Staring at the Future from the Top of the Slippery Slide
Economics, Global Warming/Climate Change, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
The IEA World Energy Outlook reports get more accurate every year - by 2030 it’ll be spot on.
Disclaimer: As the title should indicate, don’t read this post if you’re of a delicate disposition.
The International Energy Agency has just released the latest incarnation of its annual ‘World Energy Outlook‘ report - the 2008 edition. Please stand for a moment of mock-reverence.
Thank you. Please be seated.
For those not familiar, the IEA releases an annual report, making reasonably detailed projections of expected energy supplies and demands for the nations of the world. It breaks these total energy forecasts down into its various sources (oil, coal, natural gas, renewables, etc.), and looks at expected economic growth trends for different countries and sectors and their impacts on energy consumption. The last several editions have covered the period from publication to the year 2030, and they have also factored in a few different scenarios to roughly cover policy changes that could occur throughout the period to give policymakers an idea of potential outcomes.
It is certainly a worthwhile endeavour - you could say critical, actually. If only they did it well.
Comments (3)Posted on: November 17, 2008
The Food Crisis: “A Perfect Storm” - and How to Turn the Tide
Biodiversity, Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, GMOs, Global Warming/Climate Change, Health & Disease, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Water Contaminaton — by Craig Mackintosh
A recently released study, the largest of its kind, examines the root causes of, and solutions for, a food crisis that will likely get much worse before it gets better — and that will never get better if we continue with business as usual
I’m hungry.
No, not because I don’t have enough food to eat, but because I’m too busy typing and too lazy to walk to the refrigerator. How I wish it were this simple for the people I keep reading about.
Comments (3)Posted on: November 14, 2008
Powering Down - Will We?
Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Population, Society, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
 Most underestimate the implications… |
Through our Hollywood-tinted glasses we’re accustomed to happy endings. The instinctive “it won’t happen to me” mentality is alive and well, but, whilst perhaps preserving the comfortable status quo (if not our sanity), it does little to promote objectivity. In a world threatened by global warming, potential constructive accomplishments are thus too often hampered and bogged down in the realm of discourse and debate.
In plain English - we need to get real.
On this note, check out the following clip. Richard Heinburg, the author of the book “Powering Down“, has much to say on possible strategies, or failing that, outcomes, for our post peak-oil world. I think it’s time we really examine, not just computer climate models - but societal projections.
Comments (0)Posted on: November 12, 2008
New Beginnings?
Alternatives to Political Systems, Consumerism, Economics, Global Warming/Climate Change, Society — by Craig Mackintosh
 Click for larger view Courtesy: Throbgoblins |
I don’t blame old Cantankerous Frank here (at right) for getting all excited. Everyone likes to hope - and there’s nothing like a perceived new beginning to get people all agitated in a positive way, ready to pick up the ‘ol load again, and trudge forward, excitedly, into a golden new age.
For myself, half of my relief over the election was just as much that McCain didn’t get in as it was knowing that Obama will step into the Oval Office in January. The thought of just more of the same old Bush mentality was more than I could stand (I mean - really - how did he get in that second time around? Okay, let’s not go there).
And, now it’s down to Mr. Obama - a man who is the smack-dab centre target of more expectations than Santa ever was. Boy has Obama got his work cut out for him. If there was ever a great big pile of doggie do left on someone’s desk, it is this end-of-term.
Comments (1)Posted on: November 6, 2008
The Flaw of Western Economies
Alternatives to Political Systems, Consumerism, Economics, People Systems, Village Development — by Marcin Gerwin
by Marcin Gerwin, Sopot, Poland. Marcin graduated with a Ph.D. in political studies, from the University of Gdansk, Poland, with his thesis: “The idea and practice of sustainable development in the context of global challenges”.
 Cob House Photo, Gerry Thomasen |
Let’s imagine a green and responsible consumer. Let’s call him George. George lives in a sleepy town, near the center and the park where he often goes for a walk with his dog. George built his house with his friends two years ago. It is a very small house, only 320 square feet and it was made with cob – clay mixed with straw and aggregate. The clay for construction was extracted from George’s land behind the house - now you can see a nice pond there with water lilies. George was fortunate enough to find some recycled timber for the roof from the old garage that his neighbors were demolishing. He considered making a turf roof with wild flowers and herbs, but eventually he decided that a slate roof will be more practical because he will be able to collect rainwater from it and use it for watering his garden during warm summer days.
