Peak Oil and Climate Change

-- linked issues in global ethics --

AbstractThis paper looks at the ethical implications of peak oil and climate change, viewed as closely interrelated global moral problems. The relation between the two issues is manifold; the burning of oil and other fossil fuels is the primary cause of climate change, strategies to mitigate both problems often overlap and sometimes conflict, and both are problems of overshoot resulting from crossing ‘limits to growth’. There is good reason, therefore, to look at the ways in which climate change and peak oil interact.

The first paragraph is an introduction into the scientific and empirical side to peak oil, necessary for understanding the moral problem it poses. In the second paragraph I explore the moral problem both issues pose in terms of global ethics. The most important aspects I discuss are that both problems are world scale, involve long chains of causality, draw on principles of fairness and therefore involve cooperation schemes, and provide additional arguments in favour of distributive justice. Finally, peak oil lessens the importance of the issue of future generations in environmental ethics.

The conclusion I draw in this paper is that we need a truly flexible and interdisciplinary approach to meet the harsh realities of the 21st century. This applies to both ideological frameworks of policy and scientific approaches to societies, economies and ecosystems. The necessary political and economic change of course must be informed by a proper scientific understanding of limits to growth interact with each other and affect societies. Only in this way can politics provide real solutions and mitigation strategies to the different problems posed by limits to growth.

18-1-2009Freek BlauwhofBachelor student of philosophy at the University of Amsterdam freekbb2@hotmail.com+31 6 53359138

Contents

Introduction: Two ‘Limits to Growth’ 3

Short Introduction to Peak Oil 5

What Kind of Moral Problems? 92.1 World scale 92.2 Coordination problems: schemes of fairness 102.3 Where peak oil changes things 12

Green Values: Sustainable Progress? 15

References 16

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Introduction: Two ‘Limits to Growth’

Most of the time climate change, the rise in global temperature and the problems this will likely result in get discussed on their own merits. This is understandable, since the extent of the problem is enormous, and the ways in which climate change will have an effect on the global ecosystem and the people living in it are complex and many. To name just a few consequences, climate change will cause sea levels to rise and countless hectares of arable land to turn to desert, it will interrupt supplies to critical water reservoirs, increase the frequency of natural disasters, and force countless species to disappear, while the lion’s share of all the risks will be endured by the worlds’ poor. All these things should be good reasons for moral concern. They force people across the planet in a vague but profound moral relationship, because actions of people all around the world contribute to global climate change by which everyone will be affected in the future. As the well known moral philosopher Peter Singer argued in his book ‘One World’, man-made climate change binds the whole world together as one moral community; there can be no clearer illustration of the need for human beings to act globally than the issues raised by the impact of human activities on our atmosphere.1 While we may not act like a global community (yet), the need for serious global cooperation seems quite evident.

But there are other problems the world as a single moral community has to come to terms with. One of these, the progressive depletion of conventional oil or ‘peak oil’, is especially relevant to the discussion of climate change. There are at least four reasons for thinking so. First, the two topics are causally related; after all, the burning of oil is the foremost cause of climate change. Second, the solutions that help alleviate peak oil and climate change often overlap, but sometimes clash.2 Third, both problems will likely not be solved or meaningfully mitigated if they are not dealt with in a coordinated manner. Richard Heinberg makes this argument forcefully in his book ‘The Oil Depletion Protocol’.3 He argues for an international agreement to reduce oil consumption and production. Without it, Heinberg writes, “many nations would be tempted to replace their reliance on oil with an increased use of coal.” This would vastly increase emissions, even though the world economy would have been forced by nature to use less oil. Implementation of Kyoto would also be undermined by increasing international competition for remaining reserves, which would “weaken the spirit of international cooperation required for the Kyoto Protocol to function.” And fourth, like the authors of the Limits to Growth suggest, both peak oil and climate change look like problems of overshoot:

“The three causes of overshoot are always the same, at any scale from personal to planetary. First, there is growth, acceleration, rapid change. Second, there is some form of limit or barrier, beyond which the moving system cannot safely go. Third, there is a delay or mistake in the perceptions and the responses that strive to keep the system

1 P. Singer, ‘One World’, (Yale University Press, 2002), p. 14.2 For instance, Coal-to-Liquids technologies can allow for more conventional transportation fuel, but cause significantly more emissions than conventional oil. On the other hand, CO2 storage alleviates climate change but does not reduce oil dependency.3 R. Heinberg, ‘The Oil Depletion Protocol’, (New Society Publishers , 2006) p. 85-89.

