Since 2011 began, so many of the forecasts and trends I predicted over the last four years are coming true, I feel as if I’m in an almost constant state of déjà vu. Now, as I spend some 22 hours traveling from Chicago to Singapore, scanning stacks of periodicals from around the world, this feeling is amplified.

I will write a lot in the coming weeks and months about all these forecasts and trends. As a futurist, I should be judged in part on how accurate I am, so it is indeed gratifying that many of the events/trends I predicted have become reality in 2011. The purpose of all these upcoming columns is to be able to point to actual events as the manifestations of what I have been speaking and writing about since 2006, when this blog began, and 2007, when I wrote The Shift Age. This will help explain the truly transformative time we are now entering. In a few years, the world will look quite different from what it did in 2010. The early evidence is everywhere in 2011.

Here are some of the trends and forecasts ...]]> In the past I have written that as a futurist, it sometimes feels like I live in a state of déjà vu. I spend a lot of time researching and looking into the future to develop the forecasts and trends that I write and speak about. I experience them, see them, and have varying degrees of certainty when I publish or present them.

Since 2011 began, so many of the forecasts and trends I predicted over the last four years are coming true, I feel as if I’m in an almost constant state of déjà vu. Now, as I spend some 22 hours traveling from Chicago to Singapore, scanning stacks of periodicals from around the world, this feeling is amplified.

I will write a lot in the coming weeks and months about all these forecasts and trends. As a futurist, I should be judged in part on how accurate I am, so it is indeed gratifying that many of the events/trends I predicted have become reality in 2011. The purpose of all these upcoming columns is to be able to point to actual events as the manifestations of what I have been speaking and writing about since 2006, when this blog began, and 2007, when I wrote The Shift Age. This will help explain the truly transformative time we are now entering. In a few years, the world will look quite different from what it did in 2010. The early evidence is everywhere in 2011.

Here are some of the trends and forecasts I have made, listed with the events that are now making them real for the world and a déjà vu experience for me flying at 39,000 feet.

-Humanity would not globally exit the Great Reorganizational Recession of 2007-2010 until 2011.

Clearly, we are slowly and tentatively exiting the reorganizational recession this year.

-Accelerating Electronic Connectedness, one of the three fundamental forces of the Shift Age, would manifest itself in part with great political upheavals as connected individuals blow down the walled gardens of ignorance and political tyranny.

Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Libya as the beginning. The nervousness in  Yemen, Syria, Saudi Arabia and China is palpable.

-Oil would trade in the $90-$120 per barrel range for most of 2011 and would cross $100 a barrel in the first half of the year.

As of this writing, the price of Brent crude is $104 a barrel and $94 on the NYNEX

-The warming of the planet, climate change and increasing abnormal weather would have a profound upward effect on the price of food commodities, with possible dire economic consequences.

Corn, wheat, and rice futures are way up compared with 2009-’10, and current estimates are that some 40 million people in developing countries will fall from the middle class this year because they have to spend the vast majority of their household income on food.

-Work and Place will separate.

Cisco’s Telepresence suites and those of its competitors are being built around the world in ever-increasing numbers; Skype just came out with group video service; and as of last year, more than 50% of IBM employees worked from home.

-High Tech/High Touch – Technology will become ever more tactile and personal.

I checked in at the airport yesterday with a touch screen, used my iPhone at the airport, and my wife is playing a scrabble game and surfing the Internet with her fingers on our iPad. Sometimes it looks like people have a deeper personal relationship with their touch-screen devices than with the humans around them.

-Volatility in metal commodities and global stock markets will be the constant for the next few years.

Google or Bing the last six months of trending for global stock markets and the futures price of practically any metal.

-States and Municipalities would face and declare bankruptcy.

Just look at and read the media every day – a very serious stress on our country.

The above is just a partial list of the forecasts I’ve made – the ones that everyone can now see, not just this futurist. Déjà vu all over again! Watch this blog, my Free Newsletter, and the Shift Age Trend Report for deeper discourses in the coming weeks and months.

Welcome to the Shift Age!

There are a number of readers of this blog and members of the audiences when I speak that just seem to think that hydrogen fuel cell autos are a pipe dream that has no chance of becoming a reality in the next decade.  Comments like the quote above provoke a general dismissal as not being realistic.

