To Spite the Face

In line with the same thinking that seeks to cut SNAP, Congress failed to extend unemployment benefits to 1.3 million people experiencing long-term unemployment.  While some politicians claim the benefits are a disservice, those kinds of cuts end up hurting the economy as a whole. By next December, nearly 5 million people may be denied benefits.

Update (February 27, 2016):  On April 1, twenty-two states will reimpose rules that limit SNAP benefits for adults with no dependents or disabilities unless they meet work or education requirements.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that 500,000 to one million people will lose access to food stamps this year, citing the experience in states where work requirements already returned.

Peak Oil

While the topic rarely shows up in the news, a theme issue of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society addresses The Future of Oil.  According to one of the co-editors, Richard G. Miller, a retired analyst with BP,

We are probably in peak oil today, or at least in the foot-hills. Production could rise a little for a few years yet, but not sufficiently to bring the price down; alternatively, continuous recession in much of the world may keep demand essentially flat for years at the $110/bbl price we have today. But we can't grow the supply at average past rates of about 1.5% per year at today's prices.

One of the studies in the theme issue by David Murphy of Northern Illinois University estimates the global EROEI for oil and gas production at 15.

... the minimum oil price needed to increase the oil supply in the near term is at levels consistent with levels that have induced past economic recessions. From these points, I conclude that, as the EROI of the average barrel of oil declines, long-term economic growth will become harder to achieve and come at an increasingly higher financial, energetic and environmental cost.

Update (January 20, 2014):  Nafeez Ahmed reports on the Transatlantic Energy Security Dialogue.  One troubling fact:  Despite a 200 to 300 percent increase of investment by the oil industry since 2000, oil supplies increase by only 12 percent.  It's a classic case of diminishing returns.

Update (January 25, 2014):  Fracking won't prevent peak oil.

Update (March 16, 2014):  Oil companies are being squeezed by the rising cost of oil production.

Update (March 28, 2014):  Matt Mushalik argues that the boom in U.S. shale oil production masks a plateau in world crude oil production going back to 2005.

Update (August 15, 2014):  Gail Tverberg explains twelve principles of "reaching limits in a finite world".

Update (September 9, 2014):  Richard Heinberg issues a reminder that peak oil is part of a constellation of problems related to unlimited growth.

Update (July 7, 2015):  Reflections on the end of oil.

Update (August 19, 2016);  Nafeez Ahmed explains that peak oil means increasing reliance on "crappy oil" during the transition to renewable energy--oil that is dirtier and more expensive to produce.

[I]f more and more energy is invested simply in the process of producing fossil fuel energy, then that higher energy input entails higher greenhouse gas emissions: an increased carbon footprint.

The shift to unconventional fossil fuels is therefore putting us on a collision course with the climate, which will “increase global greenhouse gas emissions even more than anticipated and counteract other decarbonisation endeavours.”

In the long-term, that means we’re increasing the risk of dangerous global warming. In the short-term, there’s a tangible impact right now: the economy. The more we rely on more expensive and lower quality energy to keep the economy moving, the slower the economy moves.

Update (July 2, 2017):  Sally Dugman offers a reminder that peak oil still matters.

[W]e collectively have to stop our delusions about perpetual economic growth and find another way to live from this point forward. We need to stop pretending that all is well because our myopic view of life shows no oil or other major shortfalls in the very near future.

Update (October 8, 2017):  Nafeez Ahmed analyzes China's impending peak in oil production.

China’s rapidly rising dependence on fossil fuel imports further suggests that after 2018, world oil markets will be increasingly strained by the country’s escalating demand. This could well be another potential major driver of a global oil squeeze in or after 2018, in a way that most mainstream forecasts have overlooked.

Update (November 20, 2018):  Ugo Bardi argues that the concept of peak oil is still useful despite decreased interest in recent years.

Update (July 24, 2019):  If true, these hidden little nuggets make renewable energy even more urgent: Saudi Arabia recently announced their largest oil field produces about three-fourths of what everyone thought, and the fracking industry has lost $280 billion dollars over the past 12 years.

Update (September 4, 2020):  Although U.S. oil production orginally peaked in the 1970's, fracking techology made the country the world's largest producer. But Antonia Juhasz reports the pandemic has hit the industry hard.

[O]il analysts Casey Merriman and Abhi Rajendran of Energy Intelligence expect a good deal of the US oil production cuts to be permanent. They predict that the country has reached peak oil production and will never return to the record 13 million barrels of oil per day reached in November 2019.

The pandemic has made painfully clear that there are two ways the age of oil might end. There’s the status quo path, in which we are so overcome by the disasters brought about by our oil reliance—calamities in the forms of war, political upheaval, and the climate catastrophes of worsening drought, floods, hurricanes, fires, and disease—that we are unable to consume oil. And there is a more intentional, thoughtful path, one that embraces justice, equity, and sustainability. If we take that route, the "end of oil" will be a commitment to live in peace with one another and the planet.

Hunger and Homelessness Survey

In a survey of 25 cities, The United States Conference of Mayors reports an average increase in emergency food requests of 7 percent and an overall increase in people experiencing homelessness of 3 percent.  An estimated 47 million Americans live below the US standard for poverty.  Meanwhile, corporate subsidies amount to $90 billion per year while individuals on welfare cost a total of $59 billion per year.

