The future of almost eve.., p.25
The Future of Almost Everything, page 25
Sharia laws will be overseen by Muslim clerics, responsible for every part of government. Forced conversions will be part of the future picture, as in the past, with death threats often received by those who convert to another religion, or by those who seek to convert them. Thus, many Islamic societies will continue to use fear as an important tool to encourage religious obedience.
Christianity will focus less on government and more on policy
Christian groups over the last decades have almost always been driven by a relatively non-governmental mission: to recruit willing followers, who desire to live lives that are in keeping with Jesus’s example and teachings. They will continue to celebrate compassion, unselfish love and kindness as outward signs of inner religious obedience.
Their theology is that as individuals are touched and changed by the love of God, communities are also changed, towns and cities are transformed, whole nations and governments are revolutionised. Social action will continue to be a major element of this tradition, whether running food banks, health care for the poor, or shelter for the homeless.
While many Christians are likely to engage in politics in future, they are almost certain to do so within the context of democracy, rather than attempting to impose a radical theocracy. Most will tend to support activist campaigns rather than joining a political party.
Peace will overcome religious violence eventually
As history shows repeatedly, where you have two groups of radical zealots: one promoting hate, fear and using violence, the other promoting love, respect and peace, the violent ones tend to gain power in the short term, but lose moral force eventually. Societies built on fear are limited by the desire for human freedom, are ultimately unsustainable, and therefore unusual.
Extremely violent, intolerant, Islamic militant groups will continue to be a poor advert globally for their religious brand, and in the long-term will be damaging to the wider (voluntary) acceptance of Islamic religion in general, except to small minorities of people who are attracted by such behaviours and by the comfort of clear, dogmatic creeds. The same applies to extreme Christian groups.
Expect support to peak and wane for the most ruthless and violent groups in any religion – and for militant Islam to decline in aggression, as numbers of followers of Islam grow rapidly over the next 50–100 years, fuelled by large middle-class families, and by extra finance generated primarily from Middle East oil over the next five decades or more.
Moderate Muslims are likely to be increasingly repelled by ‘medieval’ atrocities, committed in the name of Islam. As is the case with all fanatical groups, they too are likely to realise eventually that the goals they dream of will never be achieved by terrorist acts, only by winning the hearts of people.
Radical forces in the Middle East
Radical ideologies and tribalism will dominate the Middle East for the longer term, with constant risk of more regional conflicts. One of many contributing factors is the arbitrary nature of country borders, imposed as lines in the sand on nomadic Arab peoples, by Western powers many decades ago.
The Arab Spring was a reaction to corrupt autocracy and has, it seems resulted in greater tribalism. The autocrats, such as Saddam Hussein and President Assad of Syria, kept a lid on tribal tension.
Pressure on ruling families
We are likely to see instability across large parts of the region from time to time over the next 50 years. A number of Arab nations ruled by ultra-wealthy royal families could be very vulnerable. Violent activist groups of which Islamic State is just one example will seek to bring about inter-connected theocracies as part of an Arab-wide Islamic region.
Sunni and Shiite Muslims will continue as distinct communities well beyond 2050, with ripples felt across the entire world. Such conflicts will be stoked by atrocities, and kept going by oil revenues as well as by regional interests.
The civil war in Syria is likely to further destabilise and then reform the entire region, over several generations. Even if a peace agreement were brokered in Syria tomorrow, it would take at least 15 years to rebuild the nation and resettle over 4 million refugees, and a further 15 years for bitter memories to fade.
Centuries-long vision for the region
We need to understand the wider centuries-long vision of a series of Islamic fundamentalist groups, of which Al-Qaeda is only one of the better known.
A potential flashpoint for the next century will be Saudi Arabia, the heart of Islam, protectorate of the two most holy places, with immense oil wealth, and with great aspirations for its large and young population. Saudi Arabia is likely to remain a major target for Islamic revolutionary forces over the next 20–30 years, and the royal family is likely to make concessions to help maintain stability. We can also expect further major investments in education and job creation for younger nationals. But at the same time, there will be pressures in some parts of the community for liberalisation.
Saudi Arabia’s oil revenues will decline
We cannot be sure when Saudi Arabia’s oil revenues will start to decline permanently as reserves dwindle, or as our world becomes increasingly averse to burning carbon, but at some point in the next 50 years, it is likely that oil revenues will no longer support most of the national economy. This same issue will have a very significant impact on most of the Middle East, and will drive rapid investment in alternatives such as solar power.
Major social shifts
Countries like Iran are experiencing hidden social revolutions that are quite liberal, in contrast to the public image or official government policies of such nations. For example, a government survey reported that 80% of unmarried females in Iran have boyfriends, and many are sexually active. In addition, 17% of 142,000 students in the survey said that they were homosexual.
Turkey will find itself in an increasingly uncomfortable place, under pressure to radicalise towards stricter Islamic laws, with unstable borders to Iraq and Syria, while also under pressure from many middle-class citizens who look West rather than East. Turkey is already in danger of being overwhelmed by events across its borders, with over 1.6 million refugees arriving from Syria in just three years. Turkey will also experience tensions with the Kurdish peoples to the East.
