http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/26070/?nlid=3444
Population is a function of the rate of useful energy supply, whether or not
that energy comes from renewable or nonrenewable resources. If it comes from
renewable resources, the rate cannot rise more than briefly above the rate
of renewal and therefore populations tend rather quickly to become
stabilized in ecological equilibrium with the rate of supply. ...
A population based on nonrenewable resources, on the other hand, faces a
much more formidable instability problem. Its rate of usable energy supply
depends not on man's efficiency in extracting energy from a dynamic system
constantly being renewed but upon the rate he chooses to extract energy from
a static system that is not renewable on any time scale meaningful to him.
The more he allows his numbers to become dependent on this self-chosen rate,
the more he faces ultimate catastrophe.
This lesson is 38 years and counting, but the geniuses at DoE apparently
still do not grasp the full implications. Our continuing high unemployment
rate is a symptom of energy dependence more than anything else.
