Global Catastrophes and Trends: The Next 50 Years

by Vaclav Smil

Fundamental change occurs most often in one of two ways: as a "fatal discontinuity," a sudden catastrophic event that is potentially world changing, or as a persistent, gradual trend. Global catastrophes include volcanic eruptions, viral pandemics, wars, and large-scale terrorist attacks; trends are demographic, environmental, economic, and political shifts that unfold over time. In this provocative book, scientist Vaclav Smil takes a wide-ranging, interdisciplinary look at the catastrophes and trends the next fifty years may bring. This is not a book of forecasts or scenarios but one that reminds us to pay attention to, and plan for, the consequences of apparently unpredictable events and the ultimate direction of long-term trends.

Smil first looks at rare but cataclysmic events, both natural and human-produced, then at trends of global importance: the transition from fossil fuels to other energy sources; demographic and political shifts in Europe, Japan, Russia, China, the United States, and Islamic nations; the battle for global primacy; and growing economic and social inequality. He also considers environmental change—in some ways an amalgam of sudden discontinuities and gradual change—and assesses the often misunderstood complexities of global warming.

Global Catastrophes and Trends does not come down on the side of either doom-and-gloom scenarios or techno-euphoria. Instead, relying on long-term historical perspectives and a distaste for the rigid compartmentalization of knowledge, Smil argues that understanding change will help us reverse negative trends and minimize the risk of catastrophe.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Environment, Economics, Politics, History, Technology

307 pages, Hardcover

First published July 11, 2008

About the author

Vaclav Smil is a Czech-Canadian scientist and policy analyst whose work spans energy, environment, food, population, economics, history, and public policy. Educated at Charles University in Prague and later at Pennsylvania State University, where he earned his Ph.D. in geography, Smil emigrated from Czechoslovakia to the United States in 1969 following the Soviet invasion, before beginning his long academic career at the University of Manitoba in 1972. Over the decades he established himself as a leading voice on global energy systems, environmental change, and economic development, with particular attention to China. Smil has consistently argued that transitions to renewable energy will be gradual rather than rapid, emphasizing the persistence of coal, oil, and natural gas and highlighting the difficulties of decarbonizing critical industries such as steel, cement, ammonia, and plastics. He has also been skeptical of indefinite economic growth, suggesting that human consumption could be sustained at much lower levels of material and energy use. Widely admired for his clear, data-driven analyses, Smil counts Bill Gates among his readers, while colleagues have praised his rigor and independence. Known for his reclusiveness and preference for letting his books speak for him, he has nonetheless lectured extensively worldwide and consulted for major institutions. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and a member of the Order of Canada, Smil remains a highly influential public intellectual.

Reviews

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vaclav Smil is a very intelligent man. This book is food for thought for any person who thinks about the future. All scenarios are examined and the probabilities weighed. Geophysical, geopolitical. So what should we be worried about? Global warming? Asteroid collision? Islamic fundamentalists? Perhaps none of them, because the author shows how similar predictions and fears have been very wrong. In the 1970s, the fear was global cooling!

But he does point out some possibilities that are grosly overlooked today. Such as: pandemics, caused by unknown poathogens or the resistance to antibiotics by bacteria. Nitrogen release due to fertilizer (ab)use, releasing NO2, which is more potent a greenhouse gas that C02.

Asian countries completely ignoring the fact that the water tables are falling to a degree where the popoulation is in grave danger. Soil erosion. Deforestisation. Degradation of the biosphere and the loss of biodiversity. The acidification of the oceans and the subsequent breakdown of the total oceanic ecosystem. Bees - their demise and the symbiosis with humanity.

China and India he does not see as becoming huge superpowers, but the decline of the USA is problematic.

Global warming? Perhaps, but we as humans do adapt.There is no alternative (so far) to using fossil fuels for electricity production. Renewable energy simply cannoy be built on such a scale.

No great predictions - only evidence. Things will change: Eurabia? a nuclear weapons "accident", or a war transformational war between India and Pakistan?

