The Party's Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies

Book Description

The world is about to run out of cheap oil and change dramatically. Within the next few years, global production will peak. Thereafter, even if industrial societies begin to switch to alternative energy sources, they will have less net energy each year to do all the work essential to the survival of complex societies. We are entering a new era, as different from the industrial era as the latter was from medieval times.

In The Party's Over, Richard Heinberg places this momentous transition in historical context, showing how industrialism arose from the harnessing of fossil fuels, how competition to control access to oil shaped the geopolitics of the 20th century, and how contention for dwindling energy resources in the 21st century will lead to resource wars in the Middle East, Central Asia, and South America. He describes the likely impacts of oil depletion, and all of the energy alternatives. Predicting chaos unless the U.S. -- the world's foremost oil consumer -- is willing to join with other countries to implement a global program of resource conservation and sharing, he also recommends a "managed collapse" that might make way for a slower-paced, low-energy, sustainable society in the future.

More readable than other accounts of this issue, with fuller discussion of the context, social implications, and recommendations for personal, community, national, and global action, Heinberg's book is a riveting wake-up call for humankind as the oil era winds down, and a critical tool for understanding and influencing current U.S. foreign policy.

Please note:
In producing the second edition of The Party's Over, the printers made an unfortunate mistake, duplicating page 110 on page 100 -- which was omitted entirely. We apologize for this error. Customers who have bought a copy with this error can find the correct page 100 here.

Customer Reviews:

A Thoughtful and Balanced Overview of Peak Oil.......2007-09-03

I discovered Peak Oil in August 2006 through James Kunstler's 'The Long Emergency,' and since then I have read almost every book available on this subject, including all of Heinberg's books. I have even written my own essay for friends and family - which can be downloaded from my website at http://www.dougcraftfineart.com. This book is a great overview of the Peak Oil and energy depletion crisis facing us, and I recommend it for anyone looking for a comprehensive and thoughtful overview of this difficult subject.

I have found all of Heinberg's books to be thoroughly researched, and well written, and he does offer positive suggestions for dealing with Peak Oil in this book. Other reviewers who complain of doom and gloom with Heinberg, have clearly not read some of what many other authors in this field have to offer.

Whether you are a pessimist or optimist, the facts surrounding this issue and the nature of resource depletion are simply unassailable from an honest scientific evaluation. Peak Oil and energy depletion - coupled with climate change and exponentially growing population - are deadly serious issues representing the most calamitous crisis we humans have ever faced. Ever. The problem simply cannot be sugar coated.

Nonetheless, I found 'The Party's Over' to offer a positive vision of our future where human communities have the opportunity to rediscover the traditional benefits of local economic interdependence and a much more sane pace of life. Until I had read Heinberg, I was truly in despair over our future. Now, I understand that we are adaptable and creative beyond what we think, we will survive, and we will all have the opportunity to help make positive contributions if we so choose.

Sometimes hard to find the good parts among the diatribes.......2007-07-24

This work truly does have good material in it to stretch the mind on an important topic. The problems happen when the author strays from science into politics, sociology, history, and especially economics. Even some of his technology - engineering stuff - can be unreliable. But when he's good, he's quite good.

The mind-stretch parts are particularly good in chapter 4 and some of chapter 3, where Mr. Heinberg discusses various energy technology technologies, and the concept of a "peak oil date," respectively. Simply laying out the range of energy uses, abuses, and possibilities is a quick and excellent way to make the reader aware of the state of the planet. Since the major theme of the book, after all, is what to do when the oil supplies dry up, his sober and stark assessment is to the point. Kudos for his wish to end subsidies for oil companies, but catcalls for his equal wish to subsidize other unknown technology (p165). How about no subsidy for anybody? "Corporate welfare" hasn't done much for the regular person anyway.

The major weakness in this book is one that unfortunately afflicts many on the Left. That is, comparing the theory of a system they like, with the worst actual results of the competing system they don't like. A good example on the smaller scale is Heinberg's glowing certainty about EXPECTED energy production from solar panels and windmills, vs. the listing of worst possible results and costs seen from nuclear energy reactors. On the larger scale, his clear preference for central government rule over free market forces is unsupported and irritating. The notable exception is his choice to discount our US Geological Survey findings on oil reserves, in favor of his (half dozen) gloomy retired oilmen's assessments. Things go smoother when one picks sources that agree with one's line of argument!

