The Oil Drum: Europe

On Feb. 9, linktv will be airing a special called The End of Oil that features the film Crude Impact. The film addresses the effects our pursuit of oil has had on the environment and explores some of the potential ramifications of Peak Oil. (Chris Vernon wrote a review of it in December, which can be seen here...thanks for the reminder Chris!)

During the airing of the program, there be an online discussion powered by Care2 at http://www.linktv.org/care2 with James Wood, director of the film, and oil experts like Richard Heinberg and Antonia Juhasz. They are going to talk about issues raised by the film and accept questions pertaining to oil depletion. It will take place on Feb. 9 from 9-11 p.m. ET and 6-8 p.m. PT.

They are hoping to get the word out about the discussion to people that might be interested. They are anticipating a lively and engaging discussion, and would love to have knowledgeable people who can contribute to a broader understanding of the topic participate, so if you are so inclined tomorrow night, go over and fly the TOD flag.

Under the fold are a couple of clips from the film and an example of some of what they will be talking about.

Documentaries are as old as film itself with non-fiction, explanatory, motion pictures literally documenting events in the 19th century. A mainstay of factual television broadcasting documentaries have recently broken new ground with a series of high profile, lucrative, theatrical releases such as Super Size Me, Fahrenheit 9/11 and most notably Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth.

Peak oil proponents have also adopted the format with the 2004 release of End of Suburbia, Peak Oil: Imposed by Nature in 2005 and The Power of Community - How Cuba Survived Peak Oil early 2006. More recently two new documentaries have been touring the film festivals in search of distribution deals, first Oil Crash: A Crude Awakening and towards the end of the year Crude Impact.

Director, James Wood, was able to screen his film, Crude Impact to the delegates at the ASPO-USA conference in Boston (Oct06) and co-producer/director, Ray McCormack, screened his film, Oil Crash: A Crude Awakening in London (Nov06).

One of The Oil Drum's main objectives is to educate and raise awareness of energy depletion and specifically peak oil. How successful have End of Suburbia and the rest been at addressing these goals and how influential can documentaries be in general - is An Inconvenient Truth a turning point in the public's opinion on climate change? What role do documentaries play in educating and raising awareness of critical issues?

Below the fold we have my review of Crude Impact and Jane Cownie (from PowerSwitch) has kindly reviewed Oil Crash. Direct comparisons can't be made as I haven't seen Oil Crash nor has Jane seen Crude Impact.