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within its limits. These are necessary and sufficient to produce an overshoot.”4

Quite obviously all three conditions apply. Both population and industrial production/consumption have grown exponentially, which has been made possible to a large extent by the discovery of fossil fuels and their uses. People, especially in the West, became accustomed to the idea of steady growth. Now the population-economy system, as the LtG authors call it, is growing so large we are experiencing limits that the nature of fossil fuels imposes on it. There is one ‘hard’ limit, laid down by the finity of oil5 that we cannot physically cross, and there is a ‘soft’ limit, formed by climate change, that we cannot cross without doing immense damage. The two correspond neatly with the earth’s ‘sources and sinks’:

“The physical limits to growth [of population and the economy] are limits to the ability of planetary sources to provide materials and energy and to the ability of planetary sinks to absorb pollution and waste.”6

The delays that will make us feel these limits are also quite apparent. Of course there are ideological and political delays to real energy transition, required for dealing with both climate change and peak oil. Most politicians see proposing a serious programme of economic self-restraint as either undesirable or a risk to popularity. And many corporations lobby to soften legislation forcing them to reduce emissions.7 But there are also physical delays.

The physical delays of climate change are disastrous. There is a considerable time lag between the emission of greenhouse gases and a resulting effect on the world’s climate. Therefore we are experiencing the effects of the emissions of the past, and people in the future will experience the consequences of the greenhouse gases emitted right now. A central controversy among climate scientists makes this delay even worse; a study done by James Hansen et al. implies that natural positive feedback loops might make for a point of no return sooner than the IPCC suspects.8

For the economic consequences of peak oil, the delay is also considerable. To replace the energy sources that the world economy relies on will take a long time. A study done by energy consultant Robert Hirsch9 gives us an idea as to how much. He concluded governments will need to start with serious efforts 20 years ahead of peak oil to avoid economic damage, or 10 years ahead to avoid

4D. Meadows, J. Randers, D. Meadows, ‘Limits to Growth, The 30-year Update’, (Chelsea Green Publishing Company, 2004) p. 1.5 The production of gas and especially coal will peak later than that of oil.6 D. Meadows, J. Randers, D. Meadows, ‘Limits to Growth, The 30-year Update’, (Chelsea Green Publishing Company, 2004) p. 9.7 For example, in 2007, BMW, Daimler and Porsche received the ‘Worst EU Lobbying Award’ for delaying EU emissions legislation.8 J. Hansen, M. Sato, P. Kharecha, G. Russell, D. W. Lea, M. Siddall, ‘Climate change and trace gases’, (2007)9 R. Hirsch, R. Bezdek, R. Wendling, ‘Peaking of World Oil Production: Impacts, Mitigation, and Risk Management’, DOE NETL, (2005).

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serious and major shortages. And since most serious studies forecast the peak date to fall in the coming decade, we have long passed the best opportunity to deal with the many problems peak oil will cause.

Clearly it’s worthwhile to understand the concept of oil depletion. Peak oil poses a huge problem on its own. But we have already seen that peak oil has many implications for and similarities with climate change. And the same goes for the practical strategies that could mitigate these problems. Because of these reasons I want to argue in this paper that it is a central challenge and duty for green thinkers and politics to formulate an integral vision on how to make the transition to a truly sustainable10 economy possible. We need to avoid as much ecological and economic damage and international conflict as possible, while striving to hold on to social justice. To succeed, it will not do to just concentrate on one particular problem, perspective or theoretical framework; rather we need a truly flexible and interdisciplinary approach to meet the harsh realities of the 21st century.

To show this I will first briefly introduce the basics of peak oil in §1, because not every reader might be familiar with the issue. I’ll assume that the basic discussion of climate change is clear, however. §2 will offer a reflection on what kind of moral problem peak oil and climate change pose to the world community. Finally, §3 I will draw conclusions about the challenges for green politics and ideology.