I learnt some history too: The Taipeng uprising in 1859 caused 50 million deaths and took China out of the game for 150 years. That was world.changing and I had never heard of it. Had you?

[Ryan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Smil is an intellectual with extensive knowledge in many fields, as apparent in this book. A specialist in energy by origin, his comprehensive study of all aspects of the energy systems utilized by mankind has led him to many other related areas like the study of our biosphere and climate. Global catastrophes goes even further by examining all kinds of potential big risks that could have large effects on civilization, ranging from natural disaster like asteroids, volcanoes and tsunamis to human induced calamities like nuclear war, pandemics and terrorism. He also ventures into political and economic analysis on a global scale, trying to weigh the prospects of major political blocs like USA, China, Europe in the next 50 years.

While his wide ranging topical coverage would interest many as it pertains to nothing less than humanity's collective medium term future, it lacks strong and captivating arguments for any particular scenario or outcome. Instead, we learn many bits of interesting information about many topics, but there is no big picture. For example, he would list the reasons why China could be the next superpower, and immediately come up with many disclaimers and obstacles that hinder that possibility. This is repeated for all the major regions of the world. In effect, no firm stance of any kind is taken, and the book would at most serve as a point of discussion, rather than one where deep insights can be found.

[Babbs · Rating 3 out of 5]

“When strong emotions are involved, people tend to focus on the badness of the outcome rather than on the probability that the outcome will occur.”

This retrospective non-fiction book is written by Vaclav Smil, an expert read by the likes of Bill Gates and other influential individuals interested in energy and global economics. This particular book is more than a decade old and showing it's age with some outdated expectations of what was to come since it's 2008 publication. Smil uses a look back on large historical disasters as a way to both model the probability of a future event, and what that event is likely too look like.

The authors commentary on the work of others in a variety of fields felt a little like science shaming, and on multiple accounts actually called their work derivative. Not working in any of the fields mentioned, their names don't carry any weight and I didn't feel I was always given enough of a counter argument to agree or disagree with the author's statements. Grasping the magnitude of some statements was also difficult at times, as Smil would give figures and units but not always with a comparison of a normal value, rendering the significance taken by context alone and the spouting of numbers irrelevant.

Though dated, and written with a voice* that felt a little aggressive and biased, I did enjoy large portions of this book. Some of the deep dives into catastrophic events, and what they would need to look like to have the outcome written so often in science fiction was particularly enjoyable--such as where an asteroid impact would need to take place to render nuclear winter and how it would gradually become a global event.

I've picked up Energy and Civilization: A History by the same author, and am enjoying it more by reading it in smaller chunks instead of straight through like I did with this one.



*at one point he even states that individuals in the US cannot grasp European policies or politics because we do not read news in multiple languages and only those that do can. Having started the slow process of learning another language as an adult, I do agree that what is focused on in other news outlets can be different when compared to German/Spanish language news. I wonder how my European/ multilingual friends feel about this statement?

[E · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating analysis of trends

Predicting the future is still impossible, but science has gotten much better at forecasting it, at least to the extent that it is informed by statistics and probabilities. Vaclav Smil speaks the truth as he sees it, according to mathematical information and indications. For instance, he refutes the “peak oil” scenario, but asserts that society’s transition to an economy that is less reliant on fossil fuel is long overdue, environmentally and politically. Smil predicted the financial meltdown and the flu pandemic, so clearly he’s on to something. He delves into a variety of issues in this analysis of trends and calamities, from the economic decline of the U.S. to conflicts in Muslim countries, the aging of many national populations and the depletion of essential ecosystems. getAbstract recommends this fascinating account of the future as seen through the cold eye of a statistician.

[Tirath · Rating 5 out of 5]

Its a properly brilliant book.
What makes this book great is: the quantitative approach, the scientific approach and the author's reluctance to arriving at a conclusion.
And even then, it's amusing to read certain bits on geopolitics 8 years after the book was published - so much changed that even Smil could not have seen.

The book covers:
Climate, biosphere, geopolitics, religious issues and histories, 'natural' causes of great misery to dominant species, water, nitrogen cycles, fossil fuels, and phytomass, irrationalities...
It's a thorough book and very enlightening.

