tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-195086992024-03-18T03:03:59.731+00:00Energy BalanceProfessor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.comBlogger700125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-46376013041006733212024-02-04T13:36:00.010+00:002024-02-16T12:02:08.560+00:00"Trees - Protectors Against a Changing Climate." Lecture at Braziers Park College, Sunday 25th February, 10 am.I am giving a lecture entitled, "Trees - Protectors Against a Changing Climate", at <a href="https://www.braziers.org.uk/trees-talk/">Braziers Park College</a>, on Sunday February 25th, at 10 am. <br /><br />There are estimated to be about 3 trillion trees on Earth, or about half the number that existed before the dawn of human civilization. Trees are vital to at least four major components of the Earth System, namely, the carbon, water, nitrogen and oxygen cycles. <br /><br />In addition to absorbing carbon, and releasing oxygen through photosynthesis, trees are critical for maintaining biodiversity, providing habitat for 80% of land based species, feeding and building the soil, generating clouds and increasing albedo (thus causing global cooling), influencing rainfall and weather patterns. <br /><br />The loss of trees, therefore, weakens our chances of reaching climate and biodiversity targets, and so proforestation and other practices to preserve and restore the forests must be adopted as a matter of urgency.<div><br /><p></p>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL-gIJQGJ-rs2eVXcfUcTAt-Edl5iRsIw9kxOpvGPcMESUV4F8bS1r-_o2KQ2V9xl2UlJ7nH1q16vTYmxKnXtOg-NO8iEpGIJZpIgrb4f2gL3j5qHkYuvoK1U7E2-aIcaxtHB3X1EqO8dsS9PNwhBAsJTRp3o9XXMAj7AWccLpfAnISIeKDZ4-/s1024/image.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1024" height="375" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL-gIJQGJ-rs2eVXcfUcTAt-Edl5iRsIw9kxOpvGPcMESUV4F8bS1r-_o2KQ2V9xl2UlJ7nH1q16vTYmxKnXtOg-NO8iEpGIJZpIgrb4f2gL3j5qHkYuvoK1U7E2-aIcaxtHB3X1EqO8dsS9PNwhBAsJTRp3o9XXMAj7AWccLpfAnISIeKDZ4-/w500-h375/image.png" width="500" /></a><br /></div><div> The loss of trees weakens our chances of reaching climate and biodiversity targets.</div><div><br /><br /><a href="https://form.jotform.com/240104044353340">Book your free tickets and optional food here</a> <br /><br />In this Sunday Morning lecture which is part of our winter wider community weekend, Professor Chris Rhodes will remind us how vital trees are for our Earth’s processes and the critical part they play in maintaining biodiversity, providing habitat for 80% of land-based biodiversity, feeding the soil, generating clouds, influencing rainfall and weather patterns.<br /><br /><br /><b>The Speaker.</b><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5kcGtr0vsn9DaXQIslGAAcJT7Hh7kPNLAPhZUnUzvaagsVlCyHSxDtYVWqrXSEfKnlpCJe9UrkWSwYtBt7Ol_jZoZwHKAIrW3ipHfYhKYNBojhVQtWE7CLAhBdQMGEwhGdEjU7cy-epRDv793kQeLrvgZIjFkOHsXB8lW-yA_WFUITYJ9Wp4S/s586/image.png"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5kcGtr0vsn9DaXQIslGAAcJT7Hh7kPNLAPhZUnUzvaagsVlCyHSxDtYVWqrXSEfKnlpCJe9UrkWSwYtBt7Ol_jZoZwHKAIrW3ipHfYhKYNBojhVQtWE7CLAhBdQMGEwhGdEjU7cy-epRDv793kQeLrvgZIjFkOHsXB8lW-yA_WFUITYJ9Wp4S/s320/image.png" /></a><br /><br />Professor Chris Rhodes is a director of the independent consultancy, Fresh-lands Environmental Actions and has advised on low-carbon energy for the European Commission and the governments of many nations. He is the Corresponding Author of the <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00368504211056290">“World Scientists’ Warnings into Action, Local to Global"</a>, framework paper, published during the COP26 climate change conference; to date, this has been signed by over 3,000 scientists from 110+ nations around the world. He is a Board Member of Scientists Warning Europe, and Chair of Transition Town Reading. He has published over 250 peer reviewed academic papers, which have received 20,000+ citations, and is also author of the black comedy novel ‘<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/University-Shambles-Christopher-James-Rhodes/dp/1906561397">University Shambles</a>’, and an award-winning children’s picture book, ‘<a href="https://www.waterstones.com/book/hippy-the-happy-hippopotamus/christopher-james-rhodes/jeanette-cole/9781908186003">Hippy the Happy Hippopotamus</a>’.</div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><br /></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-38907303587665101502024-01-27T15:22:00.010+00:002024-03-12T14:51:25.625+00:00"Six Inches of Soil." Film Screening at the Reading Biscuit Factory, Monday April 15th (2024), 6 pm.<p><b style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">SOLD OUT!</span><br /><br /></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.sixinchesofsoil.org/">"Despite all our accomplishments, we owe our existence to a six-inch layer of topsoil, and the fact that it rains."</a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://ual-media-res.cloudinary.com/image/fetch/c_fill,f_auto,g_auto,q_auto/w_auto:breakpoints/https://www.arts.ac.uk/__data/assets/image/0024/422178/SIOS-QUAD-Poster_digital.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="800" height="370" src="https://ual-media-res.cloudinary.com/image/fetch/c_fill,f_auto,g_auto,q_auto/w_auto:breakpoints/https://www.arts.ac.uk/__data/assets/image/0024/422178/SIOS-QUAD-Poster_digital.png" width="493" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;">This is a film screening (+ post-film Q&A), arranged with Transition Town Reading, to be held at the independent cinema, "Reading Biscuit Factory," at 6 pm on Monday, April 15th (2024), <span style="text-align: left;">1 Queens Walk, Reading RG1 7QE</span>.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/movie/six-inches-of-soil">Here is the booking link</a> (or just turn up on the door). </p><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><div class="info-section q-py-lg q-px-lg col-6 col-lg-7" data-v-14a8983e=""><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><div class="text-dark" data-v-390ab63a=""><b>The Film.</b><br /><br />Six
Inches of Soil tells
the inspiring story of young British farmers standing up against the
industrial food system and transforming the way they produce food - to
heal the soil, our health and provide for local communities. </div><div class="text-dark" data-v-390ab63a=""><br /></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-390ab63a="">The aims of
the film are to sound the alarm on a broken system, but to also give
hope that there is a way to fix it; to inspire farmers to adopt
agroecological and regenerative farming practices; and to encourage
consumers, food corporations and policymakers to support their efforts.<br /><br />Half
the food we eat in the UK is produced by about 180,000 farmers, who
manage 70% of our land. Current “industrial” mainstream farming
practices significantly contribute to soil degradation, biodiversity
loss and climate change. Regenerative farming practices, (within an
agroecological system) promote healthier soils, provide healthier,
affordable food, restore biodiversity and sequester carbon. <br /><br />Six
Inches of Soil is a story of three new farmers on the first year of
their regenerative journey to heal the soil and help transform the food
system - Anna Jackson, a Lincolnshire 11th generation arable and sheep
farmer; Adrienne Gordon, a Cambridgeshire small-scale vegetable farmer;
and Ben Thomas, who rears pasture fed beef cattle in Cornwall. <br /><br />As
the trio of young farmers strive to adopt regenerative practices and
create viable businesses, they meet seasoned mentors - John Pawsey in
Suffolk, Nic Renison in Cumbria and Marina O’Connell in Devon - who help
them on their journey. <br /><br />They are joined by other experts - Henry
Dimbleby, Ian Wilkinson, Mike Berners-Lee, Vicki Hird, Dee Woods, Tim
Lang, Hannah Jones, Satish Kumar, Nicole Masters, Tom Pearson -
providing wisdom and solutions from a growing movement of people who are
dedicated to changing the trajectory for food, farming and the planet.<br /><br />The
96 minute film, with its original music score and beautiful animation,
was completed at the end of 2023, and was launched at the Oxford Real
Farming Conference on 4th January 2024. It was also shown at COP 28 in
December 2023 through EIT Food Systems.<br /><br /><br /><b>Post-film Q&A panel:</b><br /><br />Professor Chris Rhodes, Director of Fresh-lands Environmental Actions, and Chair of Transition Town Reading.<br /><br />Kath Burton, Incredible Edible Reading.<br /><br />Dr Sarah Duddigan, Lecturer in Environmental Science, University of Reading.<br /><br />Dr Frida Mariana, Soil Food Web Analyst at Soil Bio Analysis and R&D scientist at Soil Ecology Lab.</div></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><br /><br /><b>Evening Programme:</b><br /></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><br /></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e="">6.00 pm - 7.35 pm, film screening.</div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><br /></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e="">7.35 pm - 7.50 pm, break.</div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><br /></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e="">7.50 pm - 8.20 pm, Q&A panel.</div></div></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-21965453462070426282023-12-17T08:33:00.007+00:002023-12-18T10:23:31.012+00:00The human behavioural crisis: A critical intervention point for ecological overshoot.<p> The SAGE perspectives blog have also published this (<a href="https://perspectivesblog.sagepub.com/blog/research/the-human-behavioural-crisis-a-critical-intervention-point-for-ecological-overshoot">"Editor's pick"</a>), about our Human Behavioural Crisis
paper.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“If psycho-behavioural change is given precedence
over purely physical interventions, many anthropogenic pressures on Earth may
be alleviated systemically.”</span></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-outline-level: 3;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 13.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Ecological Overshoot<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In a year beset by record high air and ocean
temperatures, wildfires and floods, and manifest across the globe, the reality
of climate change is undeniable. However, dangerous climate change is but one
of many interconnected symptoms of human ecological overshoot, along with relentless
degradation of the natural environment, loss of biodiversity, and a host of
social, economic and political trends.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Defining overshoot as, “<i>the human consumption of
natural resources at rates faster than they can be replenished, and entropic
waste production in excess of the Earth's assimilative and processing capacity</i>”,<i>
</i>begs the question of what is it that drives humans to act in such a
blatantly calamitous way?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This topic is explored more deeply in our recent
paper, “<i>World Scientists’ Warning: The Behavioural Crisis Driving Ecological
Overshoot,</i>”<b> </b>which concludes that the root cause of overshoot is
maladaptive human behaviour, framed as “the Human Behavioural Crisis” (HBC). We
argue that this may provide a critical intervention point for change, in contrast
to most current strategies, which are largely resource intensive, slow-moving
and focused on addressing the symptoms of ecological overshoot (such as climate
change) rather than the root causes (maladaptive behaviours, including those
that lead to excessive consumption and an eight-billion human
population). <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We conclude that, even in the most optimistic
scenarios, symptom-level (“downstream”) interventions are unlikely to avoid
catastrophe or achieve more than ephemeral progress. Rather, interventions are
needed at the precursory “upstream” stage to ameliorate and reverse overshoot.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Together with our colleagues, we consider how the
behavioural crisis plays out through mindsets which, at least in the western
world, drive our excessive human numbers and appetites. The global
economy, enabled by clever marketing and pronatalist narratives, manipulates
previously adaptive behaviours which are now, collectively, bringing humanity
and millions of other species to the brink of an abyss. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We propose a systemic interdisciplinary emergency
response to this crisis of human greed, acquisition of resources, wastefulness
and an exploitative economy by, inter alia, reconfiguring societal attitudes
relating to consumption, reproduction and waste production. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Indeed, could those same behavioural science
mechanisms that drive our current journey to destruction be adapted to begin
putting things into reverse, aiming to attain a more eco-harmonious state of
“one planet living”?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Decarbonisation of the global energy system is
often presented as <i>the</i> problem humankind must solve. But the
installation of sufficient renewables to substitute for the 82% of our primary
energy currently provided by fossil fuels (to achieve “net zero” by 2050 or
even 2030) would require huge quantities of both raw materials and fossil
fuels. Even if this could be pulled off, it would improve just one symptom
of ecological overshoot, climate change, likely worsening others significantly
in the process.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Since it is humankind's access to cheap, abundant energy
that has enabled us to exceed or threaten many planetary boundaries, simply
substituting one form of energy for another without addressing our consumption
and waste of it doesn’t solve our overall predicament. As environmental
journalist Hart Hagan observes wryly:<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“A species causing the extinction of 150 species
per day doesn’t need more energy to do more of what it does.”</span></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"> <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-outline-level: 3;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 13.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Specific behavioural
interventions<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">By reframing our multiple existential crises, we
may advance from merely treating symptoms to healing the core cultural malady.
If behavioural change is prioritised over purely physical interventions, many
anthropogenic pressures on Earth may be alleviated systemically and
simultaneously. Thus, the current 100 billion tonnes per annum of natural resources
required to maintain ‘the human enterprise’ could be substantially
reduced. And a focus on lighter lifestyles in the Global North,
especially, would reduce our demand for massive amounts of “new” materials
needed to try and substitute fossil fuels with renewable energy.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Paradoxically, the marketing, media and
entertainment industries, all complicit in exacerbating the behavioural crisis,
may just be our best chance at avoiding ecological catastrophe.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The stories we tell shape appetites and norms. Typically,
when we try to address maladaptive behaviours, we usually focus on raising
awareness and education, under the arguable assumption that this leads to the
desired behaviours. But while awareness and education certainly have important
roles to play in combating ecological overshoot, they are relatively
ineffective at driving behavioural change. Can the same mechanisms that
fuelled our immense consumption bring it back within planetary limits?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-outline-level: 3;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 13.5pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Directing and policing widespread
behaviour manipulation<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Like the manipulation of human impulses to buy more
and more goods that we don’t need, behaviour has been intentionally manipulated
for other nefarious purposes. Eco-centric behaviour is at the heart of any
sustainable future humanity might wish to achieve. We are now at a crossroads,
with three possible paths ahead:<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<ul type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We
can continue letting private corporations, nations and others manipulate
our behaviours for either financial or political profit,<o:p></o:p></span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We
can ignore the problem and leave our future and planet to chance, or<o:p></o:p></span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We
can use the opportunity to consciously steer our collective behaviours to
conform to the natural ecological laws that bind all life on Earth. This
is, in the case of human fertility, already happening in most countries.<o:p></o:p></span></li>
</ul>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This raises deep ethical questions: for example,
who should wield such power to reverse the exploitation of human impulse for
private profit or political gain? At present, the mechanisms for behaviour
change are in the hands of anyone with the necessary influence or financial
means to exploit them. However, large-scale social change should happen
organically, and messaging to reverse the damage of the past century should be
firmly bound by, and anchored within a framework built upon the Earth’s natural
planetary boundaries, the science of limits to growth, and a social and/or
spiritual need to reconnect to Nature as a life-support system, rather than an
arena for commodification, exploitation, competition and dominance.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We urgently call for increased interdisciplinary
work to be carried out in directing, understanding and tracking widespread
behaviour manipulation. A practical start on this is being made at the Merz
Institute and its <a href="https://merzinstitute.org/overshoot-behaviour-lab/">Overshoot
Behaviour Lab</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00368504231201372?utm_campaign=auth_awa_awab_sci&utm_medium=banner&utm_source=perspectivesblog.sagepub.com">read
the article </a><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Article Details<br />
</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">World
scientists’ warning: The behavioural crisis driving ecological overshoot<br />
Joseph J Merz, Phoebe Barnard, William E Rees, Dane Smith, Mat Maroni,
Christopher J Rhodes, Julia H Dederer, Nandita Bajaj, Michael K Joy, Thomas
Wiedmann, Rory Sutherland<br />
First Published September 20, 2023 Review Article<br />
DOI: 10.1177/00368504231201372<br />
<a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/home/SCI"><b><i>Science Progress</i></b></a><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">About the Authors</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Christopher J Rhodes</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"> (DPhil, DSc) became a full
professor in physical chemistry in his early 30s, and has published over 250
peer reviewed academic papers and an extensive online collection of essays and
journalism. He is currently Director of the consultancy, Fresh-lands
Environmental Actions, and a Board member of Scientists Warning Europe. He has
advised on low-carbon energy for the European Commission. Chris holds
Fellowships of the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Linnean Society of London,
and the Royal Society of Arts. He is Chair of Transition Town Reading (U.K.).
He has also published a novel, a collection of poetry and a series of
children's picture books.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Phoebe Barnard</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"> (PhD) is professor of environmental and societal
futures and global change science at University of Washington, climate
vulnerability research associate at University of Cape Town, founding CEO of
the global Stable Planet Alliance, and cofounder of the Global Restoration
Collaborative, a young process to drive and reframe our economy and
civilization to regenerative alternatives. Working for decades in post-independence
Africa at countries’ transition to democratic rule, she brings the “What is, to
what if?” frames that they considered at their historical crossroads to the
challenges now faced by humanity as a whole.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Joseph J Merz</span></b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"> is the Co-founder of a number of organisations. He
is the Founder and Chairman of the Merz Institute - a research institute
largely focused on addressing ecological overshoot at a behavioural level.
