The Soft Landing  

Dave Roberts at The Gristmill has been in good form lately with a variety of energy related posts. This one outlines his thoughts on peak oil in the wake of the oil crisis exercise last week.

As I said last week, I'm not sanguine about our prospects in the face of peak oil.

It would be nice if the decline of oil supplies was slow and steady, markets adapted smoothly with the introduction of alternative fuels, and we came in for the much-touted "smooth landing." But those who envision such a scenario drastically underestimate just how delicate a situation we're in. We're trying to get from one side of a chasm (an oil-based economy) to the other (a healthy economy wherein oil is marginal) on a tightrope. While patting our head and rubbing our stomach. And reciting the alphabet backwards. Drunk. On one foot.

...

Nobody knows what's going to happen in the future, and anyone who predicts confidently begs to be made a fool. But we're in a tenuous balance. There are lots and lots of ways the spinning plates could start falling, setting off a cascading series of disasters.

And the path to a soft landing looks awfully narrow.