Nevertheless, there are enough good parts in this book to make it worth reading. Unless the reader wishes to use chapters 3 and 4 for reference, maybe it would be better to just check "The Party's Over" out from the library.

Wake-up Call.......2007-05-13

This book was very informational and I especially enjoyed the initial chapters that offered an historical build up to our current crisis. From that point on, however, the author inspired a sense of hopelessness rather than motivating activism.

How Marx should have critiqued capitilism.......2007-04-08

The Party's Over lays it right out there for us - we are beginning the process of running out of oil. Doubters like to say "That can't be true, because the all mighty market hasn't yet started creating the viable alternatives" (in anything like replacement level quantities). Why then, I ask, is our foreign and military policy all about putting as much of a lock down as possible, on known supplies (see e.g. Blood and Oil by Michael T. Klare)? As Heinberg well notes, the politics of democratic capitalism depend on ongoing economic growth - which is why, from the point of view of George Bush and Dick Cheney, it seems reasonable to keep our army engaged in the middle of the Iraqi Civil War, even with little hope of short term victory. Its the oil, stupid (with a bit of desperate ego mixed in). And why there is as yet no serious politics of conservation alive and well in this country.

Heinberg mightily strengthens his case by framing the story of oil within the context of ecological science and industrial history. Industrial capitalist culture is behaving in a predictable way. We have had a fabulously productive oil party. As a player in this eco-system we have been on a roll. Such rolls tend not to want to be slowed by the soft voices of alarm pointing out that the highway ends at the edge of the cliff up there not so far ahead. The literal fuel to power our engines will likely run out sooner than the ideological fuel that powers our belief in this way of doing business. You hear the "new age" argument that its not the oil supply that should be our concern - that its the infinite supply of human ingenuity that's critical. What's scary to me is how this market sucks up so much of that ingenuity for enterprises like convincing us we need more of this, that and the other; like creating, using and selling ever more sophisticated weaponry around the globe; like sustaining our belief in the magic nature of capitalist markets.

Heinberg mentions in his afterword to the revised edition that many readers have reported finding the book depressing. Small wonder. I was depressed at times as I read it too. But I also felt something bracing about it. If you're like me, standing on the "liberal - progressive" side of the political spectrum, but feeling that there's a missing center to our politics, I recommend you read this. There is a new politics that needs to be invented, and quickly. Ever since Stalin, et. al. gave communism a bad name, and the right wing in America made liberalism tantamount to communism, progressives have been floundering. We're trying to find a way to say that we really need to wake up, learn to take care of each other and the earth, get real about the climate and the oil -- all without saying that all this will involve serious sacrifice and some serious form of the unmentionable S word (socialism). The more information like that found in The Party's Over and other like works gets into the main stream, the more likely it is that all that human ingenuity will start driving invention in the social and political realm, where we need it every bit as much as we do in the technical.

Heinberg is a definitely a Cassandra, but remember what happened to those who ignored her.......2007-02-11

Richard Heinberg set out to answer the questions, "How much petroleum is left? How much coal, natural gas, and uranium? Will we ever run out? When? What will happen when we do? How can we best prepare? Will renewable substitutes--such as wind and solar power--enable industrialism to continue in a recognizable form indefinitely?" (p. 3) He sorted the various responses to these questions into four broad voices--those of free-market economists, environmental activists, petroleum geologists, and politicians--and of these four, he found the third, the petroleum geologists, to be the most useful, if only because "theirs is a long-range view based on physical reality" (p.5). (Throughout the book, Heinberg notes that the free-market economists are almost constitutionally opposed to talk of Peak Oil, because, as economist Robert Solow said, "the world can, in effect, get along without natural resources." Resources, in other words, are merely commodities created by the market to satisfy demands, and when the demand arises, the market will find a supply. Needless to say, Heinberg finds this laissez faire approach to Peak Oil--"perilous optimism"--quite dangerous because it ignores hard ecological realities.)