Joseph serves on the Executive Committee of the Stable Planet Alliance, and is
also a Senior Fellow of the Global Evergreening Alliance.<o:p></o:p></span></p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-46751553308019769852023-12-16T08:22:00.004+00:002023-12-16T08:40:07.641+00:00COP28 Leaves the Highway to Climate Hell Wide Open.<p>Great to appear in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/dec/15/cop28-leaves-the-highway-to-climate-hell-wide-open">a lineup of Letters to the Editor, in The Guardian</a> with Rupert Read, Durwood Zaelke & Maxime Beaugrand (ours is the third one down). <br /><br />"Readers reflect on the failures of the Dubai climate summit and suggest what needs to be done to avert a climate catastrophe."</p><p>Here is the text of our Letter:<br /><br /> "Oliver Milman stresses the dangers of relying on “magical” technologies (<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/dec/10/climate-experts-warn-against-focus-technological-solutions-cop28">‘Magical’ tech innovations a distraction from real solutions, climate experts warn, 10 December</a>). But since humankind’s access to cheap, abundant energy has allowed us to threaten many planetary boundaries, simply substituting one form of energy for another won’t fix our predicament.<br /><br />The root cause of climate change lies in ecological overshoot and the behaviours and systems that enable it. We must fix these. We now burn more fossil fuels than ever. And many interventions are resource-intensive, slow and founded in a flawed business-as-usual mindset.<br /><br />The marketing, media and entertainment industries have manipulated human behaviours towards the wasteful hyperconsumption of natural resources. But as time is so tight, we propose the same methods be employed to reverse our acquisitiveness, to operate within the Earth’s limits and avoid ecological collapse.<br /><br />Economic and political power structures and vested interests form the interlocking layers of our crises. One of our grand challenges is to recast such forces to reverse the damage done. We call for a concerted effort to identify ways to best attain a rapid global embrace of new norms for consumption, reproduction and waste."</p><p><br />Prof Christopher J Rhodes<br />Fresh-lands Environmental Actions, Reading, Berkshire</p><p><br />Prof Phoebe Barnard<br />Mount Vernon, Washington, US</p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-11897125869255308602023-11-30T16:54:00.015+00:002023-12-03T08:47:18.214+00:00What can we expect from COP28?COP28 - more fully, the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference or Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC - is the 28th <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Climate_Change_conference">United Nations Climate Change conference</a>, and will run from 30 November to 12 December 2023, at the Expo City, in Dubai. Such conferences have been annual events (with the exception of 2020, due to the Covid pandemic), <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Climate_Change_conference">beginning with the first, COP1, held in Berlin, in 1995.</a><div><br />The choice of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to host the 2023 conference is controversial, due to the nation’s track record, and <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-67513901">projected expansion</a> in its production of fossil fuels. Moreover, COP28’s president is Sultan Al Jaber, head of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Dhabi_National_Oil_Company">ADNOC</a>), who has been responsible for a marked enlargement of oil and gas production, during a period in which these industries are being urged to curb their recovery of hydrocarbons, in order to combat climate change. A <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-67508331">BBC report</a> has referred to "leaked briefing documents" which showed that the UAE intended to use COP28 to target foreign governments with oil and gas deals. However, Sultan Al Jaber has <a href="https://subscriber.politicopro.com/article/eenews/2023/11/29/cop28-leader-forcefully-denies-report-uae-wanted-to-seek-oil-deals-00129060">vehemently denied this</a>.<br /><br />On November 27, from an investigation by the Centre for Climate Reporting and Channel 4 News, it was reported that, over the border, Saudi Arabia is now promoting a global development plan to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/27/revealed-saudi-arabia-plan-poor-countries-oil">"hook" poor countries on oil</a>, increasing the use of fossil fuel-powered cars, buses and planes in Africa and elsewhere, as rich countries increasingly switch to clean energy. Mohamed Adow, the director of the think-tank Power Shift Africa, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/27/revealed-saudi-arabia-plan-poor-countries-oil">said</a>: “The Saudi government is like a drug dealer trying to get Africa hooked on its harmful product", and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/27/revealed-saudi-arabia-plan-poor-countries-oil">further commented</a> that: “Africa cannot catch up with the rest of the world by trudging along in
the footsteps of the polluting nations. It would mean we miss out on the
benefits of modern energy solutions that Africa can take advantage of due to its massive renewable energy
potential. We have the latecomer advantage, which means we can leapfrog
to a genuine energy transition.”</div><div><br />Sultan Al Jaber is also chairman and a founder of the renewable energy company <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masdar">Masdar</a>. In addition, he leads the UAE's climate envoy, and serves as their minister for industry and advanced technology. An <a href="https://www.politico.eu/article/sultan-al-aber-united-nations-cop28-chief-under-fire-for-oil-ties-from-eu-and-us-lawmakers/">open letter</a> from over 130 US lawmakers and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Members_of_the_European_Parliament">Members of the European Parliament</a>, called for the removal of Al Jaber as the president-designate of COP28, and expressed reservations over how the private sector polluters were exercising "undue influence" over the climate summit’s process. <br /><br />Amnesty International has voiced its dissatisfaction, stating that, <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/02/climate-uae-state-oil-companys-expansion-plans-prove-its-chief-executive-is-unfit-to-lead-cop28-climate-talks/">"Sultan al-Jaber cannot be an honest broker for climate talks when the company he leads is planning to cause more climate damage.” </a><br /><br />As a result of its combination of high temperatures and humidity, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_United_Nations_Climate_Change_Conference">UAE is especially susceptible</a> to the effects of global heating and climate change. In the years 1990-2022, the observed annual average mean surface air temperature in the UAE rose by 1.27°C (2.29°F). Should greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase, by 2070, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wet-bulb_temperature">wet-bulb temperatures</a> in the region are expected to exceed 35°C (95°F) <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_United_Nations_Climate_Change_Conference">for prolonged periods</a>. [A wet-bulb temperature of 35°C is the threshold at which the human body is unable to keep itself cool by sweating and, if sustained is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wet-bulb_temperature#Wet-bulb_temperature_and_health">likely to be fatal</a>, even to fit and healthy people]. Thus, if people anywhere should be concerned about climate change, it is there. <br /><br />Indeed, the greatest number of heat-humidity extreme events in the world occur in the Red Sea and Persian Gulf regions, and on several occasions, these have <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/sciadv.adg9297">broken above the safe wet-bulb temperature threshold</a>. Other climate change-driven phenomena in this area are dust storms, drought and sea level rise. The UAE has pledged to reduce carbon emissions to net zero by 2050, and was also the first Middle Eastern country to sign the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris_Agreement">Paris Agreement</a> on 21 September 2016. <br /><br />The need for international cooperation as a successful climate action has been emphasised, and while the head of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Energy_Agency">International Energy Agency</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatih_Birol">Fatih Birol</a>, expressed optimism that COP28 will bring significant results, he noted that the geopolitical situation, with many nations at loggerheads over the war in Ukraine, and still frosty relations between the US and China, would make for a difficult summit. He <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/sep/26/staggering-green-growth-gives-hope-for-15c-says-global-energy-head">said</a>, "The most important challenge [to limiting temperature rises to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels] is the lack of international cooperation.” A lack of global solidarity has been <a href="https://wam.ae/article/12k6bq3-global-solidarity-gap-hinders-climate-change">proposed</a> by the Bangladeshi climate envoy as being the main obstacle to averting climate change, and has stressed the need to create a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loss_and_damage">loss and damage</a> fund. Disquiet has also been expressed that, in addition to the war in Ukraine, the 2023 Israel-Hamas war may <a href="https://www.eenews.net/articles/war-in-the-middle-east-jeopardizes-climate-talks/">adversely affect</a> negotiations at COP28. <br /><br />At a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_United_Nations_Climate_Change_Conference">pre-COP meeting</a>, held at the end of November 2023, attended by 100 delegations and 70 ministers (more than at any previous pre-COP meeting), the COP general director, Majid al-Suwaidi, insisted that COP28 would deliver the promised “loss and damage” outcomes from last year's <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_United_Nations_Climate_Change_Conference">COP27</a>. <br /><br />In advance of the conference, Pope <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_(Pope)">Francis</a> issued the apostolic exhortation, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laudate_Deum">Laudate Deum</a> - a follow on from his 2015 encyclical <a href="https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html">Laudato Si</a> - in which he urged that immediate action be taken against the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_crisis">climate crisis</a> and condemned those who would deny the existence of climate change. <br /><br />COP28 is the first COP to raise discussion about the public health impacts of climate change. Organisations representing <a href="https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/pune/cop28-health-professionals-call-pledge-phase-out-fossil-fuels-9010096/">46 million health professionals</a> have written to Sultan Al Jaber, calling for a total phase-out of fossil fuels. The <a href="https://www.who.int/news/item/18-09-2023-leaders-spotlight-the-critical-intersection-between-health-and-climate-ahead-of-cop-s-first-ever-health-day">World Health Organisation</a> has exhorted ministers of health to make “health” a force for propelling climate action, via climate-friendly healthcare systems, and called for climate finance as a means to afford protection to human well-being both now and in the future. <br /><br /></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-78975031697181591192023-10-21T10:58:00.005+01:002023-10-23T10:33:18.701+01:00Transition Towns and Local Food Growing.<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://img.evbuc.com/https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.evbuc.com%2Fimages%2F528043029%2F209580524613%2F1%2Foriginal.20230602-180431?h=230&w=460&auto=format%2Ccompress&q=75&sharp=10&rect=0%2C0%2C1000%2C500&s=ce5d957168baf3ab3637e6b85adc6886" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="230" data-original-width="460" height="257" src="https://img.evbuc.com/https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.evbuc.com%2Fimages%2F528043029%2F209580524613%2F1%2Foriginal.20230602-180431?h=230&w=460&auto=format%2Ccompress&q=75&sharp=10&rect=0%2C0%2C1000%2C500&s=ce5d957168baf3ab3637e6b85adc6886" width="513" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.canva.com/design/DAFwriaEp-c/tgB93jYFtKnpe88TE2sEEA/watch">Interview of Chris Rhodes</a> (Chair of Transition Town Reading), by Kath Burton for Incredible Edible Reading.</div><br />KB: "So, tell us about yourself and Transition Town Reading." <br /><br />CR: "I’m Chris Rhodes, I used to be a university professor in Physical Chemistry. And about, almost 20 years ago now, I got involved with energy, and I became very interested in the origins of crude oil, because there are different theories about it. <br /><br />Anyway, in my researches into this particular topic, I came across the concept of "peak oil", which doesn’t mean that we’re going to run out of oil any time soon, but we probably won’t be able to maintain the current level of consumption, because we’ve got through a lot of the easy-to-get stuff, and that made me think, well actually, if there is an issue over the oil supply, then because we get practically all our transportation from oil, at the moment, then that means we are going to have to do more of what we do at the more local level. <br /><br />Then, sort of thinking around this, I came across Transition Towns, and then I looked a bit further and discovered there is a Transition Town Reading, and I contacted them – that must have been about 12 or so years ago – anyway, I joined the group and I’ve been Chair of Transition Town Reading for about the last 10 years." <br /><br />KB: "What’s the link between Transition Town Reading and Incredible Edible Reading?" <br /><br />CR: "Well, I think I’m a sort of nominal member of RFGN [Reading Food Growing Network], actually: I’ve been along to some of the AGMs, and helped out with the seed swap. I often help cart the seeds over to various places, with my wife actually. But, the more direct connection to Reading Incredible Edible is that the Transition Network, which is sort of like Transition Towns’ HQ, actually released some funding, called the Bounce Forward Grant, for things... projects that are really in keeping with Transition core principles, like relocalisation, local food growing, so RFGN and TTR, and I think Food4Families were involved, and we put an application in, and it was funded, and so that is being used to unfold food growing activities – community food growing activities – across Reading." <br /><br />KB: "If you had a magic wand, what opportunities for realising a town connected by food and food-growing initiatives, would you bring to life?" <br /><br />CR: "A good question. There is an awful lot of spare ground, if you like, in Reading, and lots of other places, and a lot of it actually costs the local authority money to look after it. What about, if I wave my magic wand and that [land] can be released, and even people encouraged to grow food on it? Or to create oases for pollinators, and all this kind of thing?<br /><br />But, I’m reminded of Kilburn tube station, in London... I mean, ok, it’s above ground, but some years ago, they started planting vegetables there, and they’re free for anybody to take home and eat, and it’s grown into a real kind of community enterprise. <br /><br />And, I would like to see that happening, across Reading, all these plots of vegetables, maybe a few flowers, and so on, here and there. I mean, there is some guerrilla gardening going on, down by Reading Bridge, for example, and by the station, but I’d like to see a lot more of that, because it’s a great way of, ok, providing food... marvellous, especially given the current cost of everything, but it brings people together; it helps build community, and I think that’s so important, and I think it’s going to become even more important, as times change, you know, as we try and adapt to a world that is shifting in all sorts of respects. <br /><br />And the other thing I would do, if people wanted actual allotments, well, I wave my magic wand, and there’s less bureaucracy attendant to getting an allotment, so that somebody can get one, say, within three months, because sometimes people are on waiting lists for, oh, years, in some cases. So, I’d get rid of that, and try and actively encourage food growing activities across the town."Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-10644386492779833672023-10-07T09:09:00.007+01:002023-10-13T15:54:17.095+01:00The Behavioural Crisis Driving Ecological Overshoot.I am a co-author on this <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00368504231201372">new "World Scientists' Warning" paper.</a> <br /><br /><i>“If psycho-behavioural change is given precedence over purely physical interventions, many anthropogenic pressures on Earth may be alleviated systemically.”</i><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh-nrRLdsp7GN-oMxQi465uf8gSteXigMYZ53PB0ZiyDW9DfjtJPn79hRrYDjfE9BYol6o02an1-v3kLuCRoWde1eGN0sTrk1KmLLMXVYLsaDKy6F9ZoNqgstRyw-2_ay1Y0DIwZs2fLyF0PaST0BYfLNEIovqeKlxQ5Oc3OzJbpSGDRlRBOIgy"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh-nrRLdsp7GN-oMxQi465uf8gSteXigMYZ53PB0ZiyDW9DfjtJPn79hRrYDjfE9BYol6o02an1-v3kLuCRoWde1eGN0sTrk1KmLLMXVYLsaDKy6F9ZoNqgstRyw-2_ay1Y0DIwZs2fLyF0PaST0BYfLNEIovqeKlxQ5Oc3OzJbpSGDRlRBOIgy=w428-h321" /></a><br /><br /> <br /><br /><b>Ecological Overshoot. </b><br /><br />In a year beset by <a href="https://climatereanalyzer.org/clim/t2_daily/?dm_id=world">record high air and ocean temperatures</a>, wildfires and floods, and manifest across the globe, the reality of climate change is undeniable. However, this is but one of many interconnected symptoms of <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2022-11-07/architects-of-our-future-energy-and-the-changing-climate/">human ecological overshoot</a>, along with relentless degradation of the natural environment and loss of biodiversity. <br /><br />In defining overshoot as, “the human consumption of natural resources at rates faster than they can be replenished, and entropic waste production in excess of the Earth's assimilative and processing capacity”, the question is begged of what is it that drives humans to behave in such a blatantly calamitous way? <br /><br />This topic has been explored more deeply in our recent paper, <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00368504231201372">“</a><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00368504231201372">World Scientists’ Warning: The Behavioural Crisis Driving Ecological Overshoot.”</a>, which concludes that the root cause of overshoot is maladaptive human behaviour, named and framed as “the Human Behavioural Crisis” (HBC). It is furthermore proposed that this may provide a critical point where intervention can be made, in contrast to most current strategies, which are largely physical, resource intensive, slow-moving and focused on addressing the symptoms of ecological overshoot (such as climate change) rather than the root cause (maladaptive behaviours). We conclude that, even in the most optimistic scenarios, symptom-level (“downstream”) interventions are unlikely to avoid catastrophe or achieve more than ephemeral progress. Rather, it is at the precursory “upstream” stage where overshoot might best be intercepted and ameliorated. <br /><br />Three primary drivers of the behavioural crisis are considered: economic growth; marketing; and pronatalism, which haul the three “levers” of overshoot: consumption, waste and population. These have been activated and perpetuated by the intentional exploitation of previously adaptive human impulses, with advertising as a major factor. We propose an interdisciplinary (“systemic”) emergency response to the behavioural crisis by, inter alia, reconfiguring societal attitudes relating to reproduction, consumption and waste production. Indeed, could those same advertising mechanisms that are driving our current journey to destruction be adapted to begin putting things into reverse, aiming to attain an eco-harmonious state of “one planet living”. <br /><br />While decarbonisation of the global energy system is often presented as the problem humankind must solve, the installation of sufficient renewables to substitute for the 82% of our primary energy that currently is provided by fossil fuels (to achieve “net zero” by 2050, or even 2030) would require huge quantities both of raw materials and indeed fossil fuels themselves. Even if this could be pulled off, just one (albeit considerable) symptom of ecological overshoot would be addressed, likely worsening others significantly in the process. Since it is humankind's access to cheap, abundant energy that has allowed, even urged, us to exceed or threaten many planetary boundaries, simply substituting one form of energy for another, would not resolve our overall predicament. As the Environmental journalist, Hart Hagan, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9W1HX2qh51U">has observed wryly</a>: <br /><br /><i>“A species causing the extinction of 150 species per day doesn’t need more energy to do more of what it does.” </i><br /><br /><br /><b>Specific behavioural interventions. </b><br /><br />Alternatively, by reframing the issue in terms of HBC, we may advance from merely treating symptoms to healing the core cultural malady. If psycho-behavioural change is given precedence over purely physical interventions, many anthropogenic pressures on Earth may be alleviated systemically. Thus, the current <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00368504231201372">100 billion tonnes per annum</a> of natural resources required to maintain the human enterprise could be substantially reduced, and indeed the massive amounts of “new” materials that would be needed to try and substitute the fossil fuels by renewable energy, if that total energy demand target is brought down. <br /><br />In an apparent paradox, the marketing, media and entertainment industries, all currently complicit in the creation and exacerbation of the behavioural crisis, may just be our best chance at avoiding ecological catastrophe. The stories we tell shape appetites and norms. Typically, when it comes to addressing maladaptive behaviours in the current paradigm, there appears to be a focus on raising awareness and education, under the arguable assumption that this will lead to the behavioural changes desired. However, while awareness and education certainly have important roles to play in combating ecological overshoot, they are relatively ineffective at driving behavioural change. Can the same behavioural mechanisms that steered and fuelled our immense appetites bring them back within the planetary limits to growth? <br /><br /><br /><b>Directing and policing widespread behaviour manipulation. </b><br /><br />Behavioural manipulation has been intentionally <a href="https://www.globalactionplan.org.uk/news/advertisingnot-your-friend-0">used for nefarious purposes before</a>, and has played a critical role in the creation of the behavioural crisis and consequential ecological overshoot. We are now at a crossroads, with three possible paths ahead: <br /><br />•We can choose to continue using behavioural manipulation to deepen our dilemma, <br /><br />•We can choose to ignore it and leave it to chance, or <br /><br />•We can use an opportunity that almost no other species has had, and consciously steer our collective behaviours to conform to the natural laws that bind all life on Earth. <br /><br />This raises ethical questions: for example, who should be allowed to wield such power? At present, it is in the hands of anyone with the necessary influence or financial means to exploit it. However, we should not entrust this to any individual human, company, government or industry. Instead, any continued use of widespread behavioural manipulation should be firmly bound by, and anchored within a framework built upon the laws of the natural world, as well as the science on limits to growth. <br /><br />We urgently call for increased interdisciplinary work to be carried out in directing, understanding and policing widespread behaviour manipulation. <br /><br /><br /><b>Conclusion. </b><br /><br />In summary, the evidence indicates that anthropogenic ecological overshoot stems from a crisis of maladaptive human behaviours. While the behaviours generating overshoot were once adaptive for H. sapiens, they have been distorted and extended to the point where they now threaten the fabric of complex life on Earth. Simply, we are trapped in a system built to encourage growth and appetites that will end us. <br /><br />The current emphasis toward “sustainability” is resource intensive (e.g. the global transition to renewable energy) and single-symptom focused. Indeed, most mainstream attention and investment is directed towards mitigating and adapting to climate change. Even if this narrow intervention is successful, it will not resolve the meta-crisis of ecological overshoot; in fact, given the resource-intensive nature of the technologies involved, it is likely to make matters worse. Psychological interventions are likely to prove far less resource-intensive and more effective than their physical counterparts. <br /><br />•We call for increased attention on the behavioural crisis as a critical intervention point for addressing overshoot and its myriad symptoms. <br /><br />•We advocate increased interdisciplinary collaboration between the social and behavioural science theorists and practitioners, as advised by scientists working on limits to growth and planetary boundaries. <br /><br />•We call for additional research to develop a full understanding of the many dimensions of the behavioural crisis (including the overwhelming influence of power structures) and how we can best address it. <br /><br />•We call for an emergency, concerted, multidisciplinary effort to target the populations and value levers most likely to produce rapid global adoption of new consumption, reproduction and waste norms congruent with the survival of complex life on Earth. <br /><br />•We call for increased interdisciplinary work to be carried out in directing, understanding and policing widespread behaviour manipulation. <br /><br />Time is running out, not only because the health of the natural systems upon which we are utterly dependent is deteriorating, but also because widescale interventions are only possible when a society holds together and is capable of coherent action. Of course, as the effects of overshoot worsen, the likelihood of societal breakdown increases. We still have an opportunity to be proactive and utilise the intact systems we have in place, to deliver a framework for shifting social norms and other necessities for addressing the behavioural crisis. <br /><br />However, the day may come when the breakdown of society will make intervention impossible, locking the planet into an unguided recovery that may salvage much of “nature” but be inhospitable to human life. <br /><br />We seek to highlight a critical disconnect that is an ongoing societal gulf in communication between those that know, such as scientists working within limits to growth, and those members of the citizenry, largely influenced by social scientists and industry, that must act in unison. <br /><br /><span style="line-height: 115%;">We urgently call for increased interdisciplinary work to be carried out in directing, understanding and tracking widespread behaviour manipulation. A practical start on this is being made at the Merz Institute and <a href="https://merzinstitute.org/overshoot-behaviour-lab/">Overshoot Behaviour Lab</a><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span></span>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-4484492998571857772023-08-28T16:20:00.010+01:002023-10-04T08:27:26.306+01:00"Growing out of Our Troubled Civilization." Film Screening + post-film Q&A. 6 pm, Tuesday, October 24th 2023, Reading Biscuit Factory (Reading, UK).<p style="text-align: center;"><b>You can either just turn up on the night and buy a ticket there, or <a href="https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/movie/enirvonmental-shorts-night">book tickets in advance</a>. </b></p><p style="text-align: center;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgKTlltO_b7RV1dSDATFq2YmCbq8bLokshctQT26v3jA50tGkZH70H6RmXBGmZyZvt8ISTTmXRS9nv007hcPXtU7uploK6pI2uhD_SqyysqVpYXhP2HcsUjvqF-s7Sm0g-7fgcR1FsanWSDqMrgCKdC8WuGqs7AhnVUZUcMVHnxACtnnfiTY5EX" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="405" data-original-width="810" height="259" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgKTlltO_b7RV1dSDATFq2YmCbq8bLokshctQT26v3jA50tGkZH70H6RmXBGmZyZvt8ISTTmXRS9nv007hcPXtU7uploK6pI2uhD_SqyysqVpYXhP2HcsUjvqF-s7Sm0g-7fgcR1FsanWSDqMrgCKdC8WuGqs7AhnVUZUcMVHnxACtnnfiTY5EX=w518-h259" width="518" /></a></div><br /><p style="text-align: center;">This is a film screening (+ post-film Q&A), arranged with Transition
