Each moonlit night the giant would eat one of the old woman’s pigs.

Finally, she hired a young feller to keep watch. The very next morning however, another pig was gone, and all she found of their guardian was a little pile of red dust.

We should all be wary of excessive appetites. Children should be told some creatures on two feet in this world aren’t friendly. And, if you meet a giant, you have four choices: run and hide; fight; compromise (perhaps, sacrifice a village maiden); or adapt.

Today, our world faces a giant with two heads: Climate Change and Peak Oil. She is more dangerous than anything in a fairy tale.

Peak oil is the point in time when the world’s appetite for energy produced by oil reaches its catastrophic climax. Around 2012, the industry says, oil reserves, and the production of oil will start a steady decline.

With less to go around, and the higher cost of squeezing it out of tar sands, world economies and average citizens will feel a monstrous bite.

Most folks understand the relationship of rising oil price to the current recession. Businesses thrive when the cost of making things, or moving goods and services to consumers is low –that’s cheap oil.

In 1998, it was $13 a barrel (Shaun Chamberlin, The Transition Timeline for a local, resilient future). Less than 10 years later, the price had skyrocketed – $100 in Jan. 2008; six months later, $147.

Volatile fuel costs are bad for business. Shops close. Look around. Jobs vanish. Ask a neighbor.

There isn’t much from plastic food wrap to running shoes that doesn’t depend on oil to make it, or transport it to our stores. Recall the added ferry fuel surcharges?

Not long ago, a stranger at a local gas station remarked, “Are they out of regular, again?

Oil reserves in Alberta refineries may now be too small to meet daily demand. Is rationing far behind? Indeed, Peak Oil is well-positioned to take a big chomp out of the average Joe everywhere. Like Dr. Frankenstein, we have created a monster we can’t fight, or run away from. We need to adapt.

According to Chamberlin, this involves “mobilization to break our addiction to oil to create a more localized, low energy world.”

We must use less oil. Chamberlin proposes a self-sufficiency timeline. Towns would provide goods and services locally as much as possible, and alternate energy sources would be maximized. This would weaken the Peak Oil half of our ogre.

Carbon reduction would be one benefit.

Remember Climate Change, the other head? It would suffocate without CO2. This is a fact U.S. President Obama is discussing with the Chinese. We’ll see if their talks pay off when the world meets in Copenhagen next month.

Here’s what Obama and the Chinese know. Without reductions in CO2, the world’s mean temperature will continue upward. That means greater flooding half of each year, and drought the other.

Have you noticed November winds in Maple Ridge are stronger; worried about trees coming down?

In many parts of the planet, the reality is worse. Half the globe’s species may soon disappear; and there are world conferences now dealing specifically with human starvation. Meanwhile, Canada sits without a stated CO2 emissions policy.

Did we say you can’t ignore the giant? A world temperature of no more than 1.7 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures will keep global warming at bay according to Chamberlin. That’s 300 to 350 parts per million of CO2. Currently, world levels are 385, and climbing. The more oil we burn, the faster the number goes up.

Today’s two-headed giant is scary, but if we use skill and ingenuity, we’ll free ourselves of Climate Change and Peak Oil without bloodshed. Four years ago, the village of Totnes, in England, set out on a path of adaption with an Energy Descent Action Plan.

The first official “transition town,” Totnes accepted its responsibility for mitigating climate change at the community level.

Many cities around the world, including Vancouver and Victoria, have followed with their own Transition Town Initiative. Maple Ridge is on the way with the Golden Ears Transition Initiative (GETI). It is a ray of hope for anyone locally who thinks the world is falling apart, and nothing can be done about it.

Changing attitudes for energy consumption is a daunting task, but in the presence of a two-headed giant, we must adapt, or end as red dust for the old woman to sweep up in the morning.

• Jack Emberly is a steering committee member of the Golden Ears

Transition Initiative (GETI)