Crash Course: Our Fossil Fuel History in Five Minutes

All this talk about the Keystone Pipeline, hydrofracking, and other energy projects begs for some background. The short film above, from the Post Carbon Institute, tracks our fossil fuel history from industrialization's inception until now, with a nod to the future. By the end, perhaps you'll agree that, as the narrator puts it, "we have to live within nature's budget of renewable resources at rates of natural replenishment." Can we do it? It seems we can't afford not to.