Town Reading, to be held at the independent cinema, "Reading Biscuit
Factory," at 6 pm on October 24th (2023), <span style="text-align: left;">1 Queens Walk, Reading RG1 7QE</span>.</p><p style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/checkout/showing/enirvonmental-shorts-night/93192">Here is the booking link</a> (or
just turn up on the door). </p><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><div class="info-section q-py-lg q-px-lg col-6 col-lg-7" data-v-14a8983e=""><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><b>Overview.</b></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><b><br /></b></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e="">With a theme of "Growing out of Our Troubled Civilization", join Transition
Town Reading for three films, offering a realistic but practical
perspective on where we now are, and where we might go. This is part of
Reading International Festival, and includes a post-film Q&A.<br /><br />"The
Sequel" (1 hour) shines a light on the work and legacy of David
Fleming, a historian, economist, and ecologist with a deep understanding
of how we got into our current predicament, and a compelling vision of
how we can recover what we have lost as the market economy has worked
its way into every aspect of our lives.<br /><br />"Together We Grow" is a
40-minute documentary that tells the inspiring story of a thriving hub
helping to build resilience into its local community by growing, sewing,
repairing, sharing – you name it, Common Unity is doing it!<br /><br />"Earth Action Challenge" is a short (4-minute) film about a local eco-action event held at Reading's own Lavender Place Community Garden.</div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e=""><br /><br /><b>Panelists for post-film Q&A:</b><br /><br />Professor Chris Rhodes, Director of Fresh-lands Environmental Actions, and Chair of Transition Town Reading.<br /><br />Tracey Rawling Church, Co-chair of the Reading Climate Change Partnership.<br /><br />Natalie Ganpatsingh, Director of Nature Nurture.<br /><br /><br /><b>Evening Programme:</b><br /><br /></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-14a8983e="">The ordering of events is: 6.00 pm, "The Sequel"; 7.00 pm, short break;
7.10, "Together We Grow"; 7.50, "Earth in Action Challenge"; 8.00 pm,
Q&A panel. Finish about 8.25 pm. </div></div></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-58979139235176060352023-08-10T09:24:00.007+01:002023-09-15T08:31:50.567+01:00The Energy and Climate Conundrum.<p>I'm giving a Plenary Lecture at a conference next week, entitled: "The Energy and Climate Conundrum." A key focus is on energy demand reduction, in parallel with low-carbon energy generation.<br /><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEid3B3Ekic8QkNscZrsYsZYfhfk-fIGpnKt4LDhkhB5QfZAi6lUAlBK04JgVNd81rWfOmaABlhMGz666cBsJbV0-NJl5rQZarITB0MGndk7C2bn30TQIlhb9pqfuOAiRTkRX2H8DG5GDUpRIvfUL6QP5pFj_Nw-9cORg7j0ruABPn5KyFXBfHHn" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="509" height="548" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEid3B3Ekic8QkNscZrsYsZYfhfk-fIGpnKt4LDhkhB5QfZAi6lUAlBK04JgVNd81rWfOmaABlhMGz666cBsJbV0-NJl5rQZarITB0MGndk7C2bn30TQIlhb9pqfuOAiRTkRX2H8DG5GDUpRIvfUL6QP5pFj_Nw-9cORg7j0ruABPn5KyFXBfHHn=w388-h548" width="388" /></a></div><br /><br /><br />And this is the Abstract for the talk:<p></p><p><b><br /></b></p><div style="text-align: center;"><b>The Energy and Climate Conundrum.</b></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Christopher J. Rhodes*</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Fresh-lands Environmental Actions, Reading, UK.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">*Corresponding Author email: <a href="mailto:cjrhodes@fresh-lands.com">cjrhodes@fresh-lands.com</a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>ABSTRACT.</b></div><br />The global supply of oil is the lifeblood of current industrial civilization. 84% of the primary energy used by humans on Earth is from oil, coal and natural gas, whose combustion is causing global heating, which drives climate change. Hence, low carbon energy sources must be implemented rapidly and on a massive scale. However, this will necessitate the enhanced recovery of particular materials, including lithium, cobalt, graphite, rare earth elements and indeed copper, for a largely electrified energy system. Thus, it may be useful to choose/devise technologies that utilise Earth Abundant elements1, and e.g. to substitute aluminium for copper to build this on the necessary scale. <br /><br />However, decarbonising our energy sources, alone, will not solve the problem, because the human species is in ecological overshoot. Thus, reduction in our demand for energy, and for all resources is essential. Since it is the system of civilization that must be fixed, any means to accomplish this must also be systemic in nature, and bring about a consolidated amelioration of climate change, biodiversity loss, and relentless degradation of the ecosphere. A time-limited framework for this is set out in a recent “Scientists’ Warning” paper2, which underlines six principal focus areas: Energy, Atmospheric Pollutants, Nature, Food Systems, Population Stabilisation, and Economic Reforms. <br /><br /><b>Keywords:</b> Energy; Overshoot; Scientists’ Warnings;<div> <br /><b>References: </b><br /><br />(1) Rhodes, C.J. Endangered elements, critical raw materials and conflict minerals. Science Progress, 2019, Vol. 102(4) 304-350. <br /><br />(2) Barnard P. et al. World scientists’ warnings into action, local to global. Science Progress 2021, Vol. 104(4) 1–32. </div><div><br /><b>Biography:<br /><br /></b>Prof. Chris Rhodes is Director of the consultancy, Fresh-lands Environmental Actions, and a Board member of Scientists Warning Europe. He became a full professor in physical chemistry in his early 30s, and has published over 250 peer reviewed academic papers and an extensive online collection of essays and journalism. He has advised on low-carbon energy for the European Commission. Chris has given invited lectures at many international conferences and universities around the world, and at numerous popular science venues, e.g. Cafe Scientifique, along with radio and televised interviews. His novel “University Shambles,” a black comedy based on a disintegration of the U.K. university system, was nominated for a Brit Writers Award. Chris holds Fellowships of the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Linnean Society of London, and the Royal Society of Arts. He is Chair of Transition Town Reading (U.K.). He has also published a collection of poetry and a series of children’s picture books<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", "serif";">.</span><p></p>
</div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-70863178823301622022023-08-04T10:59:00.014+01:002023-08-05T13:13:24.665+01:00Passive Daytime Radiative Cooling.<p>The most effective form of renewable, low-carbon energy is energy not used at all. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_daytime_radiative_cooling">Passive daytime radiative cooling</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_daytime_radiative_cooling"> (PDRC)</a> is a method proposed to ameliorate global heating, by enhancing the radiation of heat to outer space using thermally-emissive surfaces placed around the Earth. There is no energy consumed in running this technology, and hence no associated greenhouse gas emissions. Since all natural materials absorb more heat during the day than at night, PDRC surfaces are designed with a high solar reflectance (to minimize heat gain) and strong thermal (heat) radiation transfer through the atmosphere's infrared window (in the region, 8–13 µm), so that temperatures are reduced during the daytime. PDRC offers the advantage over solar radiation management that it increases the emission of radiative heat, rather than merely reflecting solar radiation back into space before it is absorbed by the environment and heat thus generated from it.<a href="https://www.cell.com/joule/fulltext/S2542-4351(19)30354-X?"><br /></a><br />It has been estimated that if PDRC were installed over <a href="https://www.cell.com/joule/fulltext/S2542-4351(19)30354-X?">1–2% of the Earth's surface area</a>, a brake would be applied to relentless global heating, and temperature increases reined in to survivable levels. The cooling potentials are <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_daytime_radiative_cooling">greater</a> for desert and temperate regions than for tropical climates, since both humidity and cloud cover inhibit the efficiency of the devices. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_daytime_radiative_cooling">Cheap materials</a> have been developed for PDRC that can be mass produced, including coatings, thin films, aerogels, and metafabrics, to reduce the need for air conditioning, attenuate the urban heat island effect, and cool human bodies in conditions of extreme temperature. <br /><br /><a href="https://news.mit.edu/2019/system-provides-cooling-no-electricity-1030">Scientists at MIT</a> have invented a PDRC device that can cool things down by more than 13 degrees Celsius, and significantly below the ambient air temperature, in full sunlight on a cloudless day. The critical component for this device is a polyethylene foam insulating material called an aerogel. The foam is extremely lightweight (just 1/50th of the density of water), looks and feels somewhat like a marshmallow, and both blocks and reflects the visible rays of sunlight, thus preventing them from passing through it. It is also transparent to the infrared radiation wavelengths that transport heat, so they can escape and be radiated out and away. <br /><br />Hot objects cool down as a result of radiative heat loss, emitting midrange infrared radiation. Since air is effectively transparent to these wavelengths, the heat energy is lost into space. <br /><br />The basic concept was <a href="https://news.mit.edu/2019/system-provides-cooling-no-electricity-1030">demonstrated a year ago</a>, using a narrow strip of metal, as a physical barrier to shade the device from direct sunlight, and prevent it from heating up. However, its cooling power was less than one half that the new system, with its highly efficient insulating layer, without which the heat from the surrounding air raises the temperature of the device. <br /><br />The use of air conditioners and electric fans already accounts for about <a href="https://www.iea.org/news/air-conditioning-use-emerges-as-one-of-the-key-drivers-of-global-electricity-demand-growth">20% of the total electricity</a> consumed in buildings around the world, which amounts to around <a href="https://www.iea.org/news/air-conditioning-use-emerges-as-one-of-the-key-drivers-of-global-electricity-demand-growth">10% of current total global electricity consumption</a>. It is expected that demand for air conditioning will increase from the current 1.6 billion to 5.6 billion AC units by 2050, becoming one of the top drivers of global electricity demand, despite negative consequences in terms of increased energy use, costs, and global warming, described as a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0927024822002732">"vicious cycle.”</a><br /></p><p>This situation may nonetheless be mitigated, since PDRCs are most often applied to building envelopes, which can
significantly lower the temperatures within. When a reflective
white roof was combined with a PDRC, a <a href="https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2022/tc/d2tc00318j">doubling of the energy saved for cooling</a>
could be obtained. Elsewhere, it is quoted that PDRC coatings directly
covering a roof reflect a large proportion of solar radiation and
achieve a lower roof temperature, which can <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/eom2.12153">reduce cooling loads by 18%</a><a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1359431122004471">–</a><a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/eom2.12153">93%</a>. By covering 10% of a building's roof with a multilayer PDRC surface, some <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1364032120305529">35% of air conditioning</a> used during the hottest hours of the day can be avoided. Hence, PDRCs can act to replace, or reduce the energy demand of, air
conditioning, and also help to ease the pressure on energy grids during
periods of peak demand.<br /><br />It has been reported that, in suburban residential areas in the United States, PDRCs can result in a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1359431122004471">26%–46% reduction in energy use</a> and an average lowering of temperatures by 5.1 °C.<br /><br />With the addition of "cold storage to utilize the excess cooling energy of water generated during off-peak hours, the cooling effects for indoor air during the peak-cooling-load times can be significantly enhanced" and <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0378778821000335">air temperatures may be reduced by 6.6–12.7 °C</a>. <br /><br />As global temperatures increase, such PDRC cooling devices may find widespread applications, with the advantage that they use no energy, incur no greenhouse gas emissions, and hence do not add to the burden of global heating, unlike conventional refrigeration and air conditioning systems which need electricity to run them.<br /><br />Integrated, hybrid systems, that combine thermal insulation, evaporative cooling and radiative cooling, can also be used to perhaps <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666386422003629">double the time that fruit and vegetables can be kept fresh</a>, and in remote regions where refrigeration is not viable due a lack of a reliable electricity supply.<br /><br />However, there are <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/eom2.12153">a number of challenges</a> attendant to a wide scale commercialisation of PDRC, that must be considered: for example, the cost and availability of the materials employed to fabricate particular devices, along with their durability (lifetime) and performance under prevailing environmental conditions, which will vary appreciably according to location.<br /></p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-89152303413514875052023-06-09T10:38:00.015+01:002023-08-29T15:25:29.258+01:00"The Force that through the Green Fuse Drives the Flower."<p> "The Force that through the Green Fuse Drives the Flower", is the title of a <a href="https://poets.org/poem/force-through-green-fuse-drives-flower">poem by the Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas</a>, and which can be read as a metaphor for photosynthesis, with chlorophyll as the green fuse "ignited" by sunlight firing a plant into bloom, although the following allusion that it also "...drives my green age" encompasses the whole force and process of aliveness, including that of the writer of those words. I have often marvelled at the urge of nature to bring forth life, and its capacity to do so, even in very inhospitable conditions, where it may cling on precariously, and was struck by these plants, alive, if not all fully thriving, in the fast moving waters of the weir at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caversham_Lock">Caversham Lock</a>, fed by the River Thames. </p><p>Most probably, they are rooted in sediment, delivered by the river over time or, as the weir is now quite old, into its foundations. Anyway, here are a few examples of what is growing there, providing an organic interface ("edge", in permaculture terms) between water, steel and concrete. <br /><br /></p><p>First a curly- dock (<i>Rumex crispus</i>):</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhEbB65FIkIJLkuj6yT-fEKc2i6-Pu0nUp8a5JClEaODMOk80a4pAt_TkAdzU1JeUZQ-4nht2tFFCrhdGO1sQg4TmJz4rTfUthUiSDEggaLUBxfJ3phVHZUn2Wu_sN8OXemBn4upm55-GcNfPtxBv5cz5fjHNlbRdo_xYD2v1vtDgG-cOtaxg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3864" data-original-width="5152" height="338" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhEbB65FIkIJLkuj6yT-fEKc2i6-Pu0nUp8a5JClEaODMOk80a4pAt_TkAdzU1JeUZQ-4nht2tFFCrhdGO1sQg4TmJz4rTfUthUiSDEggaLUBxfJ3phVHZUn2Wu_sN8OXemBn4upm55-GcNfPtxBv5cz5fjHNlbRdo_xYD2v1vtDgG-cOtaxg=w450-h338" width="450" /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhEbB65FIkIJLkuj6yT-fEKc2i6-Pu0nUp8a5JClEaODMOk80a4pAt_TkAdzU1JeUZQ-4nht2tFFCrhdGO1sQg4TmJz4rTfUthUiSDEggaLUBxfJ3phVHZUn2Wu_sN8OXemBn4upm55-GcNfPtxBv5cz5fjHNlbRdo_xYD2v1vtDgG-cOtaxg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiExogmNUfm3yYPFuyr-r9Yx-qpW6GnxzOXXgEKDLs86cI2fA0_jGscxx0titenCd9eh9zvh72Os4hoRBZT6NNZHYqmkUW19Anqe_-XwESj8h29d1RDZRMUQCOJb2DfqvR2pCH6K5JnBmPKTeln8klV1FTL1xgG4RmC_BwJsY22kCQTIId86Q" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3864" data-original-width="5152" height="352" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiExogmNUfm3yYPFuyr-r9Yx-qpW6GnxzOXXgEKDLs86cI2fA0_jGscxx0titenCd9eh9zvh72Os4hoRBZT6NNZHYqmkUW19Anqe_-XwESj8h29d1RDZRMUQCOJb2DfqvR2pCH6K5JnBmPKTeln8klV1FTL1xgG4RmC_BwJsY22kCQTIId86Q=w468-h352" width="468" /></a></div><br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>Next to this is a buddleia (<i>buddleja</i>), seemingly anchored to the steel frame of the weir:<div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgTAv3PqZx80wXOLX727bnzZx9J5EfJYx9PC-fXFHoW3pVn-YEQeP1vLiS9NHyzHTY6a6WeHLdoYjbnoPue1arPqB3rjB6zmnJmbHi4jzG0xE8Tw83Vo5KIX3dTCiwTzZPQjcoYTLeIGgXULMvTOFV-FCACEmXSOjU3xv3OwIIgStNqXtT-fg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3864" data-original-width="5152" height="353" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgTAv3PqZx80wXOLX727bnzZx9J5EfJYx9PC-fXFHoW3pVn-YEQeP1vLiS9NHyzHTY6a6WeHLdoYjbnoPue1arPqB3rjB6zmnJmbHi4jzG0xE8Tw83Vo5KIX3dTCiwTzZPQjcoYTLeIGgXULMvTOFV-FCACEmXSOjU3xv3OwIIgStNqXtT-fg=w469-h353" width="469" /></a></div><br /><br />And to the other side of that dock is a grey willow (<i>Salix cinerea</i>), also fixed to the steel frame, but extending roots:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjNFS4UVmTDyqC_JmE2wYTbR0DdRX5A8ZwC8RYCjyp2dGB7wCAWlcAYL6h8iDTqmQqeXwK7J7tktQCmEmqSg6Hg6tNjHozDbcXEIPwzpO38GDb_Di6aLWTXwDeAIMqLNksgXBJQFVEP96cTIusheJwxOliYMVqIjmO0fJz96OM4F6weVyprIA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3864" data-original-width="5152" height="346" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjNFS4UVmTDyqC_JmE2wYTbR0DdRX5A8ZwC8RYCjyp2dGB7wCAWlcAYL6h8iDTqmQqeXwK7J7tktQCmEmqSg6Hg6tNjHozDbcXEIPwzpO38GDb_Di6aLWTXwDeAIMqLNksgXBJQFVEP96cTIusheJwxOliYMVqIjmO0fJz96OM4F6weVyprIA" width="461" /></a></div><br /><br /></div>The capacity of nature to bring forth life is a wonder, and a demonstration that our intentions should not be focussed to "Save the Planet" - an almost arrogant view considering the immensity of a <i>planet</i> in comparison with the puny human scale - but that we need to respect Nature to comprehend our place as part of it, and at best save ourselves. The book, "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Without_Us">The World Without Us</a>", amply expresses that if we fail to accomplish this, most traces of "us" - the human civilization - will be overwhelmed and erased.<br /><br />Thus, I am also reminded of the sonnet by Percy Bysshe Shelley, entitled <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozymandias">Ozymandias</a> (the name from ancient Greek sources for the pharaoh Ramesses II - "Ramesses the Great"): </div>
<p class="MsoNormal">"I met a traveller from an antique land,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Tell that its sculptor well those passions read<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">And on the pedestal, these words appear:<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Nothing beside remains. Round the decay<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">The lone and level sands stretch far away.”</p><p class="MsoNormal"><br />Similarly, I have climbed <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Nemrut">Mount Nemrut</a> in Turkey - walking along its edge in an almost paralysingly powerful wind - to view its mountain top tomb-sanctuary flanked by huge 8–9-metre high
(26–30 ft) statues of King Antiochus IV of Commagene, two lions, two eagles, and various Greek and Iranian gods, including Heracles-Artagnes-Ares, Zeus-Oromasdes, and