During the last three years, I have forecast that 2010-2015 would begin the age of the electric automobile and that 2015-2020 would begin the age of the hydrogen fuel cell automobile.  People accept the first part of that forecast but somehow can’t seem to allow themselves to believe that hydrogen fuel cell cars will ever get to scale.  There is no question that scalability is a problem for hydrogen fuel cell technologies.  There are not enough fueling stations to warrant the production of fuel cell autos and there aren’t enough fuel cell autos to warrant the construction of hydrogen fueling stations.  Joseph Heller’s classic “Catch 22″ in full display..

Here and in speeches I have suggested that now is one of those times when the federal government needs to step up and invest in critically needed infrastructure.  In the 1930’s  FDR had the government fund massive projects that created the hydro-electric industry in the U.S.  In the 1950s Eisenhower signed the Interstate Highway bill, creating the national highway system that we all rely for personal transport and the ...]]> “The chances further down the road seem to me better on the fuel-cell side than on the battery-electric side”

There are a number of readers of this blog and members of the audiences when I speak that just seem to think that hydrogen fuel cell autos are a pipe dream that has no chance of becoming a reality in the next decade.  Comments like the quote above provoke a general dismissal as not being realistic.

During the last three years, I have forecast that 2010-2015 would begin the age of the electric automobile and that 2015-2020 would begin the age of the hydrogen fuel cell automobile.  People accept the first part of that forecast but somehow can’t seem to allow themselves to believe that hydrogen fuel cell cars will ever get to scale.  There is no question that scalability is a problem for hydrogen fuel cell technologies.  There are not enough fueling stations to warrant the production of fuel cell autos and there aren’t enough fuel cell autos to warrant the construction of hydrogen fueling stations.  Joseph Heller’s classic “Catch 22″ in full display..

Here and in speeches I have suggested that now is one of those times when the federal government needs to step up and invest in critically needed infrastructure.  In the 1930’s  FDR had the government fund massive projects that created the hydro-electric industry in the U.S.  In the 1950s Eisenhower signed the Interstate Highway bill, creating the national highway system that we all rely for personal transport and the transportation of supplies.  The Obama administration needs to step up and invest in the creation of a national 21^st century energy grid to replace a decrepit collection of regional electric grids that are highly inefficient.  Steps have been taken to go down that path.  What needs to be added is an investment in a national hydrogen fueling infrastructure so that the two most promising transportation energy sources to replace gasoline, electric and hydrogen can in fact become a reality.

I have spoken with top level executives on the infrastructure side of hydrogen that are willing to invest along side the government to create this grid.  They cannot do it themselves but state that the private sector needs the leadership of the federal government to really accelerate an investment strategy.  As I wrote in a prior column, comparing the 20^th century automotive industry with the 21^st century industry, we must support both.  We have given $50 billion to GM in hopes they can transform themselves for the 21^st century.  For one fourth that amount an entire hydrogen fueling infrastructure could be put in place that would assure that every resident in the top 100 metro areas of the US would be less than 2 miles from a hydrogen fueling station.

If we don’t like green house emissions, if we don’t like being dependent on foreign oil that funds terrorism, if we want to cut oil consumption – and we must do that as we will run out of the stuff this century – then we must take action.

This is not a pipe dream.  Last month at the Frankfurt Auto Show the German government, along with Daimler, Shell Oil, Linde, EnBW, OMV, Total and the German National Organization for Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Technology announced plans to build 1,000 hydrogen fueling stations in Germany by 2015.

Two days before that announcement Toyota, Ford, GM and Hyundai called on energy companies to build an international network of hydrogen fueling stations by 2015.  These manufacturers said that by that date there could be hundreds of thousands of fuel cell vehicles on the roads.

Oh, and for additional good measure there are reports that 13 Japanese energy companies are planning or working together to coordinate a national hydrogen fueling network by 2015.

Hmmm, does this sound at all familiar?  The German and Japanese auto companies and their infrastructure partners are leading the way in innovation in the transportation sector.  It happened over the past 30 years to the auto industry in the US with the ultimate consequence that the taxpayers had to bail out two of the Big Three.  Why not use our tax money to good use and invest in the future?

