August 20th – 29th 2010 | The Village, Cloughjordan, Tipperary | For bookings and further information contact Davie Philip davie@cultivate.ie

Enjoy a full ‘PDC’ immersed in the thriving and innovative environment of Cloughjordan’s ecovillage. Tutors include: Graham Strouts, Albert Bates of the Farm, Tennessee, and Klaudia Van Gool. Also teaching will be other leading thinkers on various sustainability issues covered on the course.

Book Review:

The Transition Timeline

for  a local, resilient future

Shaun Chamberlin

Forward by Rob Hopkins

190 pp pbk

Chelsea Green 2009

The follow-up to Rob Hopkins’ seminal The Transition Handbook uses the method of “backcasting” from an envisioned  future from which we create a timeline of how the transition to a more local, resilient world unfolded.

The first part goes through four different scenarios presented as “cultural stories” roughly along the same lines as the scenarios we are familiar with from Holmgren’s Future Scenarios, this time under the headings:

-Denial

-Hitting the Wall

-The Impossible Dream

-The Transition Vision

The transition approach is to look at these possible futures in terms of the cultural stories that we tell ourselves, the idea being that we have the power to make our own cultural stories and thereby empower ouselves to guide the future to a more desirable outcome:

Human Nature is the ability to choose our own path

The second part of the book takes a deeper look at the Transition Vision in the five areas of population and demographics; Food and Water; Electricity and Energy; travel and transport; Health and Medicine.

Each of these sections presents a thorough and well-researched overview of the current situation, ending with a Timeline of how we reached a more desirable situation by 2027.

At the back of the book Chamberlin states that “This book has not attempted to quantify the energy/emissions footprint of each aspect of the Transition Vision, but this represents a critical avenue for further work.”

Unfortunatley, this lack of analysis seriously compromises the usefulness of the book, as the projected scenarios may be widely implausible or purely aspirational.

Many other authors have put work into this already, which could have been drawn from, a recent example being the Mayo Energy Audit, which also uses a scenario format, but successfully puts values and figures on the scenarios.

The population chapter, is to be lauded for highlighting an issue often neglected in the environmental movement; however, the author falls into the same trap that others tend to by visiting the “population or consumption” debate over which is the bigger issues:

…population is not (as some claim) the single most crucial environmental issue. It is clearly has a significant effect as a multiplier, but our chosen way of life and ecological footprint are bigger contributors to climate change, energy resource depletion and the other challenges facing us today and in the near future

As I have written previously

this is really a straw dog issue because as Ehrlich (whom he refers to) pointed out in The Population Bomb population and consumption are two sides of the same coin. It is in my opinion quite meaningless to speak about which is the greater issue, like we are dealing with some kind of Top of the Apocalyptic Pops.Ehrlich’s famous formula- which should be on every high-school curriculum- is: I (Impact) = P (population) x A (Affluence) x T (Technology) The issues of consumption and population are quite simply inseparable. If the population increases, there will be less resources to go around, so in theory we can increase the population so long as we reduce per capita consumption- and vice-a-verse.

The difficulty I have with making population/consumption an either/or issue is that it simplifies the challenges we have have as a species; I believe we are disposed by our evolution to increase both our population AND our consumption- see the recent discussion by Nate Hagens on environmental psychology.

It is the interplay between demographics and the natural impulse to increase our standard of living that needs to be explored here.

What would be essential to make this section work would be some kind of analysis of what a reasonable standard of living might be- it is not much use talking vaguely of reducing population without some assessment of what a sustainable level would be, which must be gauged against an acceptable level of consumption (I suggested Cuba, at about half the per capita energy use of Europe as a starting point in the above post.)

The food section gives an excellent analysis of the predicament, importantly drawing our attention to issues such as the huge “water footprint” of our food, particularly in meat and dairy- Fred Pierce in “When the Rivers Run Dry” calculates that the equivalent of 20 Nile rivers  move from developing to developed countries each year- a stunning image of the sustainability of our food production at present.

The transport section proposes a lift-Hiker system using GPS and mobile phone technology, similar to that of “the Smart Jitney” proposed by Pat Murphy in Plan C.

I particularly like the notion  of “hypermiling” which by 2018 has become a fashionable trend as it becomes socially unacceptable to waste resources.

The Health and Medicine section begins well by highlighting the oil dependency of the NHS, and presents the astonishing fact that while by far the largest cost of treating injuries is road accident related, the NHS itself generates as much as 5% of all UK transport!

Issues such as the challenge new diseases being brought by climate change, the inefficiency of big scale health services, and even euthanasia are mentioned; as well as a comparison with Cuba, which appears to have at least as healthy a population as the UK’s but with far less energy dependence.

But then, in the Timeline section, we read:

What used to be known as ‘alternative’ medicines were embraced, as practices like herbalism, acupuncture, massage and osteopathy became core pillars [my emphases] of public healthcare, with a big investment in teaching these skills leading to a blossoming of independent regulated practitioners in most communities.

Oh nooooo! Quackery! This paragraph is deeply concerning, betraying the New Age and pseudoscientific influences in the transition movement.

What is known as “alternative” medicine is simply medicine for which there is no good evidence of effectiveness; certainly, not all “conventional” medicine is evidence-based either, but new-Agers tend to use this as an excuse for throwing out the need for  evidence altogether. Often these therapies are based on dubious or discredited “ancient wisdom” which simply has not been born out by the discoveries of modern science. It is modern medical research and science which has lead to an increase in life expectancy, a decline in infant mortality etc..

Now, certainly the problems with modern medicine are manifold, in particular the over-dependence on oil, horrific levels of waste and a level of corruption amongst Big Pharma. None of this is evidence that alternatives like acupuncture work, while many repeated, verifiable blind trials indicate they do no better than placebo.

All these issues and their many nuances are discussed brilliantly in Ben Goldacre’s book Bad Science and I urge you to read it if you are of an alternative disposition when it comes to health care.

The fact is, some remedies work, some don’t; some herbs work, some dont; there is absolutely no way of knowing for sure without large scale clinical trials of the sort the medical establishment does routinely, and which the alternative sector has apparently no knowledge nor interest in.

The curious thing here is that the whole basis of the Transition Movement is based on the verifiable science of Climate Change and Peak Oil; but when it comes to quack medicine, the evidence offered is as useless as that offered by climate change deniers- personal anecdotes along the “it worked for me” kind and pseudoscience.

Transition founder Rob Hopkins provides some startling examples of this on recent comments to Zone5.

In the discussion after this post for example, he comments:

“I have had a great deal of acupuncture in my life, I think it is extraordinary. Had some on a painful back the other week, worked a treat. Acupuncture is based on many centuries of the observation of subtle phenomena.”

Many will say the same or similar, but anecdotes do not constitute evidence; if they did we would have to accept that global warming is not happening on the basis of it being rather cool today for the time of year. I’m only slightly exaggerating – climate change deniers do routinely use the same kind of reasoning to dismiss the science of anthropogenic climate change; and even more so, they point out the failings of Big Science in general terms as a way of discrediting evidence- it is corrupt, in the pockets of the government and corporations etc. “therefore we can dismiss the evidence.”

Even more worrying, Rob goes on to say:

“None of my children have ever been vaccinated, nor have they ever had any antibiotics. They are strong and healthy (touch wood).”

The irresponsibility and naivete of this statement is shocking- the reason his kids have not got measles is likely to be either just luck, or because everyone else’s kids have been vaccinated. (Unvaccinated children may also put at risk certain categories of children who cannot safely be vaccinated for medical reasons, or who may be more susceptible in the event of catching measles.)

Let’s be clear here: the evidence for the safety and effectiveness of the MMR vaccine is just as clear as the evidence for man-made climate change; the kind of thinking that refutes one is pretty much the same as that which is used to discredit the other. By throwing in “alternative medicine” in such an uncritical way Chamberlin panders to the  reactionary and retarded element of the New Age meme which believes mainstream medicine is all a con designed to make money and poison us, and alternatives can be uncritically accepted as “safe, holistic alternatives”.

