EnviroWonk writer Samantha Hulkower attended last week's Center for Science in the Public Interest's Fourth National Integrity in Science Conference in D.C. Click here for her first post on the big event.

The day began with a panel discussion on a familiar topic -- dismantling the "debate" of climate science. But the talk quickly devolved from the typical "things suck" to the "we're so screwed," which is always a nice way to start the morning.

The first speaker, IPCC scientist Anthony Broccoli, talked about what was considered known (the planet is warming and it's because of humans), made clear what they don't know (will hurricanes become more intense but less frequent?), and emphasized that uncertainty works both ways. Sure, the predicted effects could be less intense than predicted ... but they could also be much worse, which is something the skeptics like to ignore.

The discussion moved on to oil, with former DOE career employee Robert Hirsch describing his 2005 Dept of Energy Peak Oil report, in which he prophesied that a decline in world oil production would lead to a surge in price, and that would result in economic contraction. The report suggested that a recession would follow, and oil would become the government's top priority. Hmmmm, sort of sounds a little like right now, doesn't it? Hirsch highlighted some important aspects that are often overlooked, such as:

• It's being called an "energy crisis", but really its a liquid fuels problem.
• most existing oil fields are in decline and new reserves are needed to maintain current production.
• Even if we switch to battery powered cars tomorrow, there are still millions of cars, trucks, airplanes, etc., that use oil and will continue to use oil throughout their life.
• We're 1-4 years away from a decline in world oil production.

Everyone was noticeably depressed at this point, so Hirsch left us with an uplifting thought: "I'm an optimist, we're going to get through this, but it is going to be a very painful future." Thanks.

Next, Gal Luft talked about the global security aspect of rising oil prices. He reminded us that Osama bin Laden predicted $140 a barrel oil, whenever there is an increase in drilling abroad OPEC drills less (so the President may want to rethink his offshore drilling), poor nations are being hit even harder by the high prices, and the breeds people who hate America. Again, depressing stuff.

Fortunately, the last speaker, Ken Zweibel, former PV Manager at the National Renewable Energy Lab, ended with a positive spin. He pointed out that as gas gets more expensive, it becomes relatively cheaper to power our cars with electricity. Right now, electricity is equivalent to $2.50 a gallon, or $2 less than what Americans are paying for gas in some regions. To generate all the needed electricity he advocated nuclear to supplement intermittent solar and wind, but warned that the coal lobby will be doing their darnedest to get their product burned.

The bottom line from all the speakers is that we're looking at an inevitable switch to electric cars because there will be no more oil left to power them. But, this will be a good thing because as long as all of our power doesn't come from coal, we're going to have cleaner air and healthier people. We still aren't sure how the speakers manage to stay so happy and optimistic (with the exception of the rather dour Mr. Luft).

One theory: Most of the speakers were all older and probably don't expect to live to see the worse of it, which would explain why the seemingly younger Luft was not in such high spirits.