Of course hybrids and pure electric plug-ins will come first.  Hydrogen fuel cell autos will follow.  It is time for the U.S. to face the future beyond what might happen next year.   Invest for the year 2015 and 2020.

Oh, that quote at the top of this column?  Let me end this column with it, this time with the person who said it last month:

“The chances further down the road seem to me better on the fuel-cell side than on the battery-electric side” – DieterZetsche, CEO of Daimler Mercedes Benz

2008 was the year of the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression.  This collapse was the first one since the beginning of the new global economy and thus showed how humanity and all of its nation states are financially interconnected in a historically unprecedented way.  This global financial collapse is historically significant for several reasons.  First it did show that money and finance knows no national boundaries, and that nation states can no longer individually deal with major financial crises.  Second it is the start of the process to cleanse the global and particularly U.S economy from over leveraged, debt oriented mindless growth and consumption that has been a result of the mindless support of unlimited growth without thought of personal, national and global consequences.  Third it represents a clear albeit disruptive and painful part of the transition that humanity is now making from one age, the Information Age, to the new age, the Shift Age.

2008 was the year when people around the world, and most strikingly Americans, make a sudden and profound switch from consumption, debt and spending to, thrift, saving and shedding ...]]> The year 2008 will obviously go down as one of the most eventful years in recent history.  It was the year that Barack Obama was elected President of the United States.  It was the year that the Internet replaced print and TV as the driving force in a presidential election. It was the beginning of the end of 15 years of divisive cultural politics in America.

2008 was the year of the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression.  This collapse was the first one since the beginning of the new global economy and thus showed how humanity and all of its nation states are financially interconnected in a historically unprecedented way.  This global financial collapse is historically significant for several reasons.  First it did show that money and finance knows no national boundaries, and that nation states can no longer individually deal with major financial crises.  Second it is the start of the process to cleanse the global and particularly U.S economy from over leveraged, debt oriented mindless growth and consumption that has been a result of the mindless support of unlimited growth without thought of personal, national and global consequences.  Third it represents a clear albeit disruptive and painful part of the transition that humanity is now making from one age, the Information Age, to the new age, the Shift Age.

2008 was the year when people around the world, and most strikingly Americans, make a sudden and profound switch from consumption, debt and spending to, thrift, saving and shedding of debt whenever possible.  As written here months ago, “Thrift is the new hip, thrift is the new extravagance”,  It is and will be cool to shop at resale stores, drive cars years longer, save money, and in general to embrace the thrift lifestyle.  This trend, along with the collapse in the price of oil has ushered in a time of both economic contraction and monetary deflation.  Think about it, what costs more today than it did a year ago?  Not much.

2008 was, in the first half the seeming beginning of peak oil and in the second half a realization that this peak situation, while still real, will be drawn out a few years longer than was thought as recently as 2-3 years ago.  Oil, and gasoline will go up from its current price in 2009, but not enough to shock the system, just enough in underscore to the consumer the need to be thrifty elsewhere in their spending.

2008 was the year when it seemed that the critical mass thinking about global warming that occurred in 2006 reached a level of massive acceptance.  The age old exercise about talking about the weather took on new meaning this year.  If we all had the sensitivity to the earth that the Native Americans had centuries ago we would be hearing the earth and the spirits of the planet telling us clearly that all is not well.

This is the last column of this incredibly eventful year.  I deeply thank all of you who have been loyal readers of www.evolutionshift.com during its almost three years in existence.  Your support and comments over this time period has meant a lot to me.  Thank you.  I also acknowledge all of the new readers who have come to this site during 2008.  The readership has grown significantly this past year, both in the U.S. and around the world.  It makes no difference whether you came here because of hearing me speak, a recommendation from a friend or favorite blog, or just because in this time of upheaval you wanted something to read that might provoke clarity about what might seem like an uncertain future.  You are here, I thank you for that, and will strive to give you thought provoking columns in 2009.

The next couple of columns, in the New Year, will be my annual forecasts for the year.  2009 will not be a respite from the turbulence of 2008, it will be a continuation, an expansion and the beginning of the new directions that humanity is going to take in the years ahead.  Our journey together is changing course.  Happy New Year!

