The financial crisis? We’re moving on. Oil? BP’s off the front page now. Climate change? Depends on who you listen to. It’s time to read the small print.
Being something of an anorak as well as an advocate, I keep a daily log on my website of developments on the three issues that I think will probably dominate the 21st century. It embraces the interconnected crises of finance, energy and climate change, and I call it the Triple Crunch Log. Reading through it at year end provides an opportunity to gauge the tempo as well as the scale of these dramas, and to look for the small details on which to base any sketch of the future big picture.
Taking an eclectic look at the Triple Crunch Log for 2010, each of the three themes has involved major developments during the year. The financial theme has seen a remarkable bounce-back of stock markets. As the year ends, stock exchanges are around the same value they enjoyed just before the credit crunch unfolded in 2008.
The energy theme has seen the largest peacetime oil spill ever. BP’s Macondo spill in the Gulf of Mexico has had ramifications that extend far beyond the tiny amount of oil left unextractable in the miscreant