Perhaps the most critical aspect of curbing our appetite for oil is decreasing our dependence on the Middle East. But if we are ever going to get serious about it the question then becomes, where will we make up the shortfall? The answer may lie with our neighbor to the north.

The Difference a Year can Make

Just a little over a year ago, President Bush stood before Congress and urged the U.S. to limit its thirst for oil. More specifically, he proposed the huge goal of replacing more than 75% of our oil imports from the Middle East by 2025.

Staff, EB. Cambodia's coming energy bonanza
Future of NG from the Western Canada sedimentary basin
Long Beach LNG project halted
Years of flaws have killed Yucca Mtn nuclear repository, NRC member says

Staff, EB. Bill McKibben: Step it up!
US answer to global warming: smoke and giant space mirrors
We're ruining Earth, scientists warn (IPCC)
UN's vast report ends the scientific argument, but will the world act?
Davos - not united on global warming

Rep. Roscoe Bartlett, Congressional Record. Speech on peak oil by Congressman Bartlett to the House of Representatives.
Covers Admiral Rickover's prescient remarks in 1957 on energy; critique of the CERA report; Chinese awareness of peak oil.

Dr. Phil Cook, Peace United Church of Christ. For decades, many prophets' words have been lost in the winds of exuberant growth of human presence in this biosphere. But now, the reality of the finite energy and material resources may finally be creeping into the public consciousness. (Sermon)

Molly Watson, Western Mail (Wales). The UK's Soil Association conference, titled "One Planet Agriculture: Preparing for a post-peak oil food and farming future," aimed to kick-start the discussion on what practical measures farmers, consumers and local communities can take to become less energy reliant. The conference was the most over-subscribed in its history.

Droughts will be longer, flooding rains will be rarer but heavier. Cyclones will hit harder. Violent storms and extreme heatwaves will strike more frequently. Evaporation will suck up scarce inland water. Sea levels will creep up half a metre. Oceans will be so acidic that in some places shells and reefs will dissolve.

And humanity, not nature, will be to blame.

This is the assessment of the state of the planet according to what is possibly the most reviewed document in history.

The protracted fuel scarcity in the country is pushing Nigeria into zero-productivity and zero growth thereby making the nation to sink deeper into underdevelopment, the National Union of Textile, Garment and Tailoring Workers of Nigeria (NUTGTWN), has warned.

For the organised labour in the nation's textile industry, Nigeria would not meet the challenges of being one of the 20 leading economies by 2020 when its working people were sleeping in fuel stations and private enterprises grounded because of fuel crisis.

Has Al Gore got you worried about global warming, but you also think there might be a way to make some money from the soaring interest in environmental issues?

Maybe it's time to look at investing in some individual companies that are on the leading edge of the green energy revolution.

But investing in these companies is not for the faint of heart. Because of technological uncertainty, fickle government support programs, and an uncertain energy future, most are clearly for risk-taking investors who want to gamble on the chance for big gains in the future.

The US nuclear power industry is planning for a renaissance, drawing up its first applications to build nuclear plants since the 1970s.

Just a decade ago, many energy executives didn’t think nuclear power had much of a future. Strict regulations had led to costly downtime for reactors. The public showed little interest in betting billions on new plants.

Instead of fading away, the industry launched a revival, using a friendlier political climate to spur a regulatory overhaul.

Russia's OAO Gazprom sought to assure jittery Europeans on Friday that new deals for the sale of natural gas to Belarus and Ukraine would prevent any more disruptions to western Europe.

Gazprom's deputy Chief Executive Alexander Medvedev was asked whether Europe should be concerned that supply disruptions over disputes with Ukraine at the beginning of 2006 and with Belarus earlier this year could continue.

"Now we have in both cases the ... contractual base that eliminates interference of supply. We have increased the security of Russian gas to Europe," he said. "In spite of the absence of support from international organizations, we have a result that is good for everybody."

Ethanol producers in Brazil, the world's biggest and cheapest exporter of the alternative fuel, see a fantastic business opportunity in US President Bush's aim to cut his country's gasoline use by 20 percent over a decade.

Brazil's Sugar Cane Industry Union (Unica) said support for biofuels in the United States will help Brazil's pioneering ethanol industry. Brazilian ethanol experts say the use of sugar cane, which can produce ethanol more efficiently than crops such as corn, gives the South American country a competitive advantage in the world's search for new sources of energy.

With US President George W.Bush wounded by mistakes in Iraq, German Chancellor Angela Merkel made a dramatic bid to fill the void at the World Economic Forum in Davos and assume global leadership.

And because the east German born and educated Chancellor is also president of the European Union and the G8, she is in a unique position.
The Merkel master plan has at its core the need for the world to embrace carbon emission restrictions to minimise climate change. British Prime Minister Tony Blair made a similar appeal two years ago at the WEF, but this year Merkel went one step further - she offered incentives to every part of the world to join the effort.

European farmers have an excellent chance to profit from the drive towards replacing imported fossil fuels with home-produced biofuels, says the EU Commission president.

Addressing the International Green Week in Berlin - Europe's largest food and farming event - Jose Manuel Barroso said farmers had a key role to play in the "low carbon revolution" that Europe was trying to stimulate.

A combination of rich nation import controls and excessive pricing power among too few western importers is disadvantaging biofuels producers in developing countries, a London-based research institute said.

Developing countries are the biggest producers of biofuels that are currently competitive with oil, because they have lower costs and their biofuels have a higher energy content than those produced in temperate zones.

But under present trade rules rich nations -- the biggest biofuels consumers -- are disadvantaging developing country producers, the report by the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) said.