Recently, people have been asking me a lot of questions about the fluctuating price of oil

“What is the price of oil going to be?”  “Was the recent price spike of $147 a barrel an all-time high that we won’t see again?”  And “Will the global economic slowdown drive the price of oil back down below $100?”

These are just some of the questions I have been asked in recent weeks.  The reason of course, as long time regular readers of this blog know, is that I have been consistently accurate in my predictions about the price of oil.   In 2006 I predicted $125 barrel oil in 2008 and $137 in 2009.  In the past year I predicted that oil would have a near term trading range of $95 – 135 per barrel but that while there would be little downward pressure below $95, there are many scenarios that would provide upward pressure above $135.  All of this price predictions flow from my view that we have entered the time ...]]>

Recently, people have been asking me a lot of questions about the fluctuating price of oil

“What is the price of oil going to be?”  “Was the recent price spike of $147 a barrel an all-time high that we won’t see again?”  And “Will the global economic slowdown drive the price of oil back down below $100?”

These are just some of the questions I have been asked in recent weeks.  The reason of course, as long time regular readers of this blog know, is that I have been consistently accurate in my predictions about the price of oil.   In 2006 I predicted $125 barrel oil in 2008 and $137 in 2009.  In the past year I predicted that oil would have a near term trading range of $95 – 135 per barrel but that while there would be little downward pressure below $95, there are many scenarios that would provide upward pressure above $135.  All of this price predictions flow from my view that we have entered the time of peak oil globally.

I still stand on that trading range prediction.  Yes, the price has dropped from that $147 high of two months ago to, as of the writing of this column, $106.  That is a drop of  27%.  I believe that, at that peak in July, because of the lack of alternative investment options due to the sub-prime crisis, the bearish direction of the stock market and the heat in the oil futures market iself, there was a speculative trading factor of 10-15% in the price.  In addition, the dollar was at or near its’ all time low against the Euro when the price hit $147.

Well, since then, the dollar has risen some 8-10% against the Euro.  In addition we have learned the wonderful news that for the first time in 20 years Americans have several back to back months of year to year declines in both the amount of gasoline purchased and the number of miles driven by automobiles.  The pain of $4 a gallon gasoline has changed behavior and certainly automotive buying priorities.  Whether the price is $4 or drops to $3.25, people are realizing that historically high prices will now be the norm.

Most recently there has been the developing realization that the EU, and other countries are entering an economic downturn.  These two recent news stories have made traders dial down their price expectations and sell their long positions, certainly at least another 5% drop in recent weeks.  When you add this recent drop, combined with the removal of 10-15% speculative froth to the 8% increase in the value of the dollar, you get a spread of  23 to 28%.  This explains the drop in oil prices in the last two months, not any fundamental change in the global oil reality long term.

It is important to keep the long term view when looking at oil prices.  The average price per barrel in the U.S. since WWII has been around $25 a barrel.  That was roughly the price in 2001 at the beginning of the new millennium and also when Bush came into office.  We are now at a price that is 425% higher, down from 600% higher two months ago.  Due to this historical perspective, and given my view that we are indeed entering Peak Oil, I still believe that the price range for a barrel of oil will be $95 – 135.  It may dip below $95 occasionally but it could easily power through the $135 number with any combinations of hurricanes, political unrest in an oil exporting nation or news of demand continuing to outpace supply even in an economic downturn.  OPEC will do what it can, officially and unofficially to keep the price from falling much below $100

We are, and will be for the foreseeable future living in a world of historically high priced oil.  Until the coming revolutionary innovations in the alternative energy sector start to gain scale in the next decade we will be living in  one of, if not the most expensive time of energy in humanity’s history.

To quote from that January 9, 2008 column:

“In 2008, gas will, for a period of time reach $4 on the national level. A year ago I predicted that oil would rise above $80. Three months ago I predicted that the price would rise to $100 and that the trading range for oil will be $80 – 125 a barrel for the next year…but there could be several situations that could drive the price above $125.”