One of the best books I have read.

[Fabien · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting read, Smil does a good job in explaining the effects and comparative probability of various natural catastrophes and environmental changes.

Unfortunately the chapters on upcoming geopolitical trends are not as good, they seemed to me partial and much too short for the task intended. Anyway this section will probably be outdated an order of magnitude faster than the rest of the book.

[Muriel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Books by journalists on this topic tend to consumed with alarm and rage exploding in all directions – for example, “This Changes Everything” (please don't read), is like an expanded click-bait listicle throwing 100 things at you with excruciating fury, with no structure, no sense of proportion, how these are related to each other, or which threat to act on first.

If you also find that style cognitively and emotionally taxing, welcome to find sanctuary in “Global Catastrophes and Trends” by Vaclav Smil. Smil arranges topics on a probability/severity grid, so you have a clear logic and structure to navigate risks. This book taught me to think and organize catastrophes by their likely threats, and it is with such disciplined rational thinking that Smil presciently warned of a new pandemic in this 2008 book:

“If we are to act as rational risk minimizers, the current preoccupation with terrorism should not blind us to what are historically two much more likely threats: another mega - war and another pandemic (possibly two) during the next 50 years. Early interventions to defuse emerging causes of potentially massive armed confrontations, and better preparedness for a major pandemic, would be the most rewarding risk-reducing steps. We can forget (relatively speaking) about near-Earth asteroids, supervolcanoes, and monster tsunamis, but we must not underestimate the chances of another mega-war, and we must remember that unpredictably mutating viruses will be always with us. That is why we should be constantly upgrading preparedness to deal with a new pandemic.”

That prediction on pandemic is spot-on, but I’m not recommending this book just because it exactly hit the most important event in early 21st century. After all, with enough broken clocks you could always find one being "correct" at a particular moment. Even an incompetent conspiracy theorist could make thousands of predictions and claim to have hit something.

The book’s strength comes from HOW Smil arrived at such predictions -- he is a polymath scientist traversing scientific research across disciplines, reads Anthony Fauci’s research on infectious disease, Langford’s investigation on possible origin of 1918 Spanish influenza, historic pattern of influenza – then come to an observation on the recurrence interval between last known pandemics, and warn the probability of such event happening again. With simple intuitive tools (plus his wide-reading of scientific literature), he convincingly shows recurrence interval for near-Earth asteroids is much longer, and hence as rational risk minimizers we should not waste effort on such (cinematic) worries before preparing for a pandemic.

The recurrence interval are not only good approximations, importantly they are accessible to a large number of readers. About simple intuitive tools, Smil does not indulge in fancy mathematics to dress up – there’s nothing like complicated event-to-time modeling. His thought on quantitative models:

“But the greatest reward of the new quantitative models is the heuristic benefit their construction brings to the modelers, not their ability to capture anything approaching future complex realities. As for the standard applied forecasting models, they are nothing but series of ephemeral failures: thousands of forecasts are constantly issued by numerous chief economists and think tanks, only to be superseded by equally pointless exercises days or weeks later.”

Ouches, pointless exercises! But it is such an accurate observation.

Not just a useful way to think about these risks, this book enlightens with many new ways to think about our world:

“This perspective illuminates the irreplaceable importance of ecosystemic services for human survival and hence, obviously, for any economic activity. The global economy is merely a subsystem of the biosphere, and it is easy to enumerate the natural services without which it would be impossible, but it is meaningless to rank their importance because they are interconnected with a multitude of feedbacks.”

It is refreshing (like Copernicus) "The global economy is merely a subsystem of the biosphere", for someone from the economic (imperial) side.

Lest you assume Smil only write about natural disasters, he made sharp observation on "Globalization and Inequality", "The United States’ Retreat":

"does not have to watch inane TV shows or read supermarket tabloids in order to feel that public mores and tastes are driven toward the lowest common denominator."

and "China’s Rise", although the statistics he quoted for China are from around 2006, and less applicable in 2020.

