James Howard Kunstler - The Long Emergency: Surviving the End of Oil, Climate Change, and Other Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century

THE LONG EMERGENCY

SURVIVING THE END OF OIL, CLIMATE CHANGE, AND OTHER CONVERGING CATASTROPHES OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

JAMES HOWARD KUNSTLER

GROVE PRESS

NewYork

Copyright 2005 by James Howard Kunstler Epilogue copyright 2006 by James Howard Kunstler

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, or the facilitation thereof, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Any members of educational institutions wishing to photocopy part or all of the work for classroom use, or publishers who would like to obtain permission to include the work in an anthology, should send their inquiries to Grove/Atlantic, Inc., 841 Broadway, New York, NY 10003.

Published simultaneously in Canada Printedin the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Kunstler, James Howard.

The long emergency : surviving the end of oil, climate change, and other converging catastrophes of the twenty-first century / James Howard Kunstler. p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN-10: 0-8021-4249-4 ISBN-13: 978-0-8021-4249-8

1. Petroleum as fuelUnited StatesSocial aspects. 2. Fossil fuelsUnited StatesSocial aspects. 3. Petroleum industry and tradeUnited StatesHistory-20th century. 4.

Petroleum industry and tradeUnited StatesHistory-21st century. 5. Petroleum industry and tradeUnited StatesEconomic conditions-20th century. 6. Petroleum industry and trade

United StatesEconomic conditions21st century. 7. Renewable energy sourcesUnited States

Social aspects. 8. Climate and civilization. 9. EnvironmentalismUnited StatesSocial aspects. I. Title. TP355,K86 2005

303.4973dc22 2005040964

Grove Press

an imprint of Grove/Atlantic,

Inc. 841 Broadway

New York, NY 10003

Distributed by Publishers Group West

1098765432

06 07 08 09 10

THIS BOOK IS FOR MY FRIENDS' CHILDREN BENJAMIN GOLDEN NORABELLE GREENBERGER OLIVER AND NICKY EDSFORTH

THE FATAL METAPHOR OF PROGRESS, WHICH MEANS LEAVING THINGS BEHIND US, HAS UTTERLY OBSCURED THE REAL IDEA OF GROWTH, WHICH MEANS LEAVING THINGS

INSIDE US.

G. K. Chesterton

DO THE GODS EXIST? I DO NOT KNOW, BUT THEY SURE ACT AS IF THEY DID.

CONTENTS

1. SLEEPWALKING INTO THE FUTURE1

2. MODERNITY AND THE FOSSIL FUELS DILEMMA22

3. GEOPOLITICS AND THE GLOBAL OIL PEAK61

4. BEYOND OIL: WHY ALTERNATIVE FUELS WON'T RESCUE US100

5. NATURE BITES BACK: CLIMATE CHANGE, EPIDEMICS, ETC.147

6. RUNNING ON FUMES: THE HALLUCINATED ECONOMY185

7. LIVING IN THE LONG EMERGENCY235

EPILOGUE309

ONE

Carl Jung, one of the fathers of psychology, famously remarked that "people cannot stand too much reality." What you're about to read may challenge your assumptions about the kind of world we live in, and especially the kind of world into which time and events are propelling us. We are in for a rough ride through uncharted territory.

It has been very hard for Americanslost in dark raptures of nonstop infotainment, recreational shopping, and compulsive motoringto make sense of the gathering forces that will fundamentally alter the terms of everyday life in technological society. Even after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, that collapsed the twin towers of the World Trade Center and sliced through the Pentagon, America is are still sleepwalking into the future. We have walked out of our burning house and we are now headed off the edge of a cliff. Beyond that cliff is an abyss of economic and political disorder on a scale that no one has ever seen before. I call this coming time the Long Emergency.

What follows is a harsh view of the decades ahead and what will happen, in the United States. Throughout this book I will concern my-self with what I believe is happening, what will happen, or what is likely to happen, not what I hope or wish will happen. This is an important distinction. It is my view, for instance, that in the decades to come the national government will prove to be so impotent and ineffective in managing the enormous vicissitudes we face that the United States may not survive as a nation in any meaningful sense but rather will devolve into a set of autonomous regions. I do not welcome a crack-up of our nation but I think it is a plausible outcome that we ought to be prepared to face. I have published several books critical of the suburban living arrangement, which I regard as deeply pernicious to our society. While I believe we will be better off living differently, I don't welcome the tremendous personal hardship that will result as the infrastructure of that life loses its value and utility, I predict that we are entering an era of titanic international military strife over resources, but I certainly don't relish the prospect of war.

If I hope for anything in this book, it is that the American public will wake up from its sleepwalk and act to defend the project of civilization Even in the face of epochal discontinuity, there is a lot we can do to assure the refashioning of daily life around authentic local communities based on balanced local economies, purposeful activity, and a culture of ideas consistent with reality. It is imperative for citizens to be able to imagine a hopeful future, especially in times of maximum stress and change. I will spell out these strategies later in this book.

Our war against militant Islamic fundamentalism is only one element among an array of events already under way that will alter our relations with the rest of the world, and compel us to live differently at homesooner rather than laterwhether we like it or not. What's more, these world-altering forces, events, and changes will interact synergistically, mutually amplifying each other to accelerate and exacerbate the emergence of meta-problems Americans are woefully unprepared for the Long Emergency.

Your Reality Check Is in the Mail

Above all, and most immediately, we face the end of the cheap fossil fuel era. It is no exaggeration to state that reliable supplies of cheap oil and natural gas underlie everything we identify as a benefit of modem life. All the necessities, comforts, luxuries, and miracles of our timecentral heating, air conditioning, cars, airplanes, electric lighting, cheap clothing, recorded music, movies, supermarkets, power tools, hip replacement surgery, the national defense, you name itowe their origins or continued existence in one way or another to cheap fossil fuel. Even our nuclear power plants ultimately depend on cheap oil and gas for all the procedure: of construction, maintenance, and extracting and processing nuclear fuels The blandishments of cheap oil and gas were so seductive, and induced such transports of mesmerizing contentment, that we ceased paying attention to the essential nature of these miraculous gifts from the earth: that they exist in finite, nonrenewable supplies, unevenly distributed around the world. To aggravate matters, the wonders of steady technological progress under the reign of oil have tricked us into a kind of "Jiminy Cricket syndrome," leading many Americans to believe that anything we wish for hard enough can come true. These days, even people in our culture who ought to know better are wishing ardently that a smooth, seamless transition from fossil fuels to their putative replacementshydrogen, solar power, whateverlies just a few years ahead. I will try to demonstrate that this is a dangerous fantasy. The true best-case scenario may be that some of these technologies will take decades to developmeaning that we can expect an extremely turbulent interval between the end of cheap oil and whatever comes next. A more likely scenario is that new fuels and technologies may never replace fossil fuels at the scale, rate, and manner at which the world currently consumes them.