News-Record.com

Sunday's editorial.

If reporter Morgan Josey Glover’s “Peak Prospects” series wasn’t enough of a wake-up call concerning America’s shaky future with oil, take a look at what happened when Hurricane Katrina affected energy supplies in North Carolina.

Similar disruptions could occur during “peak oil,” the time when global demand for petroleum products exceeds supply, creating higher prices, shortages and other instability. Many energy experts think we are already, or will soon be, at peak oil.

Katrina and North Carolina
Much of the Southeast may have been days away from paralysis because of Katrina’s effect on energy infrastructure. The 2005 hurricane shut down the power to the two pipelines from the Gulf Coast that supply most of the motor fuel to the region.

Here is a little of what happened in North Carolina from just a few days’ disruption:

-- Gas stations in western North Carolina had trouble getting supplies. More than 60 percent of Buncombe County’s stations ran out of fuel.

-- School athletic events were canceled, with many districts considering a four-day school week.

-- Some local government vehicles began filling up at private service stations in order to preserve their supply.

-- The state ferry system cut back on trips and the state DOT went to a shortened work week.
Lessons learned

The disruptions prompted the state’s energy office to take a look at developing better emergency response plans. The state realized from the disruption, for example, that fuel storage capacity for the DOT was insufficient. It also realized it needed a way to move fuel around the state in emergencies, and so purchased a fuel tanker truck.

The crisis especially showed the vulnerabilities of local governments. Most local governments in North Carolina rely on “just-in-time fuel delivery,” a big problem in such a crisis. Some turned to the state for emergency fuel but found they had a lower priority than the state agencies. A study also found that public transit systems generally were not prepared: More people were riding public transit, yet fuel for those vehicles was running low.

Energy crisis preparation lacking
These details are provided in the report “Fuel Price, Availability and Mobility: What We Can Learn from North Carolina in the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and Oil Shocks of the 1970s and early 1980s” by Kathy Leotta of the Seattle office of Parsons Brinckerhoff. It should be mandatory reading for local government officials in our state. So should the report “Post Carbon Cities: Planning for Energy and Climate Uncertainty” by Daniel Lerch of the Post Carbon Institute. Both studies would help local governments start preparing for the volatilities associated with a declining resource.

Most public agencies haven’t made any peak oil plans. Few U.S. cities have planned how to handle disruptions that may come about because of fuel shortages. Few have looked at how to stay economically healthy when the price of petroleum products remains high.

Some think it’s alarmist to make such plans. Others argue that more drilling or alternative technology will fix the problem. But these stands are naive.

Oil resources are finite, and, even if drilling does occur, new fields will take years to get online. Even the International Energy Agency warns that, long term, the global demand for oil looks to be outpacing supply.

Production of an affordable, mass-produced alternatively powered vehicle isn’t a given and can’t be accomplished quickly. We will still face years of energy volatility even if more areas are opened for drilling and an alternatively powered car becomes viable.

Local, regional action needed
Greensboro is taking a step in the right direction by allowing a briefing on peak oil to the City Council. The city’s environmental committee then needs to put peak oil preparation front and center. A good place to start would be to contact Portland’s peak oil task force. It produced an extensive report for the way its city can best weather the problems peak oil will cause, examining issues such as planning, transportation and agriculture.

It also would be good for the Triad as a whole to examine the long-term impacts of this oncoming change. Prohibitive fuel costs endanger global supply chains. Many think that energy disruptions will out of necessity lead to more self-sufficient, localized economies (see H3 op-ed, “Gas prices bring relocalization”).

Some areas already have started planning how to adapt to such a future. A 2006 study by the Philadelphia-area Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission, “A Post-Global Economic Development Strategy,” shows that region looking at ways to benefit from a more localized world. It argues for developing “eco-industry clusters” and for “eco-branding” the region as a model for sustainability.

Peak oil is not an issue of the left or of the right. We must put old divisions behind us and unite to find new ways to address the energy challenges we face. We must all be open to looking at new ideas. Environmentalists might have to rethink their stands against drilling and nuclear energy. Conservatives may have to realize that government functions such as public transit are necessities. One thing is clear: Fifty years from now, the healthiest communities won’t be the ones that argued. They will be the ones that planned.