Enter, stage left, a sarcastic scientist.

Greetings folks. This is my first post here at Seldon's Gate, and while I loathe introductory posts I should probably mention what I'm doing here. Kir'Shara was kind enough to invite me to contribute, since I clog up the comments stream so much anyway! I'm a PhD student in biology and geology, studying climate change. From this you know I am an intellectual masochist and a cynic. Anybody in ecology and climate science is intimately familiar with the systemic problems Kir'Shara has been discussing here, and my goal is to bring a slightly more technical and focused look at them to the table. All of the problems we face are, at the end of the day, going to take the form of individual-scale, daily struggles with energy flow problems, and I want to start conversations about how to meet those with the sorts of resources that will always be available to our communities, namely teamwork, brainpower, and not a little moxie.

In that vein, I want to point everyone to a simple little site that I've been mining for information for days; the "Compendium of Useful Information" is a link database to all sorts of DIY technology for dealing with peak oil and industrial collapse. It's far from comprehensive, and it is vulnerable to broken links (although I haven't found any yet), but the principle is great and represents a good start. My hope is to provide links to these sorts of resources whenever I find them. I urge anyone with the resources to spend the time to identify and PRINT OUT articles that look like they could possibly be useful in the future. The internet is a great vehicle for moving information, but it will not prove to be terribly effective at STORING it, not in the sort of situation we're facing. A few three ring binders stashed in you garage or under your bed may come in very, very handy later when you need to figure out how to reestablish water pressure in your house when the power goes out!