Comments (5)Posted on: November 4, 2008
The Rise and Predictable Fall of Globalized Industrial Agriculture
Conservation, Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Population, Soil Conservation, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
Today I’d like to introduce you to a (well written and beautifully presented) report, titled - ‘The Rise and Predictable Fall of Globalized Industrial Agriculture‘ (55 page, 2.4mb PDF). The title says it all. Should you be concerned? Yes.
Your concern, however, should not be that the globalised industrial agribusiness model will collapse - this is not only inevitable, but also necessary, and, might I add, desirable - the focus should instead be on when and how it will fall.
Let me explain.
If you were to ask the Average Joe what is the largest contributor to global warming, many will say cars, trucks and aeroplanes - or coal fired power plants. While these are large contributors, they cannot compete with the largest, yet mostly overlooked contribution from our present system of farming and global food trading. Global warming is primarily due to agriculture. Indeed, much of the above-stated contributors are merely essential aspects in maintaining the globalised agricultural model:
Comments (0)Posted on: October 27, 2008
Learning from the Past
Biodiversity, Consumerism, Economics, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination — by Earth Policy Institute
by Lester R. Brown, Earth Policy Institute, Washington D.C., U.S.A.
Our twenty-first century global civilization is not the first to face the prospect of environmentally induced economic decline. The question is how we will respond. We do have one unique asset at our command–an archeological record that shows us what happened to earlier civilizations that got into environmental trouble and failed to respond.
As Jared Diamond points out in his book Collapse, some of the early societies that were in environmental trouble were able to change their ways in time to avoid decline and collapse. Six centuries ago, for example, Icelanders realized that overgrazing on their grass-covered highlands was leading to extensive soil loss from the inherently thin soils of the region. Rather than lose the grasslands and face economic decline, farmers joined together to determine how many sheep the highlands could sustain and then allocated quotas among themselves, thus preserving their grasslands and avoiding what Garrett Hardin later termed the “tragedy of the commons.”
Comments (0)Posted on: October 25, 2008
This is What Denial Does
Consumerism, Economics — by George Monbiot
The economic crisis is petty by comparison to the nature crunch. But they have the same cause.
by George Monbiot - journalist, author, academic and environmental and political activist
 Click for full view Courtesy: Throbgoblins |
This is nothing. Well, nothing by comparison to what’s coming. The financial crisis for which we must now pay so heavily prefigures the real collapse, when humanity bumps against its ecological limits.
As we goggle at the fluttering financial figures, a different set of numbers passes us by. On Friday, Pavan Sukhdev, the Deutsche Bank economist leading a European study on ecosystems, reported that we are losing natural capital worth between $2 trillion and $5 trillion every year, as a result of deforestation alone(1). The losses incurred so far by the financial sector amount to between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion. Sukhdev arrived at his figure by estimating the value of the services - such as locking up carbon and providing freshwater - that forests perform, and calculating the cost of either replacing them or living without them. The credit crunch is petty when compared to the nature crunch.
Comments (1)Posted on: October 16, 2008
The Other Bail-Out
Consumerism, Economics, peak oil — by George Monbiot
Another set of corporations is pressing for public money. Governments should let them die.
by George Monbiot - journalist, author, academic and environmental and political activist
While all eyes were fixed on the banking bail-out, a bucketload of public money was quietly sloshed into the pockets of another undeserving cause. Last week, George Bush agreed to lend $25bn to US car manufacturers. It’s a soft loan, which will cost the government $7.5bn(1). Few people noticed; fewer fought it. The House of Representatives approved the measure by 370 votes to 58. The great corporate bail-out is spreading like the plague.
It has already crossed the Atlantic. Yesterday European car makers demanded that the EU hand them €40bn ($54bn) in cheap loans to match the US subsidy(2). Where will the public spending spree end?
Comments (0)Posted on: October 10, 2008
Can Permaculture Save the World???