In fact, they are expensive lifestyle products which can in no way replace modern medicine other than as being different forms of TLC- Tender Loving Care. Nothing wrong with that, but they need to be seen as such and drop the false claims of being able to cure specific diseases.

And God help us if they are to become a “core pillar” of public healthcare.

Partly as a result of the kind of delusional thinking expressed by Rob in the above comment, the UK is now facing the worst measles epidemic in decades. It is about time the Transition Movement took a stand on this and put out good information on the subject.

Not only that, but by promoting alternative medicine in this way, Chamberlin is actually undermining his arguments for understanding climate change and Peak Oil. This is all the more ironic since the book covers the need for evidence on these two issues very thoroughly, plenty of graphs and stats and quotes such as that of Daniel Moynihan who said “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts” – a thought that proponents of alternative therapies would do well to meditate on for some time.

The Cuban example is really useful but although their state health service has embraced complimentary therapies including Homeopathy, there is little indication that this has become anything like a core pillar, the success of the Cuban situation being more likely a result of following evidence-based medicine to a high standard, putting in sufficient resources, and focussing on community care and prevention.

Energy Descent Planning

Rob Hopkins  writes the next section, Timelines and Energy Descent Plans which is an account of community planning tools and “visioning” processes for changing the communities’ cultural story to the more agreeable Transtion Vision.

An EDAP (Energy Descent Action Plan) is, he says “as much as anything, a new story for the community…

We often stress in Transition that we need to create visions of a post-carbon world so enticing, so compelling and attractive that people leap out of bed in the morning determined to dedicate their lives to its implementation. An EDAP is an embodiment of this.

“Determined to dedicate their lives” does sound a bit cultish and scary to me, and not a little evangelical; however, this chapter concerns itself only with the visioning processes, again with barely a mention of the need to actually count and quantify energy demand and supply; I understand that the movement is working on a more detailed follow-up to the Timeline on how to write an Energy Descent Plan, but it is a little disappointing that after two publications and several years, Transition has not even produced a few pages on basic energy literacy or how to do a simple domestic energy audit, all of which would make this book much more useful.

Rob writes as if this is all that is involved in writing an EDAP, while these visioning processes, useful and inspirational as they are, surely do not provide the meat of a true EDAP, which would start with an audit, and then assess local available resources and then assess how best to use them.

The last section of the book gives more detailed explanation of Peak Oil and then Climate Change; the Peak Oil section is fine, but adds little to existing literature; but the Climate Change section I found really excellent, surprisingly learning plenty of new things, for example about how different measures of greenhouse gas concentrations are used in public discourse which are little understood and distort the picture.

In conclusion, the Transition Timeline has plenty of useful information and some great ideas, but fails to really move the work of transition on in a way we might expect at this stage; and, perhaps inevitably, tends to paint a rather rosy picture of how the transition will play out. Personally, I would hope to see a more realistic view, which includes more on emergency planning and a future which may not be able to deliver the kind of smart technology envisioned for some of the areas explored.

(Andy Wilson of the Sustainability Institute has suggested to me that Peak Car use has probably already passed, while the Timeline puts it as not happening until 2016- a very pessimistic (sic) view!)

Predictably(!), I am highly critical- and will continue to be- of the New Age influence in the Health section,which will feed the suspicion in some quarters that transition is adopting some cultish attributes, and insist on the promotion of evidence-based medicine; and I feel, the lack of detailed energy auditing just means that the Transition Vision will tend to move further away from the observed reality.

Book Review-

Future Scenarios How Communities Can adapt to Peak Oil and Climate Change

David Holmgren

Chelsea Green 2009

When I first saw David Holmgren’s Future Scenarios talk and slide at a permaculture design course in Slovenia in 2005 I was still quite new to the concept of peak oil and listened transfixed at what seemed to be a detailed vision of the future: not precise predictions but an outline of four possible scenarios that may unfold over the next generation and beyond as human societies adapt to the consequences of the peaking and decline of our primary energy sources, peak oil and natural gas.

A couple of years ago David continued his explorations of these issues first examined in detail in his earlier book, Permaculture- Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability (2002) with a new website Future Scenarios.

Now in book form, Future Scenarios provides one of the most succinct and lucid accounts of the possible paths that await us as we start the new era of energy descent.

Holmgren is in agreement with John Michael Greer that while much mainstream discussion about energy futures centres on the first two of his scenarios- “Techno-explosion” and “Techno Stability”, and the doomer/survivalist meme amongst the peak oil community tends to focus on the fourth scenario of “lifeboats” or versions of collapse, the more likely would be the third possibility of “Energy Descent”- a more gradual adaptation to diminishing energy supplies resulting in a contracting economy and reversion to technological simplicity that may play out over many generations.

This pathway of earth Stewardship is assumed by the permaculture agenda- an adaptive approach in which human scale design and general sustainability practices are progressively implemented and are informed by the energy flows through human society and ecology, and the energy base of our economies is clearly understood.

The real problem is that this more likely future is currently still marginalised as the mainstream culture refuses to abandon its faith in the myth of progress- a belief that rests on the mistaken assumption that gains in human welfare over the past few hundred years have been as a result of some teleological process propelling us forwards, or of a general increasing application of our genious for technological improvements and innovation, while ignoring the underlying reosurce base that has made all this possible: technology is merely different ways of using energy that is usually dug out of holes in the ground.

The likelihood that this transition will be to one of less energy is such an anathema to the psychological foundations and power elites of modern societies that it is constantly misinterpreted, ignored, covered up, or derided. Instead we see geopolitical maneuvering around energy resources, including proxy and real wars to control dwindling reserves and policy gymnastics to somehow make reducing carbon emissions the new engine of economic growth.

Holmgren categorises the scenarios according to the varying potential severity of peak oil and climate change and how these tow factors interplay:

• Brown Tech- slow oil decline, fast climate change;
• Green Tech- slow oil decline, slow climate change;
• Earth Steward- fast oil decline, slow climate change;
• Lifeboats- fast oil decline, fast climate change

These typologies may necessarily be too simplistic- so many other factors may also come into play, such as financial collapse which, while no doubt linked to both peak oil and climate change, may impact in ways as yet unforeseen. However, Holmgren provides a deeper analyses by showing how the scenarios may be “nested” one within the other- each acting on the different scales of the household, local, national and international economies; or may take a stepped form over time- attempts by governments to keep the system going a little longer by following a Brown Tech path may hasten an eventual collapse; equally, an attempt to switch to green tech may result in the adoption of Earth Stewardship further down the line as renewables fail to fill the gap left by oil. The scenarios may also play out differently in different parts of the world.

Throughout Holmgren’s analysis is informed by ecological systems, the foundation for his permaculture principles, as he sees how energy dynamics in nature may be mirrored in human socieites:

Natural ecosytems tend to maintain homeostasis under stress through the allocation of stored resources. if the conditions continue to deteriorate, then further stress can fracture the homeostasis. If the stress involves a reduction in energy availability, the system may collapse. But total collapse and system disintegration are rare, at least in the short term. More typically a restabalization occurs at a lower level of energy processing and organisational complexity. The new homeostasis will typically be stable for some time before declining energy availability precipitates another crisis. This may also be a model for how human societies respond to the crisis of resource and energy decline.

Holmgren is keen to paint a more positive vision of the future in the earth Stewardship scenario- “conditions for ordinary people may actually improve when resources devoted to maintaining societal complexity are freed for meeting more basic needs”- a reference to the diminishing returns provided by endless growth.

There is a desperate need to recast energy descent as a positive process that can free people from the strictures and dysfunctions of growth economics and consumer culture. This is now apparent to many people around the world and is far more fundamental than  a public relations campaign to paint a black sky blue. It is a necessary [process to provide a sense of hope and connection to fundamental human values expressed by every traditional culture throughout human history, among them, that the prusuit of materialism is a false god.