"The message here is that we are about to enter a new era in which each year, less net energy will be available to humankind, regardless of our efforts or choices. The only significant choice we will have will be how to adjust to this new regime" (p.5). In short, an ecological perspective on humanity's consumption of petroleum and other nonrenewable resources reveals that the astronomical population growth and economic expansion of the last century are the biological bloom and population overshoot enabled by an energy subsidy from cheap, abundant oil, coal, and natural gas. As with other population overshoots in human (and evolutionary) history, the end probably won't be pretty, with massive die-offs and "structural readjustments" (to use free-market lingo) bringing the human population back into line with the Earth's carrying capacity. Heinberg's book challenges us to face this coming change NOW and to do what we can to mitigate against its worst effects through exploring and developing economical and social alternatives to the status quo.

The discovery of new oil resources peaked several decades ago, according to the majority of petroleum geologists, and as it seems that discovery and production follow similar curves, it will be but a matter of years until the production of oil peaks. (For the record, this doesn't mean that we will literally run out of oil, but only that it will seem like we've run out, because it will cost more--financially and energetically--to extract and refine the oil than it is worth.) The peak in oil production won't merely have a direct impact on the automobile industry, but will also undermine the production of plastics and pharmaceuticals, of which oil is the feed stock, and will yank the rug out from under petro-intensive, corporate, "Green Revolution" agriculture. Combine these consequences with growing population and energy consumption of developing nations like China and India, and you have a recipe for seriously ugly changes. Like James Howard Kunstler in The Long Emergency, Heinberg examines various other energy sources and technologies, from natural gas to zero-point energy, and finds them all wanting in one way or another. (Unlike Kunstler, Heinberg maintains a solid faith in our flexibility as a species and in our ability to adapt.) According to this perspective, oil (and other nonrenewables) were a one-time windfall in ecological terms, and once we've passed the peak in extracting them, we will have to recognize our ecological limitations as one species amongst many struggling for limited resources.

I recently read PowerDown, the follow-up to this book, and found it an excellently written, powerful and thought-provoking read. Perhaps it's because I read The Party's Over in conjunction with the contrarian book The Bottomless Well (Huber and Mills) or perhaps it's because I'm a bit burned out reading books on Peak Oil, but whatever the reason I did not find this book as compelling as its sequel. That said, it is still a better introduction to the subject of Peak Oil and to its ecological basis and implications than most others I have yet read.

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Wonderful Book!
good book
OK, not tops

Kailey (American Girl Today)
Amy Goldman Koss
Manufacturer: American Girl
ProductGroup: Book
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ASIN: 1584855916

Book Description

Ten-year-old Kailey loves the tide pools on her beach. Can she find a way to save them from a developer who wants to build a marina?

Customer Reviews:

Wonderful Book!.......2005-12-10

I have read this book twice already and I must say that is is as delightful to read it the first time as it is the second. Kailey loves the ocean whether she's spying on tide-pool creatures or splas-crashing though waves on her boogie board,there's no place ten-year-old Kailey loves. She and her best friend Tess, feel totally lucky when they find out a resort-mall-movie multiplex is "Coming Soon!" to their beach. TWELVE movie theaters. Cool shops. Maybe even a snack stand! Then Kailey learns the whole truth:developers plan to haul away the rocky tide pools to make a smooth,sandy beach for tourists. Messind with a whole tide-pool universere is just plain NOT OK. Kailey's got a great idea,but she's never tried anything like it before. If she can believe in herself and make iwt work, there might be hope for the tide pool yet.(Reads the back of the book). I REALLY like this book and I know you will too. Kailey is part of the American Girl of Today Special Edition Doll Collection. Here is the list of the other dolls in her collection:
1. Lindsey (2001-2002)
2. Kailey (2003-2004)
3. Marisol (2005)
4. Jess? (2006)

good book.......2004-07-18

i got this book for my birthday with my Kailey doll. i red this book and i thought it was very good. its about a surfer girl Kailey who finds out a movie theater and several other buildings. at firsth kailey is excitied but then she relizes that the tide pools will be destroyed. will she save the ocean with the help of family and friends what goes wrong with kailey's friend? you have to read this book to find out. my recommendation is to also get kailey if she is still available because it is fun to act out the scenes. hope this was helpful to you.