Short Introduction to Peak Oil

While there is much controversy around the topic of oil depletion, understanding that the production of oil will peak sooner or later is relatively easy. The state of world conventional oil production is made visible at once in figure 1:

Figure 1: Oil Discovery vs. Oil Production (ASPO 2004)

10 And I don’t use this term lightly!

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The columns represent yearly discovery of new oil fields. The biggest and easily accessible oil fields were found first, and the 1960s were to be the decade in which the most oil was found. But since that time the new discoveries have declined, and the world economy started to use more oil every year than is found since 1981. In this decade, the world started to use four barrels of oil for every barrel exploration can find. So if the word ‘unsustainable’ is to have any meaning, it applies to continued growth of consumption of oil. The production of oil is going to fall inevitably, and probably not much after half of the total oil is produced.

The relevance of all this is revealed by all the evidence that oil plays an enormous role in the world economy. There were the oil shocks of the ‘70s, which caused considerable stagflation and long recessions in the West. Following those oil shocks, studies done by professor Reiner Kümmel and Robert Ayres11

refined the standard model explaining economic growth. They suggest the actual work that energy sources do in the real economy accounts for 55-70% of GDP growth in the USA, Germany, and Japan, between 1945 and 2000, with oil being the prime source of energy.

So far I have only written about the quantity of normal easy oil. A complete account of our energy situation would refer to all the new energy sources and technologies; deepwater oil, heavy oil including tar sands, oil from the north pole, oil shale, natural gas liquids and coal-to-liquids, ethanol, first and second generation, oil from algae, electrical cars and hydrogen.

Figure 2: Jean Laherrère's model (as presented at the ASPO Conference in Lisbon 2005)12

11 A few seminal essays on this: C. Hall, D. Lindenberger, R. Kümmel, T. Kroeger, W. Eichhorn, ‘The Need to Reintegrate the Natural Sciences and Economics’, BioScience, Vol. 51, No. 8, (2001) 663-673.R. U. Ayres, B. Warr, ‘Accounting for Growth: The Role of Physical Work’, Structural Change and Economic Dynamics. 16 (2005): 181–209.12 Download the whole report at: www.peak-oil-crisis.com/Laherrere_PeakOilReportMay2005.pdf

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I don’t have time to discuss all these in detail. Some are good ideas, some are bad; some are small contributions to mitigation of peak oil and climate change, some bigger, for different reasons open to discussion. But they are very unlikely to keep economic growth going much longer the way we got used to it.

A precise discussion of alternative sources of fuel may not even be that crucial for the bigger picture. One reason for this is explained in the next graph, made by one of the students of the oil peak who forecasts the peak the latest. Jean Laherrère, former head of exploration at Total, suggests that even if there would be 1 trillion more barrels of oil available than is assumed by many others, the peaking of production will not happen much further in the future. In figure 2 he assumes there will be 1 trillion barrels of oil worth of unconventional oil, itself peaking after 2050, but these additions lead to an ‘All Liquids Peak’ around 2015.

Another critical aspect of the peak oil debate concerns not the quantity, but the quality of oil. As is the case with the exploitation of any resource, oil extraction begins with the biggest and most easily accessible fields. As those deplete extraction moves on to the more difficult resources. The implications of this are often described in terms of Energy Investment on Return, or EROI. The following graph illustrates this concept; the physical process of oil extraction in 1930s America cost one barrel of oil for every hundred extracted. Nowadays, the process takes one barrel for every ten to twenty barrels extracted; the oil in smaller and less accessible fields requires much more energy to produce.

Figure 3: EROI versus energy resource size (Charles Hall et al.13)

13 C. Hall, R. Powers, W. Schoenberg, ‘Peak Oil, EROI, Investments and the Economy in an Uncertain Future’ in D. Pimentel ed., ‘Biofuels, Solar and Wind as Renewable Energy Systems’ (Springer Press, 2008)

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Declining trends in EROI means that more and more energy is being consumed by the industry that supplies the energy to broader society. This means that the decline in net energy, which is the energy available to society, is likely to decline steeper than total production. So in the case of oil and other liquids, the net energy production curve might look something like figure 4:

Figure 4: ASPO 2004 Total Liquids Scenario updated by Colin Campbell14

In short, peak oil poses a problem that one can only describe at the risk of sounding melodramatic. But I will not tone down my conclusions for the sake of appearances. As the bulk of economic growth has relied on cheap and abundant energy, peak oil (and gas) will very likely curb the trend of sustained growth the world economy has maintained in the course of the last century and a half. For that to continue until some next natural limits are in view, much more preparation should already have been done. Furthermore, a lack of preparation for the oil peak means the crises of the ‘70s will be relived. Only this time no one can open the pipelines again, and countries will be forced to use scarce non-renewable energy to make their energy transitions happen.