Having tidily organized the global catastrophes into the rational probability/severity grid, a useful tool to approach the world with a system and a method, Smil was humble about the potential impact for having discerned these major trends:

“Trends may thus seem obvious, but because they have a multitude of drivers whose importance shifts constantly, the resulting mix is beyond anyone’s grasp. So, when contemplating the great U.S. retreat, it is useful to recall that historians have identified scores of causes for the decline of the Roman Empire (Rollins 1983; Tainter 1989), and only a naive mind would rank German tribes ahead of debased currency, or imperial overstretch ahead of ostentatious, consumption, in that typology of the causes of Rome’s fall. This is also the reason that even when large corporations and large nations are fully aware of unfolding trends, they are rarely able to shape them to their long-term advantage.”

(Note the contrast here, not the snake-oil prescription you'd encounter in a conspiracy theorist.)

The book is such a good read that the best thing is to quote the examples above. I highly recommend reading it, there is no substitute to actually reading Smil's book.

[Paige Overmyer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vaclav Smil goes into depth in regards to various environmental, biological, and even political disasters that are likely to happen by 2050. He exclaims with certainty that we are in a high- risk zone for experiencing a catastrophic viral pandemic between 2009 and 2021 (check), stating the infection rate will be at least 20% of the population. He thinks that we are at risk for major changes to our climate, citing that we're intensifying the global water cycle resulting in more precipitation. The southern United States will experience more destructive flooding, and the western United States may have longer wildfires. Interestingly enough, it is likely that we'll face frequent and (deadly) heatwaves and water shortages worldwide. By 2050, 2/3rds of humanity will live in cities definitely making this slow catastrophe. Smil does not think we're paying enough attention to the nitrogen and water cycles, though, and instead we as a society put more fear into low-probability events like terrorism because of it's worldwide impacts, referencing 9/11. This is definitely true, and we (the U.S.) allocated enormous funds to (ineffectively) combat this.
This book was well written, Smil touched on just about every threat we could face in the next half century. At the beginning you'd think he'd list the catastrophes and their likeliness of happening or rank of importance, but through reading you realize there are so many factors that go into what disasters (and hazards) could happen as well as the collateral damage caused by those throughout the world. We can predict, but even scientists have a limited knowledge on all of these things. Classifying events as catastrophes and rating them all comes down to what society values and fears. We shift significance and concern throughout time so it's impossible to conclude what we'd value as a disaster in 2050. He writes that we need to act as risk minimizers and urges people to focus more on global warming. Despite not ranking humanity's biggest threats, it seems that this is his top concern based on the detail it was given. Though it was written in 2008, it was enjoyable to review how some of the things Smil predicted either have happened or are close to happening in the coming decades. He ends with how resilient humanity is; we have the ability to cope and change quite often with whatever comes our way. Overall, it was a very informative read.

[Mallen Baker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vaclav Smil takes a detailed tour through all the different mechanisms by which we could find ourselves at the pointy end of a catastrophe over the coming fifty years. What are really the odds, and the likely consequences, of a large meteor hitting the earth, a major pandemic in the face of growing ineffectiveness of antibiotics, new conflicts sparked as the relative power balances worldwide markedly shift and - of course - from the effects of climate change?

I like that Smil pointedly refuses to engage in the prediction game, pointing out the immense complexity of overlapping systems and how this tends to render attempts to paint future scenarios hopelessly out of whack. He highlights the real dangers that exist without hyperbole, and also observes that through the complexity and global integration of modern societies can come both resilience and vulnerability.

This is the first book I've read of Smil's - I came upon him via the Netflix special on Bill Gates, since Smil is named as one of Gates' favourite authors. Having read this one, I can see why and will be looking forward to following up with some of his other works. Highly recommended.

[Giorgio Giuliani · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought the book looking for some serious material on fatal discontinuities (catastrophes) to get a better quantitive understanding of the current corona virus situation.

