Back to the Canary in the Coal Mine

Returned today to Whole Foods for my daily coffee break and lunch. The eerie emptiness I spoke of yesterday was more so today.

Weird. Like the energy has collapsed into some holodynamic wheat grass abyss.

What does it mean?

Where have all the people gone? McDonalds perhaps? Where ever they are...they were not at Whole Foods for lunch today. Is the canary about to fall over? Stay tuned.

Now the really strange thing was contrasted by the people I met for lunch. My meeting was with people who are doing oil and gas development in the Uintah Basin in eastern Utah. Despite falling oil prices and the moth balling of drilling rigs, there is a ton of other activity that bodes very well for these carbon energy developers. Big money deals. Big energy development plans. Go figure.

For all who want to projectile vomit at the mere mention of oil and gas development, I feel compelled to remind you that alternative energy projects as romantic and delicious as they sound are many years away from replacing oil and gas for energy generation. And the inconvenient truth in the whole megillah is that more than 6000 products we use on a daily basis use petroleum as the source material from nylons to Vaseline.

Its important to point out that current Solar Technology, specifically solar panels, become hazardous waste when it completes its life cycle. BTW so does your cell phone, you iPhone, your iPOD and every other electronic gadget that makes your social media life work. So lets get real and own up to our part in the pollution of the planet. Collaboration, innovation and civility will go a long way to channeling our assets, brainpower and peeps to creating a world we all want to live in.

So, yes...we must continue to develop our oil and gas resources in parallel with alternative energy development. Someday we will have replacements for oil and gas, or we will have much cleaner ways to produce it including algae biodiesel and methane from farm waste. Until then we will have to walk hand in hand with the "oil from rock crew." The thing to keep in mind is that oil has fueled the growth of civilization. That is the fact of the matter. So don't get your thing in a sling. We need to make practical accommodations with existing energy sources or this canary really will die much sooner than any of us are comfortable with.

For clarification, my focus is on clean green energy projects. And that is ultimately where our future is. But I like to think that rational self-interest, national interests and the larger global community can have a conversation for change that preserves the current good, reduces or eliminates the current bad, creates the desired future good and reduces the likelihood of new problems.

I think that is a fair and balanced approach to the energy question.

Now for some good news for those of us who dream of an idyllic world where all energy generated is from renewable energy sources such as solar and wind. These oil and gas guys are actually investing in and raising funding for both large scale solar and algae based biodiesel projects in Utah and California for projects starting in 2009.

How's that for an economic stimulus?

Clean, green projects fueled by the new focus on renewable energy sources. Apparently the old "oily dawg" can learn new tricks, and I don't mean that in the pejorative sense.

So to quote Rodney King from back in the day; "Why can't we all just get along?"

Once again I chose the Ecuadorian Organic coffee. Still a good choice on a winter's day.