Energy Problems will be Solved As Soon As We are Localized

Founder-Acharya of the world-wide Hare Krishna Movement, Brahma Sampradaya Acharya

[At the time of posting this article, oil prices are close to US$58 per barrel, having fallen from their all-time high of more than US$70 per barrel. When the oil companies reported highest profits in history this year (ExxonMobil alone reported $9.9 billion in profits last quarter), public outrage prompted the US Senate to summon oil executives for explanation, but the public continues to pay dearly for modern man's dependency on oil for everything from car petrol tanks to manufacture of synthetics to transportation/shipping costs to chemical and food production. The following abstract from an article by Norman Church points out graphically the extent of our dependency and the impending crisis, and supports Srila Prabhupada's position that a localized economy is the solution.]

Why Our Food is So Dependent on Oil
April 2, 2005

Proximity and localisation of food system would be beneficial.
The contemporary food system is inherently unsustainable.

by Norman Church
Almost every current human endeavour from transportation, to manufacturing, to electricity to plastics, and especially food production is inextricably intertwined with oil and natural gas supplies.

Commercial food production is oil powered. Most pesticides are petroleum- (oil) based, and all commercial fertilisers are ammonia-based. Ammonia is produced from natural gas Oil based agriculture is primarily responsible for the world's population exploding from 1 billion at the middle of the 19th century to 6.3 billion at the turn of the 21st Oil allowed for farming implements such as tractors, food storage systems such as refrigerators, and food transport systems such as trucks As oil production went up, so did food production. As food production went up, so did the population. As the population went up, the demand for food went up, which increased the demand for oil. Here we go round the Mulberry bush Oil is also largely responsible for the advances in medicine that have been made in the last 150 years. Oil allowed for the mass production of pharmaceutical drugs, and the development of health care infrastructure such as hospitals, ambulances, roads, etc.

We are now at a point where the demand for food/oil continues to rise, while our ability to produce it in an affordable fashion is about to drop.

Within a few years of Peak Oil occurring, the price of food will skyrocket because the cost of fertiliser will soar. The cost of storing (electricity) and transporting (gasoline) the food that is produced will also soar.

Oil is required for a lot more than just food, medicine, and transportation. It is also required for nearly every consumer item, water supply pumping, sewage disposal, garbage disposal, street/park maintenance, hospitals and health systems, police, fire services and national defence.

Additionally, as you are probably already aware, wars are often fought over oil. ... [Full Story with Graph illustrating the distribution of petroleum usage]

