Geopolitics & resource wars

-Sanctions Are the Talk of the Day
-U.S. Wants Iran Sanctions In Weeks; Embassies Attacked
-Iran begins enriching higher-grade uranium, says state TV

A weekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Prices and production
-Sovereign debt and economic recovery
-Violence in Iraq
-Quote of the week
-Briefs

-The Nordic Diet
-UK overseas aid ignoring small scale agriculture
-Greece farmers demand subsidies at Athens protest march
-Gulf firm seeks long-term lease on Tanzanian farmland

A midweek roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Prices and production
-Asian demand
-Russian Economy: Un-BRIC-like during 2009

Peter Tertzakian has a double education in geophysics and economics and is "Chief Energy Economist" at a Canadian energy investment company. His book "A Thousand Barrels a Second: The Coming Oil Breakpoint and Challenges facing an energy dependent world" was published in 2007, but was, based on the contents of the book, presumably written up around 2005.

Silly me. Here I had thought that world leaders would want to keep their nations from collapsing. They must be working hard to prevent currency collapse, financial system collapse, food system collapse, social collapse, environmental collapse, and the onset of general, overwhelming misery—right? But no, that's not what the evidence suggests. Increasingly I am forced to conclude that the object of the game that world leaders are actually playing is not to avoid collapse; it's simply to postpone it a while so as to be the last nation to go down, so yours can have the chance to pick the others' carcasses before it meets the same fate.

-Shell stakes green future on sugar biofuel in $2bn Brazil venture
-Obama Set to Outline Biofuels Strategy
-Biofuel requirements for cars may help destroy the rainforest, watchdog says
-Biofuels: the Biggest Supply Response to the 2000s Oil Shock

-The Wayfinders: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World
-Who Will Build the Ark?
-Why Ecological Revolution?
-'Population Justice' — The Wrong Way to Go

-Haiti's Energy Problems
-Living on the edge of disaster
-The west owes Haiti a bailout. And it would be a hand-back, not a handout

A weekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Prices and Production
-Is the US Economy Recovering?
-Venezuela’s Auction
-Quote of the Week
-Briefs

At the moment it seems like everyone wants a piece of Angola. The queue of prominent visitors is long with the USA’s Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at its head. Where it smells of oil one can also find China ... The international oil companies are trying to maximize oil flows from Angola’s deep water fields where production is very expensive. This means that production from these fields will lie on a plateau for some years before the usual very rapid decline begins. If we look into the future this will mean that Angola will reach Peak Oil before 2030. According to Colin Campbell they will reach peak production in about 10 years.

-Obama pushes jobs after tough year
-Obama to Party: Don’t ‘Run for the Hills’
-Barack Obama commits to climate change bill
-Sanctions, regime change take center stage

The plans to build the politically and environmentally controversial Nord Stream pipeline have been in the air since 1997. With Finland and Sweden finally saying “yes” to the pipeline in their waters, the wheels of construction are now in full speed with the first line to be opened in the 2011. This will bring relief to Europe that is struggling with energy supply--yet not everyone is a winner.

-Past Peak Oil Travelling towards Transition
-Why Transition? Creating a Brighter Future
-The Future of our Food Supply
-'Peak water' could flush civilisation
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-Care Farming
-Campaign to save tropical forests failed by food giants
-Golf and the great Lao land grab
-Food carts take the curse off Portland’s parking lots
-One quarter of US grain crops fed to cars - not people, new figures show
-Reclaiming Value: An Interview with Raj Patel
-How Cows (Grass-Fed Only) Could Save the Planet