Oil shortages would have many effects on our consumer societies. Just make a list of products made using oil and this will become evident. But the most striking are the consequences for agriculture’s green revolution that has relied on petrochemicals. Peak oil combined with soil fertility decline and water problems aggravated by climate change can lead to serious shortages of food in the longer term. One would begin to wonder how relevant Thomas Malthus might be for the 21st century, and remember discussions about population growth control (at the risk of losing all credibility in the marketplace of ideas!).

But this is not to say there is nothing that can be done. From the individual to the international level, there are ways to fairly organise reduction and replacement of oil consumption. However, the 20-year head start that Robert Hirsch proposed to is not possible any more. No respectable expert looks further than 202015 for the oil peak, and even this would leave 11 years. So the conclusion must be that people should have listened to the Club of Rome long

14From R. Costanza, ‘Ecological Economics: Creating a Sustainable and Desirable Future’.

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before. What is realistically possible now, and what therefore should be our moral goal, is damage control.

§2: What Kind of Moral Problem?

Now we have a sufficient understanding of the physical aspects of peak oil and climate change, I want to analyse in this paragraph what kind of moral problems peak oil and climate change pose. This is not an easy matter, because neither problems look like the clear-cut moral cases we are used to.

This has to do with the long chains of causality in global problems like climate change and peak oil. If Joe steals Rose’s car, Joe directly violates Rose’s particular right of property to her car. Because of the direct causality, is very intuitive that Joe did something wrong, and giving back the car would be the obvious way to right the wrong.

But when Joe contributes to the overall level of CO2 in the global atmosphere, which might harm Rose’s children in one way or another in the future, the moral problem looks quite different; there is only very mediated causality, a long time lag exists between cause and effect, and a huge coordination problem for game theorists to study. In no way could one say that Joe has a direct moral duty to stop driving, for example. Given the absence of clear moral duties to do this or that, how can climate change and peak oil be addressed as moral problems? In this paper I can only be brief, and this paper can by no means be called a conclusive analysis. But meaningful things can be said about the form of the problem, which give some idea about fair solutions. I’ll start with climate change, and arrive at how peak oil comes into play later.

2.1 World scale

At the risk of being repetitive, I will stress again that the emergence of global problems that involve the actions of almost everyone as cause forces people all over the world in one global community. There is just one atmosphere, and borders or nationalities don’t make a difference on the global climate. International politics has not really been true to this idea, of course, especially since the turn to power politics following the attacks on September the 11th

2001. But whether citizens or state officials like it or not, their actions have a great impact on the life of people all over the world for centuries to come. Personal efforts to reduce emissions are of course applaudable, but have no real effect on human caused climate change. This is why an international cooperative scheme following up Kyoto is so important; only in this way can coordination problems between states be tackled, and responsibility shared.

I will simply assume here that letting climate change reach an irreversible point would mean a grave moral failure of the world community as a whole. I cannot say that this implies a moral failure of anyone in particular, and this

15 Willem Middelkoop and Rembrandt Koppelaar, in their book ‘De Permanente Oliecrisis’, (Nieuw Amsterdam Uitgevers, 2008) published a US Department of Energy list of oil experts and their peak date forecasts (page 40). The forecasts mostly range between 2006 and 2015.

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leaves open quite some space for philosophical criticism.16 But the stakes are high enough to accept a general moral duty for the international community to prevent serious climate change. Because of this, all people and especially their representative state officials have a responsibility to join an international cooperative scheme like Kyoto when they have the opportunity.

2.2 Coordination problems: schemes of fairness

So, there are two good reasons for an international cooperative scheme; one is that it seems to be the only workable way to prevent serious climate change or to reduce its effects. The other is that it would allow for a fair allocation of responsibilities between states and their citizens.

