Crash Watcher: Major chance Europeans will starve after 2030

[Standuble]

Oil supports relatively few humans beyond their fair share available resources.

Yes, but if we insisted on sharing out the resources equally, without insisting on an acceptance of the limits of overall global economic/population growth, then we'd actually be making the problem worse. It makes the whole system less sustainable/resilient, not more.

I actually agree with Ceti, at least in principle. Humans might have followed a different path, and ended up expanding into space. It's not technologically unimaginable. The problem is that we've missed that boat. It's not technologically imaginable in the real world, given the trajectory that industrialised civilisation is on. To be able to fulfil ceti's dream, we needed to sort out our political, economic, social and other ideological problems before the oil started to run out and the population explosion got out of control.

There may be techno-fixes to some parts of the problem (such as global warming), but there's certainly no techno-fix to the overall problem.

There is only one solution: fewer humans consuming fewer resources and producing less waste.

Everything else is a fantasy.

I agree with you on everything posted here. I have mused and lamented the possibility that we took too long in getting out into space, focusing rocket technology throughout the Cold War on each other, losing sight of the potential bigger picture of a Space Race and the government not encouraging the private sector in the 1950s to engage in commercialisation of space/space tourism. There probably would not have been much of anything until the 1980s to 1990s which is past USA's oil peak but I envisioned by that point there would be enough infrastructure, investment and interest to get somewhere in time. From what I understand, we merely wasted 50 years and now we have baby steps in a time when we should be running. Makes me pray for the ridiculous sometimes e.g. alien invasion or intervention just to get a sizeable populations of humans off this world before we're stranded for good.

The prospect of billions starving has horrified me at my core for years, just think of all the settlements that have expanded (and their extent) and all that has been developed since the utilisation of oil, it's freaking scary and the potential explosive decompression of its loss scares me terribly. Sometimes I wonder whether we should stop all aid to the less economically developed countries and let their populations stagnate or decline as they come into alignment with population capacity. Soften the blow and buy the rest of us some time. I don't feel we can save them at all and we should try and save the Western world, Japan and China (let it decide its level of survival.) We consume more resources then most countries ever have but in the end if we are ever going to find a way to get through this without completely returning to an impoverished, pseudo pre-industrial age existence humanity will never escape from then it would be through technological innovations in countries like ourselves and countries in the Far East.

[boisdevie]

Makes me pray for the ridiculous sometimes e.g. alien invasion or intervention just to get a sizeable populations of humans off this world before we're stranded for good.

Getting a kilo of stuff into orbit takes a shedload of energy. The idea of getting masses of humans into space to anywhere remotely liveable is just fantasy.

Sometimes I wonder whether we should stop all aid to the less economically developed countries and let their populations stagnate or decline as they come into alignment with population capacity.

UK population is what, around 70 million. Even during WW2 with rationing, digging for victory and a population a lot less the UK couldn't feed itself.

[Catweazle]

When we look at the crop yields that feed the population and then rationalize that reduced yields will lead to starvation, we ignore the fact that yields per acre can be massively increased with the addition of human labour. I suggest that when people are hungry they will give up playing squash and watching Eastenders, and expend their energies in the fields.

Intensive agriculture is entirely possible without ruining the planet, ultimately everything comes from the Sun, and it will be with us for a while yet.

[Catweazle]

UK population is what, around 70 million. Even during WW2 with rationing, digging for victory and a population a lot less the UK couldn't feed itself.

Much of our labour force was abroad, and our factories weren't forging ploughshares.

[clv101]

UK population is what, around 70 million. Even during WW2 with rationing, digging for victory and a population a lot less the UK couldn't feed itself.

This is a poor example. There are plenty of modern studies that show how with mixed agriculture (not veggie diets) the UK can be self sufficient in food. And, as a bonus create a lot of employment.
See: http://www.thelandmagazine.org.uk/artic ... m-itself-2

[Totally_Baffled]

UK population is what, around 70 million. Even during WW2 with rationing, digging for victory and a population a lot less the UK couldn't feed itself.

Wheat yield per acre has quadrupled since 1945, the population hasn't, let alone everything else.....

[boisdevie]

UK population is what, around 70 million. Even during WW2 with rationing, digging for victory and a population a lot less the UK couldn't feed itself.

This is a poor example. There are plenty of modern studies that show how with mixed agriculture (not veggie diets) the UK can be self sufficient in food. And, as a bonus create a lot of employment.
See: http://www.thelandmagazine.org.uk/artic ... m-itself-2

I had q quick glance at the link bit it seems to refer to yields using modern methods. What happens as the oil runs out? = much lower yields presumably which throws the calculations out of the window.

