Here we go again.

Anyone here remember the main horror story the Y2k loons told everyone and scared many people half to death? The one about how the electricity grid would fail because of date misinterpretations, and once it went down there would be no way to get it back up? People got so scared that some of them, including at least one high-profile IT expert and author, bought a home in a rural area of the US West (Montana, I believe), and many others literally bought sacks of rice and beans, cases of bottled water. One household I know installed a diesel generator.

This notion of Y2k causing a permanent blackout was compelling simply because everyone in an industrialized country knows how incredibly dependent we all are on electricity. Plus, the majority of people have no clue where their moving electrons come from or what it takes to get them from wherever they originate to the nearest wall outlet, so they were easily swayed by the “logic” of the doomers’ stories.

(And just for the record, I’m not saying that Y2k wasn’t a serious problem. I know for a fact that it was, and the main (only?) thing that saved us from major problems in computerized systems was the dedication and resourcefulness of many programmers and project managers. It really was an enormous challenge, and my fellow geeks rose to the occasion.)

I bring this up again because of how often I see this “the grid is toast” meme popping up in peak oil discussions. For example, in The end of civilization and the extinction of humanity:

One by one, starting in 2012, the world’s cities will experience permanent blackouts; and once we enter the Dark Age, the Stone Age won’t be too far behind. Bear in mind, I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, I know the current culture — the culture of make believe, or the culture of death, depending on how deeply you care to think about it — is the worst possible route for most of the planet’s species; as a conservation biologist, I realize the faster and more complete the collapse of Empire, the greater our biological legacy. On the other hand, the paralyzing hand of fear grips me every time I think about Peak Oil; a life in the ivory tower is damned poor preparation for Stone-Age living. Fortunately, I only think about it a few thousand times each day.

We have only five years until “the world’s cities will experience permanent blackouts”? Really? And this hyper-precise prediction is based on what, exactly? No, really–I want to know. [insert sound of crickets here]

Perhaps the answer is in the very next sentence: “Bear in mind, I have mixed feelings about this.” What kind of misanthrope sees “permanent blackouts” in “the world’s cities” just five years from now as anything but a monumental human catastrophe? And is that what would lead someone, anyone, to make such a terrifying prediction–they want to see the Big, Scary Thing Happen during their lifetime, so the world can be brought into line with their desires, no matter the human cost?

But wait, there’s more…

Don’t think for a minute that Internet shopping will replace small, locally owned shops in every town: After all, Internet shopping relies on cheap delivery, and delivery will no longer be cheap in the days ahead. In addition, Internet shopping depends on reliable electric-power systems. Electricity is a short-lived luxury because all sources of power are derivatives of oil; for example it takes a lot of oil to rip coal out of the ground, and then a lot more to deliver it to the power plant; it takes a lot of oil to construct a solar panel or a wind turbine, or even to maintain dams used to generate hydroelectric power.

OK, I’m going to type this slowly for all the people who think there’s some Deep Truth in the above paragraph.

• Notice the slick move from “oil will be expensive” to “there won’t be oil for even the really, really important things”. This is one of the hallmark Apocalypticon tactics.
• This paragraph assumes that there’s only one way to do things–with oil–or that we’ll be too stupid or won’t have the time to change to different methods. Neither possibility is based in reality.
• There is no attempt here to back up the assertions with facts. How much oil does it take to build a wind turbine at today’s oil price, and how much will it take once we adjust to oil that costs much more? With all the focus on reducing our greenhouse gases, how much coal will we use in coming years? How much oil is used to mine and transport coal? And then there’s my favorite–the oil needed to maintain hydro dams. Again: How much, and what are the options if oil becomes much more expensive? And how expensive would oil have to become before we, as a society, say, “Nope, that’s too expensive. I’ll just do without electricity”?