Apollo-Mithras-Helios-Hermes. Although the King felt inclined to thus elevate himself beyond the mortal and into the divine realm, the head of his statue has fallen along with the others, as another metaphor for the flimsy transience of human accomplishments and illusory omnipotence, in the face of amaranthine natural forces that will prevail with or without us.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-FOOTNOTEShayegan201613_3-0"></sup></p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-62515428910949176802023-04-07T09:38:00.011+01:002023-08-29T15:26:00.556+01:00"Living the Change," Film Screening + post-film Q&A. 6 pm, April 17th (2023), Reading Biscuit Factory (Reading, UK).<p><br /></p><div class="post-header" style="color: #997755; line-height: 1.6; margin: 0px 0px 1em;"><div class="post-header-line-1"></div></div><div class="post-body entry-content" id="post-body-1497637729048744694" itemprop="description articleBody" style="font-size: 13.524px; line-height: 1.5; position: relative; width: 538px;"><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b>You can either just turn up on the night and buy a ticket there, or book tickets in advance from this link: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/checkout/showing/living-the-change-qa/54631">https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/checkout/showing/living-the-change-qa/54631</a></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhqwrv8TIWacV2tnj0Uy7DnWggNR-sfBegEMJvW9GOiMlTse4LvXVnMxNGOOurBiU31KVDHHr9SkvHdT31M1NviqzbojBbdUB2LVdrOMPmFUYj3iFYnCz01X3XP44Y6QvZ4egIFtwJUyeMVjrnfVZc_PxqLoKDl7w-nDmzA6b8GjbWGTheGKg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="329" data-original-width="237" height="535" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhqwrv8TIWacV2tnj0Uy7DnWggNR-sfBegEMJvW9GOiMlTse4LvXVnMxNGOOurBiU31KVDHHr9SkvHdT31M1NviqzbojBbdUB2LVdrOMPmFUYj3iFYnCz01X3XP44Y6QvZ4egIFtwJUyeMVjrnfVZc_PxqLoKDl7w-nDmzA6b8GjbWGTheGKg=w386-h535" width="386" /></a></div></div><br /><p></p><p>This is a film screening (+ post-film Q&A), arranged with Transition Town Reading, to be held at the independent cinema, "Reading Biscuit Factory", at 6 pm on April 17th (2023), and here is the booking link (or just turn up on the door) <a href="https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/movie/living-the-change-qa" style="color: #cc3300; text-decoration-line: none;">https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/movie/living-the-change-qa<br /><br /></a></p><h5 class="text-h5 q-mt-none q-mb-xs text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Medium, sans-serif; font-size: 1.5rem; font-weight: 400; line-height: 2rem; margin-bottom: 4px; margin-top: 0px;">Overview</h5><div class="text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Light, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">Living the Change is a feature-length documentary that explores solutions to the global crises we face today – solutions any one of us can be part of – through the inspiring stories of people pioneering change in their own lives and in their communities in order to live in a sustainable and regenerative way.<br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Directors Jordan Osmond and Antoinette Wilson have brought together stories from their travels, along with interviews with experts able to explain how we come to be where we are today. From forest gardens to composting toilets, community supported agriculture to time banking, Living the Change offers ways we can rethink our approach to how we live.</div><div class="text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Light, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Includes post-film Q&A with:<br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Professor Chris Rhodes, Director of Fresh-lands Environmental Actions, and Chair of Transition Town Reading<br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Peter Wheat, Reading Food Growing Network, and Transition Town Reading<br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Trish Whitham, Permaculture practitioner and educator</div><div class="text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Light, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Light, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></div></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-14976377290487446942023-03-17T10:43:00.004+00:002023-03-19T16:58:24.163+00:00"Living the Change," Film Screening + post-film Q&A. 6 pm, April 17th (2023), Reading Biscuit Factory (Reading, UK).<p><img alt="Living the Change: Inspiring Stories for a Sustainable Future - Movies on Google Play" height="512" src="https://play-lh.googleusercontent.com/J1VpPlRCMqA0H-ItabrXYWUj5QjRdZ-8-kSfxz0DB2DQLbCk86tVaRYqEy7mEZPmVATrpA=w356-h512" width="356" /><br /><br /></p><p>This is a film screening (+ post-film Q&A), arranged with Transition Town Reading, to be held at the independent cinema, "Reading Biscuit Factory," at 6 pm on April 17th (2023), and here is the booking link (or just turn up on the door) <a href="https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/movie/living-the-change-qa">https://www.readingbiscuitfactory.co.uk/movie/living-the-change-qa<br /><br /></a></p><h5 class="text-h5 q-mt-none q-mb-xs text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Medium, sans-serif; font-size: 1.5rem; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 2rem; margin-bottom: 4px; margin-top: 0px; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">Overview</h5><div class="text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Light, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">Living the Change is a feature-length documentary that explores solutions to the global crises we face today – solutions any one of us can be part of – through the inspiring stories of people pioneering change in their own lives and in their communities in order to live in a sustainable and regenerative way.<br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Directors Jordan Osmond and Antoinette Wilson have brought together stories from their travels, along with interviews with experts able to explain how we come to be where we are today. From forest gardens to composting toilets, community supported agriculture to time banking, Living the Change offers ways we can rethink our approach to how we live.</div><div class="text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Light, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Includes post-film Q&A with:<br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Professor Chris Rhodes, Director of Fresh-lands Environmental Actions, and Chair of Transition Town Reading<br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Peter Wheat, Reading Food Growing Network, and Transition Town Reading<br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" /><br style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; box-sizing: inherit;" />Trish Whitham, Permaculture practitioner and educator</div><div class="text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Light, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><br /></div><div class="text-dark" data-v-71f35bb0="" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: transparent; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: black; box-sizing: inherit; color: white; font-family: RBF-Light, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><br /></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-7114556606519753552022-11-22T16:12:00.010+00:002022-11-23T10:26:17.795+00:00“The Oil Machine” and the Changing Climate.Released smartly in time for the <a href="https://unfccc.int/cop27">COP27</a> climate change conference, the film <a href="https://www.theoilmachine.org/">“The Oil Machine"</a>, presents a stark picture of the imperative to cut our use of fossil fuels, in particular crude oil, but moreover of our utter dependency on the “black gold” for practically all aspects of modern civilization. While it is clear that further licenses should not be permitted for new oil exploration and production, in line with the International Energy Agency’s <a href="https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/discover/ipcc-code-red-for-humanity">Net Zero by 2050 roadmap</a>, it is likely that oil companies would need to be accordingly compensated for their losses. However, although the UK government appears set to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/oct/07/uk-offers-new-north-sea-oil-and-gas-licences-despite-climate-concerns">grant another 100 licenses in the North Sea</a>, this would not necessarily guarantee energy security for the UK, since much of the production there is <a href="https://www.common-wealth.co.uk/interactive-digital-projects/north-sea/map">in the hands of foreign agencies</a>. <br /><br />A tricky dilemma is nonetheless presented, as European nations scramble to get hold of hydrocarbons from alternative sources, in part to avoid supporting Putin’s war machine, but also now that there is no Russian gas coming to Europe down the Nord Stream 1 pipelines, which have suffered <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Nord_Stream_pipeline_sabotage">damage from deliberate sabotage</a>, although it is not yet clear exactly who put the explosives there for the job. While the finger of blame seems to oscillate in its direction, depending on exactly who is pointing it, efforts to maintain current levels of oil and gas through this winter and beyond, strengthen their grip, while renewable energy is pushed onto the proverbial back burner. <br /><br /><a href="https://www.theoilmachine.org/">The film</a> admirably emphasises the extent and complexity of the oil and gas pipeline network under the North Sea, and on land too, which is conveniently but deceptively out of sight and hence out of mind; yet it is this sprawling and fragile infrastructure whose bounty underpins the mechanics of our daily lives. We are indeed living within “the oil machine”, not only through our use of oil and gas for fuels, but our increasing reliance on oil-based products, such as plastics (think phones, computers, clothes, vehicles, packaging, toys and utensils), pharmaceuticals, and fertilizers and pesticides for agriculture. While almost no one can be unaware of the fact of plastic pollution, its close connection to the oil industry is less well known, even though <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30025551/">making plastics consumes 6% of the global oil supply</a> (including natural gas liquids). <br /><br />Here the film scores highly, in its expression of the interconnected nature of energy, jobs, finance, geopolitics and climate change, and that while we need to stop burning oil and gas to curb CO2 emissions, we can’t “just stop oil” overnight, or the system of civilization would collapse. <br /><br />Nonetheless, we have precious little time left to substantially curb our use of fossil fuels – when I began writing on these subjects <a href="http://ergobalance.blogspot.com/2005/12/how-to-plug-energy-gap-to-2050.html">back in 2005</a>, 2030 seemed almost comfortingly distant, but is now only 7 years away. However, this alone is not the whole story, since even if greenhouse gas emissions are rapidly and dramatically cut, the vast polar ice-bodies will continue to melt, thus raising sea levels in a relentless process, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/nov/07/melting-arctic-sea-ice-summer-report">lasting over centuries</a>. <br /><br />Further melting of the Arctic ice could provide a catastrophic feedback, if methane, with a heating potential <a href="https://ergobalance.blogspot.com/2008/09/global-warming-from-melting-permafrost.html">one hundred times that of CO2</a>, is released into the atmosphere from decomposing methane hydrate deposits, <a href="https://countercurrents.org/2022/10/surging-methane/">increasing global temperatures by 5 - 8 degrees</a>, and rendering large regions of the Earth effectively uninhabitable. Following such a course, mass migrations of millions would be almost inevitable. <br /><br />Since <a href="https://tupa.gtk.fi/raportti/arkisto/70_2019.pdf">81% of global production is currently in decline</a>, to reduce the use of oil is not entirely our choice, as IEA Executive director, Fatih Birol, has noted, <a href="https://www.euractiv.com/section/climate-environment/interview/iea-economist-we-have-to-leave-oil-before-it-leaves-us/">“We have to leave oil before it leaves us.”</a> <br /><br />Thus, to replace this loss, and maintain the overall flow of “oil” into industrialised civilization is an increasingly difficult, energy intensive and expensive process. Indeed, the loss of investment capital into the oil industry may well secure its demise, if it is no longer seen as a viable commodity. Hence, for this reason too, we need to look to alternative energy sources and, more generally, ways of actuating our lives that do not depend on oil. <br /><br />While <a href="https://www.theoilmachine.org/">“The Oil Machine”</a> delivers a hard punch over the status quo, it also makes clear that our present reliance on oil is an aberration, since for most of human history we managed without it perfectly well. However, in the last hundred years or so that we have based our societies on oil, and <a href="https://ourworldindata.org/energy-production-consumption">the fossil fuels more generally</a>, growth in human numbers and consumption of natural resources have followed similar exponential trajectories, practically <a href="https://www.footprintnetwork.org/resources/footprint-scenario-tool/">doubling the size of the human enterprise in just over 40 years</a>. Clearly this cannot continue, and the only real choice is between making an alternative design or continuing on the present pathway of systemic collapse. <br /><br />Toward the end of the film, an allusion is made to the need for living more simply, which reminded me of Part One of <a href="http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~sme/CSC2600/transition-handbook.pdf">“The Transition Handbook: from oil dependence to local resilience”</a>, entitled, “The Head: Why peak oil and climate change mean that small is inevitable,” and substantially involves relocalisation (deglobalisation) as part of an Energy Descent Action Plan. Indeed, much of the content of this and related “Transition” books, <a href="http://simplicitycollective.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Ted-Trainer-and-The-Simpler-Way2.pdf">and beginning earlier</a>, the work of Ted Trainer, <a href="http://thesimplerway.info/">“The Simpler Way”</a>, offer guidance as to how we might redesign our society in order to live well while using less oil, and overall resources, ultimately <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2022-11-07/architects-of-our-future-energy-and-the-changing-climate/">getting the human species out of ecological overshoot and back in balance with the carrying capacity of the Earth</a>. Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-11597109315072331792022-10-23T17:47:00.012+01:002022-11-13T09:10:52.463+00:00 Architects of Our Future: Energy and the Changing Climate.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><span face=""Calibri","sans-serif"" style="font-size: 11pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-GB; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/19508699/1159710931507233179"><span style="color: blue; font-size: 13.5pt; line-height: 115%; text-decoration-line: none;"><br /></span></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/19508699/1159710931507233179"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjOQxyHpg9tWDVksTpWcuVWBh9fxS_SE5GzipDy__c2ddoB6UisrZmDD0Qhn8WZHDBRlmuq7s-x2UfwMgcwSj1V8hSx4MzuPYpqReaagg0TbQGYERKRkPsCJQjjVBuIlu4RSDjvje8PK7SbiP78JckTk2C28XMcrJcZCA2VHlenWENCpwNfRw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="274" data-original-width="481" height="242" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjOQxyHpg9tWDVksTpWcuVWBh9fxS_SE5GzipDy__c2ddoB6UisrZmDD0Qhn8WZHDBRlmuq7s-x2UfwMgcwSj1V8hSx4MzuPYpqReaagg0TbQGYERKRkPsCJQjjVBuIlu4RSDjvje8PK7SbiP78JckTk2C28XMcrJcZCA2VHlenWENCpwNfRw=w425-h242" width="425" /></a></div></span><br /><i><br /></i><div><i>By Professor Chris Rhodes, DPhil, DSc, FRSC, FRSA, FLS. <br /><br />Published in The Linnean, Vol. 38, October 2022, pp14-20. It is also the write-up of a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLk30AQxYQQ">lecture </a></i><i><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLk30AQxYQQ">that I gave to the Linnean Society</a> </i><i>in February 2022.</i><div><br /><br /><div><b>Energy. </b><br /><br />82% of the total primary energy (BP 2022) used by humans on Earth is derived from the fossil fuels, whose combustion is causing global heating (from energy restrained from radiating into outer space by greenhouse gases) which impels climate change. <br /><br />Although our overall use of energy has increased by about 13% during the past 10 years, the relative proportions of oil, gas, nuclear, and hydro in the energy-mix have changed very little. Coal use has fallen from 30% to 27%, but despite double-digit growth rates for renewables, total wind plus solar combined still account for less than 5% of global primary energy. <br /><br />The lion’s share (31%) of our energy is furnished by crude oil, which is the lifeblood of industrial civilization; however, oil is becoming more difficult and consequently more expensive to produce. Before about 1930, for each barrel of oil’s worth of energy expended, in excess of 50 barrels of oil were recovered (Figure 1). Now, globally, this Energy Return on Investment (EROI) is less than 20, and for the heaviest oils, probably below 5, meaning that relentlessly larger amounts of energy must be consumed to maintain the flow of this critical resource (Rhodes 2014).</div><div> <br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjGY5t94hc0v8b_CyqspyPoyrPpU8pwwNbguhuO9wgYvH_P0G2OCz0ytwHUJXY-SBQnLcT2g0rWCKJrnjgEJhNxIv4ieOOziXqypVwh_ymq6ET7ruTikQRBOFOrxmIGpGY8KvmbjkT8RmYpd5841U3o0i4X5wDOry3IKku8C57JifrAi-gkGg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="364" data-original-width="306" height="271" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjGY5t94hc0v8b_CyqspyPoyrPpU8pwwNbguhuO9wgYvH_P0G2OCz0ytwHUJXY-SBQnLcT2g0rWCKJrnjgEJhNxIv4ieOOziXqypVwh_ymq6ET7ruTikQRBOFOrxmIGpGY8KvmbjkT8RmYpd5841U3o0i4X5wDOry3IKku8C57JifrAi-gkGg=w228-h271" width="228" /></a></div><div>Figure 1. The Lucas Gusher oil well, at Spindletop Hill, Texas in 1901. [This was the first gusher of the Texas oil boom]. Before about 1930, more than 50 barrels of oil could be recovered for one barrel of oil’s worth of energy expended. Now, the return is nearer 10 for US oil. [Credit: original photo by John Trost. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:Image:Lucas_gusher.jpg">w:en:Image:Lucas_gusher.jpg</a> by Nv8200p, 4/12/2006 16:29 (UTC)]</div><br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Oil Production and Use. </b><br /><br />Annually, the human enterprise devours a massive 30 billion barrels of crude oil (BP 2022): 83 million barrels a day, or almost 1,000 barrels a second. Snap your fingers, and another 1,000 barrels of oil are gone. Until about 10 years ago, the world’s main oil producers were Saudi Arabia and Russia, but the United States has now joined this exclusive club as a result of its success in hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”), which allows large volumes of light tight oil to be recovered, mainly from low-permeable shale, and now accounts for almost two-thirds of US oil production (EIA 2022a). <br /><br />Much of the oil remaining in the world is high-sulphur (sour) and heavy (e.g. from the Orinoco belt in Venezuela), needing more costly processing, and most of it is unrecoverable. “Extra-heavy” oil is not a freely flowing liquid but is bituminous, and resembles the black tar used for road surfacing. Sometimes, “statistics” are released, mainly to encourage investors, such as there is more oil (in the form of “oil shale”) under America than there is under Saudi Arabia (Rapier 2012), but this refers to an ancient solid material called kerogen, which needs to be heated to 400—500 deg C to turn it into a liquid that we recognise as oil; since this takes a lot of energy, the EROI is typically very low (Rhodes 2014). <br /><br />Oil not only fuels transportation, but (including natural gas liquids) is the raw “carbon” chemical feedstock for plastics, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and most modern devices, e.g. computers, cell phones etc. Without oil and natural gas (for fertilizers) modern agriculture could not exist, and it takes up to10 calories of fossil fuels to deliver each calorie of food onto the plate (Lott 2011). Some of the impacts of “industrialised” agriculture on the biosphere are illustrated in (Figure 2), which shows a field of soya being harvested in Brazil: the land itself was formerly rainforest, which has been cleared for crops, and the plumes of dust following the combine harvesters are topsoil, broken up by these heavy machines as they pass over it. Since the fields are left bare until the next crop is planted, erosion occurs, as the soil is blown or washed away. In a few years, the land loses its productivity, whereupon more rainforest is cleared: a relentless process of degradation. Even larger regions of the Brazilian Amazon are cleared to provide land on which to graze cattle for the meat industry (Butler 2021).</div><div><br /></div><div> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgim84ZUxB8vaPkSxO19s2nwNjKUGbpkyWZQLduLJtE1GTYxnDCkPujeR9WF8mXUmDXNlZcF9e59rBbTshcdgHKmETAyz5hz3J72xjG-7Lq8Iejetw9qkLLVGdcM5zEnk6PYeBPMBGdmzXvhMmCQtIY1JOJrg_kuypH8hPlZQGeRdWOP1A_zg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="215" data-original-width="429" height="219" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgim84ZUxB8vaPkSxO19s2nwNjKUGbpkyWZQLduLJtE1GTYxnDCkPujeR9WF8mXUmDXNlZcF9e59rBbTshcdgHKmETAyz5hz3J72xjG-7Lq8Iejetw9qkLLVGdcM5zEnk6PYeBPMBGdmzXvhMmCQtIY1JOJrg_kuypH8hPlZQGeRdWOP1A_zg=w438-h219" width="438" /></a></div><div>Figure 2. Field of soya being harvested in Brazil. Formerly this land was rainforest, and the plumes of dust following the combine harvesters are topsoil, broken up as they pass over it. Once the land becomes unproductive due to soil erosion, yet more forest is cleared. [Credit: Lou Gold (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]</div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Alternatives to Oil. </b><br /><br />Although there will always be hydrocarbons in the ground, supplies of cheaply and easily procured oil are diminishing, and so we need to find alternative fuels, and carbon feedstocks for industry. Burning oil also contributes 12.4 billion tonnes (The World Counts 2022) of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere every year (a third of all CO2 emissions), which is driving catastrophic global climate change. Obviously, as oil-production wanes, we will emit far less carbon, but struggle to maintain the dynamics of a complex oil-dependent globalised civilization. Potential uncertainties in the geopolitical landscape, for example Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, also urge actions toward reducing national dependencies on imported oil and gas (Rhodes 2022). <br /><br /><br /><b>Biofuels. </b><br /><br />Biofuels are often touted as a “low-carbon” solution to a declining oil supply, and yet in the UK, even if we converted all arable land over to making bioethanol, and grew no food, we could only match less than half (45%) of the liquid fuel demand currently met from petroleum. Similar yields of celluosic ethanol are expected from Miscanthus x giganteus (“Elephant Grass”), and although this can be grown on marginal land, large areas are still required. For biodiesel, made from rapeseed, the situation is even worse, and we could only produce one seventh (14%) of our liquid fuel requirements in this way (Rhodes 2015a), even allowing for the better “miles per gallon” obtained if all vehicles were fitted with diesel engines. Additionally, diesel fuel is needed to run tractors and combine harvesters to grow and harvest the biofuel crops, leading to a very low EROI, along with the consumption of large quantities of freshwater. Hence, it is unlikely that the currently less than 1% (BP 2022) of our total energy provided by biofuels will increase significantly. <br /><br /><br /><b>What about fracking? </b><br /><br />Hydraulic fracturing, popularly known as “fracking”, involves creating cracks in a shale layer by pumping a fluid into it under high pressure, so that the oil or gas trapped within can flow out (Figure 3). The procedure has sparked controversy, particularly in regard to potential environmental contamination and adverse health effects (Michaux 2019). Leakage of methane, not only from fracking operations (Vaughan 2020) but across the whole of the global oil and gas industry (IEA 2020), is a matter of great concern, given the very high global heating potential of the gas, as compared with carbon dioxide. Nonetheless, some 65% of US oil (EIA 2022a) and 79% of US natural gas are currently produced by fracking (EIA 2022b).</div><div><br /></div><div> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh7x276KkpYO4pRnwCXsiFYDesG1sHgaoWyCjVmsdmaDPB182EHnlGuN5OfQemb8bEyDEk18o3Gv3zDQaGttn1j2qN0Rnlg32UDcl8OQh7amDpGU_1qa_2-SCrlaCuSkXeg7sZjZ_vFYBaX1AqgCP1OJJxcYuhM2om4Up-cP4bIUiyswNJ4iQ" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="468" data-original-width="800" height="236" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh7x276KkpYO4pRnwCXsiFYDesG1sHgaoWyCjVmsdmaDPB182EHnlGuN5OfQemb8bEyDEk18o3Gv3zDQaGttn1j2qN0Rnlg32UDcl8OQh7amDpGU_1qa_2-SCrlaCuSkXeg7sZjZ_vFYBaX1AqgCP1OJJxcYuhM2om4Up-cP4bIUiyswNJ4iQ=w404-h236" width="404" /></a></div><div>Figure 3. Schematic depiction of hydraulic fracturing for shale gas, showing main possible environmental effects.<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HydroFrac.png">https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HydroFrac.png</a> [Credit Mikenorton]</div></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>In 2005, global output of conventional crude oil reached a plateau, and since then 71% of all growth in oil supply is from fracking, with much of the rest provided by extra-heavy oil (Michaux 2019). Outside of the US, the technology has proved far less successful, and given a persistently negative cash flow, the future viability of the shale industry is debatable. Should this falter, the global oil supply would struggle to meet demand, leading to soaring oil prices. <br /><br /><br /><b>Decline in “cheap to produce” oil. </b><br /><br />• 81% of global liquids production in decline by 5—7% = a loss of 3—4.5 mbd/year (Michaux 2019). <br /><br />• Hence, just to maintain existing output, a new Saudi Arabia’s worth of production must be found every 3 years: 3 new Saudis by 2030! <br /><br />• This new production will come mainly from “unconventional” oil (such as oil sands, light tight oil, coal and gas to liquids conversion) plus (ultra)deepwater drilling. <br /><br />• Such unconventional oil is more difficult, energy intensive and expensive to produce. <br /><br />• Highly uncertain how much light tight oil (from fracking shale) can be recovered; what the production rates might be; if it can take up slack from global existing field decline? <br /><br />• Oil (= “all liquids”) demand back above 100 mbd, as global economies rebound post-Covid (Blas and Hurst 2021). <br /><br />• From end-2014 to mid-2020, the market was oversupplied, forcing the oil price down (Figure 4): smaller investment at low oil prices, means less “new oil” coming online in the next few years: <br /><br />• Supply “crunch” predicted: 2025-2030 (Michaux 2019).</div><div><br /></div><div> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhY1BEjkZnwedndF2kJS9rn8Evtz7EpCBFhuqXZi9QowdQ6Bb9hLzILS8KcA9DxBb-ovR0ffyzzXqxSKvXZlxS6Dq7HA09T3RBi3QZRcXAJ8wkr6mHqMAHd6vGXAVmAG8wNfoRmeE0XA_n_MXu4og6rJMv0e8Qp1Hv4asgvMUZPw7TgVdeIUg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="312" data-original-width="800" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhY1BEjkZnwedndF2kJS9rn8Evtz7EpCBFhuqXZi9QowdQ6Bb9hLzILS8KcA9DxBb-ovR0ffyzzXqxSKvXZlxS6Dq7HA09T3RBi3QZRcXAJ8wkr6mHqMAHd6vGXAVmAG8wNfoRmeE0XA_n_MXu4og6rJMv0e8Qp1Hv4asgvMUZPw7TgVdeIUg=w483-h189" width="483" /></a></div><div>Figure 4. Comparison of benchmark oil prices: low from end-2014 with price crash in April 2020 as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Basket#/media/File:Indian_Basket.png">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Basket#/media/File:Indian_Basket.png</a> [Credit <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:AKS.9955">AKS.9955</a>]</div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>The Changing Climate and Overshoot. </b><br /><br />The term “Changing Climate” has been used (Rhodes 2015b) to emphasise a set of world-scale problems, each often regarded in isolation, but which are actually mutually entangled threads of a complex system that is failing. Although “climate change” per se, is a major factor among them (driven by global heating from energy reined in by greenhouse gases), remedying this alone, e.g. through net-zero emissions strategies, will not resolve the overall problem, which is that the human species is in a condition of ecological overshoot: <br /><br />[Overshoot = the hyperconsumption of natural resources, at rates much faster than they can be replenished, and in excess of the biosphere’s capacity to absorb and process the waste discharged through their use.] <br /><br />However, to shrink the human enterprise so that it operates within the carrying capacity of the Earth demands very large reductions in our consumption. To arrive at an estimate of just how much, we can appeal to the Ecological Footprint Analysis (Global Footprint Network 2022), which suggests around 40% as a global average, but closer to 70% in the richer, industrialised nations (Figure 5). Such “one planet living” (Figure 6) requires a fundamental recasting of our goals and lifestyles, with far more substantive changes than essentially trying to preserve business as usual, merely with low-carbon energy in place of fossil fuels. <br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjWrNgFVQON-4X9ESpQ-11_HyYuG_90fnuFPAtCcJA3H5ByNx5FVtHC33asRhSRV1klBQmAG9yykou6GIMXSLzEL3wyl3aiJDSxQ2siteRSYeLkTiol2NDuG_OfQP6Zsly6qmnEOqTPUs3OvoAB61X7K6zfZegTZhqOv9fbycqL7QBQkv3a0w" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3113" data-original-width="1896" height="332" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjWrNgFVQON-4X9ESpQ-11_HyYuG_90fnuFPAtCcJA3H5ByNx5FVtHC33asRhSRV1klBQmAG9yykou6GIMXSLzEL3wyl3aiJDSxQ2siteRSYeLkTiol2NDuG_OfQP6Zsly6qmnEOqTPUs3OvoAB61X7K6zfZegTZhqOv9fbycqL7QBQkv3a0w=w202-h332" width="202" /></a></div>Figure 5. Ecological footprints of nations. <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/How_many_earths_2018_English.jpg">https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3b/How_many_earths_2018_English.jpg</a> [Credit Footprint123]<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Even if we chose to continue burning fossil fuels, depletion would substantially reduce their availability within the next few decades (Mohr et al. 2015). Hence, for this reason too, it is essential to find alternative energy sources. While it is debatable how much renewable energy might actually be installed (Seibert and Rees 2021), it is likely that matching the energy derived from all the coal, oil and gas currently burned will prove extremely difficult.