[Bosnjak]

The Club of Rome predicts that Phosphorus reserves will end in 50-70 Years.

Without it the Output of hole world agriculture will be decreased by 50% and by fruits even 65%.



Russia will until 2045 built a permanent moon colony.


Phosophorus is in our solar system seldom but the moon consists of the same mix like earth.

[Atlantis]

The phosphorus reserves are likely to run out before the fossil fuel reserves. But long before we'll reach the end of the line, shortages and a phosphorus monopoly by a few countries holding most of the reserves (including China) will drive up prices and subject us to political pressure. We will see increasing food prices and food shortages.

The only solution is to return to sustainable farming and switch back from synthetic fertilization to organic fertilization, which will take care of climate change too.

[Potemkin]

The only solution is to return to sustainable farming and switch back from synthetic fertilization to organic fertilization, which will take care of climate change too.

I think you underestimate the extent to which the modern world is dependent on synthetic fertilisers, Atlantis. Organic farming is not a 'solution' at all; it will lead to massive famines. This isn't the Middle Ages any more - the human population far exceeds the 'natural' carrying capacity of the Earth.

[Atlantis]

I think you underestimate the extent to which the modern world is dependent on synthetic fertilisers, Atlantis. Organic farming is not a 'solution' at all; it will lead to massive famines. This isn't the Middle Ages any more - the human population far exceeds the 'natural' carrying capacity of the Earth.

I think I know more about farming than anybody in this forum. Chemical farming is inherently wasteful and, by definition, not sustainable. Thus, it has to end sooner or later. There is a vast array of sustainable methods and techniques that can be used by organic, natural and even conventional farmers. Depending on conditions and methods used, organic can achieve similar yields to conventional farming, while at the same time improve the natural environment, mitigate climate change and provide healthier food. The reasons it isn't used is merely commercial. GMO seeds together with agrochemicals represent an enormous market with huge profits. Nobody can earn big money from making compost. You have been brainwashed by the corporations. It's kind of sad that I have to explain this to a Marxist.

[Decky]

Potemkin I have to agree with Atlantis. If any group of people are the world experts in the mechanics of starving groups of people to death it is the Germans. I would trust him in this matter.

[Hong Wu]

There's supposedly hydrogen-based fertilizers and 2/3rds of the food produced goes to waste or something. So are we going to see anything resembling a 2/3rds drop? It admittedly wasn't very good, but as an experiment I was able to grow lettuce sprouts out of a paper towel and a milk cartoon, without adding any fertilizers or nutrients.

[starman2003]

The only solution is to return to sustainable farming and switch back from synthetic fertilization to organic fertilization, which will take care of climate change too.

Population control wouldn't hurt either. But just try to impose it... As for turning to the moon as a source, can they really import enough at reasonable cost? Seems your solution and mine are the only realistic ones.

[Bosnjak]

Shockfreezing would be a solution

[Political Interest]

It is best to stay away from space. You just never know what we might encounter if we go places where we have no business.

But then I probably sound like some sort of court official in England, France or Spain warning the king not to set up colonies and trading posts abroad. And such an official was certainly proven right if he did indeed exist!

[Prosthetic Conscience]

Sending back bulk materials like phosphates from the Moon is never going to be economically feasible. The energy and infrastructure needed would cost far more than any scheme to recover phosphorus from sources on Earth that are currently uneconomic (eg the runoff from land, which is where the phosphorus must currently be going).

You can't even just wait for a space elevator to be constructed; it's not just landing the stuff from orbit that's the problem, it's the delta-V needed to take off from the Moon and then put it on an orbit that will reach Earth's atmosphere. And the spacecraft needed to do this (do you manufacture them on the Moon, or do you make them reusable and send them up from Earth again?)

All that to get an element that is aboutone part in a thousand of the earth's crust - which means there are trillions of tons within far easier reach (about 3 trillion tonnes in the top 10m of the earth's crust on land, by a quick calculation).

[One Degree]

As Starman and Potemkin said, population is the problem and it's reduction will be the solution. Since we are refusing to take aggressive steps to decrease population, then when resources become more scarce we will fight for them. The wars will reduce the population as it always has, but this time it will probably be reduced to zero.

[Truth To Power]

The Club of Rome predicts that Phosphorus reserves will end in 50-70 Years.

So we know that won't happen...

The Club of Rome is so stupid, it doesn't even know what reserves are: the amount that can be produced from KNOWN deposits, using CURRENT technology, at CURRENT prices. Discover more deposits, improve extraction technology, raise the price, and presto! more reserves. If you took this claim seriously after seeing "Club of Rome" as the source, shame on you.

[Potemkin]

As Starman and Potemkin said, population is the problem and it's reduction will be the solution. Since we are refusing to take aggressive steps to decrease population, then when resources become more scarce we will fight for them. The wars will reduce the population as it always has, but this time it will probably be reduced to zero.

It's highly unlikely that the human race will go extinct any time soon. Whether our civilisation will survive in the long term is, of course, a different matter entirely. Due to resource depletion and global warming, among other factors, it's very likely that our current technological civilisation will collapse and there will be a new Dark Age with an attendant population crash (but not to zero) some time in the next century or two. This collapse will make the fall of the Roman Empire look like a vicarage tea party.

[Decky]

It will all be ok here though Potemkin. We have the channel to protect us. When the Europeans have went back to living in caves and wearing animal skins it will all be ok in blighty. We have coal, we have tin, we have great land for growing wheat, it will all be fine. Everyone will follow Corbyn's example and work on an allotment for their food of course.

[Potemkin]

That's good to know, Decky. As our descendants recline on their government-issued deckchairs on Bognor Regis beach, with their trouser legs rolled up and knotted handkerchiefs on their heads, they will perhaps hear the faint sounds of barbaric battles and war-cries wafting across the channel to the shores of Dear Old Blighty, and will shudder inwardly to themselves, before feeling a warm glow inside as they remember that they are safe on these sceptered isles in the loving embrace of the Great Helmsman of the Soviet Socialist Republic of Britain.... 8)

[Decky]

I don't even think it would be that difficult. Getting us to being totally self sufficient for growing our food would be the hardest thing of course. Raw materials would not be a problem, Scargill is still alive so the NUM could be put in charge of reopening all the mines. People in the Midlands and south Yorkshire all know how to use heavy machinery in factories due to race memory so they could make all the stuff. I am sure the Welsh and the highlanders have enough sheep to provide wool for clothes, Herefordshire grows the the worlds best cider apples so we are covered for booze. It would all be great.

[Political Interest]

Once the global south reaches middle class status the population issue will be solved.

I think people need to relax about this.

[One Degree]

Once the global south reaches middle class status the population issue will be solved.

I think people need to relax about this.

You do realize this can only happen with further declines in the Western world.

[Godstud]

Just how much Phosphorus remains is a contentious question, but conservative estimates put depletion of exploitable reserves within 200 years (Cordell et al., 2009)

Yeah. I think there's a lot of "End of the world is nigh" attitude here. If we can't sort it out in 200 years, we're probably fucked, either way.

It is best to stay away from space. You just never know what we might encounter if we go places where we have no business.

That's the most ignorant thing I've seen said in a very long time. We'd still be living in caves, and bashing rocks together, if everyone had your mentality. You wouldn't be using advanced micro-technology were it not for space exploration.

We are humans, in case you forgot. We have business everywhere. Humans are explorers.

Also, a great deal of our tech came from, and continues to comes from, space exploration and the technological advances required. We ignore space at our peril.

[MistyTiger]

I would like to see their ideas for how we humans can live on the moon. How would we breathe and what would we eat up there?