OK, not tops.......2003-10-05

From the company that gave you The American Girls Collection comes a book that does not truly belong with the line that it is with. In this okay story, which was obviously created for the sole purpose of making a limited edition doll, is Kailey, a California surfer girl, aged ten--who finds out that a large company wants to turn the tide pools into a large marina. Amid environmentalist ideas given to her by her mother's colleagues, Kailey concocts the idea to have people draw pictures to save the tide pools. I won't foil the ending. The story is okay at best. What bothers me is that this and its predecessor, the book titled "Lindsey" by Chrissa Atkinson, have some extreme environmentalist views in them. Don't get me wrong, I like the environment. And, over all, I did like the general themes of this book--Kailey learns that even kids can make a difference, and I thought that it was extremely brave of her dad to say that he would not paint the pictures for the hotel owner because it violated his beliefs. But if anyone from Pleasant Company is out there--could you please stay neutral? There is enough excessively liberal literature for kids out there, and there is also a lot of religious fiction that has an insane conservative slant to it. This book gets three stars because it is not that unique from the previous one. The views in both books are the same, and the characters somewhat carboard at best. The publisher has made far better works.

Economics and Land Use Planning (Real Estate Issues)

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Economics and Land Use Planning (Real Estate Issues)
Alan W. Evans
Manufacturer: Blackwell Publishing Professional
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Economics of Agglomeration: Cities, Industrial Location, and Regional Growth

ASIN: 140511861X

Book Description

The book's aim is to draw together the economics literature relating to planning and set it out systematically. It analyses the economics of land use planning and the relationship between economics and planning and addresses questions like: What are the limits of land use planning and the extent of its objectives?; Is the aim aesthetic?; Is it efficiency?; Is it to ensure equity?; Or sustainability?; And if all of these aims, how should one be balanced against another?

All Our Relations: Native Struggles for Land and Life

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Winona La Duke's ALL OUR RELATIONS Must Read
The ring of truth is heard loud and clear....
Becoming Native to America
Truth, told with powerful clarity
Written by a True Patriot

All Our Relations: Native Struggles for Land and Life
Winona Laduke
Manufacturer: South End Press
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ASIN: 0896085996

Book Description

This eagerly awaited non-fiction debut by acclaimed Native environmental activist Winona LaDuke is a thoughtful and in-depth account of Native resistance to environmental and cultural degradation.

LaDuke's unique understanding of Native ideas and people is born from long years of experience, and her analysis is deepened with inspiring testimonies by local Native activists sharing the struggle for survival.

On each page of this volume, LaDuke speaks forcefully for self-determination and community. Hers is a beautiful and daring vision of political, spiritual, and ecological transformation.

All Our Relations features chapters on the Seminoles, the Anishinaabeg, the Innu, the Northern Cheyenne, and the Mohawks, among others.

"One of the pleasures of reading All Our Relations is discovering the unique voices of Native people, especially Native women, speaking in their own Native truths."-Women's Review of Books

"...as Winona LaDuke describes, in moving and often beautiful prose, [these] misdeeds are not distant history but are ongoing degradation of the cherished lands of Native Americans."-Public Citizen News

"...a rare perspective on Native history and culture."-Sister to Sister/S2S

"Hers is a beautiful and daring vision of political, spiritual, and ecological transformation. All Our Relations is essential reading for everyone who cares about the fate of the Earth and indigenous peoples."-Winds of Change

"No ragtag remnants of lost cultures here. Strong voices of old, old cultures bravely trying to make sense of an Earth in chaos."-Whole Earth

Customer Reviews:

Winona La Duke's ALL OUR RELATIONS Must Read.......2005-01-18

ALL OUR RELATIONS by Indigenous Activist Winona LaDuke is a must read for everyone who cares about our earth. LaDuke presents the state of the environment focusing on several land, treaty rights and toxic exposure struggles on reservations across North America and in Hawaii. Since I met Winona when she was an economics student at Harvard, she has been at the heart of struggles and gains made by indigenous communities, always bringing a keen intellect, diligent research, unswerving commitment, and a broad vision of the whole circle to community and tribal issues.
Because I've known many of the people involved in the essential work LaDuke describes in ALL OUR RELATIONS, it was a personal pleasure to read this book and catch up with what Susannah Santos and her cousins are doing on the Columbia River, be updated on Luana Busby and Melani Trask and the Hawaiian indigenous movement and to get the inside details of the complex political fight Winona's son's father and his people are up aqainst at St. James Bay. But this book will fascinate anyone who cares about our earth, families and communities. It is one to read from end to end, then keep around to re-read again and again.
LaDuke calls the work these tribal communities do to protect their people and landbase from pollution and corporate greed, "soul-retrieval." It is work that we all need to do whatever our ethnic background, since as LaDuke's reportage on the presence of PCBs in mother's breastmilk in the Northeast attests, everyone is affected by what we are doing to the earth. Winona is a mother who has no illusions about how the choices we make as consumers affect the earth and our communities' health. What is most inpiring about LaDuke's writing and life is that she offers solutions. Each chapter not only outlines the problem, but it talks about solutions that are being implemented and suggests others that should be employed. Winona walks her talk. LaDuke has been a strong proponent of wind energy and has worked to engage major corporations like Ben & Jerry in developing wind energy projects on Indian Reservations in South Dakota. Native Harvest and White Earth Land Recovery Project have reclaimed White Earth land and developed sustainable reservation businesses that employ and train White Earth tribal members. Winona LaDuke would be a great President because she is the only public figure who has a sensible plan for economic self-sufficiency, the clarity to explain it to the American people, and the discipline and steadfastness to enact it.

The ring of truth is heard loud and clear...........2004-10-28

If I could, I would thank Winonah LaDuke in person for writing such an important, informative and engaging book on the travesty that is the North American government's view of native land and those who inhabit it. The numerous tribes who make the land their home are forced to co-exist with the insensitive, selfish and literally toxic decisions made by government and corporations who dump tons upon tons of toxic pesticides in their water and on "abandoned" land. These lands are also subject to divebombings from military jets. These are illegal decibel levels that drive those within hearing range to points of mental instability, as well as potential hearing loss.

One of the most important quotes from this book that I remember (since I read this book a couple of years ago in a Native/African-American Women's Studies course) was from a Seminole leader who said, "Selling your land for a price is like selling a piece of your mother." [I paraphrase this.] I couldn't agree more. When I remember that quote, I think about all of the animals, vegetation and tribes (consisting of families and friends) who have lived off of the land of the United States, as well as Canada. How can one possibly put a price on something that can't truly be owned by anyone and is its own autonomous entity. Even if people have the illusion that they can occupy land as territory (because of treaties, as an example) does not mean that it is ever their to keep. LaDuke makes several strong examples of this in the book. We can't continue to pollute, abuse and neglect land without paying a price environmentally or in terms of human quality of life and mortaiity. I believe everyone should read this book, regardless of occupation, national origin or territorial location. We need to face the damage done before more of it goes unacknowledged. Thank you, Winonah.

Becoming Native to America.......2003-09-11

Spoon-fed news by large media corps, few were aware that Winona LaDuke ran for the vice presidency under Ralph Nader in the 2000 elections. Even fewer know that she is also a Native American eco-philosopher with a critical perspective on the health and future prosperity of America. All Our Relations is particularly instructive, in that LaDuke surveys the entire American landscape (and by landscape, I am not merely referring to the political landscape), showing the deep connections that exist between local cultures, their environments, and the corporate-governmental giants that often compromise their health. Although LaDuke has specifically focused on Native American communities, the stories are engaging and instructive for Americans in general. Informative, powerful, and transformative, LaDuke here provides an antidote for our increasing alienation from the land and biota that sustain us. A must read for any conscious American.