Of course, there are all kinds of possible schemes. Different ideas about justice would lead to different allocations of responsibilities to reduce emissions. The world community can, for example, look back in history and demand compensation for past emissions. This would lay a heavier burden on already industrialised countries than just requiring reductions of future emissions. There are also good reasons to see climate change in a context of global justice issues in general, including issues like the widening gap between rich and poor, or ensuring global water and food security. Because of all these possibilities, let us keep to actually proposed schemes.

In his book ‘The Oil Depletion Protocol’, Richard Heinberg names three different well-known ones. Let us take two examples. The first is obviously the Kyoto Protocol. This relatively mild agreement demands a 5.2% reduction relative to 1990 greenhouse gas emission levels of the signatory developed countries, to be achieved in 2012. This should be followed up by a stricter agreement settled in Copenhagen at the end of this year, with emissions reductions for all countries, and a fund to help developing countries meet their targets. This can be seen as a mild political compromise to let the distribution of responsibilities reflect past emissions and solidarity. Whether a reached agreement could keep emission levels under a critical point of no return17

remains to be seen, however. The second proposal is Contraction and Convergence (proposed by the

Global Commons Institute). This scheme assumes a completely equal right for each person in the world to pollute ‘the global commons’. It would do that by allotting an amount of rights consistent with 450 ppm of CO2 in 2100 on a per capita basis. The differences in per capita emissions are, of course, enormous, so take time to even out. This should be achieved by 2050 under C&C.

The differences in possible cooperative schemes are interesting, but unfortunately this discussion is unlikely to have much political influence. Judging from the time the Kyoto process has taken up to now, and that the atmosphere already contains around 380 ppm of CO2, we may consider ourselves lucky if the Copenhagen negotiations will lead would take a step towards 20% to 40% of CO2

reductions by 2030.18 This target might still not be enough to prevent serious

16 A particularly hard one is posed by Derek Parfit’s Non-Identity Problem; D. Parfit, ‘Reasons and Persons’ (Oxford University Press, 1984).17 The IPCC thinks that this point might be reached at 450 ppm, while James Hansen (see ‘Climate change and trace gases’), concludes it is reached much sooner than that.

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climate change. I will, however, argue in the next paragraph that climate change generates moral reasons for distributive global justice.

2.2.1 The rich pollute, the poor suffer the effects

Obviously, per capita income and per capita emissions have something to do with each other. The more you can spend, the more fossil energy sources you consume, the more you emit. So the world’s wealthy carry the most responsibility for climate change.

Figure 5: Deaths Caused by global warming per country (World Health Organisation 2004)

In addition, the global poor are in a much worse position to defend themselves from the effects of climate change. According to the UN and World Bank, almost half of the worlds population live from less than 2$ a day poverty line, and one fifth live below $1.08 1993 PPP. Especially these people will lack proper health care, and access to food and potable water. They will also be the ones who suffer the must from natural disasters. These suspicions are confirmed by Figure 3 from the World Health Organisation. According to this map, almost all deaths attributed to climate change up to now have taken place in developing countries.

So, if anything, climate change must add to the (already convincing) arguments for global distributive justice19. Unfortunately I think an international proposal really dealing with global distributive justice on top of an adequate prevention of serious will have little chance in the coming years.

2.3 Where peak oil changes things

18 That this reduction is by no means sure is well illustrated in a recent interview by journalist George Monbiot with the Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC, Yvo de Boer (see references).19 Two good books arguing for global redistribution of wealth: P. Singer ‘One World’ (Yale University Press, 2002) and T. Pogge ‘World Poverty and Human Rights: Cosmopolitan Responsibilities and Reforms’ (Polity Press, 2008).

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Now we have some idea of what kind of moral problem climate change poses. Climate change can be described as a negative outcome of a global coordination problem involving most people on the planet. It leads to grave damage to people a considerable time in the future. Nobody who emits has a direct duty to stop emitting fossil fuels, but everyone does have a general duty to join a cooperative scheme like Kyoto. Let’s see how this picture changes with peak oil.

