My Name Is Randy, And I'm Addicted To Oil.

[Guest guest]

" My Name Is Randy, And I'm Addicted To Oil. "

It's the end of the world as he knows it and Randy White feels fine

(sort of).

BY IAN DEMSKY | idemsky at wweek.com

http://www.wweek.com/editorial/3216/7253/

 

Randy White was a few minutes late to his Wednesday-night meeting in

the basement cafeteria of the St. Francis church in Southeast Portland.

 

 

He dragged a seat up to the 40 or so addicts who sat in a circle of

folding chairs on the Smurf-blue linoleum.

 

Over the past year or so, White, 29, has gotten serious about throwing

off the trappings of his old lifestyle, the habits that drove him to

use more and more of the stuff, but it hasn't been easy.

 

By his own admission, White is still hopelessly hooked. It's hard, he

confides, when almost everyone you know—even your wife—is strung out,

too.

 

Randy White is addicted to oil.

 

Then again, he would say, so are the rest of us. At least he's trying

to do something about it.

 

" I'm the guy waving his arms saying, 'Hey, wake up! This is

important!' " White says.

 

The meeting was the weekly gathering of a group called Portland Peak

Oil, a ragtag assembly of greenies, neighborhood-association activists

and business professionals who agree with George W. Bush on one

thing—that " America is addicted to oil. "

 

Anyone with half a brain knows it would behoove us to be less reliant

on foreign oil. But Peak Oil proponents see an 800-pound gorilla

barreling down on our laissez-faire energy attitudes.

 

The way Darwin believed we descended from monkeys and Joan of Arc that

she was on a mission from God, White and his buddies think the age of

affordable energy is rapidly nearing its end. Even voices from the

other side of the petroleum divide are starting to back them up: Last

year, Chevron CEO David O'Reilly announced, " The era of easy oil is

over. "

 

So what is White doing about it? He's transformed his own life while

carrying the Peak Oil message to the masses. Along the way, his

obsession has drawn skepticism from friends and loving tolerance from

his conservative family. In fact, depending on how cynical you are,

he's either a walking example of the futility of individual action or a

model of the kind of behavior that should make the rest of us a wee bit

ashamed.

 

Or maybe both.

 

Peakers think we've already tapped about half the oil the world will

ever have to offer and that production will soon begin a long,

irremediable decline. Meanwhile, global demand is expected to grow by

40 percent over the next 20 years, according to federal Energy

Information Administration projections. This rift between supply and

demand will send prices through the roof. And not just the price of

filling up your car but the cost of almost everything, because of how

much we rely on fossil fuels for building, manufacturing and shipping

virtually every modern convenience.

 

The American way of life that Dick Cheney once called " non-negotiable, "

with its air-conditioned Hummers, suburban sprawl and Caesar salads

trucked 3,000 miles, is in for a serious blow, Peak Oil proponents say.

 

 

Nobody's arguing that oil will last forever, but there is wide

disagreement about when the peak might arrive and how market forces,

new drilling technologies and alternative fuels will be able to help.

 

Portland Peak Oil started off as a casual group that met on the

Internet and gathered over pizza. Little more than a year later, it has

grown to have an active website (www.portlandpeakoil.org) with

discussion threads, links to recent energy news and other resources.

Its popularity pushed it to seek out the space at St. Francis, where 30

to 100 people attend the weekly meetings. Portland Peak Oil's February

calendar has 17 events on it, including documentary screenings,

" powerdown circles " to help people deal with emotional realities of

this possible future, and organic-gardening classes.

 

And Portland isn't alone. Similar groups are popping up across the

country.

 

White attends many of these events, but he is about more than talk.

 

Three years ago, White was a $90,000-a-year geek who sold software that

helped Fortune 500 companies and government agencies keep track of

hazardous chemicals.

 

In 2003, he moved to Portland from Anchorage, Alaska, with a plan to do

computer consulting and play music.

 

A military brat who'd bopped all over the country, White stayed abreast

of progressive politics. His band, Railer, toured in support of a

federal bill that would increase accountability in electronic voting,

and he once protested outside The Oregonian for not publishing the

Downing Street Memo. But he was hardly a radical. He spent his spare

time writing songs, playing Risk and drinking beer into the wee hours

of many a weekend morning.