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Prabhupada: So we can discuss some of the problems, about the problems. Discuss what are the problems.
Bhagavan: Now? We shall discuss now?
Prabhupada: Yes. We are going to solve all problems. Let us have some preliminary discussion, how we are going to solve.
Bhagavan: The biggest problem now is that they have built up a type of society in which their needs are all coming from petrol energy. To produce what they need today is all coming from this petrol energy...
Prabhupada: Yes, yes.
Bhagavan: ...which they are importing basically from the Saudi Arabian countries.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Bhagavan: Now, recently, in the last war in the Middle East, Saudi Arabians raised the price of the oil over double now, I think, as a pressure to the Western countries to do things in their favor. Now they realized that the market for oil is in such great demand that they don't have to lower the price after the war, but they are going to keep the price. And actually the price is still increasing. So this is causing inflation.
Prabhupada: So this problem will be solved as soon as we are localized. Petrol is required for transport, but if you are localized, there is no question of transport. You don't require petrol. Suppose in New Vrindaban, we stay, we don't go anywhere. Then where is the need of petrol?
Bhagavan: Petrol they also use for heating. And electricity.
Prabhupada: No, heating. Heating we can do by wood. By nature.
Dhananjaya: I remember, Srila Prabhupada, you were saying that all we require is some oxen, and the oxen can carry.
Prabhupada: Yes. The oxen will solve the problem of transport. That bullock cart. Just like Krishna, when He was transferred from Gokula to Nandagrama, so they took all the bullock carts, and within a few hours they transported them, the whole thing, their luggage, family member, everything.
Bhagavan: How far can a bullock cart travel in one day?
Prabhupada: At least ten miles, very easily, very easily. And maximum he can travel fifteen miles, twenty miles. But when we are localized, we don't require to go beyond ten miles, five miles. Because we have created a rubbish civilization, therefore one is required to go fifty miles for earning bread, hundred miles, hanging.
Dhananjaya: Like in Los Angeles.
Prabhupada: Why Los Angeles? Everywhere. In New York they are coming from hundred miles. From the other side of the island. First ferry steamer, then bus, then so on, so on. Three hours, four hours, they spend for transport.
Satsvarupa: Is this an ideal solution or a practical one?
Prabhupada: This is practical.
Satsvarupa: Because sometimes we say that actually we cannot change the course of the... Prabhupada: No, no. Our society will be ideal by practical application.
Satsvarupa: If we stopped all the transportation industry, there would be huge unemployment. It would be a great...
Prabhupada: No, no, we are not going to stop employment. We live like this. You see. If you like, you live like us.
Bhagavan: Example.
Prabhupada: Example.
Satsvarupa: Not that we dictate to the... Not that we are going to force everyone.
Prabhupada: No, we are not going to force anyone. "Our mode of living is like this. If you like you can adopt." Just like we chant Hare Krishna mantra. So we are not forcing anyone that "You also, you must chant." No. We live like this.
Dhananjaya: So in fact, Srila Prabhupada, we should start using bullock carts.
Prabhupada: Yes. No, first of all you start the community project, as we have already started in New Vrindaban. Make this perfect.
Devotee: There was a big meeting of scientists in Stockholm, Sweden, and they talked that if humanity doesn't begin to live in a localized way like you say, in fifty years will be no more source of production.
Prabhupada: That is rascaldom. We can produce from anywhere, foodstuff.
Bhagavan: What about the question of using petrol for heat? Another import—... there are three uses of petrol, or four. One is the transportation, one is heat, another is electricity, and a fourth is they use it to manufacture so many products. So what if someone asks...
Prabhupada: No, you go on products, with your product. You have created problem, you go on with your problem. But we live like this. If you like, you can adopt.
Bhagavan: What is our solution to heat? Wood?
Prabhupada: Heat? Yes, wood. Sufficient.
Dhananjaya: But they are saying they used all the wood for paper, so there's no more wood.
Prabhupada: No, no. Paper you can make from grass, from cotton. So many other fibers. You don't require wood. You grow grass, sufficient quantity, and you make paper. Why should you publish so many rubbish literatures? Just like you were telling. The Times of India, the newspaper. ... So paper, if we don't produce unnecessary paper, there is no scarcity. From grass. You produce grass, huge quantity of grass, you will get paper. Cotton also. First-class paper. In India also, the rejected paper. From rejected paper you can get another paper also. But they throw it away in your country. Collect this rejected paper and again put it into paper. And why should you publish all rubbish literature? Simply publish Bhagavata and Bhagavad-gita, that's all. What is the use of this newspaper, nonsense newspaper, huge, huge quantity? So everything will be nice provided you become ideal. Live in community. Produce your own food. Even you can produce your own paper. You don't require printing of so many books. If there is one book, others can imitate, or copy. There is no need of printing. Formerly they used to do that...
