by Erica Etelson
I lived in Berkeley for sixteen years before getting around to stashing my five gallons of water and twenty cans of fruit cocktail. I’m as ready as can be for the big earthquake we’re all waiting for. But what I’m not prepared for—what no Californian save the odd self-reliant homesteader is prepared for, is the other Big One—peak oil.
Like it or not, oil fuels the engines of industrialized economies. In California, we burn through nearly 20 billion gallons of the stuff each year just driving around. Then there’s the oil we use to grow and transport food and pump water, the oil that fuels planes, trains and cargo ships, and the oil that is embedded in every computer, every inch of asphalt and every bit of plastic. Oil is everywhere; so imagine my surprise when I learned last year that it is running out–and that the federal government is doing nothing to prepare for this eventuality.