Later on (emphasis added):

We’ll also see pestilence — what we call disease, when it happens one person at a time — making a big comeback. Cheap oil allows us to sanitize our water, lethally cook harmful organisms, sterilize the surfaces on which we prepare and eat food, and manage many potentially catastrophic diseases. Contemporary American healthcare is completely dependent on ready supplies of cheap oil, for grid-based electrical power, backup generators, and thousands of pieces of equipment we all take for granted, from IVs and syringes to disposable gloves and plastic containers for tossing out contaminated needles and other sharp objects. When the trucks stop running, we won’t even be able to deliver antibiotics, unless ginormous numbers of non-apocalyptic horsemen suddenly appear. I hope society will retain some understanding of germ theory, so you are able to live at least half as long as your grandparents.

American health care depends on cheap oil for grid-based electricity? Really? According to the Annual Energy Review, Table 8.2a, petroleum accounts for 1.56% of US electricity generation. So that leaves us with that whole “we won’t be able to produce electricity from other sources if we don’t have cheap oil” thing.

The author borrows (and apparently endorses) James Howard Kunstler’s 10-step agenda, including:

Step 4: We must move people and things differently.

You’ve probably all seen the bumper sticker on about every fourth 18-wheeler on the interstate: “Without trucks, America stops.” That’s about right, at least with respect to economic growth. And the trucks are going to stop within the next half-decade or so. Shortly thereafter, the interstate highway system will simply collapse. Let’s not waste our time trying to prop up our hallucinatory economy with its fatal dependency on cars and trucks. Rather, we could restore public transit.

We could start with our railroads — currently, we have a rail system the Bulgarians would be ashamed of — and we could electrify our railways so they can run on renewable energy. Then we could move to the waterways, starting by ripping out the condos and bike paths from the inner-city harbors and then restoring the piers and warehouses (not to mention the sleazy accommodations for sailors). Numerous career opportunities lie ahead for those hardy individuals willing to put away their iPods and Blackberries long enough to chart the course.

Wait a second–we’re going to have “permanent blackouts” in “the world’s cities”, but one of the steps we need to take is to electrify rail using the same renewable sources that we can’t find enough oil to build or maintain?

Let me be painfully, unmistakably clear about why this kind of thing drives me nuts, and why it should get your back up, as well:

First, it’s the worst form of linear extrapolation. “We use resource X to do Y now, so when X becomes too expensive there won’t be any Y.” Oh brother. We won’t go from readily available $70 oil to worldwide shortages of $300 oil overnight. Hell, if we’re smart and aggressive enough in our conservation and transition efforts (and lucky enough to avoid an act of stupidity like a US war on Iran) we may never see $300 oil (measured in 2007 dollars, of course). There’s a fundamental lack of understanding of how the world works–from individuals through entire economies–inherent in such doomer predictions. I’ve said before that taking this view of our situation is akin to trying to solve a calculus problem with algebra.

Second, this shows an astonishing lack of lack of faith in humanity. We are far more resourceful and inventive than the sorry parody of humanity that doomers use to portray us. Here’s a hint for all the Apocalypticons out there: We will deal with global warming and peak oil and peak natural gas and who knows what else comes our way. It won’t be cheap or easy, but it won’t be anywhere near “the end of human civilization” as stated in this item’s title or the human disaster you predict. And we will laugh at you just as we now laugh at the TEOTWAWKI morons who scared people in the run-up to Y2k.

Third, it makes it much harder for those of us who are convinced that peak oil is a real, huge, and imminent challenge to reach out to mainstreamers. We tell them about peak oil, they do a few Google searches, and they find crackpot nonsense on the ‘net and then completely tune it out. If anything, the worst legacy of Y2k could be that people have learned to ignore any dire warnings or calls to action they read online, since that one turned out to be (from their perspective) a lot of wasted keystrokes and hours online.

If you really are convinced we’re headed to hell in a hand basket, then step up to the challenge and back up your predictions with solid analysis and facts. Educate us. Tell us exactly how things will play out in the coming years–what the price and availability of various resources will be and how we can mitigate the effects of those changes on human beings and the environment. Don’t just hand wave and make big, scary predictions. Get down here in the trenches with us and do the hard intellectual work and then teach people. You may think you’re doing that now, but you’re not even in the right time zone. All the Apocalypticons are doing is indulging themselves and their followers with doomer porn and turning away many people who need to understand how serious our situation is and take action now to help themselves and everyone else. At this point in our shared history, that’s the greatest disservice of all.