No doubt materialism without bounds, as expressed in modern society in unending growth and the development of consumer culture, is a false god; however, I am not sure that an awareness of this has always been present in every traditional culture. Holmgren here seems to betray a romantic view of the past, at odds with the  ecological basis for his work, which is  itself of course fundamentally materialistic. What seems more likely is the insights of anthropology and evolutionary psychology: that we have as a species a fundamental propensity towards getting more stuff, as is evidenced by the ready emergence in traditional societies of cargo cults after  contact with the west.

This weakness is apparent in his assessment of the corresponding ideologies and belief systems that accompany the scenarios: he seems to equate secular humanism with the materialistic ideology of “Brown Tech” and suggests that these beliefs systems are inherently negative, giving rise to dysfunctional behaviours;

While the elites continue to be driven by a commitment to superrationalist beliefs, a sense of hollowness and lack of purpose characterizes the shrinking middle class, while fundamentalist religions and cults play a stronger role in the lives of the working and unemployed classes, partly through genuine reaction to the failures of modern humanism and partly manipulated by the elites to deflect anger and disenchantment.

While this may be very true, he compares this to a shift in values in “Green Tech”:

Civic culture strengthens where further transition toward nonmaterialistic society combines with the maturation of feminism and environmentalism, and a resurgence in indigenous and  traditional cultural values.

It seems to me that there is a contradiction between “traditional values” -many of which may be parochial and overly conservative or reactionary – with post-modern feminist and environmental values; it is far from clear that they would be the same or even compatible.

Similarly, under “Earth Steward” Holmgren suggests that a “simplification in the material domain is seen as the opportunity for growth in the spiritual domain. There is a resurgence in leadership by women and a celebration of the feminine in nature and people”.

But what is the “spiritual” domain? This needs to be defined here becasue there is a vast range of possible interpretations. For the same reasons I have always had some difficulty with Holmgren’s domain of “Health and Spritual well-being” in the Permaculture Flower. I interpret it to mean “Health and Psychological/emotional well-being”. However, it is abundantly apparent that permaculture has become almost synonymous with New Age religion in many quarters, a reactionary and delusional trend that all permaculturalists should challenge strongly. Holmgren’s loose use of the word “spiritual” in this context, and his “celebration of the feminine” will inevitably be seen by many to sanctify pseudo-science and the worship of spirits and nebulous “energies”.

(Again “the feminine” and “feminine values” really needs to be defined: we are presumably not talking about the feminine values of Sex in the City; too often “the feminine” is associated with “the spiritual” in a quite meaningless way which I feel is  rather patronizing to women.)

Here, Holmgren looses an opportunity to call for a celebration of  secular humanism and rationalism- the most important legacy of the modern world, which will need to be protected less we fall back into a new dark age of superstition and delusion with energy descent.

Nor is it necessary to embody any kind of “earth spirituality” in order to foster more sustainable lifestyles- these should come of their own accord, naturally emerging from a scientific understanding of ecology and our place within it, combined with a simple sense of beauty and wonder at the natural world,  unfettered by  ideological presumptions.

There is a great danger within the environmental movement as a whole to replace the delusion of unending growth with the delusion of narcissistic spirituality, part of a wider failure to acknowledge the real gains of modernity through science.

For all this, Holmgren remains one of the most significant of contemporary thinkers, and Future Scenarios is an important contribution to peak oil literature, and one of the clearest assessments of the kind of world that awaits us.

Workshop participants practice forest garden design…

…now they are planting and mulching for real…

It was a great weekend, despite the truly wintry weather on the Saturday, and a great opportunity to see how the Village project is progressing, with three houses currently under construction.

The next permaculture course here will be a Full 10-day Permaculture Certificate Design Course August 21st-30th. Please see “courses for 2009” page for details.

This course will also include a complete Powerdown Toolkit Training.

Tutors include: Graham Strouts,  Davie Philip of the Irish Transition Network, Albert Bates of the Farm, Tenessee.

many thanks to Davie Philip for organising the event, and for all the great participants for taking part and making it possible, and most of all for staying awake through a whole day of classroom activities on the wet Saturday despite a very late campfire session Friday night!!

by Graham Strouts and Davie Philip

This is the introduction to the 10th and final episode  of the Powerdown Toolkit 10-week community learning course created by the Cultivate Center in Dublin. It has an accompanying TV show with a 30-minute episode accompanying each week of the course, soon to be aired on Dublin Community TV.

On sale Now! The Powerdown TV show featuring the 10 TV shows to accompany the introductions serialized here on zone5 over the past few weeks, with interviews with Rob Hopkins, Richard Douthwaite, Megan Quinn, Peader Kirby and many others.

A free preview of Episode 8: Energy Descent Pathways can be viewed here.

When we try to communicate the ideas being explored in the Powerdown Toolkit we run into what might be called “the environmentalists dilemma”- we are trying to get over a message few people want to hear- if they did, the world would be a very different place- it would already be in transition!

In thinking about this issue let us consider the spectrum of responses, from the “cornucopians” who believe the markets will resolve everything as price spikes send a signal to put more investment into renewables; to the “doomers” who see Peak oil as heralding in a collapse of civilisation.

Somehow we need to bridge the gap between the two: the “cornucopians” need to be challenged because the evidence we have looked at does not support their case: the flow of cheap energy will surely decline and with it the “business as usual” scenarios we have become accustomed to over the past couple of generations, with its implicit faith in technological progress and ever-increasing prosperity.

The “doomer” stance on the other hand, while providing a valuable balance to the complacency of doing nothing, may lead to paralysis and fear that “there is nothing we can do”.

Somewhere in between we have Transition: On the one hand, it is imperative that we promote a message that things will change, that many expectations will never be met, and that cosmetic adjustments will not be enough to plug the energy gap.

We must prepare psychologically for the changes ahead because there will surely be less of some things: less traffic jams, less pollution, less waste; less stress maybe, less running on the treadmill to service our debts, and less mind-numbing “reality” TV.

Alongside this however there must be an emphasis on the benefits there may be in living in a low-energy world, for there will surely be more of other things:

-more time with the family, more time in close and meaningful connection with the natural world;

-more creativity as we are called to draw upon the full wealth of our ingenuity to respond to the challenges ahead;

-there will be the opportunity for a resurgence of the community as globalisation retreats, and a rediscovery of a sense of place and connection;

-local food, local music, local culture will make a resurgence giving us a new sense of identity.

It is crucial to include ideas and openings for positive action when outlining the difficulties we may have to face. Even a small positive collective action- planting a tree for example- can go a long way to creating a sense of community empowerment. Early, easy-to-achieve sense of success will provide a strong foundation for continuing with optimism and positive energy.

Knowing your audience

Various theories have emerged from marketing and developmental psychology suggesting that people may respond differently depending on the values they hold, so “knowing your audience” is crucial.

For example, campaign strategists Chris Rose and Pat Dade (1)  draw on the work of Maslow who argued that we are all motivated to behave in ways that help  meet their underlying dominant psychological needs. They identify the following three types which fit the majority of the population:

• ‘Settlers’ are primarily motivated to fulfill their need for security; they value home, family, locality, stability

• ‘Prospectors’ are primarily motivated to fulfill their need for status; they value popularity and visible success above other things;

•    ‘Pioneers’ are primarily motivated to enhance the greater good; they particularly value ethics, justice and sustainability for their own sake.

This is important because framing new ideas and behaviours within the right dominant need may help to motivate people to engage with the issue. Getting it wrong can lead to disengagement because they do not represent the values of every group.

This may help provide a key as to why the environmental message is slow to become more widely accepted: since it tends to come initially from the third group –the “pioneers”- it is usually phrased in terms that appeal only to this group- “save Gaia” “save the whales” “think of the next generation” –but messages phrases in this way are unlikely to appeal to “prospectors”.

This group might be more likely to respond to messages that appeal to the values of status and success that they espouse-

“get ahead of the game with the latest energy-saving technology”

“the smart and savvy will start moving into renewables now”.