2.3.1 The problem on its own

As we have seen in §1, peak oil doesn’t need climate change to be a real problem. The consequences of not preparing for the peak are quite enormous, since it takes so much time to replace entire economic infrastructures that rely on particular technologies. It shares many characteristics with climate change as a moral problem. It is also an essentially global problem. It requires changing direction in the world economy, since the economies of almost all countries ‘want’ more and more oil to grow. Efforts of reducing consumption of individuals or even most individual countries will not help stabilise the world markets for energy sources. It is true, however, that individuals, municipalities and states by themselves can have an effect on the consequences of peak oil, since they can make their polity less dependent on oil (and international trade). Sweden and Iceland20 have undertaken such a serious effort, which can provide examples for others. This means that without a global coordination scheme to deal with the oil peak, mitigation is still possible at smaller scales. But international rivalry and the general turn to power politics since 9-11 is likely to worsen in this scenario, leaving little room for cooperation on the kinds of global problems posed by limits to growth. (I will relate this issue to climate change in §2.3.3)

David Strahan provides a central example of how conscious strategies for oil depletion can go bad as well. It involves a weighty politician acutely aware of the problem, Dick Cheney. That he is aware of oil depletion is made perfectly clear in a speech he gave in 1999 as CEO of Halliburton for an audience of oil managers in the London Savoy Hotel. But after appointing himself vice-president two years later, his strategy for oil depletion was not exactly one of reducing consumption, energy transition, or global cooperation. 21

Even more difficult will be the effort to keep agricultural production meeting global food demand. This will probably require serious global cooperation to work. As we have seen in 2008, food crises invite protectionism from exporting countries; this mostly made the food crisis worse.

So, it seems efforts to control the damage peak oil will cause will also benefit greatly from an international cooperative scheme. Interesting efforts of mitigation are possible at smaller scales, but fail to address the full scope of the problem. A duty to cooperate in an ‘Oil Depletion Protocol’ for oil importers and exporters looks plausible, just as in the case of climate change.

This is exactly what Colin Campbell, the founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil, the Post Carbon Institute and Richard Heinberg propose and

20 The Guardian ‘Sweden plans to be world's first oil-free economy’ (8-2-06), Renewable Energy World ‘Geothermal Energy Leaves the Window Open for Iceland’s Economy’ (20-11-08)21 D. Strahan, ‘The Last Oil Shock’, (John Murray Publishers, 2007), p. 2-5 on Cheney’s Halliburton years, p.19-22 on the Energy Taskforce and Iraq.

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campaign for. They argue for an international rationing agreement, not unlike the Kyoto Protocol. According to this agreement importing countries would be bound to reduce their yearly imports by the world average depletion rate. This can be calculated by finding the amount of oil yet-to-produce, by adding up how much oil is known to be left (remaining reserves) with projected discovery in the future (yet-to-find). The yearly production of oil is then divided by the amount yet-to-produce, which gives the world depletion rate. Colin Campbell calculated this figure at around 2.6% in 2006. Producing countries would be required to reduce their yearly production by their national depletion rate. Individual countries would decide how the reduction of consumption should come about.

As was the case with distribution schemes for emission rights, we can ask ‘why exactly this formula?’. Heinberg gives three reasons for using the world depletion rate; “because Campbell’s formula is non-arbitrary, intuitively graspable by the layperson, and within the range of percentages that would likely be negotiable”22. I would add a fourth reason, namely that using the world depletion rates would smooth out production and consumption of oil. The faster oil is being produced in one year relative to the total amount yet-to-produce, the more the production would need to be restrained under the Oil Depletion Protocol. This allows for a stable oil market, allowing predictability required for long term economic decisions (whether by governments or companies).

2.3.2 Necessity of reducing consumption and energy transition

One big effect that oil (and gas) depletion has on the discussion of climate change as a moral problem is that reduction of consumption of fossil fuels will soon be inevitable. If people don’t decide to reduce their consumption of oil and gas in self-restraint, nature will reduce it for them. As far as energy transition, efficiency and reduction of fossil energy is concerned, peak oil means that the choice is not between restricting contemporaries’ rights and freedoms now to prevent harm to future generations at large later. It is rather between restricting consumption before the peak to reduce economic and geopolitical chaos, or letting oil shortages wreak their havoc at full force.

So a proper understanding of peak oil gives additional reasons for undertaking a serious transition to renewable energy sources, combined with reduction of energy demand. This project is now no longer a voluntary act of solidarity with future generations or people across the globe; it is a geological necessity for the self-interest of current generations. This means that the philosophical argument about future generations is important, but not all deciding. A concern about climate change impact on future generations still limits the choice of energy sources replacing oil and gas. While the emissions caused by the burning of oil and gas will diminish because of geological reasons, coal is still quite abundant. To prevent serious climate change, it is crucial that the burning of coal is limited voluntarily, out of moral concerns.