So, the book has 3 main components: first part of catastrophes (mainly natural), second part on ongoing trends (mainly geopolitical), third part on global warming.
- The first part does worth the price of the book: it contains a lot of numbers and excellent academic references and helps navigating risks of future natural calamities (Highly suggested the section on influenza pandemics).
- The second part is not as interesting as more political, and obviously more prone to partisan interpretations. Prof Smil is very knowledgeable, but politics and geopolitics are not his main fields.
- The third part is specifically dedicated to climate change and provides a wealth of data and numbers. Interesting too.

In the end the book is a good read if you are looking for solid data on natural catastrophes and global warming. If you are interested in geopolitics, I'd complement this book with some more political books.

[Jaime · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was for the most part quite good and well researched.

To me it seemed like the author has a prejudiced and unreasonable fear of Islamic terrorism, and tortures the numbers a bit to try and make it seem like that fear is as well researched and fact based as the other threats he discusses in the book. If I was less lazy I would see how many citations he uses for each of the 7 threats discussed in chapter 2, my hunch is there's less for the threat of terrorism than the others.

I particularly liked the discussion of environmental change in chapter 4. Very well researched and cited, I felt it did a good job of discussing the complexity/uncertainty of measuring, predicting, and understanding what is happening and will happen in the future, without pretending like there's a both sides argument to climate change. It also did a great job discussing lots of other scary environmental change that isn't just global warming, e.g. things like the nitrogen cycle and bee colony collapse.

[Dalibor · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kniha z roku 2008, ve které Smil rozebírá rizika, která nás mohou potkat do roku 2050 a odhaduje jejich pravděpodobnosti a dopady. Sám ale dodává, že do budoucnosti nevidí a vše může být jinak nebo nás potká něco zcela nečekaného, co bude mít větší dopady na naše životy.
Stačilo jen 10 let ze čtyřiceti odhadovaných a je vidět, že v knize se vůbec nezmiňují v současnosti řešené problémy jako je třeba odmítání autorit/vůdců a dezinformace nebo kybernetické hrozby. Stejně tak se nechává na scifi knížkách ohrožení roboty a umělou inteligencí, což se už v současnosti jako takové scifi nezdá.
Nejpřínosnější mi přijde kapitola, kde se porovnávají rizika a dopady jednotlivých katastrof a získané hodnoty se srovnávají s ohrožením kouřením, chřipkou nebo automobilovou dopravou.
Pro lepší pochopení vlivu katastrof a klimatu na vývoj a zániky civilizací bych doporučil knihy od egyptologa Bárty.

[Gard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very well and objectively researched book about possible catastrophes that could hit us, with calculated probabilities of them happening within 2050. This book was first published in 2008 and, interestingly enough, Smil highlighted the probability of an emerging pandemic hitting us within 2050 as very high, and lo and behold: SARS-COV2.

The publication year is also this book's greatest weakness. It's data is outdated on the day of publication. This is especially the case for the chapter on climate change which surely would have been written differently today.

[Rosa Val]

No es un libro profético. Es una revisión del tema.
Aporta perspectivas poco difundidas sobre temas muy comentados como es el cambio climático y fuentes de energía alternas.
Aporta una extensa y variada información general en historia, pandemias, erupciones volcánicas, economía, petróleo, desastres naturales, terrorismo, guerras, estadísticas etc

Es un libro que vale la pena leer.

[Robert Banovský · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vaclav Smil se v knize zabývá přírodními a člověkem způsobenými trendy a diskontinuitami (nečekané události) které ovlivní lidstvo v následujících 50 letech. Jak sám říká, nesnaží se dělat předpovědi, pouze kvantifikuje pravděpodobnosti tam, kde to podle dat lze. Tohoto svého rámce se věrně drží, takže kniha nepůsobí jako futurologický blábol. Je zajímavé se podívat, jak se některé trendy od doby napsání knihy (2008) již částečně změnily.

[Craig Cooley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Full of interesting data. Written in about 2006 with a look forward of trends for the next 50 years. Already ten years ( 20%) in and interesting to see how his trends are holding up. I would say they are holding up pretty good. Still very well worth the read.

