A serious question (in case you think it's facetious)
Alright, so none of us can tell the future, and equally no one knows for definate what oil/gas etc reserves are left and where, but I was talking to my mate about global warming, the exhausting of petrol/oil, and so on, and I thought I'd ask here for everyone's thoughts, as we're mostly intelligent (we did buy Speccys after all).
So, seriously, what do think will happen, will there come a time in the not too distant future when petrol is no longer available or at least only available to the rich (ten years, twenty years, fifty years?), how will overpopulation (the biggest problem of all, it's said) affect the world, especially with global warming and the problems of polution?
What about the spread of genetically modified food, the growing amount of nuclear power plants, the increase in the number of countries who (allegedly) have nuclear weapons? Religious fanatasism, the growing divide between rich and poor, the ozone layer? And any other problems that I haven't mentioned?
A truly horrible post, I know, but we can either face the problem or ignore it. Any thoughts?
So, seriously, what do think will happen, will there come a time in the not too distant future when petrol is no longer available or at least only available to the rich (ten years, twenty years, fifty years?), how will overpopulation (the biggest problem of all, it's said) affect the world, especially with global warming and the problems of polution?
What about the spread of genetically modified food, the growing amount of nuclear power plants, the increase in the number of countries who (allegedly) have nuclear weapons? Religious fanatasism, the growing divide between rich and poor, the ozone layer? And any other problems that I haven't mentioned?
A truly horrible post, I know, but we can either face the problem or ignore it. Any thoughts?
Post edited by ewgf on
Comments
Necros.
and after the next 50 years or so I'm not really bothered :)
Timeframe? 20 years tops. Probably closer to 10.
and then once everyone is dead, someone will swoop in and take over to get the oilfields :)
assuming the whole place isn't irradiated, but I think that's rather unlikely.
I've read stuff from scientists who say Mars etc are having the same global warming, thats not because the martians use old deodrant cans and run leaded cars etc. I tend to sway more towards the 'it happens every x years' and i reckon we'll be alright, granted i dont have much evidence to back that up !
Lifes too short and if i kept worrying that the world is gonna be even more messed up in 10/20 years time i wont ever want to get out of bed.
Back in the 60's they thought there was gonna be a huge nuclear war, same in the 80's. Sure back in the 40's and earlier times were tough.
Granted this time it 'appears' to be something we cant do too much to stop. What does depress me is other stuff i read about 'if we reuse.... we can save enough energy for a lightbulb' which on the whole scale of things is nothing.
If major companies/countries changed the way much of their industry worked it might make a change. Having tons of lights on constantly in major cities in the world at 3am doesnt help. Having some poncey rock star moan to me about flushing the loo when hes in a private jet doesnt do much to help either.
Dont mean to put my head in the sand but i think its better than doom and gloom and being depressed.
or ten years from now, cause if so they'd better hurry up and finish the current one otherwise neither side will have time to regroup and restock their ammo :D
When the oil supplies are decreasing some time in the future, I'm sure some of these ideas will be resurrected, when the big companies realize that they have to find new sources of income.
you only have to look at people like BP and Shell being all green and coming out with all their new green "we're so great" products
Yeah Right! cause oil companies have always given a flying fig about the environment! :) it's cause oil has got so frigging expensive
And it't that kind of attitide that will not help us out either.
I imagine that at the rate were going we wont distroy the plannet. However, the plannet will cull quite a few of us off some time within the next 500 years with flooding and weather problems. From what I understand the melting of the ice caps is an expidential process. As it melts it also dilutes the salts in the sea meaning things such as the gulf stream may peter out. In the sort term this will give England a more mid Canadian climate.
The time of the floods will be really shit, as every one will be fighting for what land is left. Even a 20% reduction in the land above water will cause serious overcowding issues on this planet.
I too beleive like Monty that there may be a world war regarding the last reserves of oil. However, as I understand it America has quite a bit of oil left down south. Only it's reserving it and using everyone elses oil up first. I see this happening in 40's years rather than 20.
no it won't, if there's less land you can't grow as much food, if you can't grow as much food, less people can be sustained, therefore the population decreases.
it's nature!
we aren't going to just wake up one day and find that the sea level has risen 30 feet, it'll be a long gradual process.
the earth changes, and no species can fight nature for long, if we are screwing up the balance with all our emissions etc. the worst that we're doing is speeding up a process that will happen anyway. it's certainly obvious that the human race has made some very large scars on this planet, but in a couple of million years they will have healed up and all the energy saving lightbulbs and electric cars will have been long forgotten
I used to work for EPRC (Esso Petrolium Reserch Center) in Abingdon Oxfordshire. I heard many stories of shelved ideas, although I've only got one or two peoples say so on these and no hard proof to back up these claims.
Such as? short message filler
Hydrogen fuel cells have been around for a very long time, and nobody ever developed them, I wonder if an oil company bought the patent for that...
such as the places where the sea ice is increasing.
I'm in a mood and just want to argue with people, don't expect me to try and remember where I read it :p
However, with current technology hydrogen fuel cells a fractionally worse for the environment than reguar fuel.
