Tom Whipple

Prof Al Bartlett’s exposition of exponential growth

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Prof. Al Bartlett offers useful approximations for understanding exponential growth and its alarming consequences. He gives two rules of thumb for quick calculations about exponential growth but it’s worth noting that these are approximations, quite accurate for small percentage growth values, but not correct for large rates of growth.

Pick up your hat (response to John Michael Greer)

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In Depletion and Abundance I write about the difficulty of committing to a lifestyle change in a world where you always seem to have more time, where defining events are always on the horizon but never present. I use the phrase “time to pick up your hat” which I take from a short story by Robert Heinlein, as a way of thinking both about how difficult it is to change and how necessary.

Job Losses Push Need for Energy Bill

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Millions of job losses are pushing the U.S. Senate to consider a Jobs and Energy bill, even though Cap and Trade appears to be on life support. What are Five Key Measures that must be in a new Bill to avoid being a “half-ass..d” effort? (term from Sen. Lindsey Graham descrbing limited climate bill)

The Oil Crunch: a wake-up call for the UK economy (report excerpt)

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On 10 February 2010 at the Royal Society, six UK companies – Arup, Foster + Partners, Scottish and Southern Energy, Solarcentury, Stagecoach Group and Virgin – joined together to launch the second report of the UK Industry Task-Force on Peak Oil and Energy Security (ITPOES).

The energy consumption of avatars


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Virtual worlds (World of Warcraft, Second Life) and the avatars that exist in them use energy. Often more than the average person in many countries of the world. Many IT pundits forget or ignore that computers are physical objects that require resources for their construction and maintenance and that they thus have an (under-explored) ecological footprint.