</div><div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh0Mtw5W-M3YXu843j1YME0AxnLRyHV55k8qMI8gdmnSI9GdT1NNRGUCwpO2dWiFxIQmZ6Z3GSY9UfXPErlAtvAkmNNaZ744kE_erTHoRcVv3DGbV_8EVA0VZwmuluesgjaShNa37l4eSU3_zNPYaPAAe_eZInAmULMWCxQd3AgarPZnrP2fw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="316" data-original-width="502" height="282" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh0Mtw5W-M3YXu843j1YME0AxnLRyHV55k8qMI8gdmnSI9GdT1NNRGUCwpO2dWiFxIQmZ6Z3GSY9UfXPErlAtvAkmNNaZ744kE_erTHoRcVv3DGbV_8EVA0VZwmuluesgjaShNa37l4eSU3_zNPYaPAAe_eZInAmULMWCxQd3AgarPZnrP2fw=w449-h282" width="449" /></a></div>Figure 6. Alternative pathways: overshoot to collapse (red lines); or, controlled contraction to “one planet living”, well within Earth’s human carrying capacity (green line). [Credit Prof. W.E.Rees].<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Clearly, by reducing our energy demand, the amount of low-carbon energy that must be installed is brought down to more “manageable” levels. Significant energy savings are possible through relocalisation (so curbing unnecessary transportation and its fuel requirements), by properly insulating buildings and growing food locally. Such a strategy also helps to build resilience at the community level, and provides a buffer against global supply chain failures, e.g. resulting from freak weather events, vagaries such as Covid and Brexit, and geopolitical factors, including outbreaks of war. <br /><br /><b><br /></b></div><div><b>Some symptoms of ecological overshoot. </b><br /><br />• Increasing atmospheric CO2/global heating. <br /><br />• Ocean acidification and ocean temperatures both rising. <br /><br />• Melting ice sheets, glaciers, sea ice. <br /><br />• Rising sea-levels. <br /><br />• Loss of corals. <br /><br />• Decimated fisheries. <br /><br />• Deforestation and habitat loss. <br /><br />• Draining of fossil aquifers, rivers and lakes. <br /><br />• Erosion, nutrient depletion and loss of carbon from soils, desertification. <br /><br />• Massive species displacement and extermination, insect die-off. <br /><br />• Pollution of air, land, waterways, oceans – including by microplastics, and “forever chemicals”. <br /><br />• Unsustainable consumption: 100 billion tonnes of (mostly non-renewable) “natural resources” each year - predicted to reach184 billion tonnes in 2050. <br /><br />Even if we could switch our energy entirely to “net-zero” emissions, current consumption and waste discharge by the human “system” would continue to exceed and degrade the Earth’s biocapacity. This has been expressed succinctly (Seibert and Rees 2022) by the following analogy: <br /><br /><i> “What the passengers on the [MTI] Titanic need for survival is a dramatic course change, but what many of the ship’s engineers are proposing is to replace its FF engines with electric motors.” </i><br /><br /><br /><b>Scientists’ Warnings. </b><br /><br />The first Scientists Warning paper (Kendal 1992), stressed mainly the ecological damage then inflicted by humans, while a later study (Ripple et al 2017) demonstrated that the intervening twenty-five years had only witnessed further destruction of the ecosphere. The World Scientists’ Warning of a Climate Emergency report, published in 2019 (Ripple et al 2019) which has now been endorsed by a total of 14,594 scientists from 158 countries, emphasised a set of collective actions, aimed toward restoring and protecting natural ecosystems, conserving energy, reducing food waste, the adoption of a more plant-based diet, population control and economic reforms. However, two subsequent papers (Ripple et al, 2020a) and (Ripple at al. 2020b) merely confirmed a further, dramatic deterioration of all climate markers.<br /> <br /> The “WORLD SCIENTISTS’ WARNINGS INTO ACTION” (SWIA) paper (Barnard et al. 2021) was published on Friday, November 12th (2021), formally the concluding day of the COP26 climate change conference, although a final agreement was not actually reached until late on the Saturday (13th). It is the “Into Action” qualifier that sets this publication apart from the previous warnings, since it offers practical means for steering away from the abyss, and toward a new territory where human needs are met, harmoniously, within the biocapacity of the Earth. SWIA summons all levels of leadership, from local to global, as are required to make real the proposed changes. Only immediate, rapid and far reaching action has a serious chance of keeping the Earth’s mean global temperature below the 1.5 degree limit.<br /> <br /> Massive though this challenge is, it is really a single identifier of a whole system that is out of balance: a mechanism of resource hyperconsumption which transgresses several vital, but interwoven, planetary boundaries, powered by burning 15 billion tonnes of fossil fuels per year (Rhodes 2019). Since it is the system of civilization that must be fixed, any means to accomplish this must, of necessity, also be systemic in nature, and bring about a consolidated amelioration of climate change, biodiversity loss, and relentless degradation of the ecosphere.<br /> <br /> The SWIA paper underlines six principal areas where effort must be focussed: Energy, Atmospheric Pollutants, Nature, Food Systems, Population Stabilisation, and Economic Reforms, of which the following is a highlighted summary: <br /><br /><b>• Energy.</b> Implement massive conservation practices: retrofitting buildings, relocalisation, buying less “stuff”, could halve UK energy demand. Transition from fossil fuels to low-carbon sources including solar and wind.</div><div><br /><b>• Atmospheric Pollutants.</b> Rapidly cut emissions of methane, soot, HFCs and other short-lived climate pollutants. This could reduce the short-term warming trend by more than 50% over the next few decades. <br /><br /><b>• Nature.</b> Conserve, restore, rewild ecosystems such as forests, grasslands, peatlands, wetlands and mangroves, and allow a greater share of them to reach their ecological potential for sequestering atmospheric CO2. <br /><br /><b>• Food.</b> Shift to a more plant-based diet. Adopt more regenerative and local production methods: significantly reduce emissions of methane and other GHGs, reduce deforestation, build soil. Curb food waste: globally, at least one-third of all food produced is discarded. Place-based food systems. <br /><br /><b>• Economic Reforms.</b> Convert the economy from max GDP growth to one that operates within limits of the biosphere. Work towards regional self-reliance, and focus on restoring efficient levels of local production of food and consumer goods. Impose high taxes on high-carbon luxury goods/activities. <br /><br /><b>• Population Stabilisation.</b> Stabilize a global population that is increasing by 220,000 people a day, using approaches that ensure social and economic justice, such as guaranteeing education for young men and women and the availability of voluntary family planning services. <br /><br /><br />We urge all scientists to sign this paper, and act in a united effort to avoid a catastrophic collapse of civilisation. <a href="https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/signature">https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/signature</a> <br /><br />The time is now or never. Cooperation is fundamental to our success, and only by uniting as a human family, on all levels from local to global, can we hope to achieve an equitable and concordant future on our Mother Planet. <br /><br /><br /><b>“We are called to be architects of the future, not its victims.” </b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>– R. Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983). <br /><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;"><br /></p>
<div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><b><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">References.</span></b></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><b><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></b><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Barnard et al. 2021. </span><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00368504211056290" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00368504211056290</a></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Blas and Hurst 2021.</span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="letter-spacing: -0.3pt;"> <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-11-02/bp-says-oil-demand-is-back-above-100-million-barrels-a-day">https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-11-02/bp-says-oil-demand-is-back-above-100-million-barrels-a-day</a>?</span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="font-weight: normal;">BP 2022. Statistical Review of
World Energy, 71<sup>st</sup> ed. <a href="https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/business-sites/en/global/corporate/pdfs/energy-economics/statistical-review/bp-stats-review-2022-full-report.pdf">https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/business-sites/en/global/corporate/pdfs/energy-economics/statistical-review/bp-stats-review-2022-full-report.pdf</a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Butler 2021. </span><a href="https://rainforests.mongabay.com/amazon/amazon_destruction.html" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://rainforests.mongabay.com/amazon/amazon_destruction.html</a></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">EIA 2022a. </span><a href="https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=847&t=6" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=847&t=6</a></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">IEA 2020. </span><a href="https://www.iea.org/reports/global-methane-tracker-2022" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://www.iea.org/reports/global-methane-tracker-2022</a></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">EIA 2022a. </span><a href="https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=847&t=6" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=847&t=6</a></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">EIA 2022b. </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=907&t=8">https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=907&t=8</a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Global Footprint Network 2022. </span><a href="https://www.footprintnetwork.org/our-work/ecological-footprint/" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://www.footprintnetwork.org/our-work/ecological-footprint/</a></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Kendall 1992. </span><cite><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="https://www.ucsusa.org/sites/default/files/attach/2017/11/World%20Scientists%27%20Warning%20to%20Humanity%201992.pdf"><span style="font-style: normal;">World Scientists Warning To Humanity</span></a></span></cite></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;">Lott, 2011. <a href="https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/plugged-in/10-calories-in-1-calorie-out-the-energy-we-spend-on-food/">https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/plugged-in/10-calories-in-1-calorie-out-the-energy-we-spend-on-food/</a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;">Michaux 2019. “Oil from a critical raw material perspective,” </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;"><a href="https://tupa.gtk.fi/raportti/arkisto/70_2019.pdf">https://tupa.gtk.fi/raportti/arkisto/70_2019.pdf</a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Mohr et al. 2015 (Mohr, S.H., Wang, J., Ellem, G., Ward, J., Giuro, D.) </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Fuel, <b>141</b>, 120-135.</span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Rapier 2012. </span><a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/energysource/2012/03/29/u-s-might-have-more-oil-resources-than-saudi-arabia-but/?sh=6105eba53fdb" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://www.forbes.com/sites/energysource/2012/03/29/u-s-might-have-more-oil-resources-than-saudi-arabia-but/?sh=6105eba53fdb</a></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Rhodes 2014. “Peak oil is not a myth,” Chemistry World. </span><a href="https://www.chemistryworld.com/opinion/peak-oil-is-not-a-myth/7102.article" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://www.chemistryworld.com/opinion/peak-oil-is-not-a-myth/7102.article</a></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;">Rhodes,2015a. </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;"><a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/">https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/</a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><br /></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Rhodes, 2015b. </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.3184/003685015X14467291596242">https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.3184/003685015X14467291596242</a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Rhodes 2019. </span><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0036850419884873" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0036850419884873</a></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Rhodes 2022. </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2022-03-16/russia-ukraine-war-and-the-changing-energy-landscape/">https://www.resilience.org/stories/2022-03-16/russia-ukraine-war-and-the-changing-energy-landscape/<br /></a><o:p></o:p></span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"" style="line-height: 18.4px;"><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Ripple et al, 2017. </span><cite><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="http://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/sites/sw/files/Warning_article_with_supp_11-13-17.pdf"><span style="font-style: normal;">"World Scientists' Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice"</span></a> , <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BioScience" title="BioScience"><span style="font-style: normal;">BioScience</span></a>, <b>67</b> (12): 1026–1028.</span></cite></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><div style="line-height: normal;"><cite><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><o:p></o:p></span></cite><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Ripple et al. 2019. <cite><a href="https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/advance-article/doi/10.1093/biosci/biz088/5610806"><span style="font-style: normal;">"World Scientists' Warning of a Climate Emergency"</span></a>, BioScience, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doi_(identifier)" title="Doi (identifier)"><span style="font-style: normal;">doi</span></a>:<a href="https://doi.org/10.1093%2Fbiosci%2Fbiz088"><span style="font-style: normal;">10.1093/biosci/biz088<br /></span></a><o:p></o:p></cite></span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Ripple at al. 2020a. <a href="https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/70/6/446/5828583?login=true">https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/70/6/446/5828583?login=true<br /></a></span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Ripple at al. 2020b. <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-climate-emergency-2020-in-review/">https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-climate-emergency-2020-in-review/</a></span></div></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Seibert and Rees 2021. </span><a href="https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/15/4508/htm" style="font-family: Arial, "sans-serif";">https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/15/4508/htm</a></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Seibert and Rees 2022. </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="file:///C:/Users/Chris/Downloads/energies-15-00974%20(1).pdf">file:///C:/Users/Chris/Downloads/energies-15-00974%20(1).pdf</a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><br /></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Taylor 2021. <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/19/deforestation-in-brazils-amazon-rainforest-hits-15-year-high.html">https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/19/deforestation-in-brazils-amazon-rainforest-hits-15-year-high.html<br /></a></span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="https://rainforests.mongabay.com/amazon/amazon_destruction.html"><br /></a></span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">The World
Counts 2022. </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="https://www.theworldcounts.com/challenges/climate-change/global-warming/global-co2-emissions/story">https://www.theworldcounts.com/challenges/climate-change/global-warming/global-co2-emissions/story<br /></a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="https://www.theworldcounts.com/challenges/climate-change/global-warming/global-co2-emissions/story"><br /></a></span></div><div style="line-height: normal; text-align: left;"><span face="Arial, "sans-serif"">Vaughan 2020. </span><span face="Arial, "sans-serif""><a href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2241347-fracking-wells-in-the-us-are-leaking-loads-of-planet-warming-methane/">https://www.newscientist.com/article/2241347-fracking-wells-in-the-us-are-leaking-loads-of-planet-warming-methane/</a></span></div>
<p></p></div></div></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-14943646133866927002022-08-17T09:45:00.008+01:002022-09-04T15:30:53.522+01:00The Energy War, and Climate Breakdown.<p><b>I was one of the speakers at the @Scientists Warning
Europe event - Road to COP27: The Energy War and Climate Breakdown, held online on M</b><b>onday 22nd August at 6pm BST.</b></p><div><b></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b>The video of it is here: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okuetPh6qBY">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okuetPh6qBY</a></b></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjczpM1-R4RWfP-A1KdzCKUB-L8JXDQi5d3GM3YRP4c4m9OSlL30Gdn7A9OWI-tmuek8soABjbb1likI2W1xZroh8B_POPPM3rkCtsjAkSPghtHWdqHdcli0MrrUQBBCPyile_QzGpvyyEldlQdZm1Dpnhj3L4wnYEaTO1IP-vwQ4RRT6kB6Q" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="2084" data-original-width="2084" height="508" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjczpM1-R4RWfP-A1KdzCKUB-L8JXDQi5d3GM3YRP4c4m9OSlL30Gdn7A9OWI-tmuek8soABjbb1likI2W1xZroh8B_POPPM3rkCtsjAkSPghtHWdqHdcli0MrrUQBBCPyile_QzGpvyyEldlQdZm1Dpnhj3L4wnYEaTO1IP-vwQ4RRT6kB6Q=w508-h508" width="508" /></a></div><br /></div><div><div class="eds-l-mar-bot-8" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; font-family: "Neue Plak", -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Tahoma, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.9333px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; letter-spacing: 0.5px; margin: 0px 0px 32px; orphans: 2; padding: 0px; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><p class="eds-text-bm" style="font-size: 0.875rem; line-height: 1.25rem; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-rendering: optimizelegibility;"><b>Cost of living crisis, global conflict, and climate breakdown - is a shift in our energy systems the solution to all of this?</b></p></div><div class="eds-l-mar-bot-8 structured-content" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; font-family: "Neue Plak", -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, Roboto, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Tahoma, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14.9333px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: 0.5px; margin: 0px 0px 32px; orphans: 2; padding: 0px; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><h2 class="eds-text-bl eds-l-mar-bot-4" style="font-size: 1.125rem; font-weight: 600; letter-spacing: 0.25px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px -0.25px 16px 0px; padding: 0px; text-rendering: optimizelegibility;">About this event</h2><div class="has-user-generated-content" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><div class="eds-l-mar-vert-6 eds-l-sm-mar-vert-4 eds-text-bm structured-content-rich-text" style="font-size: 0.875rem; font-weight: 400; line-height: 1.25rem; margin: 24px 0px; padding: 0px; text-rendering: optimizelegibility;"><div class="eds-text--left" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"></p><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;"><b style="font-weight: 700; padding-top: 0px;">What does the recent Russia/Ukraine conflict tell us about our energy security? Is renewable energy the answer, or is there more to the equation? What should our energy systems look like in these times of unprecedented global change?</b></p><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;">Join Scientists Warning Europe for the second event in our Road to COP27 series: Energy and the Climate Crisis.</p><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;">In this discussion, energy experts from both science and industry will delve into the changes that are rapidly required to secure humanity's safety on a local, national, and international level.</p><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;">The panel will also offer suggestions of what we can each do, as individuals, to protect our access to energy.<br /><br /></p><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;">Panellists include:</p><ul style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; list-style: outside; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px 2em;"><li style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><b style="font-weight: 700; padding-top: 0px;">Ed Gemmell<span> </span></b>- Managing Director of Scientists Warning Europe, Climate Politician</li><li style="margin: 0px; padding: 5px 0px 0px;"><b style="font-weight: 700; padding-top: 0px;">Professor Chris Rhodes</b><span> </span>- Director of Fresh-lands Environmental Actions</li><li style="margin: 0px; padding: 5px 0px 0px;"><b style="font-weight: 700; padding-top: 0px;">Keila Abreu<span> </span></b>- Development Director of Electric Land</li><li style="margin: 0px; padding: 5px 0px 0px;"><b style="font-weight: 700; padding-top: 0px;">Andy Caulton</b><span> </span>- Founder and CEO of Hope Energy</li></ul><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;">This session includes a 45 minute panel discussion, followed by a 30 minute Q&A session where attendees are invited to share ideas and explore topics further.</p><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;">At COP26 Scientists Warning Europe launched a new paper, the 'Scientists Warnings into Action'. It expanded on the six stressors identified in the previous three warnings of Nature, Population, Economy, Food and Pollutants and - the focus of this discussion - Energy. This fourth great scientists Warning has already been signed by over 3,000 scientists and is currently collecting more signatures by graduates in any science on the way to COP27.</p><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;">All proceeds go towards Scientists Warning Europe's charitable work and climate campaigning activities.</p><p style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.5rem; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 0px;">Scientists Warning Europe is a registered charity in England and Wales with charity number 1194090.</p></div></div></div></div></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-12056012658360035572022-05-17T16:52:00.026+01:002023-06-09T15:35:28.324+01:00“Reading Hydro” – Microhydropower on the River Thames at Caversham Lock (Reading, UK).<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj3s2TIqdYuAXydENZ0wtNMmvxyQ-caw845dmVrpfeRY4afRL1lA3tkvBENtw2xxpNVtOqbEez2SU0ydS939iMjGdkRyuiN5W1iHAd3s3Mnme-VihXHKodo_oTOOo10z7zmKLHBY9i1-DR_bR0eZLc43_8AW8mYBnN8otrrjlmx7fs-vuJ1tw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3864" data-original-width="5152" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj3s2TIqdYuAXydENZ0wtNMmvxyQ-caw845dmVrpfeRY4afRL1lA3tkvBENtw2xxpNVtOqbEez2SU0ydS939iMjGdkRyuiN5W1iHAd3s3Mnme-VihXHKodo_oTOOo10z7zmKLHBY9i1-DR_bR0eZLc43_8AW8mYBnN8otrrjlmx7fs-vuJ1tw" width="320" /></a></div><br />As the culmination of many years of hard work, persistence and dedication, the <a href="https://readinghydro.org/">“Reading Hydro”</a> microhydropower system has been generating electricity on the weir at Caversham Lock (Reading, UK) since 13 August 2021. With a drop (“Head”) of about 1.4 metres and an average river water flow of 3 cubic metres per second ("<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cubic_metre_per_second">cumecs</a>") passing through each one, its twin turbines (weighing in at almost 6 tonnes apiece, and named “Tony” and “Sophie”, after the project leaders, Dr Tony Cowling and Sophie London) generate a combined output of 46 kW, and are expected to deliver 320,000 kWh (320 MWh) over a year, which is equivalent to the typical electricity consumption of 90 homes. [The turbines could produce 65 kW, but the generators are set at 46 kW, which is the limit above which <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feed-in_tariffs_in_the_United_Kingdom">feed-in tariffs</a> would not be obtained].