Similarly, “settlers” are more likely to respond to messages that support traditional values.

A similar idea was proposed by Malcom Gladwell in “The Tipping Point”.(Gladwell, 2000).

Gladwell argues that it is possible to identify some people as “innovators” who tend to be ahead of the game- in Transition this might include community activists calling for action on peak oil and climate change, those who are aware of the issues and hope to inspire change; “early adopters” who are most likely to be open to change- “late adopters” and “traditionalists”.

By understanding the dynamics of these different groups and how “connectors” are able to transmit a message very quickly through their community, it is possible for a small group of activists to start a “positive” epidemic very quickly, with very little input. It is all about framing the message in the right way and taking it to the people first who are most likely to be in a position to respond.

Visioning the Future

The visioning tools we have from the Transition Handbook, and those you will be invited to explore on this course, will allow us to gain as sense of empowerment as we ask: what is really important? Is burning more energy really the be-all and end-all of our lives? What qualities and talents do we have to bring to this process?

In the Further Reading list below you will find other resources that examine the psychology of communicating change, a fascinating topic in its own right which has a growing and rich literature developed from several decades of environmental activism.

In this area perhaps more than any other we have looked at on the course it is important to avoid “reinventing the wheel”:

Examining our own psychology, and the psychology of others, can be an emotive issue. People may not be ready to examine their own hidden motivations and resistances to change.

We should begin nonetheless with an open attitude towards people and the knowledge that in general, we all want to do the right thing.

As we travel further down the curve of energy descent over the next few years, we need to ask ourselves what we are gaining, and what we will be glad to leave behind from the old culture. It may be time to acknowledge that too much energy has been bad for us, and the environment, and try to communicate the message that in many ways, a low-energy future may find us enriched, more resilient, fulfilled and secure.

The future may be uncertain, but it need not be something to fear if we prepare together.

As David Fleming has said, “…localisation stands, at best, at the limits of practical possibility, but it has the decisive argument in its favour that there will be no alternative”.

Further reading

1] Climate Change communications: dipping a toe into public motivation Chris Rose, Pat Dade, Nick Gaillie and John Scott, May 2005

[2] The Rules of the Game: Principles of Climate Change Communications. Futerra 2005

[3] The Rules of the Game: Principles of Climate Change Communications. Futerra 2005

[4] Fostering Sustainable Behaviour: An introduction to community-based social marketing. Doug McKenzie-Mohr and William Smith, 1999

[5]   The Rules of the Game: Principles of Climate Change Communications. Futerra 2005

[6] Fostering Sustainable Behaviour: An introduction to community-based social marketing. Doug McKenzie-Mohr and William Smith, 1999:51

[7] Malcome Gladwell 2000 The Tipping Point- How Little things Can Make a Big Difference.

This is the introduction to  week 8  of the Powerdown Toolkit 10-week community learning course created by the Cultivate Center in Dublin. It has an accompanying TV show with a 30-minute episode accompanying each week of the course, soon to be aired on Dublin Community TV

Subject

The concept of “energy descent” was first proposed by Howard Odum who recognized that the human economy is governed by the Laws of thermodynamics and energy and resource availability.

Odum believed that if we were guided by geologists and ecologists as much as by economists, we would be able to safely navigate our way across the inevitable peaking of world oil production and find “a prosperous way down”.

David Holmgren drew on Odum’s thesis in creating the permaculture concept in the 1970s, and more recently proposed a set of “Energy Future Scenarios” to allow us to peak into the future and gain an image of where we may be heading.

“I use the term ‘descent’ as the least loaded word that honestly conveys the inevitable, radical reduction of material consumption and/or human numbers that will characterise the declining decades and centuries of fossil fuel abundance and availability.” -Davie Holmgren

The ‘industrial ascent’  of Hubert’s curve over the past 150 years has given us a one-time energy bonanza allowing the industrialisation of almost every aspect of our life and the globalisation of our economies. Continual economic growth has required an assumption of continuing increase of energy availability, a myth we can now see as we sink into a post oil-peak world and the commencement of global recession.

The first scenario, then, would be to continue with ‘Business as Usual’, anticipating a simple continuation of the upward curve of energy consumption we have seen in recent history. This path takes us ‘to infinity and beyond’ as we continue to try to grow our economy and keep society going just as it is. However, Holmgren refers to this scenario as “techno-fantasy” because, despite decades of talk and research on new energy forms such as hydrogen or nuclear fusion, our economies have become inexorably more dependent on dwindling supplies of fossil fuels. There seems no technological revolution on the horizon

The second scenario -‘green tech stability’ -is assumed by mainstream environmentalists and progressive politicians: as oil supplies fall away we carry on as before with a high-energy lifestyle, only switch everything to run off renewables.

Systems theory would suggest that this is unlikely because running at such high levels of energy consumption is inherently unstable and, as we have seen, renewables will fall far short of plugging the supply gap left after oil peak.

The third option, and the one Holmgren proposes as the most likely, is ‘Earth Stewardship’: a rapid powerdown with a radical localisation of our food and energy systems, a revitalising of community, and the adoption of values that promote the careful husbandry of natural resources.

“Energy Descent, where available energy and resulting organizational complexity progressively decline over many generations, is the most ignored of the four possible long-term futures, but I think the evidence is strong and increasing that it is the most likely in some form or other.” –Holmgren, Future Scenarios (2009).

In this scenario, we will use the foresight of energy descent planning year on year and generation on generation to adapt to progressively reduced energy supplies, not by looking for the magic elixir of new energy sources, but by the careful implementation of passive solar design, permaculture and frugal living, and the building of community resilience.

We should not ignore however the possibility of a fourth scenario, that of ‘collapse’ which becomes more likely the more we try to grow our economies on a contracting energy base without understanding the ecological and social limits. The ‘die off’ which would result in this hubris has been well chronicled by authors such as Jared Diamond in his book ‘Collapse’ and Homer Dixon in ‘The Up Side Of Down’.

Barriers… The extraordinary changes in society that technology and the availability of cheap fossil fuel has given us, particularly in the last 20 years, has radically changed the way we understand and interact with the world.  The energy issue is perhaps the biggest challenge as we will have no choice but to design ways of living with less in the future.

The barriers to planning our energy descent are many: •    Short term and selfish thinking •    The belief that technology will save us •    The dominance of centralised and globalised energy and food systems •    A society based on consumption •    And an economic system dependent on economic growth

Response

Rob Hopkins describes Energy Descent as : “The continual decline in net energy supporting humanity, a decline that mirrors the ascent in net energy that has taken place since the Industrial Revolution. It also refers to a future scenario in which humanity has successfully adapted to declining net fossil fuel energy availability and has become more localised and self-reliant. It is a term favoured by people looking towards energy peak as an opportunity for positive change rather than an inevitable disaster.”

The prototype at the heart of the process was developed in Kinsale, Ireland as part of the 2 year Permaculture course taught by Rob Hopkins.  It became known as Energy Descent Action Planning, and it aims to set out a timetabled plan for moving a community beyond fossil fuel dependence towards local resilience. In this report, a range of proposals for creating local resilience are outlined in each of the areas of transport, energy, housing, food and the local community.

… and opportunities

Transition Towns In response to converging challenges of an unraveling global economy, peak oil and climate change, some pioneering communities in the UK, Ireland and beyond are adopting the Transition process. These initiatives are taking an integrated and inclusive approach to increase our ability to look after itself into the long term and to adapt to the shocks that energy, food, economic and climate crises will bring. Networks have been established in the UK, Ireland, Australia, Japan and most recently in the United States. The role of these Transition Networks is to accelerate change through inspiring, encouraging, and supporting communities as they consider how they will build resilience in the face of these challenges.

