Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
The next stop in my tour through my book A Small Farm Future is Part I, which begins with a long chapter outlining ten crises that one way or another seem set in the coming years to thoroughly upend the world we’ve known.
A better way to define technology is to acknowledge that it is a global social phenomenon and a moral and political question rather than simply one of engineering.
Countries which are heavily invested in nuclear energy remain higher CO2 emitters, on average, than countries which have invested at the same level in renewable energy. This is the main finding of a study recently published in the journal Nature Energy.
From the Neolithic to the beginning of the twentieth century, coppiced woodlands, pollarded trees, and hedgerows provided people with a sustainable supply of energy, materials, and food.
To the extent that oil demand goes down in the future, it will go down because people can’t afford oil distillates at the price producers need to produce the corresponding oil.
Electricity generated from wind and solar is 30-50% cheaper than previously thought, according to newly published UK government figures.
With all these different uses, my sun oven is full all day, nearly every sunny day. It’s a big part of how we reduced our electricity use by 85%.
Despite all the demands from climate activists, scientists, and even policy makers, hardly a single country is taking the shift to renewable energy seriously. Even countries and regions that claim to be working toward an energy transition are failing to do what would be required in order for the transition to succeed. What’s behind this surprising and disturbing state of affairs?
Not unlike Einstein’s summons, Planet of the Humans is at least spot on about the need to turn away from our technocentric story and all its delusions that have claimed to give us full control. Then, and only then, will any light shine like the dawn.
Asher, Rob, and Jason grapple with the cacophony, hash out the good and bad of the film and the response to it, and argue for an honest, messy-middle approach to the transition away from fossil fuels.
The documentary “Planet of the Humans” produced by Michael Moore is not the last word on our human predicament. Still, it starts a conversation we need to have, and it’s a film that deserves to be seen.
The rise of primary energy use and CO2 emissions over four decades across 70 countries is not closely correlated with increases in life expectancy, a new study finds.
This suggests that increased fossil fuel use is not a key determinant of increased life expectancy, the lead author tells Carbon Brief.