<br /><br />The turbines are of an <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screw_turbine">Archimedes Screw Design</a>, which converts the energy from flowing river water into rotational energy, since the weight of water entering the screw presses down onto its blades, and forces it to turn. The upper end of the turbine is connected via a gearbox to an electrical generator, and the water, having passed through its length, flows freely on into the river. The scheme is owned and operated by a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co-operative_and_Community_Benefit_Societies_and_Credit_Unions_Act_2010">community benefit society</a> (Reading Hydro CBS), which was founded in 2017, and the required funding (£1.2 million) was raised through offering shares to the local community.<div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgP5horeKOaA9FD1pZA40JCdEBALdtk1yviJfRIK__pl3aeKYhMdAqEd8A3N_PQTnXtUdsrHPtyaEgfzyLE9d6KtGt5aJL44S0MQwhJcTEhiZEdxAXC26wIfc7rb3hb1z-SEpEPFtwGRm3ZGfjKtPMvgdu-d7z7tIpiohHjuAVDhIPHSagejg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3864" data-original-width="5152" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgP5horeKOaA9FD1pZA40JCdEBALdtk1yviJfRIK__pl3aeKYhMdAqEd8A3N_PQTnXtUdsrHPtyaEgfzyLE9d6KtGt5aJL44S0MQwhJcTEhiZEdxAXC26wIfc7rb3hb1z-SEpEPFtwGRm3ZGfjKtPMvgdu-d7z7tIpiohHjuAVDhIPHSagejg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div>The turbine house has been decorated on two sides with a mural by a group of young artists, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/CJugendstil/">Commando Jugendstil</a>, entitled <i>Community Energym</i>, which represents the sustainable power that Reading Hydro will generate for the local community, with the slogan: “This Energy is By the people, for the people.” On a third side of the building is a depiction of <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warming_stripes">Warming Stripes</a>, </i>a visual representation of the change in average global temperature that has occurred since 1850, and devised by Professor Ed Hawkins of Reading University. Thus, emphasis is given to the importance of renewable energy – such as hydropower – in displacing fossil fuels and their emissions.</div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhvoF88cpcWQgO8-wQ86KaHeUZT1EAXfljQJLUqfZLkLJbDi6UVgklsP6cuAR9BmzuwEt2R7owzBX0hBQ5rjIlpDEVPWyuCY0yQF50uxS46CGu_-OcbkEh5cJGdMXaFw2a9v-GEVxl-LPwViiaknpOJ18IQWvfkhQciqBNDMk0WtLExvqNdXg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3864" data-original-width="5152" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhvoF88cpcWQgO8-wQ86KaHeUZT1EAXfljQJLUqfZLkLJbDi6UVgklsP6cuAR9BmzuwEt2R7owzBX0hBQ5rjIlpDEVPWyuCY0yQF50uxS46CGu_-OcbkEh5cJGdMXaFw2a9v-GEVxl-LPwViiaknpOJ18IQWvfkhQciqBNDMk0WtLExvqNdXg" width="320" /></a></div><br />Clearly, a substantial upfront investment in fossil fuel energy is required, to make the steel and concrete, transport the turbines etc., and to construct the entire facility. Nonetheless, the technology appears to offer a very good longer term energy investment, given that the <a href="https://escholarship.org/content/qt7934c9fk/qt7934c9fk_noSplash_8431028fe46262c8f930cbd262a2fd5f.pdf">EROI (energy return on investment) for microhydro power schemes has been reckoned at 41-78</a>, as integrated over a 50 year period [and perhaps three times as much over 100 years and with reduced transportation energy costs, although there would most likely be energy needed for maintenance and repairs over such a long time]. Moreover, the harvested energy is “clean”, i.e. carbon-free, and also contributes toward local community resilience.<br /><br />There are often concerns raised about the environmental impacts of renewable energy sources, and Reading Hydro is no exception. However, the Archimedes Screw design is “fish friendly”, meaning that fish can pass, unharmed, down the turbine and into the river, although they can’t swim back to the top again. Thus, to allow them a safe return passage, a new fish pass was sculpted-out on the immediately adjacent View Island, as an essential part of the overall approval process for building the facility. The fish pass crosses this tranquil and leafy island as a sinuously flowing stream, and both fish and eels can be seen swimming along its length, resting as necessary among the artificial reeds. It is, therefore, a very pleasant place to visit, along with the excellent educational aspects, and "feel" for what energy really means, offered by the microhydropower installation itself.</div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEglT8hILf9SVFoZ6Sb5QGHGqurvG45P9KzXggZFuw08TIfRjbOQBJML4s_CAcq4ktcGXVqbo3ugS1QHx7h4qUZb634FoOUGg4sU-o-Xm08nPfJeIQ4W0mgE3PBj3_0RMbiiMd1M1Lhbb92MmJYIPOHcBsZmaceRYERkwodoBU7x8lN1ShQbBg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="3864" data-original-width="5152" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEglT8hILf9SVFoZ6Sb5QGHGqurvG45P9KzXggZFuw08TIfRjbOQBJML4s_CAcq4ktcGXVqbo3ugS1QHx7h4qUZb634FoOUGg4sU-o-Xm08nPfJeIQ4W0mgE3PBj3_0RMbiiMd1M1Lhbb92MmJYIPOHcBsZmaceRYERkwodoBU7x8lN1ShQbBg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div>Both the Turbine House and View Island are accessible via a public footpath (known to locals as <i>The Clappers</i>) that crosses over the lock and the weir. More information about Reading Hydro can be found <a href="https://readinghydro.org/">here</a>. There is also a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/rdghydro">Facebook page</a>.<br /><br /><br /><b><i>Carbon Savings. </i></b><br /><br />It is instructive to reckon the power output of the Reading Hydro facility, in terms of the amount of coal, say, that it effectively displaces from electricity production. There are <a href="https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/coal/">different types of coal</a>, and which differ in the amount of <a href="https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/coal-heating-values-d_1675.html">energy they deliver on combustion</a>, but let’s assume 30 GJ/tonne (i.e. high quality anthracitic coal):<br /><br />46 kW output = 46,000 J/s. (x 3600 s/hr) = 165.6 MJ. (x 8760 hr/yr) = 1.45 x 10^12 J/yr. Since this amounts to 403 MWh/yr (i.e. as running throughout the year, second by second, with no interruption), the expected output of 320 MWh/year corresponds to an efficiency (“capacity factor”) of about 80%. <br /><br />By direct energy-for-energy reckoning, 320 MWh is equivalent to 38.4 tonnes of coal (30 GJ/tonne), but to allow for Carnot Cycle losses in the coal-fired power plant, we need to multiply by 2.47 = 95 tonnes per year, or <b>a quarter of a tonne of coal saved per day.</b></div></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-55041808440887747882022-04-23T10:13:00.032+01:002022-04-25T08:28:07.214+01:00“Four Meals From Anarchy” – We Must Grow More Food Locally.A friend sent me a link to this <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfZZ2VAK8p0">video interview</a> of Michael Raw, an agricultural consultant, about the fragility of Britain’s food supply, which frankly shocked me. The “four meals from anarchy” is a quote to MI5, meaning that Britain could descend very rapidly indeed to large-scale disorder, including looting and rioting in the event of a <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/britain-four-meals-away-from-anarchy-fc9kfgc0w92">catastrophe that stops the supply of food</a>.<div><br />The UK’s food policy substantially presumes that foreign countries will continue to send us shiploads of food, and currently over half of what is consumed here is imported. This is perilous indeed, especially at a time when many nations are adopting their own protectionist policies, restricting food exports so to feed their own people. Should supply shortages occur, currently high food prices will escalate further still. For example, at an undersupply of 3% a 12% food price increase is expected, at 5% this rises to 20%, while at 10%, food prices would probably double. <br /><br />The implementation of rationing cannot be ruled out, as happened during WWII, although this actually continued until 1954, when the “housewife” had to spend 30-50% of her budget on food. [Now, the food shopping costs more like 8-10% of a household’s total income, whoever actually goes out to buy it, the difference being used in other areas for discretionary spending and overall growth of the economy]. Despite the immense debt borne from the war, the UK government subsidised the nation's farmers, which guaranteed oversupply, and meant that although prices did increase, the gradient remained within manageable limits, unlike the 21% increase that has occurred in only the past 12 months. <br /><br />Even though farmers have been calling for food security for a number of years, this has had little effect. Raw avers that a time is very likely at hand when supermarkets will experience massive queues, but merely to get inside the buildings, since with their shelves empty there will be no one waiting in line at the cash tills. <br /><br />Soaring costs of fertilizers might be taken as an indicator of what is likely to happen to food prices. Thus, a tonne of what is essentially ammonium nitrate, sold at £180 in the autumn (£220 in the spring) of 2020, then increased to £350 in spring 2021, and is now trading at £650, with quotes for spring 2023, i.e. for next year’s harvest, at £1,000 a tonne. So, a farmer who was paying £20,000 for his/her fertilizer in 2020, can expect to shell out £100,000 next year. This is a disastrous situation for many farmers, who could not even borrow this much from the bank, given the huge overall financial loss that this represents. <br /><br />As a way around the fertilizer problem, some farmers in the South/East of the UK, whose land is intrinsically well supplied with phosphate and potash, have switched to growing leguminous crops, such as red clover and field beans as animal fodder, which naturally fix nitrogen, and so do not need the application of increasingly unaffordable artificial nitrogen fertilizers. Not all farmers are so fortunate, and need to buy and apply phosphate and potash; however, since 33% of the world’s potash comes from Russia-Ukraine, a serious supply shortage seems likely for the foreseeable future.<br /><br />Hence the availability and price of fertilizers will determine the crops that farmers are able to grow over, say, the next five years. There is much more in this interview, which is excellent, and the interviewer remarks appositely that “we should be making a documentary talk show, but this is actually a horror film...” Raw makes the point that rather than rewilding, more of the available land should be used for food production, although this would cost money, which we don’t have. However, this was exactly the situation during 1945-1954 when the government supported its agriculture, obviously finding the money from somewhere. Controlling exports and securing imports, with farmers producing more food are identified as critical factors, but what can people do individually to make sure they have enough food? <br /><br />Raw agrees that having a chest freezer is not a bad idea, but stresses the importance of growing your own food, and says that 50% of his family’s food comes from an allotment and some raised beds in the back garden, which they use to stock their freezer. He says that having an allotment ought to be a public right, and we could see legislation go through parliament, which would enact upon parish, district and county councils, so that anyone wanting an allotment can get one in three months, rather than going onto a six year waiting list. This would necessitate a compulsory leasing (not compulsory purchasing), and it should be a public right to be given access to a piece of land to feed your family. <br /><br />Elsewhere, it has been estimated that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/food/2022/jan/24/uk-could-grow-up-fruit-and-vegetables-urban-green-spaces">40% of the UK’s fruit and veg</a> (most of which is imported) could be grown in gardens, along with some of the “spare” land in parks, playing fields, watersides and other urban green spaces that are currently overlooked. At a time when allotment provision across the country is vastly oversubscribed, taking a broader view of such neglected sites could rapidly increase the possibilities for local food production. Some changes in our diet would be necessary, to substitute fruits and vegetables that grow well over here, for those currently imported that are not suited to the British climate.<br /><br />The pandemic and Brexit have provided a taster of how vulnerable our food system is to import supply shocks. Farmland in the UK is already under pressure, not only for agriculture, but from urbanisation and demand for new homes; however, a two year pilot study indicates that urban plots <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/dec/15/city-allotments-could-be-as-productive-as-conventional-farms-research-finds">can be as productive as conventional farms</a>. Brownfield sites should not be overlooked either for food growing, by using raised beds to get around problems of soil contamination. <br /><br />Providing sufficient access to affordable food for its population is an underpinning prerequisite for any properly functioning society, and given the clear risks posed by the UK’s current heavy reliance on imports, far more domestic – particularly locally based – food production must be established as a matter of urgency, i.e. before people begin to go hungry.<br /></div>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-63936656716982423582022-03-16T09:44:00.002+00:002022-03-16T09:55:58.965+00:00Russia-Ukraine War and the Changing Energy Landscape.The can of worms that is our global use of energy, has been levered open yet further by the escalating war in Ukraine. Prices of all types of energy had already been hiked dramatically as a result of a strong economic rebound post-covid, but with limited capacity to meet additional demand. As a result of a potential embargo on Russian fuels, the UK price of natural gas briefly hit <a href="https://www.simplyswitch.com/uk-natural-gas-prices-hit-record-high-amid-suggestion-of-embargo-on-russian-imports/">800p per therm</a>, or sixteen times that of March 2021. Oil prices too, are at a high not seen since just before the Great Recession of 2008, with Brent crude spiking at <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-07/oil-keeps-rising-as-russian-invasion-reverberates-across-markets">$128 a barrel</a>, and driving record prices for petrol and diesel. Since energy underpins everything we do, its cost sets the baseline for all other commodities, including food, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/food-prices-hit-record-high-february-un-agency-says-2022-03-04/">whose prices are also surging globally</a>. <br /><br />Europe is dependent on Russia for around 40% of its gas, thus making any supply restrictions extremely problematic, to put it mildly: for example, if Russia were to carry out its threat to <a href="https://www.marketplace.org/2022/03/15/russia-threatened-to-shut-off-its-gas-taps-to-europe-can-it-do-that/">cut off the gas</a>. Similarly, refusals by the West to buy Russian oil beg the question of whether matching quantities can be secured from elsewhere. Given that oil is the lifeblood of industrial civilization, and we run the risk of a demand/supply gap, leading to soaring prices – <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/oil-could-hit-200-per-barrel-over-war-ukraine-rystad-energy-2022-03-08/">$200 a barrel has been suggested</a> – the economic consequences would almost certainly be catastrophic. <br /><br />The European Commission has now pledged to curb massively its purchase of Russian gas: by some <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/%5Beuropa_tokens:europa_interface_language%5D/ip_22_1511">two thirds by the end of this year</a>. The proposed mechanism for this includes establishing a greater diversity of suppliers, biomethane production, and energy efficiency strategies for buildings, including behavioural changes such as turning down thermostats to curb energy demand. Indeed, demand reduction must be a salient part of any viable future energy blueprint. <br /><br />Although the UK is <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/08/no-10-plans-cut-russian-fossil-fuels-use">far less dependent on Russian oil and gas</a>, the government has taken a cue to build energy security, to which end it intends to roll out more <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/russia-ukraine-and-uk-energy-factsheet">nuclear power, renewable energy</a> and domestic <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/energy-oil-gas-ukraine-boris-johnson-b2035408.html">production of fossil fuels</a>. Now this is where a number of forces converge, namely, domestic energy production, final energy use, and climate change.<br /><br />Thus, to maintain our reliance on oil and gas – whether imported (from wherever) or home grown – clearly flies in the face of intentions to cut current emissions levels <a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/2018/10/08/summary-for-policymakers-of-ipcc-special-report-on-global-warming-of-1-5c-approved-by-governments/">practically in half by 2030</a>: just 7 years and 9 months away. However, an according expansion of energy production from nuclear or renewables necessitates that it be used in final form as electricity, and so those aspects of transportation, running buildings and industry, currently directly reliant on oil and gas, would need to become increasingly electrified. <br /><br />In this same spirit of energy security, the huge amount of energy wasted must also be reduced, especially by retrofitting buildings with thermal and draught insulation, and reconfiguring towns and cities so that more can be done at the local level (including growing food), thus eliminating unnecessary transportation and its fuel requirements. Such actions would help to curb carbon emissions, and reduce demand for additional “low-carbon” energy, noting that the most reliable form of renewable energy is energy not used at all. Through a combination of such measures, <a href="https://low-energy.creds.ac.uk/the-report/">overall energy demand in the UK could be more than halved</a>. <br /><br />It has been proposed that an <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/mar/07/uk-should-mobilise-army-of-volunteers-to-transform-energy-landscape">army of volunteers should be mobilised to install small-scale renewable energy across the UK</a>, thus furthering national energy independence. Moreover, some degree of decentralisation of our energy system would contribute to local and regional energy resilience, thus providing a necessary buffer against the many storms of a <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-02/permaculture-regenerative-not-merely-sustainable/">changing global climate</a> that are likely to prevail upon us.Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-90974001340865869112021-11-14T11:49:00.026+00:002021-11-15T17:15:22.593+00:00 Confronting the Changing Climate: COP26 - Scientists’ Warnings into Action, from Local to Global.Human civilization stares out over a cliff edge. As a species in ecological <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/15/4508">overshoot</a>, our journey cannot continue on its present path. The <a href="https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/warnings-to-humanity">first</a> Scientists Warning paper was issued in 1992, stressing mainly the ecological damage then inflicted by humans, and a 2017 <a href="https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/warnings-to-humanity">study</a> demonstrated that the subsequent twenty-five years had only witnessed further destruction of the ecosphere. The World Scientists’ Warning of a Climate Emergency report, published in <a href="https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/70/1/8/5610806">2019</a>, which has now been endorsed by a total of <a href="https://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/">14,594 scientists from 158 countries</a>, emphasised a set of collective actions, aimed toward restoring and protecting natural ecosystems, conserving energy, reducing food waste, the adoption of a more plant-based diet, population control and economic reforms. However, two subsequent papers, in <a href="https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/70/6/446/5828583?login=true">2020</a> and <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-climate-emergency-2020-in-review/">2021</a> merely confirmed a further, dramatic deterioration of all climate markers. <br /><p><br />The <b><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00368504211056290">“WORLD SCIENTISTS’ WARNINGS INTO ACTION”</a></b> (SWIA) paper was published on Friday, November 12th (2021), formally the concluding day of the <a href="https://ukcop26.org/">COP26</a> climate change conference, although a <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_21_6021">final agreement</a> was not actually reached until late on the Saturday (13th). <br /><br />It is the “Into Action” qualifier that sets this publication apart from the previous warnings, since it offers practical means for steering away from the abyss, and toward a new territory where human needs are met, harmoniously, within the biocapacity of the Earth. SWIA summons all levels of leadership, from local to global, as are required to make real the proposed changes. Only immediate, rapid and far reaching action has a serious chance of keeping the Earth’s mean global temperature below the 1.5 degree limit. <br /><br />Nonetheless, we do not “only” have to stop the Earth from heating (as a result of excess energy restrained from radiating into outer space by greenhouse gases), which drives climate change. While this challenge is, of itself, massive, it is really a single identifier of a whole system that is out of balance: a mechanism of resource hyperconsumption which transgresses several vital, but interwoven, planetary boundaries, powered by burning <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-02-28/human-consumption-of-natural-resources-exceeds-an-annual-100-billion-tonnes/">15 billion tonnes of fossil fuels</a> per year. <br /><br />The term <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/">“changing climate”</a> has been used previously as a means to not only refer to global heating and climate change, but also encompass the many other indicators of systemic collapse, which are now part of our daily experience. Since it is the system of civilization that must be fixed, any means to accomplish this must, of necessity, also be systemic in nature, and bring about a consolidated amelioration of climate change, biodiversity loss, and relentless degradation of the ecosphere.<br /><br />Hence, decarbonising our energy sources, alone, will not put everything to rights, if the human animal still remains in a state of overshoot. Thus, reduction in our use of energy, and of all resources is essential, otherwise our climate targets may prove no more than hopeful and unrealistic attempts to preserve business as usual.<br /><br />At various points during COP26, murmerings could be heard that, “it may take some time”, but delay is a treacherous luxury, since actions must be well underway during the five-year planning cycle, 2022-2026, setting foundations to build upon, out to 2030, and onward to 2050. Without such urgent and cumulative action, we will fail to attain the necessary trajectory and momentum to turn the current situation around. <br /><br />The SWIA paper underlines six principal areas where effort must be focussed: Energy, Atmospheric Pollutants, Nature, Food Systems, Population Stabilisation, and Economic Reforms, of which the following is a highlighted summary: <br /><br /><br /><b>Energy. </b><br /><br />• A rapid decrease in global energy demand, including the inculcation of citizens to adapt to a less energy-intensive future, while a low-carbon energy supply is aggressively pursued. <br /><br />• Re-establishment of regional economies and commerce, so that populations are provided for as much as possible by regional resources, thus reducing reliance on carbon-intensive traded goods. <br /><br />• Buildings must be retrofitted, to curb the energy costs of running them, along with an acceleration of small-scale energy generation. <br /><br />•“Luxury” travel and trade, especially flights, inefficient vehicles and imported luxury goods must be curbed by the imposition of heavy taxes. <br /><br /><br /><b>Atmospheric Pollutants. </b><br /><br />• A new tipping point threatens, arising from dramatic Arctic warming, with the potential for a rapid and massive release of substantial reservoirs of methane, trapped in permafrost, into the Earth’s atmosphere with likely calamitous consequences. <br /><br />• Methane emissions must be intercepted at source, primarily from agriculture, and oil and gas production. <br /><br />• Furthermore, the safe and effective reduction of atmospheric methane levels must be achieved through a combination of nature-based and technological means. <br /><br /><br /><b>Nature.</b> <br /><br />• Some of the Earth’s major tropical and temperate forests have become carbon sources, rather than sinks. <br /><br />•Interdependent ecosystem processes - pollination, natural flood control and water purification have been damaged as a result of human activities. <br /><br />• Widespread conservation, restoration and rewilding are necessary, for natural habitats to recover sufficient resilience to support human survival. <br /><br />• The wholesale destruction and degradation of critical carbon-accumulating ecosystems such as forests, wetlands and grasslands must be halted immediately.</p><p>•Proforestation practices must be implemented, to protect mature forest ecosystems, while allowing secondary forests to continue growing; thus maximizing carbon storage, preserving and restoring biodiversity, and curbing emissions from harvested forests. <br /><br /><br /><b>Food Systems. </b><br /><br />• 8 billion people cannot be fed sustainably by the present food system, which is also responsible for 25+% of greenhouse gas emissions, 70% of freshwater consumption, and the majority of deforestation and nutrient runoff, the latter causing freshwater contamination and the emergence of coastal dead zones. <br /><br />• Widespread famines are likely within the present century: hence, leaders must act urgently at all, local, regional, national, and global, levels, over food production, land use, and farming practices. <br /><br />• It is also essential to shift rapidly from animal products to low impact, more plant based, foods, thus enhancing the efficiency of land and water use. <br /><br />• More regenerative (less degenerative) farming methods must be introduced rapidly, to protect and restore soil and other natural habitats. <br /><br /><br /><b>Population Stabilisation. </b><br /><br />• The human animal is in ecological overshoot, numbering 8 billion, and the Earth cannot sustain us. The addition of another 80 million people, year after year, only thwarts any efforts to alleviate climate instability, ecological destruction, famine, social and political instability and insecurity. <br /><br />• Leaders must acknowledge population and consumption as the two underpinning ‘multiplier threats’ to a sustainable civilization, and take bold, equitable, and just action by 2026 to bend the curve. <br /><br />• Support must be provided for wealthier families to have fewer children as the single most effective way to individually reduce their lifetime greenhouse gas emissions, while allowing poorer families to improve their situation, both economically and educationally. <br /><br /><br /><b>Economic Reforms. </b><br /><br />• The great magnitude of the current human enterprise drives climate change, biodiversity loss, and overall converging crises of the ecosphere. Since this is underpinned and driven by a system of growth economics, we need to rapidly supplant this by a new economic model that functions within planetary boundaries. <br /><br />• An urgent implementation of economic frameworks that support and prioritise the protection and restoration of natural capital and ecosystem services (including carbon sequestration, flood control, water purification, pollination, disease control). <br /><br />• An instigation of reforms to ensure that farm and forestry lands, like the oceans, rivers and wetlands, are managed for the long-term benefit of nature and humanity, rather than short-term profits. <br /><br /><br />We call on all scientists<b> to sign this paper, </b>and act in a united effort to avoid a catastrophic collapse of civilisation. <a href="https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/signature">https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/signature</a> <br /><br /><br />The time is now or never. Cooperation is fundamental to our success, and only by uniting as a human family, on all levels from local to global, can we hope to achieve an equitable and concordant future on our Mother Planet.</p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-55733489975045322552021-10-04T15:25:00.002+01:002021-10-05T07:54:38.126+01:00The Energy Crisis and the Climate Crisis.<p class="date"><a href="https://planetincrisis.libsyn.com/14-the-energy-crisis-and-the-climate-crisis?fbclid=IwAR2O1spAyJyBQx1BKLAals6pWwNbMV5YlnqVVwAH768AXOHsPaa_8s3usLo">Here is a short interview of me by Ed Gemmell, Managing Director of Scientists Warning Europe, in the run up to COP26.</a><br /><br /></p><p><strong>Help Drive Climate Action at COP26</strong> Support