Well sure I was right about the rapid run up in the price of oil and the price of a gallon of gas. At the time I was one of the few voices with this forecast. The interesting thing is that when I made the predictions they seemed outrageous to many people and yet they have turned out to be conservative. In a follow up column on April 27 titled “The Short and Long Term Price of Oil”, I revised my price predictions upward:

“I now think that the core trading price range of oil for the next 18 months will be $95 – 135. I seriously doubt it will ever dip below the lower price, and if it does, it will be temporary. I do however think that that there are any number of scenarios that could provoke a rapid price run up ...]]> Regular readers know that I have long predicted the current price of oil and that we are now moving through Peak Oil These subjects were included in my “Forecast for 2008″

To quote from that January 9, 2008 column:

“In 2008, gas will, for a period of time reach $4 on the national level. A year ago I predicted that oil would rise above $80. Three months ago I predicted that the price would rise to $100 and that the trading range for oil will be $80 – 125 a barrel for the next year…but there could be several situations that could drive the price above $125.”

Well sure I was right about the rapid run up in the price of oil and the price of a gallon of gas. At the time I was one of the few voices with this forecast. The interesting thing is that when I made the predictions they seemed outrageous to many people and yet they have turned out to be conservative. In a follow up column on April 27 titled “The Short and Long Term Price of Oil”, I revised my price predictions upward:

“I now think that the core trading price range of oil for the next 18 months will be $95 – 135. I seriously doubt it will ever dip below the lower price, and if it does, it will be temporary. I do however think that that there are any number of scenarios that could provoke a rapid price run up to the $150 range.”

I went on to say:

“The long term price of oil will continue to go up for many of the reasons I sited in a column two months ago. It is entirely possible that prices in the range of $150 -200 a barrel over the next 4 years will occur”

So on the topic of the price of oil my forecast was correct, hard for many to believe at the time and ultimately conservative. I absolutely believe that there will be $150-200 barrel oil in the years ahead. Oil will be on a generally upward trend for the next few years.

Peak Oil

I firmly believe we are moving through Global Peak Oil. Peak Oil was predicted 50 years ago by M. King Hubbert. Peak Oil was defined by Hubbert and others as being the time when half of all petroleum in the earth had been extracted and that this time would be marked by a rapid increase in price, volatility and a clear view that demand was outpacing supply. Sound remotely familiar? The subject has been a heated topic of conversation among energy professionals, scientists and futurists. In my “Forecast for 2008″ column I wrote:

“2008 will be the year when the concept of “Peak Oil” moves from the scientific, energy and futurist communities into the mainstream culture in the U.S. and other developed countries. This will have the effect of further accelerating investment in and development of alternative, renewable sources of energy. It will also begin to force government officials and policy makers into facing the truly dire consequences of anything less than an urgent national initiative to cut consumption of petroleum by 50% as soon as possible, certainly with in the next ten years”

Well, I have heard the words “Peak Oil” mentioned many times on the cable news channels and have read them in a number of newspapers and magazines this year. So it has become part of the mainstream media conversation about energy. In addition the run up in oil prices has triggered a tsunami of investment by VCs and corporate R&D labs in renewable and alternative energy. Many VC firms now agree with what I have written here, that the field of alternative energy will be one of the greatest wealth creation opportunities in history, rivaling and perhaps even exceeding all the wealth created around computers. So the first two parts of my prediction concerning Peak Oil have proven true

The third part of this prediction has yet to be manifested. When two of the three major Presidential candidates think it is a smart idea to suspend the gasoline tax for the summer, it is clear that we have a long way to go. Congressional outrage and investigations into speculation in the petroleum futures market also shows a complete lack of wanting to face the real issue. There is no more than 5-10% of speculation in this market. The upward price is driven by the realities of Peak Oil. What politicians are facing is the huge reaction and behavioral changes brought about by $4 a gallon gasoline Pain at the pump will be manifested in the voting booth. That might empower a true and real look at the need to wean our country from oil and to do so as quickly as possible. Barack Obama, while still far from the goal of cutting petroleum consumption by 50% within the next ten years, is making statements that the problem is systemic and cannot be solved by the quick fix, the blaming of anyone but ourselves, or the non-solution of opening up more offshore drilling lease areas. So there is at least hope that this third part of my prediction about Peak Oil might have a chance.