peakoil.com

[Incrementalist]

Regarding self-sufficiency, the peakoil.com forums have a great section on homesteading, including specific tactical threads about everything from raising chickens to performing maintenance and repairs on solar panels.

The section is called "Planning for the Future":

http://www.peakoil.com/forum8.html

No, I don't endorse peak oil theory, it's just a cool discussion section that happens to be in a peak oil board.

[Russell Kanning]

I think we are about to hit peakchicken.

[error]

Hey, now the federal government is going to get in on peak oil!

To better prepare for a peak in oil production, GAO recommends that the Secretary of Energy work with other agencies to establish a strategy to coordinate and prioritize federal agency efforts to reduce uncertainty about the likely timing of a peak and to advise Congress on how best to mitigate consequences. In commenting on a draft of the report, the Departments of Energy and the Interior generally agreed with the report and recommendations.

[eques]

Peak oil or no peak oil, I was reading about algal oil this morning.  It sounds deceptively simple--the yield from algae per acre blows all land-based crops out of the water (ha).  What I want to find out is if the cost of harvesting and extracting oil from algae is so high that it's not "commercially feasible."  Could it work on a small scale?

I was going to post about it and then decided I wanted to study it, but I may as well post about it anyway.  Maybe somebody else will have the skinny.

[Lloyd Danforth]

The University of NH has a big research project using Algae for making Bio-Diesel

http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/goals_index.html

[Insurgent]

Thanks for the link--looks like a good forum!

[Insurgent]

I just found a good website that serves as a basic primer on the concept of Peak Oil http://www.peakaware.com
It's very accessible and easy to navigate; it's something we can point people to who either aren't familiar with Peak Oil or are just beginning to learn about it. There are some terrific videos on there.

Another good introduction is at www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net The homepage has an excellent presentation on the ramifications of Peak Oil on civilization. There is also a breaking news section with constantly updated stories and articles.

For those already in the know, a more detailed, heavy and technical discussion happens at http://www.theoildrum.com

[Insurgent]

Another phenomenal resource is http://www.oilempire.us/index.html OilEmpire: A Political Map to Understand Peak Oil Wars

This site attempts to "connect the dots" of how everything is intertwined and related; Peak Oil, 9/11, WWIV, Media, Election Fraud, Fascism, etc. All of these are important issues, but without understanding how they are related, we can't understand the big picture. It's a wealth of information, and while the visual layout of the site isn't the greatest, it's well-worth digging around.

[Friday]

"If we took 1/10 of the state of New Mexico and converted it to algae production, we could meet all the energy demands for the entire United States."

http://www.valcent.net/i/misc/Vertigro/index.html

[dalebert]

"If we took 1/10 of the state of New Mexico and converted it to algae production, we could meet all the energy demands for the entire United States."

http://www.valcent.net/i/misc/Vertigro/index.html

That makes too much sense. The grain lobby will nip that in the bud.

[Lloyd Danforth]

I didn't open the link, but, New Mexico isn't the state I would pick to grow Algae.

[John Edward Mercier]

The point was the small amount of land it would take... and the biodiesel can already be used in the current infrastructure. Optimally the algae operations would be smaller but localized. Its the difference between collection waste vegetable oil, and discovering a way to produce the oil.

[Russell Kanning]

1/10 of NM is huge
that would take some serious flood irrigation ... maybe put it all behind a Mississippi river dike

[Pat McCotter]

Yep. It is 1.35 times as large as NH.

[Lloyd Danforth]

I'm guessing some of the gulf states would provide the most Algae