Truth, told with powerful clarity.......2002-11-29

Winona Laduke ran as vice president alongside Ralph Nader. It would be truly amazing if this woman had become our vice president (for many reasons). It is my hope that some day she will be our vice president (or president). Her views on the environment and its effect upon animals and people (particularly babies, children and pregnant/nursing mothers) are exactly how I feel. She expresses these views eloquently in these quotes by Lil'wat grandmother Loretta Pascal, "Where did you get your right to destroy these forests? How does your right supercede my rights? These are our forests, these are our ancestors."(p.5), by Ted Strong, "If this nation has a long way to go before all of our people are truly created equally without regard to race, religion, or national origin, it has even further to go before achieving anything that remotely resembles equal treatment for other creatures who called this land home before humans ever set foot upon it...."(p.5), and by Katsi Cook, "Why is it we must change our lives, our way of life, to accommodate the corporations, and they are allowed to continue without changing any of their behavior?"(p.12). Reading this book you will feel sorrow, and be inspired to action. Most of what was said in this book I already knew a little about, but through this book I understood the depth and complexity of all the factors. I can not recommend this book enough. She tells the truth of our world with a powerful clarity. She tells the stories of many Native American Tribes throughout North America (Canada and the United States, including a chapter on Hawaii). She ends the book with the optimism that it is possible for us to make change, but it is up to us.

Written by a True Patriot.......2002-02-01

To think this woman could be our Vice President today. Most people don't even know that Winona LaDuke ran for Vice President on Ralph Nader's ticket. An articulate and passionate writer, LaDuke presents an awareness of the plight of America unsurpassed by any other. She knows what's wrong. She knows what needs to be done. She knows who is doing the work, how and why. She presents her advocacy as human, heartfelt and real. I learned things about what is happening to this country that I would never have known otherwise. You certainly don't see it in the news, and you don't learn about it in school. We're in trouble, folks, and it's not too late to do something about it. With more power she could have made such a difference! But she continues to work on the issues, and it is so important that more people are aware of her work. Please, please, please read this book. It is the most important book you will read all year.

Golf Course Management & Construction: Environmental Issues

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Golf Course Management & Construction: Environmental Issues
James C. Balogh , and William J. Walker
Manufacturer: CRC
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Golf Course Architecture: Evolutions in Design, Construction, and Restoration Technology

ASIN: 0873717422

Book Description

Golf Course Management & Construction presents a comprehensive summary and assessment of technical and scientific research on the environmental effects of turfgrass system construction and maintenance. Although the book focuses on golf courses, it also discusses turfgrass systems for residential and commercial lawns, parks, and greenways. The book is an excellent introduction to the concepts of nonpoint source environmental impacts of turfgrass management for turfgrass scientists and specialists, landscape and golf course architects, turfgrass system and golf course developers, golf course superintendents, environmental scientists, and land-use regulators.

A Rediscovered Frontier: Land Use and Resource Issues in the New West

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A Rediscovered Frontier: Land Use and Resource Issues in the New West
Philip L. Jackson
Manufacturer: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0742526178

Book Description

A Rediscovered Frontier describes the changing land use issues taking place in the rapidly growing western United States, paying special attention to the previously unexplored area of private lands planning and local growth management. A Rediscovered Frontier begins by exploring the term New West, describes prototypical land use patterns found throughout the West, and examines the spatial circumstances of rural and small town growth patterns. Intended as a text for college students taking courses in land use planning, a sourcebook for land use planning and environmental management professionals, as well as anyone who cares about western environments, A Rediscovered Frontier addresses the social, economic, political, and above all, geographical realities of land use in the West today.

Water under Threat (Global Issues Series)

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Water under Threat (Global Issues Series)
Larbi Bouguerra
Manufacturer: Zed Books
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Binding: Paperback

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International Organizations: The Politics and Processes of Global Governance

ASIN: 184277705X
Release Date: 2006-10-03

Book Description

This richly documented book asks the major questions about the enormously important political and geostrategic issue of water. Does water have a price? Is it a right or a need? Is there a water crisis? Will wars be fought over water? Should we be worried about water pollution? Can the available technological solutions keep it under control? It also provides some elements of an answer. It shows that the ways in which water is used and managed raise central issues about our lifestyle, our ethics, and our relationship to nature and the biosphere. It makes the case for a society that is more economical with water, and calls for global management of water resources in a spirit of solidarity, openness, and respect for the rules of democracy.