[PS_RalphW]

Oil consumption in agriculture is not that high. Most chemicals used are derived from natural gas. Biofuels could be employed to replace some or all the fuel directly on farms. The biggest use of oil is in food distribution. Electricity or CNG could be more widely deployed - either electric trucks or wider rail distribution.

The biggest oil use is by us driving to Tesco's to buy 20Kg of food in a 2000Kg SUV.

[Totally_Baffled]

Oil consumption in agriculture is not that high. Most chemicals used are derived from natural gas. Biofuels could be employed to replace some or all the fuel directly on farms. The biggest use of oil is in food distribution. Electricity or CNG could be more widely deployed - either electric trucks or wider rail distribution.

The biggest oil use is by us driving to Tesco's to buy 20Kg of food in a 2000Kg SUV.

+1

[vtsnowedin]

Oil supports relatively few humans beyond their fair share available resources.

A technological fix for a technological problem is not the answer.

I have to doubt that premise very much. The world was quite crowded back in 1857 when the oil age began. Up to a third of farmland was used to support the horses...

An interesting notion of "crowded." Crowded with fields of horses?

The world was not crowded in 1857, unless you're talking about a comparison with 1657. I understand what you are saying, but looking at it from an ecological point of view, it makes no sense. In my part of the world, many of those horsefields have become urban places - part of the concrete jungle where the only wildlife is a few weeds and insects, plus the foxes and pigeons that survive thanks only to our wastefulness. Pasture is much better, both in terms of local wildlife and global ecology.

In other words, the world may have been crowded in 1857, but human civilisation was not buggering up the entire planet. We were only just getting started.

By crowded I mean near carrying capacity considering the means and methods in use at the time. Dicken's "Excess population" the potato famine in Ireland (politics included). periodic famines in China, India and Africa etc.
Without the advent of fossil fuel powered farm equipment and chemical fertilisers produced from and with fossil fuels world human population would have long sense peaked and now as the oil runs out and we dare not burn the remaining coal for fear of climate change it will most probably crash back to 1850 levels. And no, adding more human labor to an Iowa corn field will not increase yields beyond the 200 bushels of corn per acre they are harvesting now.

[ceti331]

Oil consumption in agriculture is not that high. Most chemicals used are derived from natural gas.

I almost find myself using "oil" as a slightly inaccurate abreviation for Fossil Fuels. they all have the same problem (finite, will deplete). oil,coal,natural gas. hydrocarbons with embedded energy that we can release for our benefit.

Biofuels could be employed to replace some or all the fuel directly on farms. The biggest use of oil is in food distribution. Electricity or CNG could be more widely deployed - either electric trucks or wider rail distribution.

this is the root of our problem:
at the moment all uses of fuel *enhances* our food supply - multiplies what land produces/increases the amount of farmland

but If you want to *grow* fuel, this will *detract* from the amount of farmland available.

that extra energy above and beyond the daily solar in the biosphere is why we had a population explosion , and why we are heading for a crash, only question is where & how fast

Wheat yield per acre has quadrupled since 1945,

due to fossil fuels; every reason to expect as the fuels deplete, the yields will reverse. food is energy.
more energy = more food, less energy = less food.

[Totally_Baffled]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20968076

Half of all food thrown away??

Good grief!

due to fossil fuels; every reason to expect as the fuels deplete, the yields will reverse. food is energy.
more energy = more food, less energy = less food.

Well eventually yes, given the tiny amount agriculture uses to get these yields. That could be centuries!

[ceti331]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20968076

Half of all food thrown away??
Good grief!

yes under fossil fueled conditions we have super-abundance so we can be wasteful.
resources excceed our needs, so we have waste , plus (globally) rising population

(I get the impression you're just talking about UK, but in a globalized world that would be silly ... the whole world will be affected one way or another...and the UK has been involved in global trade for so long because of the empire...)

Well eventually yes, given the tiny amount agriculture uses to get these yields. That could be centuries!

food = energy. The most likely explanation for the population boom since the industrial revolution is the energy input (in whatever way) from fossil fuels.. whether its making other materials, directly increasing the amount of food, allowing us to transport surplusses around the world, processing it to increase shelf-life, providing sanitation to let us crowd more densely in cities for further benefts, heating (without needing to devote land to firewood), etc etc

[PS_RalphW]

If people starve as a result of peak oil it will be because the oil (and land to grow biofuels) will have been used to sustain BAU for the 1 billion first worlders on this planet driving huge distances in their SUVs whilst the remainder of the world is progressively priced out of the market.

This is of course what is happening. The rich will drive whilst the poor starve.

[RenewableCandy]

The figure in the Beeb article is for the world as a whole. Generally the poor world loses food on its way from the fields to the shop, the rich world loses it in, and after, the shop.