Alzo, again you read too much into whatever source you quote, especially me. All I was pointing out is that those ice core samples were not the basis for concern over CO2. As John Houghtin, head of the IPCC says...

"That carbon dioxide content and temperature correlate so closely during the last ice age is not evidence of carbon dioxide driving the temperature but rather the other way round - TRUE.

The programme went on to state that this correlation has been presented as the main evidence for global warming by the IPCC – NOT TRUE.

For instance, I often show that diagram in my lectures on climate change but always make the point that it gives no proof of global warming due to increased carbon dioxide."

http://tinyurl.com/2xu4yj

New Scientist covers it here as well.
http://tinyurl.com/2c7ld5

Global Warming IS still a threat if we don't deal with it through agrichar and renewable energy systems — and rezoning our landscapes for New Urbanism, and moving towards a Hi-tech bright green eco-city and New Urbanism (and maybe even re-ruralized) mix of city plans for a low energy, post-oil, post-coal world.

Richard Register of Eco-City builders says he can visualize a quick make-over of CBD's that would let people live "Light and Local" for under 10% of our current energy requirements, yet still maintain an attractive, hi-tech way of life. It's about clever planning and designing energy efficient CITIES (not energy efficient cars.)
http://www.ecocitybuilders.org/

Perseus lacks perspicacity:
"This whole concept of "peak anything" is mired in moronic simplicity. For it implies some sort of catastrophic decline when there is every indication that technology will replace a resource long before the resource runs out. It is particularly stupid when we are talking about a resource like coal that is so large that it could last a century or two. Given the rate of technological advance in just the last 30 years, can anyone seriously suggest that there will not be a cheaper alternative to coal by year 2100?"

I can seriously suggest that.

I am not stupefied by the fantasy that technology will replace a resource long before the resource runs out.

Have a look around the planet, P. Is technology replacing water in NSW and SA long before the water runs out? Non-renewable energy sources can become unobtainable, just as surely as water in a drought.

It struck me as folly, years ago, that we are burning irreplaceable chemical feedstocks when we burn coal and oil. We can synthesize many of the complex organic products which we once obtained from these natural sources, but I wonder about the energetics of the processes involved. It makes more sense to me to conserve these resources and use them with greater finesse. I would hope Coal could be made to last, as an economical chemical feedstock, for far more than 200 years, though I doubt there is any guarantee of political will except in Utopia.

Anybody interested in energy flow in the environment ought to delve into the work of HT Odum (Google "HT Odum" embodied energy emergy).

michael_in_adelaide might be particularly interested, if not already aware of this work.

I am told that there is new technology that can convert Coal into fuel oil and petrol.

Is this the reason so many Australian coal reserves have been purchased by OS companies.

Has anyone else heard of this?

I have not heard of heaps of Aussie coal being bought up by overseas units... unless... was China buying uranium fields or coal fields? Can't remember what that story was.

But the Coal liquefaction is a real thing. Indeed, studies on old reserve data (not the revised reports that Heinberg was quoting above) argued that, based on the more traditional data + a massive increase in coal consumption because of coal liquefaction trying to offset oil depletion, that peak coal would be somewhere mid century.

See
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/052504_coal_peak.html

The Nazi's perfected coal liquefaction in WW2 when their access to oil was limited.

See here for more on coal to liquids programs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_liquefaction#Liquefaction

I noticed that just this month China became a net coal importer. It also went from, amongst other things, a net steel importer to a net exporter just a year or so ago. Way back in 2004, it was soaking up 49% of global cement. China's economy is on fire and there is no likelihood of a drop in coal orders soon.

As some research has indicated, it's also not air conditioners and cars that are driving China’s current energy demand but heavy industry and the mix of what China makes for itself and what it buys from others.

When you think of it, we are seen an extraordinary shift in the world’s middle classes from North America to North Asia. In a few years the middle classes of India and China will be somewhere between 400 - 800 million people. Thus, consumption-led demand is China’s future energy challenge

Wow, so even all their coal is not sufficient?

That's what happens with exponential growth people!

China is the only country in the world who's energy needs jumped by 20% in ONE year! (2005).