How Can We Live with Peak Oil?

Abstract

Ernst Solvay was a famous Belgian chemist, industrialist, and philanthropist. Over 100 years ago in 1911, he invited a number of the leading physicists of the age to Brussels to discuss the “new physics,” the physics that would ultimately revolutionize our world and our understanding of the universe. Einstein had already presented his theory of relativity but the atomic structure of nature was still a secret. We did not know the source of the sun’s energy, but the new physics could explain how its energy was transported to our planet. Nobody had heard of the “Big Bang.” In 1911, Conseil Solvay became the world’s first international conference on physics.