On the whole, peak oil means that for an important part of global warming mitigation strategies, much less altruism is required; so there is a greater potential for action. Provided, of course, that enough citizens and policy makers can be informed about oil depletion.

22 R. Heinberg, ‘The Oil Depletion Protocol’ (New Society Publishers, 2006), p. 79.

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2.3.3 Possibility of ruining Kyoto-type solutions

It is inevitable that the depletion of oil and natural gas will force a reduction of consumption. This can lead to a kick-start in renewable energy, but it can also tempt people to increase use of energy sources that would be disastrous for the climate. A turn to heavy oil and tar sands, oil shale (if ever possible), coal and coal-to-liquids especially would lead to much more emissions than conventional crude oil. A large increase in the inefficient first generation biofuels would also lead to competition between energy and food production. If global cooperation to stabilise the energy market will not come about, chances are that individual countries will turn to dangerous technologies to fuel their economies, and compromise Kyoto-like efforts to prevent serious global warming.

2.3.4 Distributive Justice

As a last topic in this chapter, I would like to say a few things about what peak oil implies for distributive justice. In §2.2.1, we have seen that the effects of global warming provide strong arguments for global distributive justice. What would peak oil imply for this discussion?

As I have tried to show in §1, peak oil (among other limits to growth like agricultural productivity) will likely end the trend of steady economic growth seen in the 19th and 20th century. If this is true, it reduces the applicability of one of the most common philosophical justifications of economic inequality, John Rawls’ famous ‘Difference Principle’:

“Social and economic inequalities are to satisfy two conditions: (a) They are to be attached to positions and offices open to all under conditions of fair equality of opportunity; and (b), they are to be to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged members of society.”23

This principle is meant to satisfy the idea that more wealth for everyone can be generated in an economic system in which productive members of a society are rewarded for their productivity. Put simply, if inequality can lead to a bigger economic pie for all, the worst-off might end up with a bigger absolute share of the pie, even if their relative share is smaller. But assuming peak oil will end the possibility to grow economic pies beyond current levels, it also reduces the possibility to justify economic inequality under the difference principle.

It does not follow here, however, that all economic inequality is unjustified. Even if economic growth will never be possible again, it might still be the case that imposing complete economic equality would harm the economy as a whole. Also, the difference principle is meant to apply only inside nation states. Any valid argument about international redistribution would cover too much philosophical ground to say anything decisive here. But it seems clear that peak oil and other dangers to human survival, like those posed by changes in water supply and soil fertility decline, will only increase the stakes involved in the discussion about international distributive justice and poverty relief. In a world

23 See J. Rawls, ‘A Theory of Justice’ (Harvard University Press, 1971), and J. Rawls, ‘Political Liberalism’ (Columbia University Press, 1993).

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where more people have to do with less, the need for solidarity is that much more critical.

Conclusion: Sustainability and Ideology

If we don't change our course, we'll end up where we're headed. — Chinese proverb

From this short attempt to make moral sense out of some difficult global problems facing the world population as a whole in this 21st century, it seems that there are quite overwhelming moral reasons for serious political cooperation between people and their nations on a global scale. This should involve a fundamental change of economic course guided by both a stricter version of the Kyoto Protocol and a parallel Oil Depletion Protocol. Still further away from political reality, there are ever more reasons for global redistribution of wealth to ensure the basic necessities of life for all people on earth.

These ideas might sound radical to most people, but I don’t think they rely on any radical moral beliefs. Instead, I believe this perceived radicality is just the result of common and quite elementary morality combined with a proper understanding of the problems of overshoot caused by continuous growth of the population-economy system (to speak again with the authors of Limits to Growth). It is indeed time that the world reads this book again. Far too long we looked for policies through the lens of free market economics, while largely ignoring the material nature and limits of the real economy. This has led to a largely unquestioned pursuit of GDP growth as a remedy to various problems; so much so that a stagnant GDP is normally viewed as a serious problem itself!