Greenfields, Brownfields and Housing Development (REAL ESTATE ISSUES)

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Greenfields, Brownfields and Housing Development (REAL ESTATE ISSUES)
David Adams , and Craig Watkins
Manufacturer: Blackwell Publishing Limited
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ASIN: 0632063874

Book Description

The location of new housing development has become one of the most intractable controversies of modern times. This book provides a powerful critique of the growing tendency to reduce the debate on the development of new housing to a mere choice between greenfield and brownfield locations. It calls for full account to be taken of such factors as the structure and organisation of the housebuilding industry, supply and demand pressures in the housing market, the contested nature of sustainability and the political character of the planning process if a truly effective housing land policy is to be devised.Drawing on theories from economics and political science, this book will provide an important reference point on the institutional context within which residential development takes place and on the concerns of planning authorities, environmentalists, housebuilders, and their customers in relation to the apparent choice between greenfield and brownfield development.

Last Oasis: Facing Water Scarcity (The Worldwatch Environmental Alert Series)

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The Whirlwind Tour
Water - what's it worth?
Last Oasis: Facing Water Scarcity

Last Oasis: Facing Water Scarcity (The Worldwatch Environmental Alert Series)
Sandra Postel
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0393317447

Book Description

As we approach the twenty-first century, we are entering a new era-an era of water scarcity. We have taken for granted seemingly endless supplies of water flowing from reservoirs wells, and diversion projects; access to water has been key to food security, industrialization, and the growth of cities. In this book from the Worldwatch Institute, Sandra Postel explains that decades of profligacy and mismanagement of the world's water resources have produced signs of shortages and environmental destruction. She writes with authority and clarity of the limits-ecological, economic, and political-of this vital natural resource. She explores the potential for conflict over water between nations, and between urban and rural residents. And she offers a sensible way out of such struggles. Last Oasis makes clear that the technologies and know-how exist to increase the productivity of every liter of water. But citizens must first understand the issues and insist on policies, laws, and institutions that promote the sustainable use of water.

Customer Reviews:

The Whirlwind Tour.......2003-08-30

This book is like one of those European tourbuses that promise to escort you through twelve countries in just seven days. If you're just there to make some deliveries, it's quite convenient. If you just want to have something to talk about with your friends, it's a means. If you've never been to Europe and want to familiarize yourself, it's exhausting.

I write this review over five years since the most recent edition, so the staying power of the book is clear. But it is ripe for a newer edition. An up-to-date copy of "The Last Oases" would be an excellent reference. And the original bibliography is certainly worth buying the whole book in any case.

This book is divided into two sections. The first, called "Trouble on Tap", is an overview of the water situation in many countries throughout the world. It looks at supplies, type and amount of use, and political factors. This is the weaker part of the book. Under each chapter heading, various countries or regions are addressed, and each time a new place name appears, clusters of concentrated statistics pop up like mushrooms after the rain. This approach makes actual assimilation of the facts nearly impossible. It relies on some fundamental understanding of the geography of river basins, politics, agricultural practices, etc. I think that rather than structuring the chapters according to engineering, politics, or farming, a better approach would be to deal with geographical regions one at a time. It's easier to grasp a host of facts about China than facts about a hairball of dams in China, Egypt, the U.S., and Russia.

The second part of the book, Living within Water's Limits, discusses how the world is solving its water problems. This part of the book was most interesting. When Postel describes, for example, industrial cooling you can place yourself inside a factory and walk through the steps with her. Her vivid explanation of microirrigation processes puts you out in the fields under the baking sun.

Mercifully, this book came before the craze for overwrought poetry and literary reference that has swept the science popularizing book field. The writing throughout the book is clear without melodrama or pedantry. The problem is one of structure, and (sadly) creeping obsolescence.

Water - what's it worth?.......2002-08-05

Sandra Postel published LAST OASIS - FACING WATER SCARCITY back in 1992, year of the RIO Conference on Development and Environment, also called the Earth Summit. Re-issued in 1997 (with a new introduction) it formed the basis for a PBS documentary in the series "Cadillac Desert". Is it still relevant today? So much has been written on water issues since, from environmental concerns to promoting the privatization of water, that the question is valid.

