The fact that we are likely headed for a long decent into cold means we should not be wasting our fossil fuels today. We should be using wind and solar and saving those fuels for freezing weather. Also we need to get serious about reducing the world population. And it does not need to be done the Chinese way or by rampant abortions. Look at all the migration troubles throughout the world today. Imagine what is going to happen if the temperature keeps going up, droughts become more severe, storms more violent, and significant areas of seacoast and urban areas threatened and overcome by sea level rise. Then if the big freeze starts suddenly, vast migrations to warmer areas. Already we have seen the Syria migration problem. Much of this whole problem caused by severe drought driving people to the cities in Syria and a very unsympathetic ruler.
Right now, what I fear is the slowing and stoppage of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). That is water heating up in the tropics, flowing North as the Gulf Stream, the water freezing into fresh water ice in the far north and the saltier and heavier water that remains sinking deep and flowing back toward the equator to repeat the process. With so much less ice seeming to form in far north waters, this circulation process can be in danger. Without the warmth of the Gulf Stream, British Isles and Europe would become far colder. Crops would start failing, and the people from Africa and the middle east would be even less welcome and desperate. Part of the cause of the French Revolution was economic failure as vulcanism in Iceland following 1783 caused multiple crop disruptions that even our French ambassador, Benjamin Franklin, commented on.
Much needed diesel and heating oil will gel and become useless. Don’t count on fossil fuels doing any good to help anything at that point. The population issue will then take care of it’s self. There will be only small clans of those with the knowledge to survive on limited resources and without modern technology. We will once again be back in the stone age and maybe survive as a species to start all over again someday.