The 12th step in the Transition process is to ‘Create an Energy Descent Action Plan EDAP’. This plan is the culmination of the learning, the networking and the work done so far by a Transition Initiative’s activities. Each of the initiative’s working groups will have been developing actions to build resilience; it is these actions that form the Energy Descent Action Plan. One of the first detailed attempts to assess the energy needs of a whole region and make proposals for meeting those needs from local sources in the future has been written by The Sustainability Institute in Ireland for County of Mayo in Ireland. References

The Transition Handbook: From Oil Dependency to Local Resilience. by Rob Hopkins (2008) Green Books  2008 http://transitionculture.org/shop/the-transition-handbook/

Kinsale 2021: An Energy Descent Action Plan Download from http://transitionculture.org/essential-info/pdf-downloads/kinsale-energy-descent-action-plan-2005/

Collapse, Jared Diamond, Penguin Books, London. 2006

The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization by Thomas Homer-Dixon http://www.theupsideofdown.com/ A Prosperous Way Down: Principles and Policies by Howard, T. Odum , Elisabeth, C. Odum Mayo Energy Audit 2009-2020 The Sustainability Institute, http://www.sustainability.ie/auditorder.html

Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability by David Holmgren

Future Scenarios: How Communities can adapt to Peak Oil and Climate Change by David Holmgren (2009)

The Transition Timeline for a local, resilient future by Shaun Chamberlin (2009)

This is the introduction to  week seven of the Powerdown Toolkit 10-week community learning course created by the Cultivate Center in Dublin. It has an accompanying TV show with a 30-minute episode accompanying each week of the course, soon to be aired on Dublin Community TV.

Energy and the Household

Recent increases in energy costs have spawned a huge increase in interest in “sustainable” housing with considerable improvements in some aspects of house design and construction. With a plethora of new building products and systems emerging from the industry on one hand and a burgeoning interest in natural building materials such as cob and strawbale, housing has been one of the most intensely scrutinised areas in terms of energy conservation and use. The industrial revolution that downgraded the household to the edge of economic life; the time has come now for it to reclaim its place. David Holmgren has described how this might occur for many over the first years of energy descent in his paper Retrofitting the Suburbs.

In the future, the great challenge will be to retrofit the existing housing stock to be more energy efficient. New builds will decline to a fraction of what they have been during the years and decades of industrial growth.

House Design

A Pattern Language by Christopher Alexander {1977} is a design manual for convivial housing and town planning, compiling over 240 “patterns” or design solutions many of which will both help conserve energy and build community.

“Each pattern”, says Alexander “describes a problem which occurs over and over again in our environment, and then describes the core of the solution to that problem, in such a way as you can use this solution a million times over, without ever doing it the same way twice.”

Here are a few examples of patterns in house design and function that may prove useful in the low-energy future:

1.    Living space: The house needs to be a place where families – or the extended household – lives, talks and eats together, on a regular basis.

2.    Working space: There should be a workshop, and/or a study, and/or a potting shed.  Houses will be central to the economy of the future, power houses of the local economy, and not just places for leisure and sleep.

3.    Growing space.  Most houses will need a garden or contact with a garden.  They need some way of recycling food waste and, in the longer term, of recycling, composting and reusing human waste.  Not every householder will have the aptitude to grow his or her own vegetables, but there could be reciprocal arrangements with other households that do.

4.    Located in the community.  Every household will need to participate in the community’s material economy and in its social capital.  This will have a bearing on the design of houses: they will need to be compact in layout, saving space and forming neighbourhoods, all parts of which are in easy walking distance; the neighbourhoods should be held together by its busy, sociable streets.  Gardens may vary in size: terraced houses can have long/large gardens; other gardens can be a short distance away, or in allotments.

The design and placement of buildings in towns and the squares and meeting places they define will have a big impact on the development of the community.

5.    Local materials.  Houses in the community of the future will rely on local materials, wherever possible, for construction and repair.

Energy in Housing. By Andy Wilson

Andy Wilson is an independent energy consultant working mainly in renewables and off-grip systems, as well as energy efficient house construction and retro-fitting. He has extensive experience in many other areas of self-sufficiency  including woodland management and horticulture.

He is the editor of Sustainability Magazine and co-author with Paul Lynch of the  recent Mayo Energy Audit.

Andy gives workshops and talks around Ireland on energy in housing and solar DIY.

The housing sector accounts for some 20-30% of all energy used in Ireland today. Energy use in the sector can be subdivided into three categories:

Energy used in construction (the embodied energy) Energy used to heat the dwelling Energy used to provide lighting and to run appliances

Embodied Energy

The total embodied energy in a modest dwelling made largely from locally sourced low energy materials could be as little as one twentieth  of the embodied energy in a very large house constructed entirely from high energy products or ones imported from thousands of miles away.

Size of Dwellings

The average dwelling size in Ireland is approximately 110m2. The average size of new dwellings however, is about 150m2. In tandem with this increase in size has been the gradual decease in the number of occupants per dwelling, down from about 4.0 occupants per dwelling in 1966 to only 2.9 today. Floor area in new build has now exceeded 50m2 per occupant. This compares with 20-25m2 per occupant in Eastern Europe. Heating

The energy required to heat a typical house, when measured as the quantity of energy per unit area of floor space, has been decreasing gradually in recent years owing to better standards of insulation.  This increase in energy efficiency has been largely offset by the larger size of new houses and by higher internal temperatures.  According to SEI data, the average household uses some 20,000 kWh of energy per annum for heating. Over 97% of this energy is derived from non renewable sources.

The heating requirement of a building is usually expressed as kWh/m² of floor space per annum. The figure may be as high as 500 kWh/m²/ annum in an uninsulated house,   but 50-70 kWh/m² / annum in  houses  compliant with current building regulations, and as little as 10-15 kWh/ m² / annum for a passive house. Houses described as passive often use electrical appliances for domestic water heating and for running heat recovery ventilation systems and micro heat pumps.

Reducing Energy Requirements for Heating

Keep dwelling sizes small both in floor area and volume. High ceilings waste heat: we only     occupy the bottom 1.5-2 meters of a room.

Insulate well

Minimise draughts: Airtightness in newly built houses can vary by up to a factor of six     depending on construction methods, choice of materials, design detail and standard of     workmanship.

Use the highest spec windows and external doors affordable

Avoid open chimneys

Make use of passive solar design

Improve air tightness -On average about 40% of heat losses from buildings occurs through ventilation and about 60% through the fabric of the structure, though the proportions can vary widely from building to building.

Insulation

It is estimated that about 20-30% of our entire housing stock has totally inadequate insulation (or no insulation whatsoever). Less than 5% of our housing stock is well insulated.

There are many insulation products on the market. Some are made from natural fibres and have a low embodied energy as well as being environmentally friendly. The synthetic insulation products generally have a higher embodied energy and carry a higher environmental price tag.  While some insulation products, notably the multi-layer foil insulation genre, perform very poorly, most insulation materials work well if they are installed properly. Unfortunately this is often not the case, with insulation being frequently applied poorly or not at all, for example many lofts have not been insulated at all.

In the case of retrofit on older buildings, space may be at a premium and compromises will have to be made. Even so, minimum targets to aim for should be walls 50-100mm, roofs/ceilings 200mm, and floors 50-80mm. It should be recognised that these are only ballpark figures and the depth required will also vary according to the insulation product used.

Beyond a certain point, the benefits of extra insulation are marginal, particularly as the heat losses through windows and doors may be almost as much as the losses from the floor roof and walls combined.

Thermal Mass

Thermal mass is the mass of a building which is available for use as a heat store, rather like a large storage heater.

Timber frame houses typically have low thermal mass, especially ones built on pillars which are not in contact with the ground. Houses built from stone, concrete blocks and cob all have high thermal mass. Thermal mass is only useful if it is insulated on the outside to prevent the heat simply radiating out and being lost.

Materials such as cob and hemp lime have properties which allow them to warm up more quickly than stone or concrete.