 

Randy White, right, discusses life after cheap energy with members of

Portland Peak Oil at a recent meeting.

In other words, a fairly typical young Portlander.

 

That all ended in late 2004 when a friend handed him a DVD titled The

End of Suburbia.

 

He went home that night and watched it on his jumbo JVC flat screen.

The next 78 minutes changed his life, he says.

 

" It was like I had a 5,000-piece puzzle and it was the first time I got

to see what the whole picture looked like, " he says. " And it was a

scary, scary picture. "

 

The End of Suburbia is a documentary that wows not with production

values but with serious (and seriously researched) interviews with some

of the biggest names currently sounding the Peak Oil alarm: James

Howard Kunstler, Michael Klare, Richard Heinberg, Matthew Simmons and

Michael C. Ruppert.

 

Together they trace America's increasing dependence on oil and present

the case that the peak is real and will dramatically reshape America as

we know it. Kunstler goes so far as to suggest the suburbs will become

the new slums when most people will no longer be able to afford to live

50 miles from where they work.

 

" It was the first time, " says White, " I realized the future was going

to a look a lot more like Mad Max than I, Robot. "

 

It was also the first time he realized he might not always be able to

just go to the supermarket and have food waiting for him. Oil became

the card that could bring the whole house down.

 

" I've never been one to roll over and just accept defeat without

fighting to the end, " he says. " So I started thinking, 'What can I do

to help society prepare for this?' "

 

Almost immediately, White started making changes in his lifestyle.

 

He installed a wood-burning stove and new insulation in the 1,400

square-foot Southeast Portland home he shares with his wife, Michelle,

and their two rescued cats. Around the yard he planted apple and cherry

trees, lemongrass and strawberries. He started a compost heap and a

small vegetable garden.

 

And he sold his 1998 Volkswagen Jetta and bought a Twist N' Go Milano

scooter that gets 70 miles per gallon, effectively cutting the family's

emissions in half.

 

He rides the scooter to work when he's not carpooling with Michelle, an

OHSU nursing student. It sucks, he admits, during Portland's rainy

winters. " Man, I loved that Jetta, " he reminisces.

 

On a bookshelf in his dining room, White keeps five copies of a

post-apocalyptic guidebook called When Technology Fails. The four extra

copies are for barter in the event of a systemwide meltdown, White

says. He's also stockpiling knowledge on vegetarian cooking, basic home

repair, sustainable agriculture and cooperative communities.

 

And White has been slowly eliminating meat from his diet.

 

" I've been a meat-eater my whole life, " he says. " But in preparing for

Peak Oil I've realized that by eating beef I'm contributing to the

deforestation of the South American rainforests. " So far he's been

unable to completely cut himself off, but he has " greatly reduced " his

intake, he says, to the equivalent of a steak every two weeks.

 

But that wasn't enough. White quit his computer consulting gig last

spring and got a job selling ads for a radio station. Not just any

radio station, but KPOJ, Portland's liberal answer to Rush Limbaugh and

Lars Larson. " I picked KPOJ because I started listening and heard the

truth coming out over the airwaves, " he says.

 

He tries to sell ads to local companies with environmentally

sustainable business practices, but he admits it isn't always possible.

His environmental attitudes and his job keeping the station on the air

can be at odds sometimes.

 

" I'm trained to convince people to buy goods and services they don't

really need, " he says. " And it's like, 'Hey, by the way, thanks for

helping to destroy the planet.' "

 

He says he currently earns a third of what he did before.

 

White has also found a creative outlet for his environmental passion in

his music. As the singer for Railer, White goes by the name Randall

Scott. ( " Randy White sounded boring, " he says. " I sound like the guy

who used to play football for the Dallas Cowboys, not a wannabe rock

star. " )

 

A recent Railer song titled " Basic Allowance " samples a Jimmy Carter

speech in which he calls America's reliance on foreign oil a " clear and

present danger to our nation. " White's lyrics refrain: " We're getting

closer to one day/ one day left to find the energy to/ walk away from

the things we make. "

 

Not everyone in White's life is on board with his new anti-oil outlook.

