Start Date: August 13, 2023
If you believe the paleontological record, hominids date back one or two million years and homo sapiens a few hundred thousand years.
Throughout our history, humans, or at least one of the clan, had to be able to find or create shelter, make fire, follow trails, find water, dig wells, hunt prey, grow crops, preserve foods, use animal skins, spin thread, weave fabrics, make garments, bear children without doctors, navigate the seas by the stars, nurse babies, cook in a fireplace without burning down the shelter, and use weapons for defense. In simplest terms we had to know how to survive.
In a mere two centuries the skill set of the average modern American has become downloading Apps, DVR-ing TV, placing a video on TikTok, using a fob, streaming digital content, altering images with photoshop, programming a security system, thermostat, microwave oven, and computer. Yes we do have surgeons, architects, and people who can repair our stuff. But they all seem to require computers and robotics. We really just manipulate electronics in various forms.
The fact that the term “survivalist” conjures up some crazy conspiracy theorist along the lines of the Unabomber shows how little familiarity or regard we have for people who possess the basic skills of existence.
Why should you care? Think “Enron”. I know that seems a digression. But more than two decades back Enron was a high-flying energy stock. They presented their future as golden. Some of the leadership encouraged employees to invest much of their retirement benefits in company stock. This is the opposite of diversification. When the company collapsed they lost their jobs and much of their pension and retirements accounts. Never bet it all on any one thing. You want a plan A, plan B, and plan C for the benefit of the long run.
Yet as a nation we are increasingly consolidating, as opposed to diversifying, to a sole source of energy. We rely on an interdependent electrical grid and outsource essentials to foreign adversaries. Our hospitals, schools, and industries are vulnerable to cyber attacks. We build everything from electronics that can be interrupted by electromagnetic pulses. We are all one blip away from being sent back to life before the industrial revolution. No plan B.
Even worse we have a generation or more of politicians and educators encouraging people to voluntarily give up all of the reliable energy infrastructure built in the last two centuries and replace it with inadequate undependable sources that wax and wane with the very weather/climate that they have said will be increasingly variable and unpredictable. In some regions, at some times, and in some measure, they can be useful as elements of plan B and plan C etc. But they will not, nor should ever, carry the entire load.
One basic problem is economic supply and demand. We are reducing the supply of electricity by closing existing power plants and increasing demand by mandating all electric homes, cars, appliances, and tools. This will induce a spike in the cost of electricity.
But there is yet another fly in the ointment which is the issue of transformers. Over 90 percent of the electricity consumed in the U.S. passes through a large power transformer (LPT) [1]. Their expected lifetime is 40 years. Their mean age is 40 years. Some are over 70 years old and 70% are over 25 years old. [2].
Most are imported. They require rare and expensive materials and specially trained engineers. Per Jim Templeton, a consultant with 40 years in the industry, the place to get the skilled engineers is, or was, Ukraine. Apparently American schools don’t teach these skills because the manufacturing jobs left. All and all it may take three years to obtain a large transformer. [1]
Someone else can work out the statistical implications for a major breakdown. But for me it doesn’t inspire confidence.
You might even recall that in December 2022 a relatively minor act of vandalism took out two power sub-stations in North Carolina and left an entire county without power in winter for many days.
So work through it in your mind. The power infrastructure is attacked or overloaded and goes down. Day 1, day 2, day 3. It’s been a week. The batteries are all dead. No heat or AC. No light after dark. No water treatment. No sanitation processing. No power to run pumps for wells.
No internet or telecommunications to get information.
No air traffic control. No power to run the pumps at the gas station, should we still be allowed to have gas stations. So no transportation, which is a good thing as there won’t be any traffic lights or street lights.
No hospitals. Their backup generators will have run down or the fuel was banned.
No ATMs. But what would you do with the money? The food in the grocery stores has all rotted even if you could get there.
All of the security systems are down. As I write this my region has experienced numerous massive mob robberies of malls and shopping centers in a short time. All in broad daylight with security video running. Imagine your city on a long term blackout. Many American cities have experienced mass chaos, looting, and and rioting with everything up and running.
Maybe you have been through a hurricane or an earthquake or a major fire. On some level it was local. It was limited in time. What if there is no help on the way any time soon?
So what happens come the apocalypse? You are living in the 19th century.
It was only three or four generations back that your family was living their best life without electricity. Over a thousand years ago the Roman Empire constructed roads, aqueducts and Coliseums. The Greeks built the Parthenon, theaters, and temples. The ancient Egyptians erected the pyramids and managed the flooding of the Nile. All without power tools. Maybe you have seen scholars on TV programs using computer simulations attempting to discover how it was done. But it is unlikely our generation could reproduce their accomplishments.
The outdoorsy type that many mock will hold out much longer than the rest of us. They are the ones who would make it through “survival of the fittest” if “fit” still referred to existential ability. I think of a friend who can, and does, chop wood, manage home fires, and plant fruit trees. His family know where to find local fresh water and can manage sub-freezing temperatures in sleeping bags. They collectively raise chickens, goats, and horses. At minimum they have eggs, milk, and transportation. They all have and know how to use guns.
In what is known as flyover country farmers and ranchers will have a tough time but they will be feeding and sheltering their families long after I have curled up in a ball in the corner to cry and await my demise.
You see I was counting on larger society as a collective entity to take care of the basics so I could get by without being an Eagle Scout. They did a fine job for a century or more. Not so much these days.
So when it goes dark will you be among the last ones standing?
REFERENCES
[1] Postelwait, Jeff, “Transformative Times: Update on the U.S. Transformer Supply Chain”, July 12, 2022, https://www.tdworld.com/utility-business/article/21243198/transformative-times-update-on-the-us-transformer-supply-chain
[2] ” The electric grid could be down for years if LPTs destroyed”, energyskeptic.com, July 3, 2023, https://energyskeptic.com/2023/power-transformers-that-take-up-to-2-years-to-build/#:~:text=Over%2090%25%20of%20the%20nation’s,aged%20more%20than%2025%20years