twelve dollar gas

Because what we pay for energy is just way too little.

Most of us feel otherwise, since gas and oil are more expensive than ever and not much is changing to make us need less of them. And of course there's our collective optimism and faith in eternal economic growth and technology's impending miracle that will replace petroleum with some new clean fuel too cheap to meter.

But what's the probability of this really? How likely is it that we'll stumble into another societal energy feedstock that can provide the equivalent of 80 million barrels of oil per day at the cost of extraction? Coal, oil and natural gas were the three matches we were given to ignite a perpetual, clean energy future. These matches are burning down pretty close to our fingers (or we're coughing on their smoke) and we haven't done such a great job getting that fire lit.

Energy use is notoriously inelastic - we don't use less as the price goes up - but twelve dollar gas would cost the average driver in America a buck every two miles and it wouldn't be long before this giant sucking sound started to change our driving habits. And the way we heat and cool our homes. And perhaps it would sober us up to the fact that we've been tapping a trust fund for the past century that's stopped earning interest.

It will really hurt. Bad. The entire global economy will convulse and spasm through the detox. But maybe, though only maybe, if a significant slice of this massive capital reallocation can find its way into renewable energy investment, maybe we will get that fire going before those matches are just smoldering ash in our cold hands.