Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
John Michael Greer Not that long ago, the notion of an archdruid speaking at a national conference on peak oil would likely have occurred only to humorists and anti-environmental zealots. Over the week just past, as the industrial world showed unnerving signs of lurching into crisis, that preposterous scenario did indeed come to pass. The Archdruid offers his reflections on the event.
The crude industrial processes that powered our world for a century or more leave us with depletion, fragmentation, and decay. Living systems can show us the way to recover and sustain the damaged systems upon which life depends.
A midweekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Developments this week
Think about it! We’ve been presented with a win-win opportunity to build on the Occupy Movement. And — really — don’t we all share the “Occupy” vision of a kinder, more sustainable world?
If together we could see everyone as part of the 100%, rather than as “we-versus-them” confrontational camps, then perhaps we can all actually make a difference.
It struck me that Transition says to people “take this model and do it where you are”, whereas Occupy suggests coming together to suspend your life while you explore, with others, the question of what’s the best thing to do now. Transition is about building that into your own life, right now, drawing on the experience of many others. You might say that Occupy suggests occupying, for example, Wall Street, while Transition suggests occupying your own street, putting up runner beans and solar panels rather than tents. There is great richness in this diversity of approaches. I was left mulling the question I should have asked Frannie from the information tent, when people arrive and say “I don’t have the time to be here at Occupy, but what can I do in my own life, at home, in my street?” It would be fascinating to know the answer they receive.
Growth as we’ve known it is over, Paul Gilding and Richard Heinberg told a Climate One audience in San Francisco on November 7. Confronted by resource constraints and crippling debt, nations must instead focus on growth that respects nature’s limits.
– Who knows where the occupations are going – it’s just great to be moving
– Occupy Cross-Roads: What Will Happen If OWS Loses Its Park?
– A Chill Descends On Occupy Wall Street
– Paul Krugman on solar innovation: Here Comes the Sun
– Solar Power and its Discontents
– Five challenges facing the energy sector in 2012
– ‘Tipping Point’: A primer on the Alberta tar sands
– New video from Annie Leonard: The Story of Broke (2011)
– Nassim Taleb (“Black Swans”) in NYT: End Bonuses for Bankers
– Why Iceland Should Be in the News, But Is Not
– Resources for Understanding the Crisis in Greece
For over a century, liberals and radicals have seen the possibility of change in capitalist systems from one of two perspectives: the reform tradition assumes that corporate institutions remain central to the system but believes that regulatory policies can contain, modify, and control corporations and their political allies. The revolutionary tradition assumes that change can come about only if corporate institutions are eliminated or transcended during an acute crisis, usually but not always by violence. But what happens if a system neither reforms nor collapses in crisis?
The notion that politics only takes place in the voting booth or halls of state basically evaporated in the 1960s. We now know that political acts occur in a range of settings: in our neighborhoods, bedrooms, kitchens, and, yes, even in our gardens.
When we enter the decline phase of conventional oil—likely before 2020—we will scramble to fill the gap with alternative liquid fuels. The Hirsch Report of 2005, commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy, took a hard look at alternatives that could respond to the scale of the problem in time to have an impact. Not one of the approaches deemed to be currently viable in the report departs from fossil fuels. But what about biofuels? To what extent can they solve our problem? We’ll dip our toes into the math and see where a first-cut analysis leaves us.