Bhagavan: I didn't understand that about one book.
Prabhupada: One book... Suppose we have prepared some small quantity of paper. So you can, if you want that book, you just copy another book.
Bhagavan: By hand.
Prabhupada: Yes. There is no need of printing books.
Bhagavan: Some people would be engaged in copying books.
Prabhupada: No, you engage yourself. If you want book, that book, you copy yourself. Why someone should be engaged for you? You have got enough time. You are not going to the factory or hundred miles for your earning livelihood. You are on the local space. You have got enough time. You just take, copy. That's all. Minimize your unnecessary waste of time. Save time. Chant Hare Krishna. Go back to home. This is our idea. Instead of chanting twenty-five rounds, you chant hundred rounds. That is utilization of proper time. Instead of begetting cats and dogs, you just beget one child, Krishna conscious. This is the ideal life. What is the use of using sex life unnecessarily? Therefore only for begetting nice child one should have sex life. This is ideal life. Not that you use sex life, contraceptive method. This is all demonism. But they cannot do without it. Because they have no other engagement, they do not know how nice Krishna is and how pleasurable it is to reciprocate with Krishna. Therefore they go to the dog's pleasure, sex life on the street and there, on the beach. That's all. They have been educated like dogs...
Bhagavan: Now they have... the other day in the paper that India exploded its first atomic bomb. Prabhupada: Yes, and therefore yet it has become very great.
Yogeshvara: Now its in the top six.
Prabhupada: But there is no food. Never mind, you starve, but get your atom bomb. That's all. This is civilization. There was a cartoon. Somebody approached some politician, and he said, "Yes, I know there is food problem. So I cannot say what can I do for you, but from next week, you will have television." This is their program, "From next week you will have television." As if television will minimize my hunger. This is the civilization. Hare Krishna.
So you ask problem, I will answer. Your energy, problems of energy, petrol, it will be automatically solved. If we are localized, there is no question of petrol.
Bhagavan: You say in the, I think it's in the Second Canto of Srimad-Bhagavatam, that by doing so much drilling into the earth, they actually disturbed the rotation of the earth.
Prabhupada: Yes, we can think like that. Just like the plane, aeroplane, is flying. There is sufficient petrol stock. Is it not? So the world has got sufficient petrol stock. If you do not know how it is being used, maybe due to this petrol, it is floating. And if you take away the petrol stock, it may drop. Everything is there. There is a purpose. Purnam idam [Ishopanishad, Invocation]: "The Personality of Godhead is perfect and complete, and because He is completely perfect, all emanations from Him, such as this phenomenal world, are perfectly equipped as complete wholes..."] There is full purpose. Not that whimsically petrol is there within the earth. There is some purpose.
Devotee: What they do, Srila Prabhupada, is take the petrol out and put salt water, because they know there can be a imbalance. And then they put salt water in the holes.
Prabhupada: But water cannot produce gas. Petrol produces gas. Maybe due to that gas, it is floating. Because we have got practical experience. When there is gas, you can float anything.
Dhananjaya: Like a balloon.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Bhagavan: There is another big problem that now all the opposing countries have built up excess amounts of atomic weapons all pointed at each other. So now they are trying to have big planning conference how to diminish all these weapons.
Prabhupada: If there is no opposite elements, there is no need of weapons. If I am not your enemy, there is no fear. We are preaching this philosophy, brahma-bhutah prasannatma: "As soon as you become Krishna conscious, you become jubilant..." [Bhagavad-gita 18.54] So where is your enemy? Samah sarveshu bhuteshu [Bhagavad-gita 18.54]: "...He is equally disposed toward every living entity..." Then where is your enemy? Formerly, a man might have become enemy of another man. But this demonic civilization has created nation to nation, country to country, community to community, all enemies. And on account of this communistic enemy, so many innocent people are killed. I have seen in Calcutta during the partition days. So many innocent Hindus and Muslims were killed. Any (indistinct), very quickly this Communistic feeling is aroused, and they fight, like cats and dogs. "Oh, here is another dog! Here is another dog, coming from another neighborhood." So this is demonic civilization. If you want to go to some country, you have to take visa, permission, this, that, so many. Why? Vedic civilization is "You come to my country. Welcome. You are my guest." Grihe shatrum api praptam vishvastam akutobhayam: "Even one is enemy, when he comes to my house, he is my honorable guest." And here, they are so much afraid that you keep dogs. The dog is kept here. [break] Yogeshvara: ...all the major nations of the world have... These atomic weapons constitute very great storehouses for them. So what should they do with all of these things?
Prabhupada: They should throw. I throw upon you, you throw upon me. You go to hell, I go to hell. That's all. This will be the result. And the world will be cleansed of these all rascals. This will be the result. [laughs]

Energy Problems will be Solved As Soon As We are Localized

Talks on Varnashram Dharma