In 2005, the U.S. Department of Energy published a report entitled Peaking of World Oil Production: Impacts, Mitigation, & Risk Management. Called “The Hirsch Report” after its lead author, Robert Hirsch, its purpose was to lay out a governmental strategy for softening the effects of peak oil and its aftermath: that is, the chaos and economic crises sure to follow the point at which the world’s oil reserves would begin to fall.

The Hirsch Report laid out three possible scenarios for mitigation and risk management. In the first scenario, alternative energy sources, redesign of U.S. infrastructure, and other extraordinary measures are taken 20 years in advance of peak oil, with significant negative impact on the economy but a good chance at a positive outcome after a period of adjustment.

In the second scenario, extraordinary coordinated emergency measures are taken at all levels of government 10 years in advance of peak oil, with a period of severe shortages and social stress in the immediate 5-10 years after peak oil.

In the final and scariest scenario, nothing is done until after worldwide peak oil production occurs. In this scenario, severe shortages, widespread social upheaval, the collapse of financial markets, and violence are predicted, with an uncertain and painful adjustment period that could take decades.

What is alarming is that the U.S. government and the oil industry have known since the mid-1950s that peak oil would occur sometime between the year 2000 and 2010 if not earlier. Shell Oil itself commissioned the original study, done in 1956 by geophysicist M. King Hubbert. Hubbert predicted that after the peak, reserves would drop off very sharply, creating an environment in which social upheaval, famine, violence, and general chaos could occur if other energy sources were not in place. The first chart at the top of this post shows M. King Hubbert’s original 1956 peak oil curve.

Ever since Hubbert’s peak oil curve became the touchstone for oil supplies and the mitigation of their depletion, very little has been done in terms of preparing for what both the U.S. government and big oil have known would happen all along. I think it is disturbing and revealing that, even though the Hirsch report was commissioned in 2005, the U.S. is still basically doing nothing to mitigate the effects of peak oil.

Why would that be? Is it because the U.S. Department of Energy thinks peak oil is still 20 years off in the future or more? Or is it because it is already too late and the U.S. is being run by a pack of oil executives like George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and Condoleezza Rice? I mean, it’s not like they personally are going to suffer when the worst consequences hit. On their way out, to very wealthy established lives, they have little to lose at this point.

Houston, I think we have a problem.

I think we had a problem back in the seventies, and we should have dealt with it then by instituting a sane longterm energy policy. We didn’t. By general agreement, we passed our own peak oil production point during that same time period and for the past 30 years have been relying heavily on imports (as shown by the chart at the bottom; the middle chart shows all the competing current theories on when peak oil will occur worldwide). By all the best estimates, globally, we are now at or just past peak oil, and we’ve done basically nothing to mitigate its effects. This has happened just as global demand for oil in developing industrial nations like China and India has spiked and continues to climb rapidly.

Yes, commodities speculators are driving up prices right now, including oil prices, but trading in oil commodities is tightly regulated. Speculation is a very small part of the total picture. What is happening right now with oil (and by default gas prices) is more consistent with increased demand in the face of limited or even decreasing supply.

If in fact we have passed peak oil production, we will know it very quickly because things will get very, very bad very, very fast.

But let’s say the optimists are right and peak oil will not hit until 2020 or 2030. (I think they’re wrong, but for the sake of argument, let’s say they’re right.) Even then, by our own government’s study on mitigation, we know that right now we need to be taking extraordinary measures toward alternative energy and energy independence just to soften the blow. Where are these measures? Why are we not taking them?

Think about that for awhile, and while you’re thinking about it, think about planting some food in your backyard and getting to know your neighbors.

I think we’re in for quite a ride.

Related posts:

1. We Need Tighter Laws to Control the Speculation of Oil
2. Why a Culture of Speculation Has Led to the Economic Crisis
3. Oil Market Manipulation: The FTC’s Latest Target in Fighting the Rising Cost of Oil
4. The Scarcity of Time and the Quality of Decisions: Why You Shouldn’t Worry About the Price of Gas
5. The Government’s Latest Efforts to Rein in Oil Speculators