[Waqar Danny]

I is amazing book written and state of mind he provided in this masterpiece book I m also amazed to see that bow all the characters ork fluently just love this book : i m loving this book

[Drew Edwards · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like most of Smil's books: an excellent reference book and an intelligent, thoughtful synthesis on the topic presented. His writing style and tone can be hard to read - it's very dry and sometimes seemingly arrogant. I wish he dissected his methodological decisions more clearly.

[Hotrats · Rating 5 out of 5]

Too scary. Better than Stephen King for keeping you up at night.

[Johan D'Haenen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Een must read voor al wie werkelijk begaan is met de onze toekomst en die van de planeet... meer hoef ik daarover niet te zeggen.

[Jason · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pertinent. Unsettling. Well written but not easy. Come for the scientific straight talk, stay for the geopolitical analysis.

[Derrick Monk · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was beyond the scope of what I needed, I love Smil books but he goes way to deep often for very simplistic concepts and subject matters

[Minervas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perhaps because my fatigue from the pandemic and other things had morphed into a general apathy towards all kinds of disasters, I didn't immediately fall for this book. I know it's not a healthy attitude since overlooking tail risks is what has gotten us into this mess. But anyway, I wasn't grasped by the first two chapters.

I am also not impressed by the country studies in chapter 3. They are comprehensive and balanced, but a bit trite. Specifically, the discussions on US fiscal deficit and trade deficit are uninformed by economic theories.

But I did warm up to the book since chapter 4. On global warming, Vaclav showcases how to introduce the scientific facts about a complex topic. He not only describes historical trends but also informs readers of the reliability of their measures. He points out both possibly unfortunate and fortuitous feedbacks, and he reminds us of uncertainty in forecasts. All popular science writers should take a page from him.

I also like the last chapter, "Dealing with Risk and Uncertainty." The per person per hour of exposure risk measure is a crude measure of risk, but it's effective in guiding individual and social decisions. The no-regret strategies he recommends are wise and prudent.

Side Notes:
• It is astonishing to learn that 40% of EU spending is on agriculture subsidies, a number Vaclav uses to criticize the EU's economic policies. But I later found online that 1) the "subsidies" contain not only direct payout to farmers but also finances to the rural development programs, the goals of which include environmental protection and climate actions. In fact, Banerjee and Duflo praised those programs for the upkeep of European countryside in Good Economics for Hard Times. 2) EU common-pool spending is only 2% of all EU public spending. The 40% figure probably speaks more about not enough total across-EU spending than over-spending on agriculture.

[Tyler · Rating 4 out of 5]

goes over catastrophes (meteors, volcanoes, world wars) and trends (climate change in particular) that could have very meaningful consequences. The guy is super smart and approaches issues from a multidisciplinary viewpoint that is second to none. Most interesting idea from the book - the inherent predictability of war (or at least the outbreak of war), i.e. they're going to happen on average so often over a certain time period - causes can always be found later.

[Luciana Nery · Rating 5 out of 5]

The three adjectives above say it all. Impressive work. He never resorts to alarmism even when the scenarios he paints seem dire.

In fact, he is quick to point out when nature seems to counteract some of the attacks that it suffers constantly. I would not say there is optmism in his work, it's better to say that his views do not come with a set of ideologies behind, and this is so refreshing to read.

[Vlad · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best non-forecasting book about the future I have read. Smil insists on not making predictions but the plethora of data is enough to paint a clear probabilistic picture of the next 50 years. Very well documented: 36 (!) pages of references. The future ain't what it used to be.

[Garret Seinen · Rating 3 out of 5]

A book I had a hard time finishing as I have some difficulty even considering major catastrophes.

[unperspicacious · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting survey of political risks, but again relatively little on the possible consequences of transitions to lower energy density infrastructures.

[Bryce · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lesson: expect a big flu pandemic in the next five years. Gratuitous use of scientific nomenclature.

[Chris Kramolis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting. Smil is careful not to predict but only observe trends and possible outcomes. Looking forward to reading more by the author.