Still, as we approach the 10-year review conference of RIO in Johannesburg, politicians, government officials, economists, environment and development experts and activists meet to take stock of what happened to the many promises of RIO - reflected in Agenda 21. In this context, it is interesting and useful to read LAST OASIS with a view to weighing the global water situation today against the problems and possible solutions outlined ten years ago.

Postel, a long-time specialist in environmental issues, traveled across the globe to review problem areas as well as conservation initiatives and solutions first hand. In addition to giving us an overview of the problems, she also outlined projects and initiatives representing a variety of approaches to address the challenges: either by living with and adapting to water scarcity or by finding solutions for preserving and replenishing the finite clean water resources available to us.

When it was published, Postel presented a comprehensive examination of the causes for water scarcity across the globe. Although not up-to-date anymore in terms of statistics, her analyis of the issues and her review of danger zones have not lost relevance. We are still facing the same dramatic divide: On the one hand, close to one billion people live without access to clean water and their daily requirements can only be met through enormous physical strain, in particular on women and girls who are the traditional water carriers. The inaquate water resources threaten the mere survival of the majority of the world's poor who live on the land and off the land to secure their livelihood with small-scale subsistence agriculture. On the other hand, water in industrialized societies, and also increasingly by the elites around the world, is treated as a cheap commodity: too often wasted and its safety jeopardized through carelessness and/or through industrial pollution. A major culprit in the long term destruction of safe water resources was then and remains today large scale agro-business. Postel argues the reasons for that and also reviews alternative and small-scale systems that have proven to be successful in delivering good crops as well as reducing the strain on the soil and the water table. Postel's 1999 book "Pillar of Sand" focusses on irrigation systems.

It is only unfortunate that the book was not updated in 1997 (or since). Some of the encouraging initiatives Postel described were "pending" or in progress and it would be good to know if any of them have come to fruition.

Is LAST OASIS still relevant today? Yes, it should be in any collection of books for those interested in and concerned with this most fundamental of environmental issues. It is a good starting point for informed debate on the future of water availability and safety. Will future generations debate a right to clean and adequate water ? Postel's call for a new ethics on water and the development of a "water security" system do not go quite that far, but she makes a strong case for it. She argues on two major fronts. Water conservation can be achieved and encouraged through "proper pricing" of water and by creating incentives for wise water use. If industries, and in particular agriculture had to pay the real cost of water, efficient and ecological systems would be designed. Complementing this policy of water pricing would be a new "water ethic". This ethic would focus on our responsibility for comprehensive water ecological systems; it would have to accommodate our short-term needs for water with our long-term responsibility for water conservation. Postel knows that this ethic would require a major philosophical shift and that it would lead to other fundamental questions on quality of life, on the need to bridge the gap between the haves and the have-nots. It would change the agenda for economic growth towards ecologically based sustainable development.

Last Oasis: Facing Water Scarcity.......2000-02-08

For anyone who is interested in water supply issues worldwide, this book is for you. I especially like the way the author is objective and presents both a realist and idealistic endevor. I am from West Texas so I am concerned about water. The book gives great information dealing with how private business has been able to cope with water scarcity, and how farmers are using new methods of irrigation to provide food for the world yet conserving water. Also, it shows how these projects would have never taken place if government did not take action. It talks about water scarcity globally, and makes us understand how this can affect us locally.

Urban Regeneration in Europe (Real Estate Issues (Oxford, England).)

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Urban Regeneration in Europe (Real Estate Issues (Oxford, England).)
Susan Percy
Manufacturer: Blackwell Publishing Limited
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0632058412

Book Description

Many old urban areas in Europe are undergoing a radical restructuring of their economic base and are subject to regeneration strategies. There is much political interest in urban regeneration as an element of urban policy and large amounts of public money are being invested in various urban centres.This book gives a comparative account of the process of urban regeneration in France, Italy, Holland, Belgium, Germany and the UK. It examines the factors influencing these processes, as well as the consequences of their implementation.Through a mixture of theoretical discussion and detailed case studies, Urban Regeneration in Europe will:provide a comprehensive and informed presentation of policiesdiscuss the challenges and opportunities faced by old industrial areasdevelop current knowledge and understanding on the urban regeneration processput forward an interdisciplinary approach

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