our record-breaking campaign for COP26. There are just a few days
left. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbXBSeXNSaDlLdkdLMjNubUJYaGZ3dUs1TEpLUXxBQ3Jtc0tsTFhjNWYyMThzazFrek5KYzdwNXViOFdfa1I5SFFZbE10UllHdjNMd0xIMjEtLTMzakViNmFWUkVmVU1WdWR3STJFY2J1U09NbXRWaF9INlkxSU9ldERROWRacERSdnZMYkxFQlVsVzd5ZEhZd3dEOA&q=https%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2Fwarningintoaction" rel="noopener" target="_blank">https://bit.ly/warningintoaction</a></p>
<p>What actions must be taken at COP26, and what happens if this
doesn't happen? What can individuals do to help tackle the climate
crisis? Find out in this short interview with energy expert,
Professor Chris Rhodes.</p>
<p>“The world must quickly implement massive energy efficiency and
conservation practices and must replace fossil fuels with
low-carbon renewables and other cleaner sources of energy if safe
for people and the environment. We must swiftly eliminate subsidies
for fossil fuels and use effective and fair policies for steadily
escalating carbon prices to restrain their use.”</p>
<p>In this brief episode, Ed Gemmell, Managing Director of
Scientists Warning Europe, talks to Professor Chris Rhodes, who is
a Scientists Warning Europe Board member and well versed on all
aspects of energy. Chris quickly puts the limited transition
towards renewable energy we have made so far into perspective with
how much more needs to be done by 2050.</p>
<p>See the video version of this conversation at <a href="https://youtu.be/zkZrGIl8UJ8" rel="noopener" target="_blank">https://youtu.be/zkZrGIl8UJ8</a></p>
<p class="p5">Scientists Warning Europe presents and promotes
science endorsed solutions which will lead to a just transition for
our World to a sustainable and equitable future. Learn more, sign
up for updates, and support our work at <a href="https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk" rel="noopener" target="_blank">https://www.scientistswarningeurope.org.uk</a></p>
<p class="p3">This podcast series is made possible through the
generous help of <span class="s3"><em>The Overpopulation
Podcast</em></span> and the <span class="s3"><em>GrowthBusters</em></span> podcast about limits to
growth.</p>
<p class="p3"><strong><br />
LINKS:</strong></p>
<p class="p3"><span class="s2"><a href="https://scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/">Scientists Warning
Europe</a><br /></span><a href="https://scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/" rel="noopener" target="_blank">https://scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/</a></p>
<p class="p3"><span class="s2"><a href="https://scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/warnings">All Three World
Scientists’ Warnings</a><br /></span><a href="https://scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/warnings" rel="noopener" target="_blank">https://scientistswarningeurope.org.uk/warnings</a></p>
<p class="p6"><span class="s4"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLyl1v07bfIaLHtXjYBtaca3YdlPaKC9Vx">
<em>Planet in Crisis</em> Pre-COP Video Series</a><br />
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLyl1v07bfIaLHtXjYBtaca3YdlPaKC9Vx">
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLyl1v07bfIaLHtXjYBtaca3YdlPaKC9Vx</a></span></p>
<p class="p3"><em>GrowthBusters</em> podcast<br />
<a href="http://www.growthbusters.org/podcast/" rel="noopener" target="_blank">http://www.growthbusters.org/podcast/</a></p><p> </p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-13441786424788940642021-08-15T09:23:00.027+01:002021-08-16T11:42:04.188+01:00IPCC Climate Report Signals “Code Red” for Humanity, but the reality is so much worse.<p><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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</p><p>Following on the heels of the “Net Zero by 2050” roadmap <a href="https://www.iea.org/reports/net-zero-by-2050">(NZE)</a> from the International Energy Agency (IEA), is the latest <a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/assessment-report/ar6/">IPCC Climate Report</a>, which <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/10/code-red-for-humanity-what-the-papers-say-about-the-ipcc-report-on-the-climate-crisis">signals a “code red” for humankind</a> in terms of widespread extreme weather events. It also unequivocally establishes a near-linear relationship between cumulative anthropogenic CO2 emissions, as a result of burning fossil fuels and deforestation, and the planetary warming that is driving climate change.</p><p>Such a relationship accords that a carbon budget can be used to quantify necessary mitigation requirements for restricting warming to within specific limits; most significantly, it may be deduced that in order to stabilise human-induced global temperature increase at any level, net anthropogenic CO2 emissions must be brought to zero. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/06/reduce-methane-or-face-climate-catastrophe-scientists-warn">Curbing methane emissions</a>, too, is a critical factor in limiting the global temperature increase.<br /> <br />Both reports agree that if immediate action is not undertaken to drastically reduce carbon emissions, the warming, systemic behemoth of the Earth’s ecosphere will break its leash at a temperature rise of 1.5°C, with projected climatic adversities unfolding across the globe. Nowhere will be safe. While all scenarios considered by the IPCC suggest a 1.5°C increase by 2040, it is in the latter decades of the present century that the full ramifications of a heat-driven changing climate will be discharged, which, at the extreme range of high greenhouse emissions, where the global temperature rises by 3.3-5.7°C, has been described as a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/10/code-red-for-humanity-what-the-papers-say-about-the-ipcc-report-on-the-climate-crisis">“hell on earth”</a>. <br /><br />One critical action, both reports make clear, is for no new coal fired power stations to be built beyond 2021, while NZE specifically emphasises <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2021-05-28/not-just-energy-but-everything/">no more drilling for new oil and gas fields</a>. Furthermore, the IPCC stresses, the OECD countries must phase out existing coal by 2030, and all others do likewise by 2040. In their ending of new fossil fuel exploration and production, all nations are urged to shift fossil-fuel subsidies into renewable energy, and by 2030, a quadrupling of solar and wind capacity should have happened, with a trebling of renewable energy investments, in order to keep on track for achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. <br /><br />Since a degree of warming of <a href="https://www.un.org/press/en/2021/sgsm20847.doc.htm">1.2 °C above pre-industrial levels has already taken place</a>, an urging of further climatic effects can be expected as the Earth warms up to the full 1.5°C, even if it were to stop there. Hence, the deployment of <a href="https://royalsociety.org/topics-policy/projects/biodiversity/nature-based-solutions/">adaptation strategies</a> like working with nature to address societal goals is a critical factor, to build resilience against the inevitable changes already factored into the climate system, as the UK government’s Chief Scientific advisor, Sir Patrick Vallance, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/09/ipcc-report-transforming-society-avert-catastrophe-net-zero">has summarised</a>: <br /><br />“We must also recognise that the climate has already changed, and will continue to do so as we near 1.5 C. The seas are rising, and floods and wildfires are more frequent. Again, science and engineering can help us to adapt, boosting the resilience of the most vulnerable and strengthening global food security. Existing tools can anticipate adverse events, while adjusting the design of cities, transport systems and agriculture can minimise their worst effects.” <br /><br />Fair enough, but although CO2 has been identified by the IPCC as the main driver (>50%) of climate change, to focus entirely on eliminating carbon emissions misses the systemic nature of a <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/">changing climate</a>, and by merely recasting the source of our energy supply (gargantuan task though this surely is) degradation of the natural environment and depletion of resources will not be abated. The fundamental driver is a massive overconsumption of resources, as has been more bluntly expressed that the human animal is in <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/en14154508">ecological overshoot</a>. <b>Hence, without a complete redesign and downsizing of the human enterprise, to bring it back within the carrying capacity of the Earth, the system cannot be “fixed”. </b><br /><br />According to the <a href="https://data.footprintnetwork.org/?_ga=2.9934709.1352344526.1610740013-650899000.1610740013#/compareCountries?type=earth&cn=5001,351,231&yr=2017">Global Footprint Network</a>, humans crossed the global overshoot threshold of “one planet” in 1970, and now, we are using up the equivalent of “1.75 planets”. However, the situation is even <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1001701">worse</a> than is formally expressed by this metric. For example, no biocapacity is set aside for <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2079-9276/7/3/58">non-human</a> creatures, even in the face of irrefutable biodiversity loss and species extinctions, and neither is the depletion of <a href="https://www.greenbiz.com/article/resource-depletion-serious-problem-footprint-estimates-dont-tell-us-much-about-it">non-renewable resources</a> (e.g. fossil fuels and minerals) explicitly accounted for. <br /><br />Other <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-021-00708-4">impacts</a>, such as depletion of fossil aquifers, soil erosion, desertification, deforestation, wildfires, floods, chemical and waste pollution, ocean acidification, pollinator decline, <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-10-02/solving-the-plastic-problem-from-cradle-to-grave-to-reincarnation/">plastics in the oceans (and everywhere else)</a>, are not reckoned either, as <a href="https://canadiancor.com/growth-through-contraction-conceiving-an-eco-economy">has been noted</a>: “Environmental Footprint estimates are actually conservative for several reasons. In particular, while the method can estimate the area of ecosystems “appropriated” by humans (the human EF) and compare this with available productive land and water area (biocapacity), it cannot account for erosion, other forms of depletion or lost productivity through pollution.” <br /><br />One further wildcard that could profoundly affect the course of the Earth’s climate is the loss of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/05/climate-crisis-scientists-spot-warning-signs-of-gulf-stream-collapse?utm_source=pocket-newtab-global-en-GB">stability and weakening of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation</a> (AMOC), and the Gulf Stream. <br /><br />From another perspective, <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2014/09/30/a-wicked-problem-controlling-global-climate-change">climate change has been described as a “Wicked Problem”</a>, that is to say, one characterised by complexity, and lacking a simple solution, unlike a “tamer” challenge such as solving a mathematical equation or winning a game of chess. In this context, “wicked” does not mean “evil”, but signifies a resistance to resolution. The lack of balance that is signalled by the many apparent “problems” (<a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/">the changing climate</a>), including those just mentioned, occur because the system overall, is in a state of distortion. Hence, only the application of a systemic approach might improve the outcome; as, for example, in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permaculture">permaculture</a>, where the overall functioning of a given system is optimised, through mutually harmonising the arrangement of its constituent elements, working together in a dynamic equilibrium. <br /><br />In order to begin optimising the elements of humans within the limits of the biosphere, we might approach the latter with an emphasis on protecting nature and allowing it to achieve its full potential, in which case various problematic issues begin to fall into line. Such thinking is at the root of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proforestation">proforestation</a>, forest and land regeneration, regenerative agriculture, agroforestry, and other <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nature-based_solutions">nature based solutions</a>. <br /><br />Clear <a href="https://canadiancor.com/growth-through-contraction-conceiving-an-eco-economy/">culpability for overshoot</a> has been placed at the door of our neoliberal economic system, which requires perpetual “growth” to feed it, positing that the only way out of this is through re-localisation into smaller communities, none of which exceed the regenerative limits (carrying capacity) of their local region: “The most adaptive form of this new civilization might be a network of cooperation-based eco-regional economies supporting many fewer people thriving more equitably within the regenerative capacity of their local ecosystems.” <br /><br />It is further proposed that a global population of <a href="https://canadiancor.com/growth-through-contraction-conceiving-an-eco-economy/">“one to two billion... could live comfortably indefinitely within the biophysical means of nature.”</a> Nevertheless, how such a population contraction by <i>6 billion or more</i> might happen exactly is a moot and open question. As viewed through any lens, such a future landscape does look vastly different from the present, with all pretence razed that we can carry on (over)consuming more or less as we do now, having "only" net-zeroed our carbon emissions by putting renewable energy in place of fossil fuels. Quite correctly, the need for a complete, corporeal reconstruction of society is identified, not just a makeover. <br /><br />Certainly, if we do nothing, or only half-heartedly, we all cook together in the same planetary pot. So, we have to reduce emissions. Depletion of finite resources and degradation of the natural environment are associated issues. Since the <a href="https://www.oxfam.org/en/research/confronting-carbon-inequality">richest 10% produce 52% of emissions</a> (which can also be taken as a kind of proxy for resource use, in general), this is where the greatest reductions must be made. <br /><br />Energy efficiency is an essential counterpart to low-carbon energy generation: for example, better thermal insulation and draught-proofing of buildings, while working from home or locally, avoids commuting and reduces demand for transportation fuels. Heavy carbon taxes could be introduced, but not across the board, so to avoid the poorest people being hit unfairly by rising energy costs; rather, to target “luxury” activities, such as unnecessary flights and travel in general, excessive car ownership (number and size), and purchase of (mostly imported) non-essential consumer “stuff” - frippery that no one really needs, and may not truly want. <br /><br /> A reconfiguration of towns and cities is necessary to assist non-carbon intensive travel (walking and cycling), based around community hubs where accommodation, work and leisure activates are integrated into the same area, along with low energy local food growing and soil improvement. Natural regeneration/rewilding can be introduced within and around community spaces, so that low maintenance pollinator corridors and habitat are created in cities, towns and villages, thus converting them into a network of insect reserves. By installing remakeries and repair cafes, the overall consumption of resources and the production of waste can be ameliorated, along with associated emissions of greenhouse and landfill gases, and plastic pollution too. <br /><br /> There are good reasons to believe that <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/en14154508">there will be less overall energy available to us in the future</a> than we currently “enjoy”, which is a further critical reason for undertaking a designed energy descent. We may take an optimistic view of <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-04-13/transition-towns-re-localisation-covid-19-and-the-fracking-industry/">re-localisation as the best single strategy</a> for significantly curbing demand for oil and energy in general, mitigating greenhouse gas emissions, building community resilience, improving health and wellbeing, increasing energy security, and reducing supply chain vulnerability; although, it is most likely <a href="https://www.thefreelibrary.com/De-growth+is+not+a+liberal+agenda%3A+Relocalisation+and+the+limits+to...-a0446300575">naive to think</a> that such a transition would be a simple and painless process. <br /><br />Nonetheless, despite the remarkable technological advances and “progress” of our “civilization”, humans may remain too immature to <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1755088217713765">cooperate to the extent necessary</a> to pull off the great “energy” transition, and will continue to squabble and bicker on into the flames of Hell! <br /><br /><b>There is no <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/11/no-getting-back-to-normal-climate-breakdown-ipcc-report">"getting back to normal”</a>; now is the dawn of a new age, either by design or default.</b> We have to thoroughly transform how we live, or it will be transformed for us. Indeed, it may well prove <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/en14154508">“easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for humanity to shift its prevailing paradigm and embark on a planned, voluntary descent from a state of overshoot to a steady-state harmonic relationship with the ecosphere—in just a decade or two.”</a> </p><p>The alternative, however, is the fulfillment of Paul Kingsnorth’s warning averment, that, quite simply, industrial civilization <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/apr/12/confessions-of-a-recovering-environmentalist-by-paul-kingsnorth-review">“will run on, until it runs out.”</a>
</p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-63642247293388904392021-07-17T12:19:00.032+01:002021-07-20T09:30:06.118+01:00Covid-19 and the Changing Climate: Seeking the Word.<p>The prospect of getting back to normal, of being released from the current peculiar restricted condition is suddenly almost as overwhelming as was <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-07-21/will-the-virus-go-away-post-covid-or-recalibration/">the initial lockdown</a>. Then, I felt something close to panic: a sense of imminently being trapped, and yet, a year or so on, while I can’t say that I like the situation, an accustomed routine and familiarity has crystallized around me. It is indeed a bubble of me and mine, cocooning us from normal expectations and demands. Once the bunker doors are again thrown open (practically all lockdown restrictions to be lifted in England on Monday, July 19th, and fanfared as <a href="https://inews.co.uk/news/uk/covid-rules-from-19-july-lockdown-restrictions-easing-after-freedom-day-explained-1105651">“Freedom Day”</a>) this metastable state of limbo will cease to exist, and we will be impelled to move forward into a landscape that has grown all the more uneasy by temporal disconnection and dissociated contemplation of what it might now extend to us.<br /> <br /> Imminently, there will be actions to perform, decisions to be made; the suspension of the real and the mundane is over, and normal responsibilities no longer in abeyance. Probably, the best I can say is that I feel as though I have been in a state of “suspended animation”; how otherwise could the past sixteen months have moved four-dimensionally past my three dimensional awareness, with time as an absent component? What we normally call time gives a sense of directedness – without it, all appears in randomness. Thoughts of future, making plans, being fretted by past errors – if they were really that – and other directionalities of the ego, have become isotropic.<br /> <br /> The normal signposts spin and average out to zero, as though time were effectively nonexistent or irrelevant. This is probably a defence mechanism: a local anaesthetic that is beginning to wear off, and I oscillate between a detached numbness, and a wish for something more, or just else. I have been trying to find a word for how exactly I do feel, but it is hard to be specific, hence describing the whole condition in terms of suspension. The emotions themselves are not singular – there is no one feeling – more a roiling of alternatively not quite happy, near fretful, and weirdly almost contented contrasts. Then the mood morphs again. <br /><br />The word ennui gives some sense of definition for this cacophony of mental sensations, but doesn’t entirely fill the void. Perhaps I don’t understand the root of it properly, and there is a mismatch between how I feel viscerally and an analytical urge which is merely cerebral (or disembodied, at least)? Definitely, a kind of incongruity is present somewhere, almost absurdist in its disharmony; that the realm of existence is out of kilter with my perception of reality, or how it ought to be. <br /><br />If we need <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropy_(arrow_of_time)">entropy as a measure that time does exist and what its direction is</a>, the state of <a href="https://www.scientistswarning.org/warnings/">enlarging chaos around the world</a> – both natural and political – suggests impermanency, which is also isotropic in its unfolding drama. Disintegration is all around – <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/">the changing climate</a> – which I look out upon as from a storm’s eye: a node of great forces, whose calmness is deceptive indeed. Yet I have the sense that its impetus is shifting my way too, drawing in elements, albeit more slowly, that are all markers of change.<br /><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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</p><p>[Indeed, such is the scale and exquisite interlocking of our <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2021-05-28/not-just-energy-but-everything/">use of energy and resources</a>, to drive a mechanism <a href="https://www.scientistswarning.org/warnings/">seemingly hell bent on degrading the biosphere</a>, that I am beginning to wonder if, in some deep psychology, we have already decided that the present vehicle is on an unsustainable journey, and are increasingly loading it for the axle to break, and the wheels to come off.].