 

Railer's bassist, Zev D-Clind, thinks White's passions are misplaced

and not very likely to lead to much actual change.

 

" I just told him, 'You're wasting your time,' " D-Clind says. " You can

bitch and moan all you want, but I'm here to rock. We should be playing

music, not whining. "

 

Both say it hasn't hurt the band, but White says it may have caused

their friendship to cool a bit.

 

" That's the type of apathy that I really can't stand, " White says.

 

The time and energy Peak Oil now takes up in White's life is time he

could be spending with his wife.

 

" I just need to remember to stop and remember to enjoy life a lot

more, " he says. " This can be consuming. She definitely has to tell me,

'Stop, just stop. I get it. I understand. I'm not going to do anything

about it. You go do something about it.'

 

" I'm still in my 20s, " he says. " I need to remember that this needs to

be a fun and romantic time, too. "

 

Michelle was less hard on Randy than he was on himself.

 

She says she understands the severity of the Peak Oil issue, but lets

Randy do the fretting for both of them.

 

" I have enough things to keep me busy without worrying about what may

happen if the world falls apart, " Michelle says. " I give him a hard

time about it sometimes, but I don't think he's crazy or anything. "

 

Yet she's also the first to admit her husband can get a bit carried

away.

 

" He'll let the weight of the world overtake him, " she says. " He was a

software consultant when I met him. Now he's a total activist guy. "

 

When Randy gets depressed or consumed or starts on another rant, both

agree she helps him take a step back.

 

" So, what are you going to do about it? " is her usual refrain.

 

And the changes around the house haven't gone too far. Yet, she adds.

 

" I don't see it as him preparing for the apocalypse, per se, " Michelle

says. " I see it as a motivation to become more self-sufficient in

general, which is admirable for anyone to try to do. "

 

Randy's conservative-leaning family in Alaska sometimes joke about

whether he's really related to the rest of the clan, his mom, Diane,

says.

 

" If he starts talking about [Peak Oil] a little too much, we tell him

to stop obsessing and relax, " she says. " 'Don't work yourself up into a

lather,' we tell him. His brother lets it go in one ear and out the

other. "

 

Still, White's parents have installed a wood stove and started

carpooling to work more at Randy's urging.

 

" He's changed our attitudes a little bit, " his mom says. " But for us,

everything we do is in moderation. When Randy's interested in

something, he never does it less than 100 percent. "

 

Even going to work for liberal KPOJ had its drawbacks, since it's owned

by radio and outdoor advertising behemoth Clear Channel, which is often

held up by lefties as the prime example of what's wrong with media

consolidation. Clear Channel is also known for its generous support of

Republican political campaigns.

 

" If lining the pockets of a big media company is part of me doing what

it takes to help people get the awareness they need, then it's worth it

to me, " White says.

 

There is a certain futility to White's efforts.

 

The wood stove cuts down on energy bills, but puts more carbon dioxide

into the air and requires a steady supply of wood.

 

" If everyone in America did that, we'd run out of trees pretty quick, "

he concedes.

 

His garden consists of a small plot where a few spindly stalks of

winter broccoli push up next to a patch of greens chewed to shreds by

slugs.

 

" If I had to live off what I could grow here, " he says, " it would last

me exactly one meal. I don't know anything about farming. "

 

If White were a junkie instead of an oil addict, it would be easy to

see kicking the habit as a total success. But even if he got everyone

he knew to live on a commune and wear homemade hemp clothing, the

global oil market wouldn't miss them. It could even be argued that

White could make more of a difference renting a couple of Hummers and

driving around with his friends gathering signatures to put a penny tax

on any product made from, made with or transported to market using oil.

 

 

That's where Portland Peak Oil comes in—theoretically. The group is

getting the word out that the problem even exists, getting local

politicians involved (and marshaling the grassroots to pressure them),

and serving as a clearinghouse for conservation and sustainability

information.

