Tonight, The History Channel broadcasts a two-hour documentary special ‘Life After People’. The program speculates:

“What would happen to planet earth if the human race were to suddenly disappear forever? Would ecosystems thrive? What remnants of our industrialized world would survive?”

A mix of science fiction and science fact, using expert testimony from a range of disciplines, we are shown how the world as we have made it would change if the human race were no longer there to ‘maintain’ it. Judging by the accompanying History Channel web site, the program follows quite closely the general thread of a 1996 New Scientist article, ‘Return to Paradise‘, which traces the changes in a deserted London over 5, 10, 50 and 500 years.

The thing about ‘What if?’ scenarios is that they often raise more questions than they answer. In this case, one has to ask how the human race disappeared, because the manner of our departure could have a strong influence over how, or if, the planet and its remaining occupants survive us. The web site describes a number of possible causes: pandemic, nuclear winter, asteroid impact. Several of these would be relatively quick, but indiscriminate, possibly leaving a totally dead planet. The premise of the show seems to be an instantaneous vanishing, leaving all physical traces of our civilisation intact. This kind of begs the question, who turns the lights off? Who makes the nukes safe, and closes down industrial processes? What about the mess?

I suppose this is outside the scope of the program. As another New Scientist article ‘Imagine Earth Without People’ put it in 2006:

“Imagine that all the people on Earth – all 6.5 billion of us and counting – could be spirited away tomorrow, transported to a re-education camp in a far-off galaxy. (Let’s not invoke the mother of all plagues to wipe us out, if only to avoid complications from all the corpses).”

Cheery stuff. Inevitably, ‘Life After People’ concentrates on the decay and collapse of our built environment, because it makes more dramatic visuals than watching grass grow, which I imagine would be a major activity if this were to happen for real. It should be remembered that there’s very little of the planet’s surface left that doesn’t bear the mark of human activity, and very few ecosystems that wouldn’t change once we went.

The second series of Jericho is scheduled to premiere on CBS on February 12th. The post-apocalyptic drama follows the progress of a small Kansas town as it struggles to come to terms with the destruction of 22 major US cities. Series 1 ended on a cliff-hanger with the people of Jericho defending themselves against an invasion by superior forces from the neighbouring town of New Bern. Series 2 picks up the story, as the battle is brought to a halt by the intervention of troops from the Allied States of America, a regional grouping of former western US states rising out of the chaos, one of several coalitions all claiming to be the legitimate government.
www.cbs.com/primetime/jericho/video.php

Just after Jericho began, I wondered whether it could be seen as an allegory of America’s geopolitical imagination; for the town, read the USA, hemmed in by terrorism and uncertainty; for the rest of the world, read, well, the rest of the world. Or look at it another way: is the post-attack world of resource shortages a parable for an imminent Peak Oil world?
“Jericho Deconstructed”
Things have moved on quite a bit in 18 months, in Jericho and in reality. It’s much harder to pull off a convincing portrayal of a united America. The wider world into which the folk of Jericho are being integrated, an America of competing factions and regional warlords, is a disturbing one. But is it so fanciful to see in it echoes of the America of George Bush’s final year? Perhaps we don’t need nuclear terrorism and millions of deaths to bring about the disintegration of the ‘United’ States.

Today, California and 15 other states have filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn Washington’s refusal to allow California’s request to implement stricter controls on motor vehicle emissions. Under the federal Clean Air Act, California is allowed to enact stricter air pollution laws than the federal government as long as the state is given a waiver from the EPA. Waivers have been routinely granted in roughly 50 cases during the last three decades, allowing the state to lead the way in catalytic converters, unleaded gasoline and other areas. Strangely, this refusal came on the same day that President Bush signed the Energy Independence and Security Act, which features much less stringent emissions standards.
LA Times: “California sues government for rejecting bid to curb emissions”

The argument about whether this was a political decision or a scientific one continues to rage, and may well lead to a permanently weaker central government in Washington. Meanwhile, the Lakota Nation is voting with its feet, having declared its independence and renounced the 33 treaties that they claim have never been honoured by the United States. Will they be the first of many?
“Lakota withdraw from treaties, declare independence from U.S.”