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Join us to discuss much-needed Economic Relocalization –and share ideas about how to visualize it– based on the Think Resilience course by Richard Heinberg, Post Carbon Institute.

On this episode, chemical engineer Paul Martin joins The Great Simplification to talk about all things hydrogen. There are many ‘Fuels of the Future’ about which the media likes to create hopeful and seamless narratives, one of the currently popular of these being hydrogen.

What credence should be given to the most recent summary report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)? To do that, you need to separate the science from the politics that pervades the IPCC processes.

Unpicking the dominant, growth-based worldview will mean closely analysing the stories we have been told (and who those stories might serve), and bravely and courageously assessing whether all of this growth really does bring us ‘the good life’.

This perfect storm highlights exactly why local resilience is so important, as communities were forced to adopt localized responses—with many drawing heavily on traditional resilience strategies and values to do so.

And honestly, all of this leaves me wondering today what that “prophesy” might look like for the high school graduates of 2023 or those of my grandchildren’s generation in an even more distant future. I certainly hope for the best, but also fear the worst. 

By taking a longer view, we can see the arc of the horizon of our agricultural past, which gives us the ability to put our endeavors in context and to see what’s possible for the future just over the horizon.

When the IPCC mitigation report comments on the possibilities and likely effects of different emissions reduction strategies, it usually relies on quantitative integrated assessment models (IAMs) to do so.

Saito’s book is refreshing because it helps end an old feud between socialists who trust that new technologies and the automation of work can deliver an expanding economy with greater leisure time and those who argue for a socialism without growth.

Putin’s war has exposed the fact that nations that lack access to affordable energy and those that are most dependent on fossil fuels are vulnerable.

After liberalism, then, I believe the task is to steer our societies towards a small farm civic republicanism of the front porch and not the front parlour variety. I don’t think that’s going to be easy.

US oil production is about to peak, but the world is unprepared for the tremendous economic and political consequences. The only path through is energy and economic transformation.