Preparing NYC for energy constraints
One aspect of sustainability is climate change response. Equally vital, perhaps more likely to gain public support, and less widely discussed, are ways to prepare for increased fuel costs. A growing number of observers from government, military, science and business contend that we're about at the point where the world's demand for oil keeps increasing, but the world's overall rate of oil production peaks and goes into permanent decline. When this happens, the price and supply of oil will become increasingly volatile.- Current oil production data from Association for the Study of Peak Oil
- Energy Bulletin’s peak oil primer
- Wikipedia on peak oil
In
2005, the Hirsch Report, prepared for the US Department of Energy by a
team of physicists and economists employed by SAIC, said that the US
would need 20 years of massive Federal programs to buffer the impact of
the event.
“Peaking of World Oil Production: Impacts, Mitigation, & Risk
Management,” http://www.bartlett.house.gov/UploadedFiles/the_hirsch_report.pdf
http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d07283.pdf
For a long time, the International Energy Agency dismissed concerns of an imminent peak in world oil production, although each year, projected production increases became smaller and smaller. This year, the IEA's World Energy Report quietly admitted that conventional oil production already peaked - in 2006. Future production increases, according to the IEA, will come from oil fields that have not yet been found!
Higher energy
prices not yet on radar
NYC leaders are apparently unaware of the
paradigm shift in oil prices that may be just around the corner – but
so are almost all US government officials, aside from a few like
Congressman
Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD) and Assemblyman Terry
Backer (D-CT). On the other hand, fuel
depletion is being studied carefully by a growing number of military
analysts. In a bibliography
of 60 military reports on energy security,
40 cite peak oil as a near-term concern.
The U.S. Joint Forces Command puts out an annual
report to guide future military planning. The Joint
Operating Environment 2010 warns
that despite technological innovations and non-conventional oils, “by
2012, surplus oil production capacity could entirely disappear, and as
early as 2015, the shortfall in [worldwide] output could reach nearly
10 million barrels per day.” (P. 29) A group of British companies issued a 2010
report warning UK government and business to prepare for an oil crunch
within five years.
A few
cities have put out excellent initial reports on how to prepare for
volatile oil prices and supplies.
Bloomington,
Indiana Peak Oil Task Force Report, Oct.
2009
San Francisco Peak Oil Task Force, March 2009
Portland
Peak Oil Task Force, Feb. 2007
Shouldn't
NYC government officials and thought leaders start considering this
issue?
If NYC does not prepare now, we will have to develop
responses to the next fuel shocks as they are taking place. So
far, fuel volatility seems to be absent from the NYC policy arena. A bill to create an energy shortage
contingency plan was introduced to the
NYC Council in 2004 in response to the Northeast regional blackout, but
no action was taken.
This writer's 2008 report requested the City reexamine this issue.
Key recommendations included: (1) revising all City planning and
budgeting decisions to accomodate potentially higher energy costs; (2)
creating contingency plans for price spikes; and (3) promoting
sustainability initiatives as a way of buffering higher energy
costs.
It was distributed to many Bloomberg Administration officials and
Council members, and to NYC print media. Rohit
Aggarwalla, Director of the City's PlaNYC initiative,
politely replied that an energy
volatility task force would be duplicative of other
existing planning boards.
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