Hi, I'm 'the other letter writer'. My original post to the Noosa News begged a respondent for suggestions, and this is what I wrote... Cheers, Mike Stasse, Cooran Geoff Cass (NN June 17) says he's searched for solutions to the 'doom and gloom' I forecast some time ago, to no avail. I am not surprised. There are no solutions, though it does depend on how one defines 'solution'. If by solution you mean keep business as usual running using alternatives, then forget about it..... it will never happen. For all of human history, 'progress' has depended on an ever increasing amount of increasingly better quality energy. Thus we went from firewood to charcoal to coal to oil and gas. A litre of petrol has the same energy content as 3 kg of firewood... and it's far more practical to just turn up at the bowser than to go bush and chop down a few trees! The age of cheap energy is as good as over. As I write this, oil is back up to $57+, and petrol is well over the dollar a litre mark. As supply tightens up even further, it will only go up from here. The only solution as I see it, is that we must adapt. As much as people hate change, change is what we must do. We need to change the way we do everything, from the way we grow our food, to what work we do, what sort of economy we run, what houses we live in, how many children we have, and we must absolutely give up our cars (aaargh!). And growth! Within ten years, in my humble opinion, we will be in unchartered territory. Civilisations have collapsed many times before, but never on this scale. Past civilisations just moved on to some place else. We have no other planet to conquer. Whether future history turns out to be 'doom and gloom' is entirely up to us. We are the masters of our destinies. We need to make some seriously important choices, and much sooner than I for one had ever anticipated even 25 yrs ago when I first became aware of limits to growth. So how do we start? Forget our pollies (whose amusing diatribes in this paper sound to me like fiddling while Rome burns); they refuse to rock the boat because there are no votes in said rocking. Picture Howard coming out on TV next week and announcing that within 5 yrs they would phase out all car manufacturing, close the banks, forgive all debts, force farmers to go organic, enforce a one day working week, and start a forced educational program to teach people to grow their own food in their own backyards using green technologies. Who do you think would win the next election? No, we need to do this ourselves. We need to acknowledge, just like any other addicts, that we've been hooked on nearly free energy, that the party's over, and that we have to work out our own solutions. Want to join me? Go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/roeoz/ and join up to this national forum. If we get enough locals, we can start the ball rolling in Noosa. Why not start in Paradise? Mike Stasse Energy efficiency consultant http://www.greenhousedesign.green.net.au