A Lack of Scarcity

"There is always more...that's what more means." - Earl Sinclair (Dinosaurs circa 1992)

You might not remember the short-live TV sitcom "Dinosaurs" (ABC Television 1991-1994). I recall the irreverent manner in which modern American society was satirized by over-sized muppets. Strikingly, the dinosaur society embraced all things irresponsible - conservatism and environmentalism were mocked by the mainstream. In the episode on conservatism, the question was posed about what happens when the society consumes all of a precious resource and there is no more - hence the memorable quote above - a battle cry for consumerism.


Remember how absurd it seemed the first time you were forced to pay 40 cents for a gallon of gas?!?! Of course, that was before my own driving days, but I was old enough to recognize what was going on. Living in Houston Texas, and spending my Sundays watching a football team called the "Oilers", I could not understand how oil and gasoline could suddenly be in short supply! Over the last 30 years, the world has started to realize the finite nature of oil and petro reserves - this doesn’t necessarily mean that there is a solution in sight, but at least we understand that there is NOT "always more".


Much like the 1970's, I sense the dawn of a new reality in the civilized world - one that is even harder to swallow. What if there is not always more water? In 2003, a power utility executive in the Southeast informed me that southeast states such as Florida expected to have extreme water shortages within the next five years - that was five years ago. I wonder if the economics of water will soon follow the economics of gas and oil. (Of course, you may argue that, for the average consumer of bottled drinking water, the economic shift is in place). Go to a gas station, fill up the car with unleaded and buy yourself a cold bottle of water - which was more expensive?


But for the really large consumers of water, the price isn't moving very fast. When other commodity costs shot through the roof (oil, steel, gas), industry responded by finding more efficient alternatives that reduced their consumption of these precious commodities. Even with the epic drought conditions in many parts of the world - the price of water is not tracking with supply - removing the financial incentive to conservation. So, despite the lowering lake and river levels, financially speaking - there is a lack of scarcity.

(On the other hand - Sean Tevis seems to have come up with his own conservation solution.)

The Air Out There

Recently, I had a unique opportunity to participate in the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperative Clean Fossil Energy Conference in Xi'an, China. It was my third trip to China in as many months (OK, one of those three was to Taiwan). This was a first hand look at the real world conflict that grips the world's most populous nation - environmental responsibility versus economic development. My myriad of observations and reflections could keep me blogging for weeks, so I'll focus on just a single impact - air quality. Spending time living in both Houston and Los Angeles, I felt like I had a pretty good understanding of pollution, smog, and poor air quality. It just took a single morning's run in the not-so-crisp autumn air of Xi'an to recalibrate my senses. I had previously experienced the smog and haze in Beijing, but this cool October day had a completely different feel - and smell. Distinctive in the air was the odor of burning coal, like at a power plant with no emissions controls. Dr. Ting later explained to me that most houses in this region still use coal heating in their homes, with no pollution control furnaces. The result was a continuous haze and stench over the entire city that never subsided.

The good news is - there are a whole lot of people working towards a solution. While it could take decades or longer for the entire Chinese infrastructure to adopt modern day pollution controls, everyone agrees on the urgency and impact of the issue. I can't say that this 3-day workshop equipped me with any particular insight as to the likelihood of strict environmental controls taking root in China (and other APEC countries), but at least I am satisfied that the problem is well understood and at least something is being done to improve the situation. But when you are dealing with the China-type numbers, you quickly realize that the environmental efforts of rest of the industrialized world could be easily countered by the irresponsibility of a single country. For this reason, we should continue to do whatever we can to help deploy best in class pollution controls in the world's oldest and largest civilization.