<br /><br />The prospect that a more apt word than ennui is acedia, both uplifts me and weights me further down into the depths of definition. Here, the striving is not only for a word per se, but for certainty of the feeling it needs to describe. Thus, it is not the mood that shifts, but the shadowing periodicity of my response to it. Nor is it languor precisely, either, which implies a sense of pleasure, the dreaminess of a balmy afternoon – of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYEC4TZsy-Y">Lou Reed’s “Perfect Day”</a> – a deliberately chosen oasis to rest beside, while well aware of the constancy and normality that exists beyond it and waits for the bubble to burst. Indeed, it is this two way mirror that actually makes the day or the moment what it is: unblemished and ephemeral. However, the current situation is not one of choice, nor does it provide respite; more a restless apathy, and dissatisfaction with an inertial reality. Thus, we see that the word sought must capture the essential duality of opposing forces, whose jarring mismatch drives a sense of great anxiety. <br /><br />The meaning of acedia itself is open to interpretation, but I am inclined toward the word by <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Acedia-Me-Marriage-Monks-Writers/dp/1594484384">Kathleen Norris, who, in her book "Acedia and Me"</a>, posits that terms such as torpor and sloth do not capture its mood; rather, that a state of restlessness, of “not living in the present and seeing the future as overwhelming” expresses it more closely. Thus, the enforced isolation that exists in monasteries (a sort of lockdown from the life that to most of us is normal), may give rise to it. In line with this, <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=cassian+%22sleep%2C+inactivity%2C+and+surrender+on+the+one+hand%22+acedia+baylor+%22amy+freeman%22&client=firefox-b-d&biw=1525&bih=740&sxsrf=ALeKk03-l3WXonb5NEdATZXPYuaUAAzCSQ%3A1626514163457&ei=86LyYJG0G9SW8gLy8oToAg&oq=cassian+%22sleep%2C+inactivity%2C+and+surrender+on+the+one+hand%22+acedia+baylor+%22amy+freeman%22&gs_lcp=Cgdnd3Mtd2l6EAM6BwgAEEcQsANKBAhBGABQvtABWO35AWDY_QFoAnACeACAAV-IAcsEkgEBN5gBAKABAaoBB2d3cy13aXrIAQLAAQE&sclient=gws-wiz&ved=0ahUKEwjR-by35enxAhVUi1wKHXI5AS0Q4dUDCA0&uact=5">Evagrius of Pontius</a> (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evagrius_Ponticus">Evagrius Ponticus</a>) averred that acedia seeds dissatisfaction in the monk for both his cell and existence, hence urging him to take flight; however, by becoming absorbed in prayer and the work of their community, these feelings can be suppressed.<br /><br />Evagrius’ protégé, <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=cassian+%22sleep%2C+inactivity%2C+and+surrender+on+the+one+hand%22+acedia+baylor+%22amy+freeman%22&client=firefox-b-d&biw=1525&bih=740&sxsrf=ALeKk03-l3WXonb5NEdATZXPYuaUAAzCSQ%3A1626514163457&ei=86LyYJG0G9SW8gLy8oToAg&oq=cassian+%22sleep%2C+inactivity%2C+and+surrender+on+the+one+hand%22+acedia+baylor+%22amy+freeman%22&gs_lcp=Cgdnd3Mtd2l6EAM6BwgAEEcQsANKBAhBGABQvtABWO35AWDY_QFoAnACeACAAV-IAcsEkgEBN5gBAKABAaoBB2d3cy13aXrIAQLAAQE&sclient=gws-wiz&ved=0ahUKEwjR-by35enxAhVUi1wKHXI5AS0Q4dUDCA0&uact=5">John Cassian</a>, took the view that acedia comprised two opposing symptoms - sleep, inactivity, and surrender on the one hand, and instability, fecklessness, and agitated activity for activity’s sake on the other. Cassian believed that the source of the problem was a lack of manual labour, based upon his interpretation of <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Thessalonians%203%3A6-15&version=NIV ">Thessalonians 3:6-15</a>, in which the Apostle Paul castigated those who were beset by acedia, lest they become idle and disruptive busybodies. <br /><br />Indeed, I have found great diversion and consolation in keeping physically active during this pandemic period: in my case, walking up to about 20 kilometres most days, allowing my senses to become absorbed in communing with Nature, photographing and identifying trees, and feeling something like a higher intelligence at work in the complex, interlaced mechanisms that underpin a <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.3184/003685017X14968299580423">woodland ecosystem</a>... especially an ancient one. <br /><br />The practical dealing with this condition is the proverbial <a href="https://alcoholrehab.com/alcohol-recovery/aftercare/one-day-at-a-time/">“one day at a time”</a>, and it is not so much coping with an addiction, but avoiding the uncharted. Planning ahead is part of the normal, but not exactly possible against a backdrop of uncertainty. As Winston Churchill observed, <a href="https://winstonchurchill.org/publications/churchill-bulletin/bulletin-057-mar-2013/winston-churchill-for-traders-a-analysts/">“it is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link of the chain of destiny can be handled at a time.”</a> This was, of course, during World War II, and parallels have been drawn between dealing with that and then, and this and now. [The common features are an enemy (i.e. a military foe or the virus), and not knowing if we will win; the great difference is that we are currently detached by a state of social distancing, rather than the mutual digging for victory and community support that prevailed during the war itself]. <br /><br />It is a lack of purpose, of looking ahead to achieving identified worthwhile goals, a temporal cage in which normal conduits of action-to-outcome are truncated or deactivated. A switching off of normal motivation. But it is not a calm place, rather one of restless agitation; a disconnected rattling around within an imprisoning vessel, outside of which nothing seems important enough to engage with. There is a pervasive sense of, “why bother?” Yet, oddly, in writing this, I feel suddenly better; like I’m beginning to sort my head out. It is disorder, but some visceral set of bones seems to be assembling, not just the wispy outlines of a detached apparition. <br /><br />I also feel a sense of “what’s the point?”, which is something different from “why bother?” It is a feeling of normal goals being futile that also forms a barrier to action. The latter is driven by a profound fear of the future, and an almost superstitious sense that by not acting, the latter can be held in abeyance, or avoided altogether; almost as though the flow of time itself can be suspended by passivity. <br /><br />There is also a perception that I really should be "doing something"; that time is running out, but the spur for action is not present, and this emotional dichotomy is overwhelming. Like the proverbial one foot on the accelerator and the other on the brake, there is an energy-consuming revving and rattling, but the vehicle does not advance, merely grinds and flexes in its own captive disquietude.<br /><br />Intolerance is a strong feature of this condition. Thus, I find
my reserve capacity is more limited, so that some things I normally
would take in my stride, become magnified and I have to regain my sense
of perspective. I find that writing lists, as I tend to when I have a
lot of different things to do, helps to keep me on track. Better still,
is when I have actual deadlines to do things by, and there is a definite set of
dates by when particular tasks, and exchanges with my co-workers must be
completed. <br /><br />A strong desire also prevails,
to slough off the wearying layers of the “old normal” – emotionally
vampiric and unnurturing associations, both with individuals and more
amorphous bodies, that drain finite resources of time and emotional
strength, while giving nothing worthwhile back. It is a stripping down
of mind and spirit – and body too, as I have lost about a stone in
weight, mainly through walking miles, finding succour in the natural
world – to a basic core that tries to fathom its own substance, and
where and with whom that might belong. In an oddly enervated way, I have
never yearned more thoroughly for significance and a sense of purpose. <br /><br />The
jab has proved particularly jarring, piercing the bubble of
disconnection: immediately, it links us both with the promise of a “back to
normal”, and an uncertainty that such a thing will prevail. Before the
massive numbers of vaccinations had actually happened – especially in
the UK – the actual and real could still be kept at a safe distance. <a href="https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/vaccinations">Now that the first jab has been delivered to almost 70% of the UK population (but with a bare half having had the “double jab”)</a>, our reconnection to future realities has begun, and we are being swept forward, inescapably, into a new momentum.<br /><br />Within the change that is all invasive – the disintegration of the familiar, the old; covid, climate change, <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-02-28/human-consumption-of-natural-resources-exceeds-an-annual-100-billion-tonnes/">resource misuse and depletion</a>, elections that show a lack of identity both of the individual nation citizens and their governance, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/dec/29/the-guardian-view-on-the-future-of-the-union-britain-faces-breakup">Brexit and the impending break-up of the UK union</a> - we may find motivation and heart in looking to <a href="https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20200930-why-embracing-change-is-the-key-to-a-good-life">embrace</a> the new age that is being born while old definitions amorphize. <br /><br />Perhaps, once we accept <a href="https://www.scientistswarning.org/warnings/">our reality</a>, we will know both the way and the word, but for now, I offer <i>gestation</i> to describe this peculiar place and its concomitant discomfort, viewing it as an <i>active</i> process, en route to our re-emergence into a more open space; but one that is somehow both structurally, and functionally a <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-07-21/will-the-virus-go-away-post-covid-or-recalibration/">recalibration</a> of the one we left, when we entered that first lockdown.</p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-88293670637432856832021-05-27T11:56:00.024+01:002021-05-29T10:55:12.181+01:00Not Just Energy, but Everything.<p>The criticality of the global energy situation is emphasised by the release, on schedule (18-5-21), of the eagerly awaited <a href="https://www.iea.org/reports/net-zero-by-2050">“Net Zero by 2050”</a> roadmap (NZE) from the International Energy Agency (IEA). <br /></p><br />Not only does this document delineate the gargantuan quantities of energy currently used by humans on Earth, mainly from the fossil fuels, but the enormity of change necessary to bring their emissions to net zero by 2050. [It is <a href="http://report.ipcc.ch/sr15/pdf/sr15_faq.pdf">thought</a> this would give a 50:50 chance of limiting the rise in global average temperature to <span style="color: black;"><a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/">1.5°C</a></span> above pre-industrial levels by 2100]. <br /><br />Although NZE is a guide, not a mandate, it fully identifies the steepness of the terrain that must be negotiated, with no new oil or gas fields to be approved, as of 2021. Instead, oil and gas producers would concentrate on output from existing fields, and in reducing any associated emissions. New coal mines and additional unabated coal fired power plants are also ruled out. <br /><br />Given that various governments, including that of the UK, who commissioned the report, are <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/18/no-new-investment-in-fossil-fuels-demands-top-energy-economist">set to endorse</a> various new fossil fuel projects, and oil companies continue to invest in new production, this particular criterion may prove difficult to meet. <br /><br />The publication of the roadmap is timed in anticipation of the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) of the United Nations Climate Change Framework Convention in Glasgow in November, whose high-level discussions it aims to inform. Even if the climate pledges made to date by the world’s governments were entirely fulfilled, the resulting reduction in global energy-related <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]-->CO<sub>2</sub> energy sector and industrial process emissions in 2050, although there are important structural differences, including avoiding “overshoot”. In particular, NZE depends less on bioenergy and carbon capture (CCUS/BECCS) technologies, but more on direct emissions reductions, with a greater share of wind and solar energy being introduced. Thus, the NZE vs (IPCC) <a href="https://www.carbonbrief.org/iea-renewables-should-overtake-coal-within-five-years-to-secure-1-5c-goal">figures</a> for 2050 are: fossil energy use = 120 EJ (184); overall energy use = 344 EJ (404); wind/solar share = 70% (53%); CCS = 7.6 Gt (8.4); BECCS = 1.9 Gt (4.5); bioenergy = 102 EJ (152) <br /><br />A doubling of current nuclear power (and also of hydroelectric capacity) is anticipated, which might raise some eyebrows. However, without it, much more solar PV and wind energy is necessary. Thus, in the NZE <a href="https://www.current-news.co.uk/news/iea-warns-of-huge-challenge-as-it-details-pathways-to-net-zero-power-transport-and-heat">“low nuclear and CCUS”</a> case (with nuclear 60% lower in 2050 than for NZE and only the existing planned CCUS projects completed) an additional 2,400GW of solar and wind capacity would be needed to compensate for the shortfall. In addition, around 480GW of battery capacity would be necessary, on top of the 3,100GW planned in NZE, and an extra 300GW of other dispatchable capacity to cope with seasonal energy demand. <br /><br />Profound changes must already have been made by 2030, to garner sufficient momentum that the NZE target can be reached “by 2050”. Such intense transformation is also necessary given the very tight remaining global carbon budget, and to minimise locking-in high emissions infrastructure. <a href="https://energy-now.co.uk/iea-releases-roadmap-for-the-global-energy-sector-to-reach-net-zero-emissions-by-2050/"><span style="color: black;">Thus, an immediate and massive deployment of all available clean and efficient energy technologies must be undertaken, with respective annual additions of solar PV and of wind power to reach 630 GW and 390 GW by 2030. </span>Together, this is four times the record level set in 2020. For solar PV, it is equivalent to installing the world’s current largest solar park [1,000 MW] roughly every day.</a><br /><br />Energy efficiency (i.e. <a href="https://www.hartenergy.com/news/iea-narrow-pathway-net-zero-emissions-2050-194151">MJ of energy used per $ GDP generated</a>) is also a significant feature of the roadmap, and which must increase by 4% per year, up to 2030, i.e. a trebling of the average over the past two decades. In 2030, 60% of new cars sold globally would be electric vehicles. <br /><br />The NZE scenario has critical implications for <a href="https://www.iea.org/reports/net-zero-by-2050">global oil demand</a>, which would need to fall from 88 million barrels a day (mbd) in 2020, to 72 mbd in 2030; reaching 24 mbd in 2050 (an overall annual decline of -4.2%). If all further investment in those fields now producing were to cease, the global oil supply would decline by -8%/year, but the IEA estimate that this can be braked at -4.5% by allowing continued investment in existing fields, including those already approved for development. However, a delicate balancing act is required, since if the resulting loss of oil is not adequately matched in step by alternatives such as EVs, discontinuities may appear in the energy supply chain, with impacts on critical functions, e.g. transportation. <br /><br />Thus, governments need proactively to anticipate energy security risks surrounding market concentration, critical minerals and an increased reliance on electricity systems, including their vulnerability to <a href="https://www.iea.org/reports/power-systems-in-transition/cyber-resilience">cyber attack</a>: in 2050, almost 50% of global energy would be used in the form of electricity, up from 20% in 2020. This will necessitate a <a href="https://www.iea.org/reports/the-role-of-critical-minerals-in-clean-energy-transitions">huge increase</a> in the production of lithium, cobalt, nickel, graphite, rare earths and copper, whose supplies must be secured by individual nations. As the mining or processing of these resources is <a href="https://www.kitco.com/news/2021-05-05/The-five-best-charts-from-IEA-s-critical-metals-and-energy-transition-report.html">concentrated in only a few countries</a>, potential geopolitical problems seem almost inevitable. <br /><br />If entirely implemented, the global energy landscape would be almost unrecognisable, as NZE summarises: <br /><br />“By 2050, the energy world looks completely different. Global energy demand is around 8% smaller than today, but it serves an economy more than twice as big and a population with 2 billion more people. Almost 90% of electricity generation comes from renewable sources, with wind and solar PV together accounting for almost 70%. Most of the remainder comes from nuclear power. Solar is the world’s single largest source of total energy supply. Fossil fuels fall from almost four-fifths of total energy supply today to slightly over one-fifth. Fossil fuels that remain are used in goods where the carbon is embodied in the product such as plastics, in facilities fitted with carbon capture, and in sectors where low-emissions technology options are scarce.” <br /><br />NZE is an attempt at “business as usual”: of trying to maintain the mechanics of current civilization, but with energy largely provided from renewable sources, instead of fossil fuels. In a practical sense, “renewable” is a misnomer, since although the power of the sun, and of the wind which it also drives, is effectively endless, acquiring useful energy, still depends on minerals mined from the Earth, and which are subject to the inevitability of depletion, the same as the fossil fuels are now. To some extent, this can be mitigated by <a href="https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/recycling-revolution-necessary-complete-clean-energy-transition">recycling</a>, but there are energy costs and the need to create new infrastructure on a very large scale to do this. <br /><br />Meanwhile, until the new low carbon energy system has attained a sufficient size to feed back energy to build and maintain itself, <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41560-019-0425-z">fossil fuel energy will be required to subsidise its growth</a>. Hence, the questions arise of, how much energy do we really need, and<a href="http://simplerway.org/"> [how] might we manage with [a lot] less of it</a>? <br /><br />Indeed, while energy is the critical underpinning factor for future society, it is not the only point of issue, and we are presented with an opportunity to reimagine that society. It is noteworthy that <a href="https://earth.org/climate-inequality/">the richest 10% of humans on Earth produce 52% of its total emissions (of which 15% are produced by the “top” 1%)</a>; hence, this is where the major <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-55229725">behavioural changes</a> (a critical feature of NZE) must be made. <br /><br />In all probability, the NZE projections both in terms of energy saving and changing our behaviour must be transcended considerably, if we are to deal with all aspects of a <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/">changing climate</a>. The fundamental concept of <a href="https://theconversation.com/climate-scientists-concept-of-net-zero-is-a-dangerous-trap-157368">“net zero”</a>, has recently been challenged as a “dangerous trap”, in that it might be used to defer action that should be taken immediately, continuing to burn fossil fuels as part of a business plan that assumes carbon emissions will be cleaned up later, using technology as yet to be applied on the massive scale. <br /><br />Globally, the energy costs of transportation run to <a href="https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/energy-economics/energy-outlook/demand-by-sector.html">21% of primary energy consumption</a>; hence, a curbing of the unnecessary movement of people or goods (including food and energy) could considerably reduce the amount of low carbon energy that must be produced. <br /><br />Indeed, <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-04-13/transition-towns-re-localisation-covid-19-and-the-fracking-industry/">relocalisation has been proposed</a> as the best single approach to reducing demand for oil and resources of all kinds, while building <a href="https://www.resilience.org/think-resilience/">resilience into our communities</a> and societies. The process of relocalisation implicitly involves many other re-words, all of which ameliorate demand for energy and other resources, e.g. reduce, reuse, recycle... repair, repurpose, replace, refill, rethink, redesign, reimagine, reinvent, regenerate, restore, respond, refuse! <br /><br />To tackle the global problem of climate change will require unparalleled coordination and collaboration across societies and between nations. Without the international cooperation assumed in NZE, the transition to net‐zero emissions <a href="https://www.iea.org/reports/net-zero-by-2050">“would be delayed by decades”</a>, thus greatly increasing the chances of missing the 1.5 <sup>o</sup>C
target. At a time when the peoples of the world are becoming <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1755088217713765">increasingly fragmented and divided</a>, along with potential production and supply issues, this does not appear unlikely. <br /><br />In any case, to focus primarily on eliminating carbon emissions is too narrow: the problems confronting humanity are actually systemic in nature, and not resolved by changing the source(s) of our energy alone, while degradation of the natural environment and depletion of resources continue. <br /><br />Indeed, we can list energy and carbon emissions along with many other of the <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/">“world’s woes”</a>, such as loss of biodiversity and habitat, pollinator decline, soil erosion, and a consumption of close to <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2020-02-28/human-consumption-of-natural-resources-exceeds-an-annual-100-billion-tonnes/">100 billion tonnes of materials every year</a> (even allowing for a substitution of coal, gas and oil by other minerals), which, acting in concert, comprise what has been termed the <a href="https://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-11-06/the-global-oil-supply-implications-for-biodiversity/">“changing climate”</a>. <br /><br /><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0594-0">The world food system</a> and (as part of it) <a href="https://medium.com/insurge-intelligence/this-is-how-we-end-deforestation-to-avert-pandemic-climate-and-societal-collapse-98eb40646eab">deforestation</a> are major contributors to this overall degradative mechanism. Potential biodiversity threats from mining the necessary minerals for renewable energy, are also <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17928-5">likely to be exacerbated</a>. <br /><br />Thus, in our quest for Net Zero carbon emissions, what if we exhaust our resources - of which the most precious is time - in a last ditch attempt to prop up a system that fails us anyway? What then?Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19508699.post-66799277326278711532020-10-29T11:55:00.012+00:002020-11-14T13:29:21.579+00:00Covid-19, Fracking and the Global Oil Supply. <blockquote style="border: medium none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">
<blockquote style="border: medium none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;">Talk by me, via Zoom, on 10.00 am, Wednesday November 4th, 2020, as part of the Scientists Warning Europe, Pre-COP26 programme<i>.<br /></i></blockquote></blockquote><p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6p6LyT28bw"> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6p6LyT28bw</a><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span face=""Arial","sans-serif"" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Synopsis:</span></b><span face=""Arial","sans-serif"" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"> "The price of crude oil has crashed in the
wake of the Covid-19 crisis, and the consequent fall in demand for liquid
transportation fuels. Ironically, it is the "success" of the shale
industry, through fracking, that has provided much of the growth in overall
global oil production during the past decade, and yet the current low oil price
has raised questions over the future robustness of this industry.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span face=""Arial","sans-serif"" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">While it
is true that plans to revitalise the global economy "post-covid" must
also create substantial and permanent reductions in carbon emissions, the
prevailing oversupply of oil will in any case be attenuated by the background
fall in production from existing oil fields, which has, so far, only been
offset by production from unconventional sources: mainly shale and oil sands.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span face=""Arial","sans-serif"" style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 150%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Since oil
is a critical raw material for the running of global civilization, it is
essential to anticipate how its supply may play out, against demand, in the
coming decades, and this must be considered in the broader context of our use of
energy, overall, and of resources in general."</span></p>
<blockquote style="border: medium none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><blockquote style="border: medium none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><i><br />I'm delighted to be hosting a free webinar
as part of the <a href="https://www.planetincrisis.com/events">Planet
in Crisis</a> series of online climate and
environmental events running from 1-8 November. As this event is coming up soon, please make sure
you book your free ticket now. You can register
for a free ticket here - </i><a href="https://www.eventbrite.com/e/126302589445">https://www.eventbrite.com/e/126302589445</a><i>
- and please share this link with your network.</i>
</blockquote>
</blockquote><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-P0cCyHyg-C0/X5qsyIKHh0I/AAAAAAAAAM4/F9iEObsMtWE2TMNySDsIpKpIP5RiVQxoACLcBGAsYHQ/s800/Scientists%2BWarning%2BEurope%2BPre-COP26%2Bevent%2BCovid-19%252C%2BFracking%2Band%2Bthe%2BGlobal%2BOil%2BSupply.%2B4-11-20.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="800" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-P0cCyHyg-C0/X5qsyIKHh0I/AAAAAAAAAM4/F9iEObsMtWE2TMNySDsIpKpIP5RiVQxoACLcBGAsYHQ/s320/Scientists%2BWarning%2BEurope%2BPre-COP26%2Bevent%2BCovid-19%252C%2BFracking%2Band%2Bthe%2BGlobal%2BOil%2BSupply.%2B4-11-20.png" /></a></div><br /><p></p>Professor Chris Rhodeshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12060542089215379056noreply@blogger.com6