All I want is to be left alone?

One of the major concerns of attempting to reduce your dependence on current structures of "support" provided by contemporary government, is whether you will actually be allowed to drop off the grid. The structures set up to support western culture have been succesful in providing basic services and provide a minimal safety-net in case the unthinkable befalls you and you are destitute, but aren't these simply control mechanisms?

If we try and remove ourselves from these state apparatus and form more localised, more useful, more humane groupings can we? This isn't really a thought experiment, it's a genuine question as energy descent will require much more localisation, much more community cooperation, much more self-reliance.

"The decentralized provision of basic necessities is not likely to flow from a utopian vision of a perfect or even improved society (as have some social movements of the past). It will emerge instead from iterative human responses to a daunting and worsening set of environmental and economic problems, and it will in many instances be impeded and opposed by politicians, bankers, and industrialists. It is this contest between traditional power elites on one hand, and growing masses of disenfranchised poor and formerly middle-class people attempting to provide the necessities of life for themselves in the context of a shrinking economy, that is shaping up to be the fight of the century."

http://www.postcarbon.org/article/714558-the-fight-of-the-century

I cannot recommend Richard Heinberg more highly. He along with others at the Post Carbon Institute are trying to challenge the status quo, trying to challenge business as usual model, I implore you all to read and get involved in any way you can.

Agrarian Anarchy

When one considers energy descent we have to at least consider alternatives to our current way of living. This can be traumatic, not least because we (well I) really haven't been exposed to anything other then neo-liberal capitalist economic dogma. We need to properly study our history and take examples from our pasts that can offer us alternatives. Now I don't want to get into a discussion on the merits of Marxism or Parecon or some other econmic theory, but what I would like a discussion on is the merits of Agrarian Anarchy.

Anarchy, that misquoted and misused word that we all fear right? Wrong!

“Anarchism is not a romantic fable but the hardheaded realization, based on five thousand years of experience, that we cannot entrust the management of our lives to kings, priests, politicians, generals, and county commissioners”; (2) “Anarchism is founded on the observation that since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others”; and (3) “A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.” - Edward Abbey

My learned brother is a keeper of an eye-watering array of literature on anarchist writings and would be best placed to take up this discussion, but for today and for the coming weekend, you only need consider that the current arrangement in our Western Culture is only a contemporary attempt to organise us into easily managed resources. It's not really for us... we are so much better served reverting to our former selves, selves that learned to focus on a reliable and clean food source, potable water and a means of keeping warm. Seems simple enough, but with our modern-selves surrounded by a bigger and bigger array of things to keep us indoors, how can we ever transition from our current living arrangements to a more sustainable, worthwhile, challenging and egalitarian situation?

"It should be clear that the industrial economy is making us sick, mentally and physically, and also greatly reducing habitat for our species on Earth. As a result, I’m a big fan of terminating this set of living arrangements — that is, I’m a fan of terminating industrialized civilization — and replacing it with a more sane and durable set of living arrangements."

http://guymcpherson.com/2012/02/toward-an-economy-of-earth/

What alternatives do you see?

Limits to Growth

Big birthday coming soon, FORTY! Sometimes I like to project what life MAY be like for Freya in 2050 on her 40th birthday... what will be the "norm", how far would energy descent have gone, how will 2050 compare with 2012? Well the clever minds of MIT through the Club of Rome published what they called the Limits to Growth in 1972, attempting something like my thought experiment the year I was born, Forty years ago. I bring this up for two reasons, 1) if any of you clever peeps can find me an original copy of this work, not the republished and updated versions of 1992 and 2002 you'd make my birthday a happy day; 2) it surely is an essential read for anyone who wants to question how we can continue to consider unlimited economic growth as the only measure of progress on a finite planet.


Todays online Guardian has a mention of this:

There are many problematic issues to do with growth that can't be covered here. Clinging to growth, however, suffocates the imagination needed to devise more convivial ways to share a finite planet. At the very least, and with so much evidence to the contrary, the burden of proof now lies heavily on those who reject the original message of the Limits report, for them to demonstrate how, and under what circumstances, we could possibly enjoy "growth forever" in a finite world. Kenneth Boulding, the founder of general systems theory, thought this to be a view held only by "madmen and economists".

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/feb/01/limits-to-economic-growth

Hopefully I'll be able to edumacate myself enough so that I can pass on the necessary skills... scratch that... I need to be able to teach my little pudding two things, creativity and resourcefulness.

We are all aware of the 500lb Gorilla in the room, right? It's not just me who sees it?

What is your energy descent plan?

You may see a little more of this coming over the coming months (posting of special interest pieces) as I believe there are brighter people then me that can talk clearly, passionately and in some cases humourously about energy descent. I encourage you all to follow regularly some of the blogsites listed at the sides of my blog, but if i find some pearl, it'll be posted here too.

"Right now, global food supply is largely sustained through oil-powered “green revolution” technology. In the US, we spend 9 calories of petrochemical energy per food calorie which we consume. In Bangladesh, about 1/2 calorie of human and animal energy goes into producing each calorie of food energy consumed. The petro-energy has meant that we get by with very little human and animal energy. In our equation, it is treated as negligible. A lot of the energy devoted to the calories we eat comes from our cars, refrigerators and cooking devices. Also, we are wasteful of this energetically expensive food. If you throw out half of what you cook, after leaving it sitting in the fridge, you doubly worsen your calorific efficiency." - John Day

http://guymcpherson.com/2012/01/personal-choices-in-uncertain-times/

Time to get tooled up?

Energy Descent

I've recently discovered this little gem of a website and wanted to share with you an essay on the site regarding energy descent.

http://www.simondale.net/house/essay.htm

I particularly like the simple positive feedback cycle they have in this essay. Once again it all points in the same direction that we are embracing, an ordered descent from our current fossil-fuel rich lifestyles to a more sustainable future.