The
simultaneous onset of climate change and the peaking of global oil
supply represent unprecedented challenges for human civilisation.
Global oil peak has the potential to shake if not destroy the
foundations of global industrial economy and culture. Climate change
has the potential to rearrange the biosphere more radically than the
last ice age. Each limits the effective options for responses to the
other.
The strategies for mitigating the adverse effects and/or
adapting to the consequences of Climate Change have mostly been
considered and discussed in isolation from those relevant to Peak
Oil. While awareness of Peak Oil, or at least energy crisis, is
increasing, understanding of how these two problems might interact to
generate quite different futures, is still at an early state.