Quote:
Originally Posted by lbird
To be honest, if you really believe peak oil is here, you shouldn't be living downtown, you should be living in an acreage near Osler with a well, septic system and a large garden.
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I've thought about this extensively and have come to the conclusion that I'm absolutely useless at most forms of manual labour and devoting 90 percent of my time to subsistence wouldn't even help because I wouldn't know where to begin. Growing my own food and finding my own heat/energy sources and building my own shelter is a full time job that I'd have in addition to the one I already work, and would need to continue working at, as I build my off-grid acreage.
I do believe that peak oil has long come and gone, and the oil industry is getting desperate, sucking at straws to get every last hard-to-get drop to feed our incredible appetite for car culture. But, on the other hand, I do believe in the intrinsic value of the city, as a community of people that can build upon and take advantage of each-other's resources and talents, and as a far better place to live should the "shit hit the fan", rather than out in the middle of nowhere, on your own, with no one to help you but yourself. Although cities cannot grow food at capacity to meet internal demand, they can come closer than you might think, if current underutilized space (suburban backyards, road medians, rights of way, and community gardens) is devoted to food production, and we reduce the "size" of our resource footprint.
More often than not, I've got a dim view of humanity. But, I think we can change, it'll just take money out of our pockets, economic, social, and political upheaval, perhaps a little mass-starvation thrown in the mix as well, and gradually, behaviour and values will change.
Remember: when living on your acreage in the post-energy apocalypse, don't forget weapons. You'll need to them to fight off the zombies.
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