Windows and Doors

It is not widely known  that windows  (even double or triple glazed ones) conduct heat  five or even ten times as rapidly as a well insulated wall or roof. In the case of timber doors the difference is even greater. For this reason, windows should be sized according to their primary function, which is to provide light.  In terms of heat losses, timber frames perform better than PVC frames.

Almost all windows are net energy losers in wintertime, even south facing ones. For this reason, heavy curtains or internal shutters are an excellent idea.

Passive Solar

The idea behind passive solar is that solar radiation is trapped in the building behind glazing and is used as a supplementary or even principal form of heating. Most of the glazing should be on the south side of the building, but excessive glazing can lead to overheating and then heat loss through the glass at night time.

Insulation is more important than solar gain however as other heat sources- from cooking, the occupants’ metabolism (each occupant of a building is equivalent to a 80-100 watt incandescent light bulb), or electrical appliances may often warm the house more than the sun.

Internal Temperatures

No statistics are available for Ireland but in the UK,  the average internal temperatures of dwellings rose from only 12.6 ºC in 1970 to 18.9 ºC  in 2001. These averages mask the much higher and much lower temperatures which will be found in some dwellings.

One aspect of energy conservation is to change out habits and requirements- an extra piece of clothing could be just as important as extra insulation, saving money as well as carbon emissions.

Heat Losses from Pipes and Cylinders

Lagging of hot water pipes and cylinders is woefully inadequate in the majority of dwellings, irrespective of the method of heating water or whether the water being heated is for delivering to radiators or hot water cylinders. In many cases, transmission heat losses probably exceed 50%. The greater part of these losses could be eliminated by properly lagging all hot water pipes and connections, double or even triple lagging cylinders, and insulating hot presses. In most cases, the cost of doing this is extremely low. Energy Used for Lighting and Appliances

The   average annual domestic   consumption of 5000 kWh of electricity per household is at its highest level ever and is still rising as houses become bigger and are filled with an increasing number of appliances; notably televisions, computers, freezers and dishwashers.. The difference between the electricity consumption of the most energy aware households and the energy oblivious is in excess of a factor of ten.

Lighting may account for up to one fifth of the total electricity usage but this may easily be reduced by changing over to compact fluorescent lights (CFLs). CFLs use less than 25% of the energy of conventional incandescent lights for a comparable light output. As a simple rule, if a light gets hot, it means a lot of energy is being wasted as heat.  Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) are even more efficient than compact fluorescents and may be particularly useful for background lighting or small spotlights.

A huge amount of electrical energy (up to 50% in some households) is wasted simply by leaving things switched on when not in use or by leaving appliances plugged in when they are ‘turned off’.

Final words

Think small, think simple.

Rethinking Energy: Conservation, Curtailment, Efficiency and Appropriate Technology

by David Fleming and Graham Strouts

Energy is first and foremost a demand issue- how much do we need and for what ?- and yet the majority of public debate on the issue is to do with finding new sources of supply so as to allow industrial growth to continue.

Community Powerdown is concerned with redesigning our living arrangements as far as possible so as to reduce demand. We need to reduce drastically both per capita energy consumption as well as total world energy use.

This is an essential point to understand because simply making energy use more efficient, or even reducing per capita consumption, will not be sufficient if total demand is still increasing- for example, driven by rising population.

This means that we will sometimes have to make hard decisions about what we use energy for. Energy is fundamental but one of the challenges of understanding energy in today’s’ world is that we are so unaware of how much we use or what the impacts of its use are. Taking more responsibility for how we use energy is the starting point.

In order to understand better our use of energy it is useful to consider the laws of thermodynamics, and how they impose absolute limits on energy consumption in society. By understanding this we will be able to make better choices about the use of energy in society.

Howard Odum {Odum, H., Odum, E. Energy Basis for Man and Nature 1976} has done much to show how energy is fundamental to not just the physical world, but also the social and even the psychological world:

“Citizens who think of energy as simply one commodity, separate from matter, information, art, and human spirit, must learn that everything has an energy component. The more intangible and valuable something is the more it costs in energy. And the more intangible a value is the more energy value is lost when it deteriorates or is lost”.

Thus, energy is not just for physicists: everyone in all sectors of society should become energy literate. Odum explains the Laws of Thermodynamics in the following way:

1)    Energy cannot be created or destroyed. This is known as the Law of Conservation of Energy We cannot “create” new sources of energy: either we use non-renewable sources which are essentially extracted from holes in the ground- including oil, gas and uranium- or we are confined to the availability of ambient solar energy that arrives on the planet each day. Thus, burning wood is renewable because trees can re-grow, but if we use the resource faster than the replenishment rate, it is no longer sustainable.

2)    The Law of Degradation of Energy. Without compensating changes elsewhere, heat can flow only from a hotter to a colder body. This is the law of entropy- the tendency for heat energy to become progressively more diffuse over time.

3)    Systems which use energy best survive. The maximum power principle explains that systems which use energy the most effectively are more likely to survive longer.

These energy laws together can be summed up by the concept of limits: there are absolute physical and natural limits to human activity on the planet, and we need to bring a deep understanding of this into every area of society.

One of the reasons it is so hard to accept the reality of these energy laws is that cheap oil has effectively been a source of “free” energy, allowing humans for one or two generations to escape the natural laws that hold all other life forms in check. With the rapid rise in technology, particularly computer processing power and communications technology, we have created a compelling illusion that we can delay pay-back time indefinitely.

Another reason is to do with the second law, the entropy law: ancient fossil energy stored deep in the ground represent potential energy; once they have been burned, that energy is dispersed throughout the environment, and some of its effect will turn up later as climate change, habitat destruction or pollution- often far removed from where it was consumed. So the consumer may be far removed from the results of that consumption.

Metaphorically, we might also perceive the effects of entropy in some of the common ills of modern society: traffic jams, road rage, road kill are all side-effects of a society using too much energy too fast. It has been estimated for example that the energy content of 40litres of oil would be roughly equivalent to three years of human physical labour- imagine pushing your car around over the same distance! And yet, in the past, and still over much of the planet, most work was done by human or animal labour. We need to prepare for a world where this will once again be the case.

Here are 6 points that should always be born in mind when discussing energy:

Firstly, the entropy law tells us that there will be consequences for the consummate use of energy that we have not yet paid for: the use of energy has a cost, in pollution, environmental destruction, and climate change.

Secondly, we take energy for granted: at the flick of a switch we can turn on powerful engines that can do the work of many people. The use of energy has allowed us evolve a new type of human- what William Catton calls “Homo Colossus”- a monstrous being with enormous  energy at its disposal- and enormous capacity for destruction.{Catton, W., Overshoot 1982)

Thirdly, the use of energy has had an enormous effect on social relationships. The introduction of machinery has turned us from a mainly agrarian culture to an urban one in which much of the work is done by machines. We have lost many traditional skills that we may have to re-learn.

In addition, we have become extremely mobile and this has lead to families and communities being flung to the four corners of the earth. Commitment and retaining connection to the land is very hard when there are so many exotic opportunities for travel and adventure.

Fourthly, the rebound effect means that in a society dedicated to growth, improvements in efficiency without equal attention to reduction in overall demand may actually lead to an increase of energy, as that energy can now do more work and is therefore more valuable.

Fifthly, the energy return on energy invested is reducing. We have picked the low-hanging fruit and remaining energy supplies will be very costly to extract. This is known as “Energy Return on Energy Invested” or EROEI. Often, when a new oil discovery is reported for example, the energy cost required to extract the resource is not counted. In reality, much of the oil and gas in the ground will never be recovered because the energy to do so will exceed the energy it would provide.

Finally, energy is a social justice issue because worldwide, energy consumption is hugely inequitable. For example, Ireland’s per capita consumption of energy is only half that of the average American, but 4 times that of the average Cuban and nearly 8 times that of the average Indian. {World resource Institute 2007} While much of the developed world is still in denial about the reduced availability of energy in the future, most of the world will never experience the benefits of cheap fossil fuels that the West has had.

