When the Age of Oil ends...

... people seem to think it'll be the end of the world. One reaction to a piece I posted on a message board about how people need to wake up to the fact that oil and petrol are expensive and will remain expensive in the future was that I was somehow heralding the end of the world.

Far from it - the idea of a world without oil excites me. Oil has permeated every aspect of life to the point where you can't even buy food without having relied on oil in some form to have provided it for you. Compare that to the food you could grow in your back garden organically using just water from your water butt and compost from your food waste (invest in one of these new composters, and you'll have a rich source of plant food too so there's no need for oil-based fertilizers). There, the world doesn't sound half so bad does it?

There's an interesting article in the Independent about the end of oil - click here. People still claim that peak oil is some kind of government conspiracy, but it appears to be gaining credence awfully quickly. A bit like the debate over climate change - now it's the deniers who sound shrill and out of tune.