Addicted

Some say we have an addiction to oil. I say we have much more than an addiction. We are entirely reliant upon it. Oil will run out someday. And when it does we will have no cars, transportation, plastic, oil-based paint, petroleum, asphalt, some kinds of wax, and 3% of the nations electricity (which is actually a lot). However, wind, water movement, geothermal, and solar energy will not run out, making them excellent alternatives to oil.
Now it is true that in the past few years considerable steps forward have been made in the domestic clean energy effort. However, considerable is not momentous. We need to look at the facts and not believe everything we hear or read. In the 1970s an embargo against the U.S., as well as other countries that supported Israel, was enacted by multiple oil producing countries in the middle east. This embargo devastated the U.S. and caused the government to start releasing energy conservation ads. At the time most sources of renewable energy were either out of reach or not thought of. During this shortage of fuel, people started driving smaller, and more fuel efficient cars. However, after the embargo was ended people began to revert to their old, wasteful selves. We could learn a few lessons from this crisis. To begin with, we can not place a significant amount of our energy dependence in oil, whether foreign or domestic. The United states is currently the worlds biggest consumer of oil. Also contrary to popular belief, the price of oil did not skyrocket in the last few months. It did rise but the spikes were caused by speculation that in the future it will rise. You see roughly two thirds of all energy used in transportation is based on petroleum. When the price of travel (which is considered a necessity) goes up, than the consumer has less money to spend in the every day world. Now that they have less to spend many businesses start to lose money, and when businesses start to lose money, their stock price goes down, devaluing the company. When all of those companies combined stocks plummet the stock market becomes a scary place. So if you think about it, oil could be blamed for the economic “Slump” we're in.
In a study published in Gallup Poll, March 2007, 53% of Americans thought the United States of America was likely to face an energy shortage within the next five years. We know the problems are there. We are just doing little about it. With this in mind, we must be more conservative and fuel efficient. It is time to stop pleasing the oil companies and start pleasing the people who comprise this incredible nation. This problem cannot be solved over night. We must wean ourselves slowly off the oil, and gradualy use our money (that our economy currently does not have due to a financial crisis) to fill in those gaps of open land with solar panels and wind turbines. It is a huge investment we must make but in the end are the results not worth it? We send billions of dollars overseas for oil each year draining the ocean that is our economy until only the fish are left to flop around and die. We must stop being so gluttonous in nature. We shouldn’t be the country where bigger is better and excess is excellent. We should be the country where efficient, is better. Many people believe that the government is to blame for all the trouble we are in, but this is not true. Although they are a large culprit, so are all of us normal folk. We are the ones actually allowing it to happen, if not causing it. We are not only the nation of excess, but we are than nation of laziness. We have the highest rate of obesity of any developed country in the world. We are the country where a quarter mile is too much to walk.
Another ill effect of our oil addiction is the cause it has on the world around us. We are releasing excess amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels. Carbon dioxide is naturally occurring in the atmosphere in low percentages, and assists with the trapping of heat from the sun. Now that we have too much, the world is slowly heating. Ice bergs are melting causing a rise in sea level. A rise in sea level (as well as a rise in ocean temperature) is causing delicate ecosystems to falter or fail entirely. In addition to this, warmer ocean temperatures are causing new air flow patterns in the atmosphere, resulting in strange new weather patterns. Places that need rain are no longer getting it, and places that were getting rain are now getting too much.
In short, oil is the root of all our problems. The financial crisis, our wars, and animal extinction can all be related to it. So grab a fuel efficient car, move to a city at least thirty feet above sea level, and hold on. The transition from oil to alternative energy is likely to be a lengthy one.