David Fleming calls the following issues the “Lean Energy Sequence”.

1.  Energy conservation: Develop all the ways you can think of to use energy more efficiently.  Most energy in the United Kingdom and Ireland is used for heating, lighting, and the other energy-based services of buildings, so some simple changes such as turning the heating down can make significant savings.  Aim to get the energy services you use now for less than half the energy you use now.

2.  Structural change: By changing structural aspects of your life- for example, by taking a job you can cycle to, or working part time so you can spend more time growing your own food- it may be possible to aim for ultimately an 80 percent reduction in total energy consumption. In this era of cheap energy, transport is the rule; doing things locally is the exception.  When the energy famine comes, it will be the other way round. Better conservation can help to open the way to structural change; structural change can open the way to better conservation.

3.  Renewables.  Living off the grid with domestic wind or solar systems will only be for the very few, partly because of cost and partly because few sites are suitable. Passive solar water and space heating will however be applicable to some extent in most places; but renewable energy production for the most part needs to be on a community or municipal scale, and its source will depend on the area.

4.  Institutional framework.  If we are going to reduce and redesign our energy needs, and achieve the massive changes needed by the proximity principle, we will need a system in which we can all work to a common purpose.  This will eventually mean some system of rationing- one such proposal is David Fleming’s Tradable Energy Quotas (www.teqs.net).

Re-thinking energy means exploring all of these issues together so that declining supplies of fossil energy are replaced, not with new sources of energy but with systems that promote community resilience.

It’s All Connected: Whole Systems Thinking and Permaculture

Systems theory is an interdisciplinary theory of how we can understand the world in terms of the dynamics of a system: a network of interrelating parts which themselves can also be seen as parts.

This idea of “parts within parts” has been referred to as a “holarchy”- a nested series of systems, one within the other like Russian dolls.

Thus, an atom is part of a molecule which is part of a cell which is part of an organ which is part of a body. As a formal branch of science, systems theory emerged first within the ecological sciences, but has been perhaps most influential in the development of computers. Since the 1960s, its use in the understanding of humans interconnectedness with the rest of nature in the “web of life” has been a compelling and powerful motivation for the sustainability movement.

A complex system is a system which:

• consists of many different parts, which in turn join up at higher levels of complexity;

-where control is widely distributed throughout the system, though there is often some overarching centre which gives direction to the system’s responses and behaviour;

-a complex system is capable of learning and acting on what it has learned;

-it can respond to its environment through  feedbacks: in climate science for example, a positive feedback would be seen in a warming atmosphere melting the icecaps, which reduces the albedo effect as the ice declines, allowing more heat to be absorbed by the darker oceans, thus causing more warming; Negative feedback in this case might be the result of human awareness of what is happening leading to powerdown communities reducing their fossil energy consumption, and thus reducing their contribution to this warming.

-it is capable of non-linear change through these feedback mechanisms which may make it unpredictable and potentially chaotic, at least for a while, until a new equilibrium is achieved.

James Lovelock applied the idea of systems thinking when he used the term Gaia {Lovelock, J. Gaia- A New look at life on Earth 2000 } to describe the planet. The image of Gaia as a whole system allows us to think beyond the immediate effects of our actions- burning fuel to travel to work or heat the house for example- to see the wider implications for the system as a whole: the cumulative effects of fossil fuel burning leading to a warming planet with potentially disastrous effects for life around the globe, changing weather patterns leading to disruption of our own agricultural systems  and the environment which sustains us.

Permaculture

It was from a study of ecological systems than Australian ecologists Bill Mollison and David Holmgren developed the concept of Permaculture in the 1970s.

Their understanding of the interrelationship between the soil, food production and energy made them realise that the emergence of industrial farming through the process known as the “Green Revolution” could only last a few decades before we would be compelled to adapt to less energy and declining soil fertility.

Permaculture Design Principles were devised as practical tools for applying the lessons learned from nature to the conscious design of human homes, gardens, farms and to guide our interaction with the landscape.{Holmgren,D. The Essence of Permaculture } The aim of this design process is to develop systems that require minimal inputs and are to a large degree self-sustaining.

The idea is best developed with the concept of an Forest Garden consisting primarily of perennial vegetables, mimicking the layers of a woodland, each plant making the most of the diverse niches for space and nutrients, and as far as possible mutually supporting each others needs.

This whole systems approach gives us a sustainable approach to everything from farming and land use, to renewable energy and the economy, seeing them all as subsets of the wider planetary system.

Every system has points of leverage – that is, the parts, properties, and reactions which will enable you to get rich results from the system if we learn to apply the design principles learned from natural systems.

Response

One of the key ideas in systems thinking is to focus not so much on the constituent parts, but in the relationships between them: hence the adage “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts”.

When we apply system thinking to communities we move away from the notion of sustainable development which fails to understand the system constraints of resources and environmental degradation, and focus instead on sustainable resilience which allows us to first identify, and then put in place, the system conditions for sustainability capable of withstanding the shocks that may be coming.

By finding the system’s points of leverage we may develop more creative and ultimately more effective responses. Resilience has three properties:

1.    Modularity: that is, the resilient system consists of many parts which, despite their many interactions between each other, have a high degree of self-reliance and independence.  If one part gets destroyed, that is not fatal for the rest of the system, because the other parts can carry on more-or-less as before.  The opposite of modularity is connectedness: if one part breaks down the consequences will ripple through the system as a whole.

For instance, in the fuel-strike in the United Kingdom in 2000, a quite small number of members of the haulage unions came close to closing down the entire economy, simply by blockading the exit roles of the major oil refineries.  Modularity, like the cells of a resistance movement, copes with damage to the parts of a system, which carries on as a whole.

2.    Diversity: the parts (e.g. the communities) within the system differ sharply from each other.  Like plants in a woodland co-existing by using different niches of light and nutrient availability, they live in different places, with different barriers and opportunities, different supplies of local skills, different soils, different cultures, and they respond to all this in different ways, developing their own characters which then evolve with increasing diversity.  This is disconcerting for the bureaucratic mind – the top-down authority, which likes things to be done in the one best way, but it is a central property of complex systems.

3.    Tight feedback loops: this refers to how quickly and strongly the consequences of a change in one part of the system are felt and responded to in other parts.{Hopkins, R. The Transition Handbook 2008} While big, globalised systems based on large-scale organisations such as corporations and governments are inherently slow and cumbersome in their responses-like a huge oil tanker taking too long to switch course and avoid the ice-berg-  and often fail completely to see the wider effects of their policies, small-scale systems can move much faster.

For example, someone living off-grid will monitor their energy consumption carefully because they are closely connected to its source; global consumers may have little awareness of where there energy, or food or other goods and services actually come from, nor the environmental impact their production may cause.

A key element, therefore, of tight feedback is that a system like a community has the incentive to maintain a substantially closed system; that is, it reuses its waste, reinvesting it (for example) in local fertility; or else it exchanges its waste with other local ecosystems: what it does not do is simply dump its waste out of sight, calling on ever-increasing supplies of energy and materials.  Tight feedback loops mean that the system is aware of the whole extent of the energy and materials cycles to which it belongs, and takes full responsibility for them.

Opportunities for Change

As more science and data emerge about the environment, and in particular as our understanding of climate change develop and becomes more widely known, so we will be compelled to find whole systems approaches.

Oil price fluctuations and declining availability will make alternatives more appealing, for example renewables may become more cost-effective. The decline in global resources will lead us to become more reliant on local resources which we will have a greater incentive to take care of.

An awareness of the interconnectedness of the natural and human worlds will lead us away from hierarchical, top-down approaches as we realise that the system is self-regulating, and that no one is in control: we make the world through the some total of our choices.

Change is not always incremental or linear, and systems thinking can help us to manage change more effectively in society.

