're not into math, then find yourself an engineer or physicist, and figure out how much energy our current lifestyle consumes all around. Then cry, naturally. Then try and figure out how it could be done without using ancient solar deposits in the form of oil and natural gas. I'll warn you about the empty feeling in the pit of your stomach before you resume crying.

The energy storage problem? Tears.

Energy transmission? Weep.

Extracting elements for nuclear fission without combustion engines? More tears.

Power conditioning and quality issues? Sob.

Mass production without quality power? Whimper.

Personal transporation isn't going to be the problem.

This is what I alluded to in another thread.  Or maybe it was this one.  I'm not going to go back and look.

I don't think any single problem, on paper, is insurmountable.  The real problem is that each problem is part of a giant web of problems, each dependent on the other problems getting solved first.

Good example:  Why we don't have good mass transit in my town:

My town is designed for a car culture.  There are precious few bike lanes, and they're just glorified shoulders, where any passing ruffian can clip you going 50 mph and kill you.  It's happened several times in the last couple of years.  There's a bus system, but it's habitually late because  -- guess what -- it's stuck in traffic all the time.  It only runs once an hour because nobody will take it because its always late and people who need to take the bus have to get to work on time or they lose their jobs.

I live close to town, relatively speaking.  It takes me most of an hour to walk downtown from my house.  Biking is life threatening. 

The main feature in this town is the college.  We are a consumer/service industry economy.  It's all restaurants, bars, and retail.   Out of that, the most revenue comes from the bar/restaurant industry, which the county actively tries to drive out, which depresses the economy, making it impossible for the city to pull in the resources necessary to improve the transit situation -- if they wanted to.  Oh, and the university takes up most of the good land, and they are tax exempt.

On top of that, the police, because of the low tax base in the county, have to raise money somehow.  The most productive way to do so?  DUIs at $2k a pop.  Don't try to tell me they want to stop drunk driving.  They want to pull over drunk drivers and give them big fines.  Most everyone here is a student, and will be gone in two to three years.  What do the police care if they don't have their license and can't get to work because there's no decent mass transit?

Of course, the other problem with improving mass transit is the historical society.  This is an old town.  In order to do anything with a historic building, you have to get permission from the historical society, which will only happen if you're making it more historic looking, which means not increasing density in the old parts of town.  If you can't increase density, the only thing you can do is move outward.  But, if you're building on the outsides of town, you can't just throw up densely populated apartments.  You have to do single family dwellings or duplexes, because that's why people move outside of downtown, which isn't dense anyway because of historic preservation...

(I could go on for another 20 minutes.)

Seriously... this is the beginning of the discussion of why people don't ride the bus here.

I agree though I wouldn't mind having a civilian version of the M1A1 Abrams.  Just slap on a rear view mirror and some turn signals ( got to keep the 120 mm smooth bore cannon for solving traffic jams ) and I'd be happy.

Oh, and I'd proudly display my "Visualize World Peace" bumper sticker on the turret.

The problem with anything that plugs in to the wall is that the majority of electricity produced in the U.S. comes from coal-fired power plants. If anything is going to be outlawed, it should be those. They're by far the dirtiest source of energy. China, in particular, has metric assloads of coal and is using to generate electricity for their exponentially-increasing demand.

The interesting thing about gasoline prices in the U.S. is that even though prices are currently hovering around the inflation-adjusted record high from 1981, they still aren't high enough to cause a reduction in consumption. We're seeing the tip of the iceberg now, with prices increasing for everything due to higher fuel costs. And there's also the orgy of mergers and bankruptcy going on with the airlines - an industry that lives and dies by fuel prices.

I think gasoline is going to have to hit $5 per gallon before people really start getting their shit together and cut back on consumption.