Future of Palestine and Israel
Another flashpoint will, of course, be Israel and Palestine. I realise that many readers may have strong feelings about what should happen, but this book is about what it is reasonable to expect may happen, in the context of all other global and regional trends, and with many uncertainties. Here is a ‘common sense’ view, based on the current situation and some long-term factors.
Israel is a tiny nation of only 8 million people, packed into a narrow strip 263 miles long and up to 71 miles wide. If the entire Arab world starts to focus on Israel instead of inter-Arab conflicts, it is clear that the entire nation could be overrun, unless Israel resorts to the threat of using some kind of nuclear device. But against what nation would such a device be used if the forces raging against their borders on all sides are diffuse in origin, with tens of thousands of militia volunteers from more than forty countries? And what if an Arab nation with a nuclear device threatened to retaliate?
Pressure likely to grow for autonomy in Palestine
Israel seems likely to continue to resist external efforts to broker a lasting settlement for 4.4 million Palestinian people, who are living in densely packed areas with limited freedoms. New generations of freedom fighters, militants, and activists are likely to grow up in these communities, deeply hostile to Israel, finding common cause with wider movements across the Middle East.
The future well-being of the Palestinian people is likely to remain a fundamental issue of justice for most Arab peoples as well as for a growing number of non-Arabs around the world. A total of 135 nations have now officially recognised Palestine as a country.
If America chooses, at any point in the future, to fully defend Israel’s borders, it is likely that American troops will be drawn into a long-distance, bitterly contested, very costly and potentially lengthy land battle. Such action could be ultimately unwinnable, if this enrages the entire Arab world against America and Israel for generations to come.
Despite these threats, Israel seems likely to try to pursue similar strategies as they have in the past for the next 15 years – hit back hard when attacked, keep a constant military alert, and weaken the Palestinian people with oppressive actions including the building of new Israeli settlements on land that has been inhabited recently by Palestinians.
However, Israel will need to adapt its strategy rapidly to the new world of asymmetric tribal conflicts. Like America, Israel is very ill-equipped for multi-dimensional, informal, urban battles, sweeping across several of its borders at once, as a movement of people on a collective suicide mission, rather than structured as a traditional military campaign.
Sustainability will be a dominant theme for 300 years
Worries about ‘sustainability’ will drive radical thinking about the very survival of humanity for the next 300 years and beyond.
Our world is short of water, food and mineral resources. A quarter of all 4000 known mammal species face extinction by 2035, according to the UN Environment Programme. One in eight plant types are also threatened. Only 10% of large fish in the ocean remain. Acidity from dissolved CO2 has risen by 25% since the industrial revolution, altering the chemistry of trillions of sea organisms. Preserving biodiversity will be a growing priority, accelerated by the impact of global warming and loss of habitats. How will our world survive? How can economic growth continue indefinitely?
Concerns about global warming will intensify
China is now producing almost twice as much CO2 as America, more than any other nation. On current trends, China alone will emit more CO2 from 1990 to 2050 than the entire world produced from 1750 to 1970. But how much does this really matter?
The science of global warming is just a ‘best guess’ about what life will be like in 2100, and about the contribution of carbon emissions to what is happening now. But by the time we have proved whether the science is right, it will be too late. In the meantime, emotion is what will matter most in predicting the impact of global warming trends on business and government. How passionately people feel about an issue that could be devastating, but is as yet still unproven in the minds of some people, who believe that the temperature changes we are seeing are part of natural cycles, and are less serious than has been claimed.
Most people in the world are becoming more aware of risks from climate change, and more concerned that human activity may be contributing to it. Expect these concerns to grow, except where nations are temporarily distracted by other crises. These concerns will mean more laws, international agreements, carbon taxes, and so on.
What of the long-term future? My own view is that there is a very significant risk that our world will become warmer by at least 2 degrees centigrade, as a result of CO2 emissions, by 2060. But even if you think that risk is as low as 5%, in other words very unlikely even by 2100, the potential consequences could be so overwhelming that by the time we know for sure, the damage will have been done. And that argument will guarantee vigorous action, with an increasing sense of urgency over the next 40 years or more.
CO2 levels are likely to rise more in the next decade than in any previous decade in recent history, if the global economy grows strongly, and emerging market emissions grow faster than emission reductions by developed nations. Thereafter, hopefully we will see year-on-year declines as the world switches towards green technologies.
There is great speculation about future sea levels and how much they might rise. We know that sea levels rose 17cm in the last century. Research also shows that from 1993 to 2010 sea levels rose a further 3.2mm each year on average, or by around 3cm a decade, double the rate of 1901 to 1990. On that basis alone, we would expect the sea to rise by at least 24–30cm by 2100. So we can see how easily sea levels could rise to the widely accepted forecasts of 30–60cm above today’s levels. Or even 1 metre if the world warms more rapidly than expected.
