Issue #3
November 2001
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The Oil Crunch by Gerry Krownstein We are currently in the calm before the energy storm. Efficiencies gained during and since the oil shock of the 70's, and the shift in our economy from heavy manufacturing to services and information, have somewhat reduced our economic dependancy on petroleum. Electricity generation has moved towards natural gas, to the point that oil powers only a small percentage of our generating capacity. Presently, transportation, including airlines, over-the-road trucking and personal cars are our heaviest users of oil, but major improvements in fuel efficiency are possible with today's technology. Now is the perfect time to begin to phase out our dependance on oil altogether. Soon it will be too late to do it gracefully.
The problem is not that oil reserves are dwindling. The problem is that much of the world's oil comes from politically unstable countries, and the instability will get worse before it gets better. Take the Middle East, for example. Iran is politically hostile to the US; more importantly, although some progress has been made in ameliorating the influence of the Ayatollahs, a confrontation is brewing between hard-liners and moderates that may take the Iranian oil-fields off line for a while when the explosion comes. Iraq, potentially the second-largest oil supplier in the world, will have its own conflagration when Saddam Hussein's grip starts to slip. It would not be beyond him, sore-loser that he is, to destroy his own oil fields if he feels that others will control them.
Most of the Arabian states, especially Saudi Arabia, are dictatorships kept in power by repressive governments and the US military. The recent Saudi threat, quickly retracted, to withhold oil if we did not rein in Israel, was without teeth. They know as well as we do that without American military backing the Saudi regime would be at the mercy of its own Islamic fundamentalists and external adventurers like Saddam Hussein. Keeping the lid on this boiling pot will not work forever, though. Sooner or later the regime will come apart at the seams and the spate of oil will be disrupted, at least temporarily.
Venezuela and Mexico have their own problems managing their oil industries. The recent turmoil in Venezuela and the ongoing crisis in Mexico don't make either of these countries islands of petroleum stability.
For our own protection (not to mention environmental health) we need to convert our economy from petroleum to other energy sources. Electric power generation is almost there already. Lubricants have oil-free alternatives, but more needs to be done. Most plastics can be synthesized from agricultural products, although some parts of the petrochemical industry will have to rely on oil for a long time to come. The biggest hurdle is transportation. Here there are many possible solutions, from all-electric vehicles to hybrids to diesels running on agricultural oils to hydrogen-based vehicles to greater use of mass transit (especially trains, which are mainly electrified). Merely reversing the SUV trend will help.
We don't have to give up our standard of living to free ourselves from the oil economy. We don't even have to give up the American love-affair with the car, although we should. We merely have to decide to make the necessary changes. The tools and techniques and alternative fuels exist. It won't take much to make them cost-effective. If we start now, we can avoid serious repercussions when oil deliveries are disrupted.
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