A broken government and lackluster economic recovery probably have a lot to do with increasing hunger and homelessness in the United States.  But worldwide, extreme poverty has been reduced. The proportion of people living on less than $1.25 per day went from 43 percent to 22 percent during the period from 1990 to 2008.  Even a broader definition called the Multidimensional Poverty Index showed improvement in 18 of 22 countries.  Less extreme poverty doesn't necessarily imply a smaller gap between rich and poor.

Of course, the big question for future reductions in poverty will be how governments choose to respond (or not respond) to increasing inequality and climate change.

Update (January 2, 2016):  Even in a recovering economy, the need for help increases.

Voter Suppression

Research by Keith Bentele and Erin O'Brien at the University of Massachusetts shows that voter restrictions were more likely to be proposed in states where greater numbers of minorities and lower income people voted.  Restrictions were more likely to be passed when Republicans controlled the state government.

Update (April 23, 2014):  The Republican election strategy starts with disenfranchisement.

Update (July 31, 2016):  Court rulings have overturned some voting restrictions. The law in North Carolina was especially harsh. From the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit:

[I]n what comes as close to a smoking gun as we are likely to see in modern times, the State’s very justification for a challenged statute hinges explicitly on race — specifically its concern that African Americans, who had overwhelmingly voted for Democrats, had too much access to the franchise.

Faced with this record, we can only conclude that the North Carolina General Assembly enacted the challenged provisions of the law with discriminatory intent.

Worst Case

While the IPCC reports are, of necessity, based on consensus, Dahr Jamail investigates the views of some climate scientists who see the possibility of rapid, catastrophic changes.  For example, the "Great Dying" extinction event of 250 million years ago was related to the release of methane.  Ninety-five percent of species were killed.  And with temperatures rising fastest in the polar regions, a 50 gigaton "burp" of methane from melting permafrost is possible.  That would be equivalent to at least 1000 gigatons of carbon dioxide emissions (compared to 240 gigatons total emissions since the industrial revolution began).  It's hard to see how civilization could withstand that sort of disaster.

These views get derided as alarmist, yet our political institutions have yet to heed any warning.

Update (December 19):  Nafeez Ahmed reviews research that claims climate change impacts may be underestimated.

Update (December 26):  Bruce Melton offers a review of current climate science and calls for "sky mining" as a solution since emissions reductions are inadequate to prevent dangerous climate change.

Update (December 29):  Climate change by the numbers.

Update (February 14, 2014):  Answering the deniers.

Update (March 8, 2014):  Lindsay Abrams offers five theories for the motives of climate change deniers.

Newtown

Today is the one year anniversary of that horrible day.  It is fitting to hold the families in our thoughts. It is also fitting to note the on-going tragedy of gun violence in the United States and the failure of our political system to do anything about it.

There is evidence to suggest that fearful people tend to be more conservative.  And the conservative belief that human nature is fundamentally competitive would seem to reinforce the fear of a dangerous world.  I could see how the acquisition of guns would assuage that fear, even though, for me, the idea of people around me having guns adds to my own fear.

Isn't it just logical to think that fewer weapons would avoid at least some the violence that happens everyday?  And yet gun control isn't going to happen because fear overrides compassion.

Update (December 31):  The Boston Globe editorializes about mass killings this past year.

Update (June 20, 2014):  A study from the Violence Policy Center ranks states by gun death rate and finds that

states with the lowest overall gun death rates have lower rates of gun ownership and some of the strongest gun violence prevention laws in the nation.

Update (July 29, 2014):  Differences in threat bias explain a large part of the variation in political ideology according to a study from lead author John Hibbing of the University of Nebraska.  John Stuart Mill referred to a party of stability and a party of progress as common in political systems.

Update (February 15, 2022):  In a settlement with nine families of Sandy Hook Elementary School victims, Remington Arms will pay $73 million. It's the first time a gun manufacturer has been held liable for a mass shooting.

Getting Ahead

A bachelor's degree still pays, but not as much as it used to.

Young women managed to hold steady, but still don't earn as much in real terms as male high school graduates forty years ago.

And yet, somewhat contrasting research suggests that twenty percent of Americans will experience a household income of $100,000 or more for at least a year during their lifetime.

So it may be largely a function of age--a certain number of people will be in a profession that eventually leads to that higher income.

2 Degree Disaster

A paper by James Hansen et al concludes that 2 degrees Celsius of warming would spur an eventual warming of 3 to 4 degrees Celsius with "disastrous consequences".

Rapid emissions reduction is required to restore Earth’s energy balance and avoid ocean heat uptake that would practically guarantee irreversible effects.

Update (December 17):  NASA reports that the mean global temperature for November was the highest ever recorded for that month since records began in 1880.  The November mean was 0.78 degrees Celsius above the base mean.  It was the 345th consecutive month with a mean temperature above the long-term average.

Update (December 31):  A study published in Nature suggests that cloud formation would decrease with higher temperatures which in turn would enhance the warming.  A minimum warming of 4 degrees Celsius is expected by 2100.

Update (April 4, 2015):  Petra Tschakert with the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute at Pennsylvania State University argues that the 2 degrees Celsius limit on warming is inadequate.

A low temperature target is the best bet to prevent severe, pervasive and potentially irreversible impacts, while allowing ecosystems to adapt naturally, ensuring food production and security, and enabling economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner.