Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Kurt Cobb As societies expand their service sectors, it is inevitable that overall productivity growth will decline. And that can mean that overall economic growth will tend to decline as well. We have certainly seen progressively slower growth in mature world economies over time, particularly since the 2008-2009 recession.
Sooner or later, people will have to give away their cars, closing a peculiar and unusual cycle in the history of humankind. (This is the most subversive post I’ve ever published, I think.)
We are so used to rapid progress in so many fields, especially in the communications devices and computers. It’s hard to imagine that there might areas of our lives in which progress has not only ceased but been reversed.
There is no insurance policy that will protect us against catastrophic climate change. We cannot get our habitable climate back on any time scale that matters to humans once it’s gone. The insurance policy is us, that is, changes in our behavior and our technology done quickly enough to matter. There is no other hedge that will help us.
Long-lived public and private infrastructure can and does increase economic productivity. But infrastructure can also become the leech that keeps on sucking when it becomes overly large and when we choose temporary economic pain relief and stimulants over the true medicine of forging a new trajectory for our infrastructure which requires deference to the limits we face.
Three places showing how to make the transition from domination and resource extraction to regeneration and interdependence.
“The key question for the future of the oil market is for how long can a surge in US shale supplies make up for the slow pace of growth elsewhere in the oil sector.”
–Fatih Birol, the IEA’s executive director
The Saudis and the Russians want to appear to being “doing something” about low oil prices. But they and their fellow producers aren’t really doing enough to push prices higher. And, that may suit the Saudis and the Russians just fine.
Here in the predominantly low-income Latino community of Wilmington, CA, we have five major oil refineries within a nine-mile radius. We are not alone: across the country, minority and low-income neighborhoods host the lion’s share of polluting facilities, and families like mine are impacted first and worst.
The story I am to tell you in this book is a story about a community that became isolated on a small island in the wake of industrial civilisation’s collapse, during the third decade of the twenty-first century. Those who grew up on the Isle, as I did, sometimes liked to jest that we were the descendents of Plato’s banished poets, but the reality is that our humble story is considerably less romantic, with more grit and tears than any fairy tale could ever allow.
“Global oil inventories are falling because of OPEC and non-OPEC production cuts, but the road to market balance will be long.” –Arthur Berman, Consulting Geologist
This lively reference book offers great insights and practical advice for those striving to embrace sustainable, nature-based ways of living—and to liberate themselves from the pernicious, ailing technosphere that dictates life for most people in the industrial world.