In climate change we are familiar with the notion of “tipping points” which may lead to an abrupt switch into a new climate regime.  This notion has been applied to social change also {Malcom Gladwell The Tipping Point 2000}

The system driver of the last few decades has been economic growth; a new vision, a new set of values underpinned by systems thinking may yet allow a tipping point of values into a new cultural state which, like the sudden tearing down of the Berlin Wall, will create the conditions for resurgence.

Subject: “Community powerdown”.

“Community” is often dismissed as a romantic notion, “harking back a golden age that never existed”. Traditional rural communities tended to be held together by the absence of choice: you were your mother’s daughter or your father’s son, and the range of possible futures – opportunities for travel, education, and employment- were limited.

From an ecological perspective, such opportunities were limited essentially by the availability of energy. This may have lead to a sense of being stifled by the conservative norms of the community, and their  parochial and sometimes oppressive nature. The community became something to escape from once the opportunity arose.

In the industrial world, for the developed nations at least, the influx of energy and the cheap resources that came with it lead to a dramatic increase in opportunities for education and travel, but at a cost: as people became more mobile, and came into contact with a greater range of ideas and influences, traditional values tended to break down and along with them the “glue” of religion, family and place that may have held them together for so long.

The 1960s saw the emergence of “post-modern” feelings of loss of community and a yearning for a return to a sense of place- this can be seen in the experiments in communal living that began with hippy communes and has now evolved into the eco-village movement.

Intentional communities such as these will probably be only ever possible for small numbers of people; for the majority, we will have to rebuild community from where we find ourselves now. In effect, the resilience of the local community will be the most efficient way of making up for the decline of energy supplies. Convivial and reciprocal relationships with our neighbours will become more important as global trade links disintegrate, and many of the tasks now performed by corporations with no vested interest in the local community will need to be done instead by people with a common interest and a common purpose rooted in the resources of their locality.

There are many reasons why local community needs now to be recovered and rebuilt, and the two main reasons are as follows:

1.  Energy solutions.

After Peak Oil, the energy needed to sustain the centralised urban economy will not be available.  The decentralised local economy, with some productive land around it, needs far less energy than the centralised urban pattern of living which we have now.  Here are some reasons: 1.    It does not depend on long-distance transport for almost all its daily needs and activities.  This alone is decisive. 2.    It is better able to reduce its material needs, saving the energy required to sustained material flows – the production, transport, processing and disposal of materials:

• -    It can reduce the quantity of materials it needs (less packaging, less material needed for transport).
• -    It can re-use its materials (the re-use of – for instance – bottles is complicated and impractical on a very large centralised scale, but quite easy on a local scale).
• -    It can recycle its waste easily.  For example, sorting waste carefully by type is more easily done locally, where there is a chance to give attention to individual items, than when the materials arrive at a central depot in bulk.  It also becomes practical to recycle organic materials on a small scale; people are better motivated to get results which are close-at-hand, and which they can see; it becomes easier to control what goes into the waste when it is done on a small scale; and quantities of organic waste (compost) need to be limited in scale to have contact with the air.

2.  Practical economics

The great disadvantage of a globalised economy is that banks will tend to invest their depositors money wherever in the world they believe they can get the best return; they are unlikely to have much interest in re-investing the profits they make in a local community.

When things go wrong, as we have seen on a global scale recently with the credit crash, the small communities are the first to suffer, with “bailouts” being reserved for the banks that lost their gambles. What will be needed is locally owned banks and financial institutions who will not bring the whole global economy down with them if they make bad decisions, but who are much more likely to invest in the resilience of their own community, for example by supporting regional energy schemes.

Many communities around the world have held intact local currencies and locally owned credit agencies, and often these communities find that they can both prosper as the surplus wealth is reinvested in the community, as well as be resilient to the vagaries of the international financial markets. { Douthwaite 1996}

Response

The success of Community Powerdown depends upon the successful integration of the interests of the local community and its ability to husband in a sustainable manner the local resources- the natural capital of soil, energy, biodiversity, skills and knowledge- it has available in its locality.

In addition, many “services” that have been progressively “outsourced” to corporations may be done much more efficiently in the home or community. An increased sense of community involvement may have tremendous healing effects on individuals and help them find a sense of purpose. This could have great benefits in terms of public health, levels of crime, and social justice. For example, a study for Feasta in 2004 found that a range of Quality of Life indicators including increased alcoholism, income disparity, poverty in old age and others increased during the very years of the Celtic Tiger. {Cullen, E. 2004}

People’s willingness to do things for each other, and to trust, depends on (amongst other things) how well they know each other and how often they see them.  The fullest collaboration takes place within families, close relations and households.  On this scale, people may be willing to provide care and services for each other over long periods and without expecting any return beyond the courtesies and affection which hold a family together. At the next level – the neighbourhood, consisting of some 150 adults – people are prepared to cooperate fully and persistently, without necessarily balancing up how much they get in return.  The priority is to sustain the health and well-being of your street – or, it may be, of the 150 people living in houses scattered over a rural area. {Alexander 1977}

Every household maintains its own private sphere and individuality, but there will be some common assets in the neighbourhood: some shared land, some equipment and buildings, calling for a shared response. Then there is the larger scale of the parish, the village, or a small town.  At this hometown level, the community meets (e.g.) to plan its future, to celebrate, to go church, or for sports.  This is the level at which most interesting initiatives take place; strategy is considered at the level of the town, village or rural area, but it is put into effect by smaller groups and neighbourhoods.  It is also the scale on which local currencies operate: they protect local trades, making it possible for local producers to trade with each other even though their prices would rule out competition in the open market.

Above that, there is the nation.  It is vital that the community/transition movement should be understood at the level of the nation; it would be hard to get results if the nation were not an ally, and it has fundamental tasks, such as keeping the peace, and enabling the law to evolve in response to the needs of community. If all this is to happen, there needs to be a basic atmosphere of good faith, shared humour, a sense of shared destiny, a common culture, a shared identity.  This is fragile.  Groups or factions committed to the view that it is “us or them”, could make the existence of community hard, or impossible.

When that shared identity and a commitment to community-building does exist, however, it brings some critical assets.  First, it brings common purpose, the alignment of incentives between you and the community you live in: its members’ own interests are advanced by the well-being of the community as a whole; the community’s interests are advanced by the well-being of its members.  Secondly, common capability: the opportunities that open up for the individual to get results if the whole community is doing the same thing.  When those results consist of developing local food production and designing mini-grids for the generation and distribution of energy, there can be no question: you are only going to make progress when the community as a whole is committed to the same aim.

Barriers

We have left it very late.  We should have been building community – and preventing the decline of the communities we inherited – fifty years ago, but we have barely started.  Land, housing, relevant skills, and understanding of the character and capability of community – to think about any of these, is to realise how far there is to go.   We all depend on our current jobs, which most of us cannot afford to leave; and when the oil peak has happened it will be hard indeed to start the long process of transforming the communities we live in, or choosing a site to start afresh.  Deep rifts of faction and divided loyalties have been allowed to develop in many nations, especially in northern Europe.  For most of us, the choice is obvious: carry on as we are and see what happens.

Opportunities

On the other hand, there are some things going the other way. The most encouraging recent development is the Transition Town movement.  This started in Kinsale in 2001; it started again on  larger scale in Totnes, (England) in 2006, and it is spreading.

Transition Towns provide the most visible manifestation of the kind of thinking that underpins this course, including such fundamentals as producing food locally and organising local energy grids.

Crucially, everything they are doing is set in the context of community as a place to enjoy, with its own culture, its celebrations, its loyalties and rivalries, its sense of being interesting in its own way.  A living, participative culture is an essential condition, not just for becoming self-reliant, but for becoming a person.

Community-building on the local scale forms the corner-stone of the transition to a post-oil future, and it has in its favour the reality that there will be no alternative.

References

Douthwaite, R. 1996 Short Circuit Online edition : http://www.feasta.org/documents/shortcircuit/index.htm

Cullen, E 2004 Unprecedented growth, but for whose benefit? http://www.feasta.org/documents/review2/cullen.htm

Alexander, C. 1977 A Pattern Language