The best survey of the energy future ever. And from a liberal in Salon.

I think Al Gore forgot to spike the coolaid this month.  This is a fascinating survey of just how much technological changes in production of fossil fuels have changed the energy calculus.  It's a pity that the Obami stopped learning things around 1976...

Eventually civilization may well run out of natural gas and other fossil fuels that are recoverable at a reasonable cost, and may be forced to switch permanently to other sources of energy. These are more likely to be nuclear fission or nuclear fusion than solar or wind power, which will be as weak, diffuse and intermittent a thousand years from now as they are today. But that is a problem for the inhabitants of the world of 2500 or 3000 A.D.

In the meantime, it appears that the prophets of an age of renewable energy following Peak Oil got things backwards. We may be living in the era of Peak Renewables, which will be followed by a very long Age of Fossil Fuels that has only just begun.

We haven't had much good news recently.  It's nice to see some.  The Saudis and Iranians are going to be bummed.