While hydrogen cars do not polute as much, I've heard that the process required to manufacture them does.
well the fuel cell is only an energy store (just like an incredibly efficient battery)
you still have to generate the hydrogen, which means electrolysing water, using huge amounts of electricity, as long as the electricity is coming from coal power stations the fuel cell is just as bad as any fossil fuel
of course if the electricity all came from nuclear, that would be "clean"
From what I understand the process of the ice-caps melting is expedential due to pockets of methane trapped within it.
These ices, called clathrates, contain 3,000 times as much methane as is in the atmosphere. See below for details.
Methane Burps a ticking time Bomb.
http://www.energybulletin.net/3647.html
aha, well that certainly makes sense, 'cause the refreezing water would not take that back out of the atmosphere
Sure China are turning on a new coal powerstation every week, but were paying for that by going to sainsbury's, currys and the like and wanting cheap goods.
Stop buying foreign, cheap imports and start buying localy manufactured items.
( Easier said than done I know, but hey you got to start somewhere )
Also the big supermarkets are working on the 'pile it high, sell it cheap' ethos and that is making things worse. The pressure to make food cheaper means farmers overproduce to keep prices down - chicken is the prime example. And because we overproduce 50% of all food goes to landfill and that only adds more greenhouse gas.
Due to consumers demands for cheep meat, cows are now the biggest CO2 producers in the world.
I wonder how many mp3 players, mobile phones and lcd tv's people can actually own before saturation occurs.
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I agree with you 100% Saboteur.
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This is what annoys me about the 21st century in the Western world.
All people care about these days is the perception of opulence, and how sophisticated they appear to others.
It happens on many levels, from Chavs and lower income families through to the middle classes right up to the upper classes. There seems to be an attitude amongst an increasing number of the human population that want to be seen to outdo the next one (human racing). People think nothing of shafting the next man just to get a leg up in society, it sucks!.
So many people all living above their means and it all on credit. They spend years living right on the edge of their credit line instead of being happy with life and living within their means. Living on the financial edge puts a unnecessary stain on a relationship and in a large number of cases ends up in divorce or separation. It seems in many cases that when the cash flow runs dry so does the magic. Maybe the perception of success, and the acquisition of possessions is the only thing keeping some couples tougher. It’s a very sad situation, I feel sorry for them. (Where is the love).
When will people realise that possessions will not make you happy.
Because of our consumerist ways we are raping the planet of resources for our children’s children. Whilst everyone knows about global warming and the distruction of our planet most people want to burry their heads in the sand as it all to much to worry about and they are comfortable in their bubbles of consumerism.
The amount of Junk a family throws away is at an all time high. I can’t count the number of times I have heard my family members and those of other families say the immortal words “Ahh thow it out get new!!”, when it's not even broken or unfit for its purpose. Nothing gets fixed anymore people just throw things away, they end up in landfills.
My parents are bad examples of this, they are always throwing things out, not because they are broken but because they are old (they call 4 years old). For example, when they got new curtains they threw out their sofa because the colour did not match. They didn’t even attempt to sell the sofa on, or give it free to a needy person. It was in good condition, they simply could not be assed. They may be in their fifties but I really let them have a piece of my mind on that one.
What image are we sending the next generation of adults, our consumerist culture is not right. We need to teach our children that the way we currently live our lives, is both extremely selfish and wrong. We need to educate them to live more sustainable and enviromentally considerate lifestyles.
I am proud to say that almost all of the possessions in my house are second hand, yet of very high quality. Why feed this consumerism by buying new stuff when you can buy better quality second hand stuff at under half the price.
Scottie_UK
You've got it good round your way then, in Newcastle the council gave us big square black boxes, that basically can't hold all the recyclables produced in 2 weeks (they're supposed to be collected every 2 weeks). When people leave them out they don't turn up to collect them, then you find drunken radgees have kicked them all over the fucking street.
However when they first came about a lot of the charvas stole them because apparently they were "Proper Shweet for growin' ya ganja plants in".
yeah ive got one of them black tubs, and a green wheelie bin, and a regular wheelie bin. i don't really know whats meant to go in what. i let mother nature decide and sling my rubbish in the nearby woods. 'cept my bank statements which i eat.
You dont know you were born lad!!
All we get is a roll of clear plastic bags. However, on a serious note I beleive this is better than a box as the stuff does not spill out.
The only downer is I have 6 bins in my kitchen.
Bin1 for Plastics,
Bin2 for Glass,
Bin3 For Metal,
Bin4 For paper,
Bin5 For Garden and vegetable Waste.
Bin6 For other stuff that wont go in the others.
The good thing is that bin 6 never gets past 20% full which means less for landfill.
However, due to complaints our council have now recently consolidated bins 1,2,3. but only once loads of peeps like us went out and got them selves 5 extra bins.
Scottie_UK.
it must be a joy living in your house. :)
souldn't you have two bins for glass, one for clear and one for green?
http://illconsidered.blogspot.com/2006/02/how-to-talk-to-global-warming-sceptic.html