Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Staff – Fred Magdoff: Harmony and Ecological Civilization
– Commencement Address: You’re Not Special
– Population and Biodiversity: The Parable of Isle Royale
– Ehrlich et al: Securing natural capital and expanding equity to rescale civilization
– North Carolina Ignores Science, Tries To Make Sea Level Rise Illegal
– Jan Lundberg: The 2012/Aliens/Consciousness Movement: a potential New-Age Tea Party?
– The Denialism of Progressive Environmentalists
– Germany Meets Half Its Energy Demand From Solar, Briefly
– The new new hydropower: Small-scale turbines have big potential
– National Defense: Efficiency and Conservation Not Enough to Achieve Energy Security
– Energy now hitting pop charts (Muse and the 2nd Law of thermodynamics)
The bicycle is a perfect example of the permaculture principle that everything should have multiple functions. And as permaculture is one of the key cornerstones of the Transition movement, I think this qualifies bikes as a brilliant thing for a Transition Initiative to get involved in. Let me elaborate.
My apologies to Ray Stevens, writer of the 1970s hit “Everything Is Beautiful,” the lyrics and title of which I’ve morphed into the title of this piece. But with that I note the perpetual bullishness of the financial industry in the face of what is really an ongoing debt deflation. Every incident, every turn of events is summarized by the industry as a “bullish development.”
When the world-economy stagnates and real unemployment expands considerably, it means that the overall pie is shrinking. The question then becomes who shall bear the burden of the shrinkage – within countries and between countries. The class struggle becomes acute and sooner or later leads to open conflict in the streets.
Craft3 aims to build regional resilience in the Pacific Northwest by focusing investments in rural and urban centers, and in Indian country
Bill Rees discusses cultural denial and how we could start adapting to our ecological challenges through a new cultural narrative. From the recent International Conference on Degrowth in the Americas.
At the end of March, when Brent traded at around $125 per barrel, Saudi oil minister Ali al Naimi wrote a sharply worded article in the FT claiming there was no justification for such high oil prices, and Brent has since slumped to $100, which happens to be the Saudi target price. The decline is likely to be temporary, however, and Mr al Naimi soon shown to be as influential as King Canute…
Commons are not just common goods or assets. They are not “things” separate from us. They are not simply water, the forest, or ideas. They are social practices of commoning, of acting together, based on principles of sharing, stewarding, and producing in common. To ensure this, all those who participate in a common have the right to an equal voice in making decisions on the provisions and rules governing its management.
The military imperative is to prepare. In many ways, it’s leading the way in the development of new energy sources, said Brandon Fureigh, advocacy director for the Truman National Security Project. And with a massive budget and an oversized carbon bootprint, the military is in a good position to drive innovation. “The military has always been a good testing ground for technology in general and one reason is they have a large budget,” he said, noting how ideas sparked by military research trickle into the general business arena. Its budget for clean energy has tripled in the last four years to $1.2 billion.
-For first time in years, the world is producing more oil than it needs
-Bill Reinert Describes What the Future of Energy Looks Like to his University of Colorado Audience
-The Saudi Oil Problem
-Citi’s Ed Morse Has A Huge Note Blasting Everyone Who Believes In Peak Oil
-The Oil Bubble Is Popping, But Will It Pop Down To $67?
-Aggregate factors in the price of oil
