Transition Culture has moved
I no longer blog on this site. You can now find me, my general blogs, and the work I am doing researching my forthcoming book on imagination, on my new blog.
Come find me at robhopkins.net
Archive for “Peak Oil” category
Showing results 631 - 635 of 635 for the category: Peak Oil.
9 Nov 2005
Lisa Rayner’s article on permaculture and trauma therapy is well worth a read.
It highlights some very interesting comparisons between the development of trauma theory to treat people with deep trauma, such as post traumatic stress disorder, and permaculture as a tool for dealing with the trauma of peak oil. The whole question of how to help people through what for some people will be deeply traumatic changes in the way our world works is a very important area that I am exploring as part of the research I am doing. I am in dialogue with a number of people with interesting things to say on the matter, and I will share insights from that whenever possible. This article raises some interesting questions for deeper exploration.
Read more»
9 Nov 2005
I always enjoy Maddy Harland’s editorials in the Permaculture Magazine, and this new issue’s (No.46) is no different. This latest issue has a distinct Peak Oil flavour, with articles by Colin Campbell, David Holmgren and myself. I want to point out the last paragraph of the editorial, as I think it sets out very well, as does David Holmgren’s fantastic article in the same issue, how permaculture and peak oil are coming together in a very dynamic and exciting way. I think that peak oil is what permaculture has been waiting for, and that the peak oil movement desperately needs permaculture. I think we have come of age, and need to ramp permaculture up to the next level.
Maddy writes,
Read more»
9 Nov 2005
So our good friend Colin Campbell went to the conference in Rimini in Italy with the Oil DeplepletionProtocol he has been working on for a good while now, which you can read here, having been led to believe that the event was in part organised around launching the Protocol, only to find that the event had been steered away from it, and he didn’t even get to speak in the main plenary session. You can read Jeremy Leggett’s article about the conference and its disappointing outcome here
The Rimini Protocol would basically commit all signatories to reducing the demand level for oil in their countries to follow the same diminishing curve as oil availability. As Colin sets out, it is basic good business practice for the oil industry and represents common sense. Of course, common sense doesn’t really come into it when politics are around, and oil is one area more than most where politics rule the roost. Strikes me that we need to be realistic to the fact that, like with climate change and the Kyoto agreement, the powers that be tend to act too late and do too little. The time for the Rimini Protocol is now, not in 10 years. As Colin points out in other articles, the rate of depletion will be steeper and more rapid the longer consumption continues at the present rate.
Read more»
8 Nov 2005
The free energy argument is picking up momentum as the implications of peak oil kick in. At every talk I have given or been to on peak oil there is always a token free energy advocate, who once read a book by Viktor Schauberger or Nikolai Tesla, and who thinks that the US Government has had ownership of this technology for decades but has kept it secret, while at the same time, alongside powerful US corporations, it buys up the patents on any free energy machine developed anywhere, popping the plans in a drawer never again to see the light of day. It is a nice idea (and probably a convenient interpretation of the fact that actually no-one ever actually came up with a free energy machine because it is impossible…). It is reassuring to think that what Richard Heinberg calls ‘the magic elixir’ is out there somewhere, almost ready to go into production. We can all keep driving, business as usual will continue forever.
Read more»
8 Nov 2005
The question of whether or not the UK could ever be self sufficient in food is obviously a question of great importance to the work of designing energy descent strategies. The subject was touched upon in a recent series of pieces on BBC Radio 4’s Farming Today programme, for the week from Mon 31st – Friday 4th November. You can still hear it at Radio 4s Listen Again section.
What was particularly interesting
Read more»