To repeat the central argument I promised to defend in this paper; we need to avoid as much ecological and economic damage and international conflict as possible, while striving to hold on to social justice. To succeed, it will not do to just concentrate on one particular problem, perspective or theoretical framework; rather we need a truly flexible and interdisciplinary approach to meet the harsh realities of the 21st century. At the very least, this requires that neoclassical economics should be balanced by a system dynamics view on the economy, that states should be engineering energy conservation and transition with serious effort, and that geopolitical power games must be replaced with genuine international cooperation. I hope this position has become plausible, and that the need for real sustainability is evident.

The flexible and interdisciplinary approach I call for can be called an ideological change, but only in terms of how to realise perceived values. Green politics will have to find local and regional possibilities for energy transition. It will have to set up a monetary system that will not lead to foreclosures and unemployment when growth is not possible. It will have to deal with the effects of climate change, to find ways to secure food and water supplies across the world, to deal with international political crises and prevent resource wars. All this requires a radical break from 20th century politics, economics, and diplomacy.

But it cannot mean a change in terms of moral values. Sustainability cannot be a moral value by itself. The word only points to the way any

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reasonable interpretation of human flourishing can be realised for most people over time. What other value should political action try to realise, if not sustained human flourishing for all?

So, to start with, let’s challenge the common idea that green politics is a optional side-issue for the fans of the environment. Green politics should not be afraid to make clear to the general public that without a green revolution in policy, the future will not be as bright as it still can be!

References

Books:

R. Heinberg, ‘The Oil Depletion Protocol’, (New Society Publishers, 2006).

D. Meadows, J. Randers, D. Meadows, ‘Limits to Growth, The 30-year Update’, (Chelsea Green Publishing Company, 2004).

W. Middelkoop and R. Koppelaar, ‘De Permanente Oliecrisis’, (Nieuw Amsterdam Uitgevers, 2008).

D. Parfit, ‘Reasons and Persons’, (Oxford University Press, 1986).

T. Pogge, ‘World Poverty and Human Rights: Cosmopolitan Responsibilities and Reforms’, (Polity Press, 2008).

J. Rawls, ‘A Theory of Justice’, (Harvard University Press, 1971).

J. Rawls, ‘Political Liberalism’, (Columbia University Press, 1993).

P. Singer, ‘One World’, (Yale University Press, 2002).

D. Strahan, ‘The Last Oil Shock’, (John Murray Publishers, 2007),

Articles:

R. Ayres, B. Warr, ‘Accounting for Growth: The Role of Physical Work’, Structural Change and Economic Dynamics. Vol. 16, No. 1, (2005): 181–209.

C. Hall, D. Lindenberger, R. Kümmel, T. Kroeger, W. Eichhorn, ‘The Need to Reintegrate the Natural Sciences and Economics’, BioScience, Vol. 51, No. 8, (2001): 663-673

C. Hall, R. Powers, W. Schoenberg, ‘Peak Oil, EROI, Investments and the Economy in an Uncertain Future’ in D. Pimentel ed., ‘Biofuels, Solar and Wind as Renewable Energy Systems’ (Springer Press, 2008).

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J. Hansen, M. Sato, P. Kharecha, G. Russell, D. W. Lea, M. Siddall, ‘Climate change and trace gases’, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A, (2007), 365

http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2007/2007_Hansen_etal_2.pdf

R. Hirsch, R. Bezdek, R. Wendling, ‘Peaking of World Oil Production: Impacts, Mitigation, and Risk Management’, DOE NETL, (2005).

http://www.netl.doe.gov/publications/others/pdf/Oil_Peaking_NETL.pdf

J. Laherrère, ‘Peak Oil Report’, (presented at ASPO conference, Lisbon, 2005).www.peak-oil-crisis.com/Laherrere_PeakOilReportMay2005.pdf

The Guardian, ‘Sweden plans to be world's first oil-free economy’ (8-2-06).

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/feb/08/frontpagenews.oilandpetrol

Renewable Energy World ‘Geothermal Energy Leaves the Window Open for Iceland’s Economy’ (20-11-08).

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/story?id=54131

Miscellaneous Internet Sources:

Journalist George Monbiot interviews Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC, Yvo de Boer (2008):

http://therealnews.com/t/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=2943

R. Constanza, ‘Ecological Economics: Creating a Sustainable and Desirable Future’, http://www.uvm.edu/giee/publications/Ecological%20Economics.ppt

ASPO homepage: http://www.peakoil.net/

Post Carbon Institute Homepage: http://www.postcarbon.org/

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