FrostyWooldridge's Blog

By Frosty Wooldridge

If you think America suffers an energy crisis, you haven't seen anything yet. Shall we drill offshore? In Alaska? Should we continue with as John Denver sang, "More scars upon the land"? When will we pull our heads out of our proverbial armpits? Sooner rather later! As T. Boone Pickens said, “It's time to jump to solar and wind power!”

In last week’s dueling op-ed in U.S. News and World Report, Joseph Romm and Robinson West battled via words to catch readers' ears. Their theme: energy and our oil price crisis! Romm demanded an end to our oil addiction. West countered with a reality check: it ain't gonna' happen!

They're both encouraged to remember Einstein's prophetic words, "The problems in the world today are so enormous they cannot be solved with the level of thinking that created them."

What constitutes the most enormous problem of our energy crisis that no national leader addresses? What creates massive demand without benefit to Americans?

Dr. Albert Bartlett, physics professor at Colorado University offers a clue, “We can demonstrate that the U.S. is overpopulated by noting that we now (2008) import 60 percent of the petroleum that we consume, 15 percent of the natural gas and about 20 percent of the food we eat. Because the U.S. population increases by over 3 million per year, all of these fractions are increasing. Natural gas production in North America has peaked in spite of the drilling of hundreds of new gas wells annually. In a nutshell, the U.S. in 2008 is unsustainable.” (Source: Vol. 27, No. 2, Spring 2008, Pg. 21--WHY HAVE SCIENTISTS SUCCUMBED TO POLITICAL CORRECTNESS)

Both Romm and West failed to address the most ignored culprit in this energy equation! Today, with 1.3 billion people, China expects a car in every garage and a chicken in every pot! Chinese citizens add 25,000 cars to their highways per week according to Brian Williams at NBC Nightly News. India follows them into the motoring age like a hailstorm after a tornado! Both countries burn millions of barrels daily while they compete for oil with the United States.

As Forrest Gump said, "Stupid is as stupid does." The United States imports two hundred thousand legal and illegal immigrants (about 2.2 to 2.4 million annually), or two Pasadena Rose Bowls filled with people--and tips the contents into this country every 30 days, month in and month out, year in and year out--without any plans to stop. Results? California leads the charge by adding 1,600 people every single day of the year! (Source: www.capsweb.org) They, in turn, add 400 new vehicles to California's roads 24/7.

Bio-fuel, according Cornell's David Pimentel, cannot and will not fulfill our need for an alternative to oil. Sunlight cannot generate enough electricity nor can wind power to run the engines of commerce at the levels needed today. It will take one or two technology breakthroughs the size of the Manhattan Project to bring viable energy alternatives to this civilization. See Picken’s web site.

“As we go from this happy hydrocarbon bubble we have reached now to a renewable energy resource economy, which we do this century, will the “civil” part of civilization survive? As we both know there is no way that alternative energy sources can supply the amount of per capita energy we enjoy now, much less for the 9 billion expected by 2050. And energy is what keeps this game going. We are involved in a Faustian bargain—selling our economic souls for the luxurious life of the moment, but sooner or later the price has to be paid.” Walter Youngquist

To put it bluntly, we cannot drill and grow our way out of this energy crisis!

T. Boone Pickens, a powerful oil man, presents on TV the fact that we spend $700 billion annually on foreign oil. “It’s the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of the world,” Pickens said. “I have a plan.” While our president and Congress sit on their hands, it takes a private citizen to take action. Go to www.pickensplan.com.”

Additionally, visit www.willyoujoinus.com to show you first hand what we confront. How much trouble do we face?

Dan B., a man intimate with Mexico, said, “We have less time than we think. The biggest money maker in Mexico is the petroleum industry. The second biggest is tourism. Most Mexican oil comes from the Cantarell oil field. It's expected to be depleted in three years. Mexico will be an oil importer in eight years. Because of the huge increases in crime, tourism is falling off. The recession here is closing out many jobs here. The remittance to Mexico is falling off. Oil provides about 45% of the income for Mexico. Tourism is about 30%. Imagine what will happen when the net income of Mexico is diminished by 60%.

“I spent 10 years driving around Mexico as a mechanic for the motor home caravans. I've been to every corner and I speak and write the language. Mexico has very little water. The Alta Plano has generally poor soil, same for the northern deserts. The same is true for the entire Yucatan peninsula. It's pure limestone, no nutrients. There are no rivers in the Yucatan because of the porosity of the limestone.

“No food and no money to buy food. The Latinos in the USA are starting to see that the competition from immigrants is depressing the job market. There should be an effort made to educate the Latinos here NOT to vote for pro-immigration policies or candidates.”

Reality check: let’s imagine for a moment that if we do keep drilling and growing successfully, and if we DO keep importing 2.2 million immigrants annually, our exploding energy crisis most certainly morphs into a water crisis beyond solving.

Symptoms now facing America include parched Lake Lanier, Georgia--drought affecting 37.5 million human overload in

California--$4.00 a gallon gas--grinding gridlock in our cities--suffocating air pollution--water crisis in Colorado--Lake Mead and Powell drying up along with dozens of your own experiences.

Will any of these problems vanish by drilling and growing? The fact remains, all those problems accelerate beyond solving with growth. It’s time to change our civilization toward sustainability.

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