Earlier last week, I wrote a diary (What the west means and what roles NATO plays therein) that used a recent Financial Times editorial as a springboard for a discussion on what the "West" was, and what the use of NATO was - questions that  left-of-center Europeans tend to see quite differently from most Americans, including left-of-center ones.

The editorial, by a well-respected British pundit, was insightful and interesting, and led me to conclude what many on the European Tribune have long suspected: that NATO is simply an instrument for Europe to support US strategic priorities, and that the "West" exists only when Europe (and in particular France) aligns itself unconditionally on US positions. The UK, as per that senior British commentator, has as its main role that of disrupting and dividing Europe when it is insufficiently respectful of US interests.

Since I'm French, you may be tempted to conclude that this is just sour grapes by a citizen of a supposedly declining country; however, what I found more interesting in that article was the dominant tone of fear - about the west being under siege, and needing security against various threats - in the form of coordinated military power and little else. It was a narrow, downcast, closed vision of the world, with little about values, progress or hope.

The comment thread is worth reading too, and one of the last comments, by Loefing, pointed me to another article on the same topic, this time by a graduate of the US Naval War College, Tony Corn. The article, (The Revolution in Transatlantic Affairs, has the same dominant tone of fear, but a much more detailed examination of the world. Given the credentials of its author, it is likely to have serious influence on the thinking of the strategists in the Pentagon, and it is thus worth deconstructing.

I have written recently about some of the reasons that coal reserves, as currently understood, might not be quite as large, at present, as they are assumed to be. However, while I could continue on that tack for some additional time, it is perhaps time to give a gentle cough and suggest that there is perhaps a little terminologically inexact thinking in some of the discussions on the actual size of reserves, relative to the overall resource and that there is another viewpoint that should be considered in this debate. Particularly this relates to how much is left and how long it will last.

Firstly it should be recognized that a number of studies of coal reserves have put caveats on their numbers along the lines of “under current operating and economic conditions.” And so let me first put back up the table I posted in my last post , relating to the coal reserves of the UK back in 1952.

Note that this is coal that has largely been proved to be in place. However, in the time frame between 1952 and today it has not been mined or gone away, but it has become, at present, uneconomic to mine. And thus under current conditions it is no longer a reserve. And the one thing that those who write here should know better about assuming is the “current conditions.” Jeepers! We have spent over two years here accumulating convincing evidence that current conditions are not sustainable, and yet that argument is accepted, with little discussion, when it is proposed.

[editor's note, by Prof. Goose] This is a guest post by Roland Watson, who publishes an investment newsletter based on Peak Oil and other events that will impact the global economy.

As I recently re-read some articles on the debate about global oil reserves, a thought struck about how one could arrive at a rough estimate for such a number.

The search for that magic number of total oil in place and hence an estimate of how much can be realistically recovered has been a bone of contention across the Peak Oil divide. In fact, the absence or unreliability of data provides a sufficient haze for one group to point in one direction whilst another points in a completely opposite path. Hence we will find that estimates varying from 2 trillion barrels of URR up to 3 trillion barrels are the typical of the debate. Now a difference of one trillion barrels is important. At a current global consumption rate of 85 mbpd (original was 30 bbpd, that isn't right...PG) we get another 33 years of time to get things sorted out in terms of alternate energy sources and so on (though increasing demand would pull that number back to 20-25 years).

So I was considering the oil life of the United States of America...

Sheesh! There I was, just quietly slipped out of town for a quiet week at one or two of those conferences and westexas slips this little spark-emitting fizzy sounding thing into the comments. The FT story requires subscription, but the Mosnews seems to have most of it. The basic story itself is a dash of water in the face...all of it suggests that we are definitely entering one of those "interesting times", if we weren't in it already. (much more under the fold).