The End of Oil: The Decline of the Petroleum Economy and the Rise of a New Energy Order

by PaulRoberts (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2005

  $3.25

  Billions of people around the world enjoy an unprecedented standard of living based on one thing: oil. And each year we demand more. We produce and consume energy not simply to heat, feed, move or defend ourselves, but to educate, entertain, construct our world then fill it with stuff. Everything we buy, from a McDonald's hamburger to garden furniture to cancer drugs, represents a measure of energy produced and consumed. But how can this sustain itself, when already we have burned our way through half the easily available oil? Yet the pursuit of fuel is relentless. It can shape the diplomatic, economic and military strategies of nations, perverting the cultures and politics of entire regions; it props up corrupt governments and dictators; it fosters the instability and resentments that have already spawned Muammar Qaddafi, Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. In this devastating piece of reportage, Paul Roberts shows what is likely to happen, why the transition from oil will be complicated, traumatic and possibly dangerous, and what it will mean for our daily lives.

• Used

  Paperback
  2005

  $3.25

• Used

  Hardcover
  2004

  $3.25

  In a single century, we have evolved into a species for whom oil is as essential as air or water, and one that will go to inordinate lengths to protect it. In fact, petroleum is now so deeply entrenched in our economy, our politics, and our expectations of living standards and personal power that even modest efforts to replace it or phase it out are fought tooth and nail by the most powerful forces in the world: the oil companies and governments who depend on oil revenues; the developing nations who see oil as the only means to industrial success; and the Western middle class which refuses to modify its energy-lavish life-style. But within thirty years, by even conservative estimates, we will have burned our way through half the oil that is easily available. How will we break our addiction to oil? And what will we use in its place to maintain a global economy and political system that is currently entirely dependent on cheap, readily available energy? In this scrupulously researched and gripping book, Paul Roberts shows what is likely to happen, why the transition will probably be traumatic and dangerous, and suggests how and where the coming battle will be fought and what victory will mean for ordinary people.