Peak Oil Task Force Report - City of Bloomington - State of Indiana

VULNERABILITIES
1. Systemic reliance.
As pointed out in the Introduction, crude oil is the lifeblood of our culture and society.
From transportation to food to ubiquitous plastic products, everything hinges on oil.
Thanks to this dependency, few of us have control over basic necessities of life. As a
community, we are very vulnerable to a decline in cheap oil.
2. New competitors for energy resources.
When the United States was on the upward slope of Hubbert's Curve, there were many
populous countries in the world that consumed relatively little petroleum per capita. Now
some of those countries – particularly China and India – are developing and motorizing
rapidly. As a result, on the downward slope of the curve, Americans will have formidable
new competitors for the world's remaining supplies of petroleum and other fossil fuels.
3. Financial chaos.
The current financial crisis will continue to make it difficult to mobilize the resources
necessary either to maintain the current level of oil production or to continue the migration
to a post‐petroleum economy. The development of new oil fields, which are often in
challenging environments and therefore very costly, has been slowed or postponed. The
development of major renewable energy projects has likewise been delayed or postponed.
4. A finite Earth cannot support infinite growth.
This is a point that seems simple enough to grasp, but it tends to get lost in our well‐
intended efforts to produce and consume more. This point is also one long championed by
ecological economists, specifically Herman Daly. Daly struggled to communicate the idea of
ecological constraint to the World Bank, where he worked in the late 1980s and early
1990s.
Report of the Bloomington Peak Oil Task Force
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