Asher Miller

Shovels and ballots… Getting to work on 10/10/10

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After major disappointments in Copenhagen and Washington D.C., millions of us concerned about the climate crisis have been left wondering "what now?". The stakes couldn’t be higher, and the political and infrastructural challenges so large and complex, that it’s no surprise to see soul-searching and disagreements over the best course of action. Especially when legislative and diplomatic efforts to date have fallen flat. When folks like Dave Roberts — who fiercely advocated for admittedly weak Cap & Trade legislation because he felt that it was our best hope for progress — have given up on the nation’s capitol, it’s clear that a lot of people are being forced to re-evaluate.

Tales from a tail of wooded land (Days 164-165) September 8th -9th

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It would be heartening to think that there could be trust regained in place of the fear, what is it that those who honour ownership above all else fear? And from whence came the sense of alienation from one another, and the sense of entitlement of one above the other?

Animals I: birds, bats and bumblebees

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Most people who think of animals at all in the context of producing food at home think of livestock and not much else. To make an garden yield in the absence of abundant fossil fuels, though, many wild creatures need to be recruited to fill roles in the garden ecosystem. The Archdruid explains…

Politics in the Great Transition

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Someday there will be thousands of scholarly books on how political systems coped or failed during the transition from fossil fuel-sustained civilizations to that which is to come. For now, however, there are practically none as only a relative handful of the 6.7 billion on earth today have even a glimmer that the great transition is underway.

Food frugality freedom

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I am not a foodie, but I am very good at eating. Put a hamburger and plate of fries in front of me and I am an eating machine. I eat mostly for the satisfaction of not having to eat again for another four hours. This, as one of my writing teachers suggested, is how a dog views food, bypassing all the delights of the human senses for the sake of a satisfied stomach.

Lines of defence (I): The thin brown line

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There’s a palpable sense of expectation as we cruise down the canal. Two dozen people and barely a word passes between us. It’s not the roar of the triple outboard engines, nor the forced camaraderie of strangers thrust together, with only their environmentalisms in common. Rather, it’s the sense that we’re travelling towards something—not a place, but a phenomenon, an event—whose name we know but whose face we have not yet seen.

Steady growth of wind industry moves EU closer to green goals

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Europe is in the midst of a wind energy boom, with the continent now installing more wind power capacity than any other form of energy. In an interview with Yale Environment 360, the European Wind Energy Association’s Christian Kjaer describes his vision of how wind can lead the way in making Europe’s electricity generation 100 percent renewable by 2050.