Alternatives to Political Systems, Bio-regional Organisations, Biodiversity, Consumerism, Eco-Villages, Economics, Financial Management, Food Shortages, Global Warming/Climate Change, People Systems, Population, Soil Erosion & Contamination, Village Development, Water Contaminaton, peak oil — by Ted Trainer
Editor’s Note: Point one - this article is circa 1998, from the now ceased-publication Permaculture International Journal. Point two - it is now more relevant than ever, so please read and ponder. The article goes a long way towards explaining why I mix articles the way I do - some about Permaculture, some about current events, the global situation, and the desperate need for systemic social, political and economic change.
Ted Trainer argues that although the planet cannot be saved without Permaculture, not enough people in the movement realise where Permaculture fits into the solution.
We are fast approaching a period of enormous and probably chaotic change. Western industrial-affluent-consumer society is unsustainable and is rapidly running into serious difficulties.
Permaculture is a crucial component of the solution to the global predicament. However I want to argue that Permaculture is far from sufficient, and indeed that it can be counter-productive if it is not put in the right context. That is unless we are careful, promoting Permaculture can actually help to reinforce our existing unsustainable society. We must do much more than just contribute to the spread of Permaculture. We must locate Permaculture within a wider campaign of radical social change. Before I try to explain this, I need to outline how I see the global predicament we are in. Whether or not you will agree with my conclusions about what needs to be done and where Permaculture fits in will depend greatly on whether you share my view of the situation we are in.
Comments (4)Posted on: October 2, 2008
Congress Confronts its Contradictions
Alternatives to Political Systems, Consumerism, Economics, Society — by George Monbiot
They baled out of the bail-out, but the money will still have to come from us. It always has.
by George Monbiot - journalist, author, academic and environmental and political activist
According to Senator Jim Bunning, the proposal to purchase $700bn of dodgy debt by the US government “is financial socialism, it is un-American”(1). The economics professor Nouriel Roubini calls George Bush, Henry Paulson and Ben Bernanke “a troika of Bolsheviks who turned the USA into the United Socialist State Republic of America”(2). Bill Perkins, the venture capitalist who took out an advertisement in the New York Times attacking the deal, calls it “trickle-down communism”(3).
They are wrong. The banking subsidies Congress rejected last night are as American as apple pie and obesity. The sums demanded by Bush and Paulson might be unprecedented, but there is nothing new about the principle: corporate welfare is a consistent feature of advanced capitalism. Only one thing has changed: Congress has been forced to confront its contradictions.
Comments (1)Posted on: October 1, 2008
The Money Masters
Alternatives to Political Systems, Consumerism, Economics, Financial Management — by Craig Mackintosh
The stock market crisis has been described by many as the worst financial disaster since the great depression of the 1930s. It is freezing cashflows worldwide, putting the livelihoods of millions at risk, and stopping economic growth in its tracks. Even the US$700 billion bailout plan, with US taxpayers picking up the tab, seems not to be calming investor fears as it was hoped. People have "a sense that there’s a lot more bad news to come".
I think they are right.
Comments (1)Posted on: September 29, 2008
Easter Island - Our Past, or Our Future?
Economics, Food Shortages, Population, Society, Soil Erosion & Contamination, peak oil — by Craig Mackintosh
 Click for full view Courtesy: Throbgoblins |
Easter Island has long been looked upon as an historical looking glass, through which we can observe the implications of continued environmental destruction to our planet - the larger island floating in a sea of black. The cries of a people that could clearly see destruction coming, but did little or nothing about it, come hauntingly down to us here in this new millenium. With startling clarity they teach us what happens when immediacy takes precedence over future needs.
If you have a moment to take a trip to another time and place, check out some of the material and links here. No need to dream of going to Easter Island though, as, in many ways, you’re already there….
Comments (0)Posted on: September 24, 2008
How the West was Lost
Consumerism, Economics, Society — by Craig Mackintosh
Click for larger view
Courtesy: Throbgoblins
What a week it has been. The world’s financial systems have been convulsing violently - an edge-of-seat roller coaster ride, sans the fun. Massive centralisation of financial management, combined with blinkered, short-term thinking, is seeing us teetering on the edge of a global depression. And the result? Even greater centralisation as banks swallow up banks in a bid to shore up the damage - and the taxpayer, it seems, is left to foot the bill for the greed and ineptitude of a ‘chosen few’.
The question is, where from here? Or, as this BBC article asks - "Where now for Capitalism?"
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