 

The group's recommendations for individuals are fairly generic: buy

local food, boycott non-sustainable businesses, get to know your

neighbors, build a library of basic survival knowledge, change spending

habits, consider alternative energy sources like solar. Bus and bike

whenever you can, and combine your car errands into one trip.

 

Most of their ideas mesh nicely with Portland's already green vibe.

 

For many people, the idea of another local taskforce elicits a groan.

 

But Metro Councilor Rex Burkholder, who served on the governor's Global

Warming Advisory Taskforce, has already drafted a letter asking Ted

Kulongoski to address the Peak Oil issue in the same way as global

warming.

 

" A credible, widely supported analysis of this challenge would help

immensely in the public discussion of our region's future, as well as

providing a factual foundation for our land-use and transportation

modeling, " Burkholder writes.

 

" We're in the midst of a 50-year land-use plan and a 20-year

transportation plan. It's only prudent we look at issues like this

one, " he told WW.

 

Portland City Commissioner Dan Saltzman's office is also supportive—as

long as a taskforce would come back with concrete recommendations.

 

U.S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) says the calamitous scenarios

painted by the Peak Oil crowd are " not beyond the scope of probability.

Let's just say they're only near-fetched. "

 

Peak Oil " is a way to tie the green consciousness together, " Blumenauer

told WW. " Cycling, land use, energy efficiency, mass transit—a lot of

what our community prides itself on already. [Portland] is in a pretty

good position for when the inevitable happens. "

 

There's another, more personal motive behind White's efforts: the death

last year of his older brother Christopher.

 

A career Air Force noncommissioned officer who served in various hot

zones, Christopher committed suicide. But in Randy's eyes, his brother

should be counted among the other casualties in the nation's fight to

control strategic territory and resources in the Middle East—and is

another reason to wean us from the oil mainline.

 

" I love my country, too. The people with the yellow 'Support Our

Troops' magnets on their SUVs, they're the ones that really need to

stop and think, " White says. " They need to follow the path back to

where we are now. Every drop of blood that's spilled over there comes

back to them. "

 

Some Peakers are more worried about mounting global destabilization and

fighting over the remaining oil resources than the decline of oil

itself.

 

In the end, White admits that if worse came to worse tomorrow and the

gas pumps shut off, despite his best efforts, he'd probably be one of

the pins knocked over.

 

" I still don't really know how to help myself when it really comes down

to it. What would you do? I mean, what would you do? "

 

 

Digging Deeper

" Americans threw away their communities in order to save a few dollars

on hair dryers and plastic food storage tubs, never stopping to reflect

on what they were destroying. " —James Howard Kunstler, The Long

Emergency

 

" As peaking is approached, liquid fuel prices and price volatility will

increase dramatically, and, without timely mitigation, the economic,

social, and political costs will be unprecedented. " —energy analyst

Robert Hirsch, February 2005 report for U.S. Department of Energy

 

" The United States—and the world—cannot afford to leave the Age of Oil

before realistic substitutes are fully in place. It is important to

remember that man left the Stone Age not because he ran out of

stones—and we will not leave the Age of Oil because we will run out. "

—Red Cavaney, president and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute,

" Global Oil Production About to Peak? A Recurring Myth " in World Watch

magazine

 

" The most intriguing thing about this raging debate over whether oil

production will soon peak—and put an end to the go-go days of the

petroleum age—is that it's occurring at all. " —Christopher Flavin,

president of Worldwatch Institute, " Over the Peak " in World Watch

magazine

 

" We have only a dwindling amount of time to build lifeboats—that is,

the needed alternative infrastructure. It has been clear for at least

30 years what characteristics this should have—organic, small-scale,

local, convivial, cooperative, slower paced, human-oriented rather than

machine-oriented, agrarian, diverse, democratic, culturally rich, and

ecologically sustainable. " —author and lecturer Richard Heinberg,

closing address for a Peak Oil conference in 2004

 

 

 

 

 

" The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of

private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic State

itself. That, in its essence, is Fascism - ownership of government by an

individual, by a group or by any controlling private power. " -Franklin Delano

Roosevelt

 

" I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the

people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and

sudden usurpations. " -James Madison