By transforming patterns of travel and work around the world, the COVID-19 pandemic is accelerating the transition to renewable energy and the decline of fossil fuels. Lockdowns brought car commuting and plane travel to a near halt, and the mass experiment in which white-collar employees have been working from home may permanently reduce energy consumption for business travel. Renewable energy and electric vehicles were already gaining market share before the pandemic. Under pressure from investors, major energy companies have started writing off fossil fuel reserves as stranded assets that are no longer worth the cost of extracting. These shifts may indicate that “peak oil demand” has arrived earlier than expected.

The progression from semiautonomous, unarmed supply robots to fully autonomous weapons systems is likely to occur rapidly and with limited public scrutiny.

The world is beginning to move away from reliance on fossil fuels altogether, rendering obsolete many of the strategic plans intended to ensure the safe flow of oil.

What makes these disputes so dangerous … is the apparent willingness of many claimants to employ military means in demarking their offshore territories and demonstrating their resolve to keep them.

The transition from an easy to a tough resource era will come at a high price.

The transition from our current energy system to one based largely on renewables will be fraught with danger and crisis. …

It may well be that the most costly and challenging consequence of climate change will be an increase in violent conflict and all the humanitarian trauma this brings with it.

Unless the world's existing powers are prepared to descend into the sort of resource-driven geopolitical competition that resulted in World War I … they must make room at the table for an energy-hungry China.

With the global flow of energy assuming ever-growing economic and strategic prominence, oil and gas pipelines in the world today have become the major focus of international geopolitical competition.

The United States … wants to enhance its own strategic position in south-central Eurasia, much as Great Britain attempted in the late nineteenth century. This effort encompasses anti-terrorism and the pursuit of oil, but many in Washington also see it as an end in itself—as the natural behavior of a global superpower engaged in global dominance.

As part of our occasional post–September 11 series on terrorism, contributing editor Michael Klare examines the motives behind America's decision to make Iraq a central objective in the war on terrorism. “If concerns about weapons of mass destruction, terrorism, and the export of democracy do not explain the administration's determination to oust Saddam Hussein, what does? The answer [can be found in] the pursuit of oil and the preservation of America's status as the paramount world power.”

If the United States wants to reduce its exposure to terrorism and avert further involvement in overseas conflicts, the choice is clear: it must eschew the use of military force to ensure access to foreign petroleum and rely instead on conservation, the market, and alternative sources of energy.

The United States cannot increase its intake of foreign oil by 50 percent, as called for under the Bush energy plan, without involving itself in the political, economic, and military affairs of the states from which all this petroleum is expected to flow. This involvement may take financial and diplomatic forms in most cases, but it will also often entail military action.

Much about [September 11], and the larger terror campaign of which it is a part, distinguishes it from similar episodes in the past. This is not the work of a localized insurgency against a particular ruler or authority; it is a global assault on the very structure of modern, Western society. And yet, for all of its anti-Western ideology, it is a campaign that is thoroughly grounded in the hightech, transnational processes of globalization.

Resource issues will likely affect world affairs significantly in the years ahead. This impact may not always take the form of discord and conflict, but will certainly demand growing attention from policymakers. Whether in the economic, environmental, or political-military area, resource concerns are certain to rise on the international policy agenda.