A rise of half a metre would affect most of the largest cities in the world in a significant way, since they are all built around sea ports for historic reasons. Over 3 billion people live within 100 miles of the sea, a significant proportion of whom will be affected in some way by rising sea levels, for example, by higher taxes to pay for coastal protection. Even without the melting of land-based polar ice, sea levels will rise because water expands as it warms.
We will also see changes in agriculture and fishing, as some areas become more arid, and others are flooded more often. Many floods or droughts will be blamed on global warming, even if the truth is that they would almost certainly have happened anyway.
Unstable oil prices will create chaos for energy companies
We have already seen how 40-year energy policies can be overturned by a single 40-second event, and why energy markets will continue to be very unstable at times. We should expect a number of oil price peaks and slumps, created by over-production, stop-start investment, economic cycles and regional conflicts.
Oil prices are likely to swing below $30 and above $220 per barrel at various points over the next three decades. Prices fell from over $140 to below $40 in a few weeks of 2008, and to below $20 in 2001. Such extremes will continue to cause chaos and pain for oil and gas companies, as well as for green tech.
However, it is likely that the average oil price will be well above $110 a barrel for most of the next 30 years, which will help drive transition to a carbon-less future. Indeed, many oil-rich countries need to achieve such a price to balance their budgets. And it is hard to see how we can transition to a lower-carbon existence without such an average price.
Whenever oil prices fall below $75 a barrel, huge damage is done to green tech industries because the numbers no longer stack up to justify investment. Fund managers can easily lose confidence in the sector, postponing new financial commitments. Businesses and private individuals may decide to put off energy saving measures for another year or two. And as we have seen in the past, some green tech companies can rapidly run out of money if they cannot sell their energy at a high enough price. Their entire business models can come crashing to the ground.
Future oil prices will depend (among other things) on whether low-cost producers hold back production, since a nation like Saudi Arabia can easily flood the world with oil for a number of years, and still make a profit at prices of less than $40 a barrel. But they cannot do so for long without squandering their limited oil reserves.
Truth about peak oil – global supplies
Many Futurists have made wild predictions over the past 30 years about how the world will soon run out of oil and gas, and about the price of oil. However, from 2008–2013 alone, energy industry estimates for global gas reserves went up from just 60 years to 200 years at current rates of consumption, because of shale gas innovation. The same has happened with oil. Every year, proven oil reserves continue to rise, and only a third of geological formations that could contain oil have so far been explored.
Every time energy prices rise, more carbon can be extracted. Around 65% of oil in most wells had to be left underground in the past, because it is too hard to extract. Until oil prices collapsed in 2014–2015, companies were routinely drilling around 10km below sea beds to extract oil, because technology has improved and because they think future oil prices will make the effort worthwhile.
Frozen methane and other untapped carbon reserves
We have not even begun to explore extraction of frozen methane, which is one of the world’s largest carbon stores. Energy stores under the ice caps or oceans could be as great as all proven oil, gas and coal reserves today.
Expect the Arctic to become one of the world’s most important new areas for extraction of fossil fuels, iron ore, uranium and other resources. The Arctic probably contains up to 30% of the world’s undiscovered natural gas and 15% of the oil. Expect $60bn of Arctic investment by 2025.
We will see growing geopolitical tensions over who has rights to what is under the ice – with Canada laying claim to the North Pole, and Russia increasing its military presence in the region. We will also see similar disputes over ownership of tiny islands and surrounding sea beds across South East Asia, to secure drilling rights.
The truth is that carbon reserves will never quite run out, because there will always be more that can be extracted, if the price goes even higher. After a certain point, other forms of energy become far more affordable, especially with carbon taxes, so use of fossil fuels will fall gradually towards zero. Indeed, it is unlikely that our world will be able to burn all the reserves we have already discovered, unless we find better ways to capture CO2 emissions from power stations, and store them underground.
And of course we can already convert any form of carbon into more or less any other form: gas to a coal-like substance, energy to gas, rapeseed oil to petrol, coal to gas, wood to oil, waste CO2 to petrol, and so on. We can also use wind power to manufacture methane or hydrogen gas as a way to store energy. The scale of production will depend on optimisation and price differences between input and output.
Quick route to reducing emissions
The fastest and cheapest way for any nation to reduce carbon emissions is to switch from coal to gas. Replacing five coal power stations with gas is the equivalent of installing 9000 megawatts of wind power. In America, emissions fell by 12% from 2007 to 2013, primarily because the shale gas boom drove more than fifty coal-fired power stations out of business.
Gas will still be widely used in power generation in 2060, as a rapid and flexible balancer between sources like nuclear and wind or solar, and will be a central element of national power management.
Fracking will become far more widely accepted, partly encouraged by national security fears in the EU, threatened by the thought of unreliable gas supplies from Russia. The fracking revolution has transformed the national energy market in America, which as we have seen will overtake Saudi Arabia as an oil producer by 2020.
