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Endless growth is a delusion with consequences...The spiral of climate change, peak energy, and economic crisis, with author Richard Heinberg. Fresh interview on giant new book "Energy: Overdevelopment and the Delusion of Endless Growth". Followed by speech to Chicago Bioneers "Life After Growth: Why the Economy Is Shrinking and What to Do About It”. Radio Ecoshock 130116
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Download/listen to Richard Heinberg's speech to the Chicago Great Lakes Bioneers conference (42 minutes) in CD Quality or Lo-fi.
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And now, one with the show.
Richard Heinberg, California.
Eye-popping, jaw-dropping, - I'm out of words to describe the tsunami of agencies and experts admitting our troubles are bigger than our brains.
But this week we're going to step back from brink. I want to explore what it means. But who can assemble the currents of climate change, peak energy, and a delusional economy into a big picture? Richard Heinberg, Senior Fellow at the Post Carbon Institute is one of the few who consistently keeps track of all three. He's the author of 10 books including "The Party’s Over", "Peak Everything", and "The End of Growth".
I start by calling Richard up about a very big new book, and then we'll hear his assessment from his keynote speech at the Great Lakes Bioneers Conference in Chicago. I knew some of the facts Richard brings out, but I didn't know how these forces of collapse interact, or when.
THE BIGGEST BOOK I'VE EVER OWNED
I wanted to give Richard Heinberg Hell for wasting resources on an eight pound monster book - about wasting precious resources!
The book "Energy, Overdevelopment and the Delusion of Endless Growth" is so big, I had to clear off my desk just to look at it. But then I got sucked in, by 2 foot photos of the-wide photos of the nasty industrial mess hiding behind our cars and smart-phones. Why didn't I know it's that bad out there?
The book has huge photos of even larger landscapes, places wrecked by our insatiable need for more and more energy. I began to wonder: why don't we see these images in the media, or in our daily lives? Are they censored, or is it because we don't want to look?
For one thing, Richard points out, if you don't have a private plane, you'll never see most of these energy reserves. They are generally in the out back lands. Plus, since 911, most of these energy farms have private security guards and the threat of being labeled a terrorist if you are there taking pictures.
I've seen horrible photos of the Canadian Tar sands oozing across the scarred landscape, as far as the eye can see. But until this book, I didn't realize the vast impact of conventional oil and gas production. Richard and I talk about "energy sprawl".
I was taken by the paper by the former Director of the C.I.A., R. James Woolsey. He says we are ready to spend billions fighting malevolent groups like Al Queda, but we totally unwilling to even talk about what he calls the "malignant threats" like system collapse of things like our electric grid, or the climate. Richard Heinberg has experienced that unwillingness to look, talk, and act for much of his
professional life.
Surprisingly, this book includes green favorites like wind energy and solar farms as "blighted industrial landscape". And yet, despite the hard-headed figures on world energy sources and things like return on energy investment, I was surprised by the photos and essays on the importance of wild places and the species that live there. Is this a return to the old environmentalism?
Along those lines, I notice the flagship web site and discussion spot for the Post Carbon Institute has changed from the well-known "Energy Bulletin" to a completely new site, Resilience.org Richard Heinberg explains why, and notes some of the new resources aimed at helping us all relocalize.
He also says you can read some of the essays from the book online at resilience.org as time develops, from luminaries like Wendell Berry, James Hansen, David Orr, Amory Lovins, Sandra Steingraber, Juan Pablo Orrega and just too many more to mention. The
essays are also found in the book "Energy Reader", available from the Post Carbon Institute. This Reader, Heinberg says, is already being used in some college classes.
The book "Energy: Overdevelopment and the Delusion of Endless Growth" was published with the help of the Foundation for Deep Ecology, which also spearheaded other activist large format books, including CAFO (Confined Animal Feeding Operations) and a great rainforest book.
Find the Radio Ecoshock coverage of CAFO - Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations The horrible truth about our meat production practices. Interview with Daniel Imhoff, editor of 2 new books on factory farm production. From Ecoshock 101015 Lo-Fi 4 MB 19 min
THE MEETING OF CLIMATE DISRUPTION, ENERGY DECLINE, AND ECONOMIC CRISIS or "Why the Economy Is Shrinking".
How do climate change, energy problems, and the fragile economy interact? And which will hit us worst and first? Let's hear Richard Heinberg add it all up at this keynote speech at the Great Lakes Bioneers Conference in Chicago, on November 2nd, 2012. This was recorded for Radio Ecoshock by Kelly Pierce of the Chicago Independent Media Center. The talk is titled “Life After Growth: Why the Economy Is Shrinking and What to Do About It”. We take you there. Find the links to listen to or download this speech by Richard Heinberg above.
What caused 5 previous mass extinctions of species? Scientists say we are in the 6th one now.
Dr. Andrew Glikson of Australian National University studied the rocks and the timelines. He's also an expert on asteroid hits.
A deep 44 minute interview with a world-class climate scientist and geologist - on what the past says about our future under climate change.
Dr. William Calvin of the University of Washington is author of over a dozen books, including "Global Fever, How to Treat Climate Change" and "A Brain for All Seasons, Human Evolution and Abrupt Climate Change". We have a short chat, about how the ice ages shaped our brains, and recent signs of climate shift.
Followed by Calvin's introduction in a speech at the University of Victoria, by Dr. Colin Campbell of the Sierra Club. Insightful on the way climate shapes our species, and all species.
http://bit.ly/w0fBnz Master winter gardener Eliot Coleman grows year round in Maine, USA. UK, guerrilla gardener Chris Tomlinson secretly plants food. "HumptyDumptyTribe" warns global famine from climate change comng soon. Winter greenhouse interview from "Locavore," with Martin Ronda at the U. of Guelph Centre for Urban Organic Farming. Radio Ecoshock Show 111207 1 hour.
SHOW LINE UP - WITH INTERVIEW DOWNLOADS
1. "Winter Gardening with Eliot Coleman"
How to grow food in winter, even in Northern climates. Master gardener Eliot Coleman, from Four Seasons Farm in Bar Harbor Maine, grows (and sells) vegetables year-round, using inexpensive portable "hoop house" greenhouses, with no added heat source. Classic how-to interview, from Radio Ecoshock Show 111207 23 minutes 5 MB
2. "Guerrilla Gardening"
How to create an edible landscape on public and private lands. UK "Guerrilla of Love" Chris Tomlinson explains how he secretly plants food, perennials and trees, in waste lands, untended gardens, and even city streets. Fun interview on serious topic, as economy erodes. From Radio Ecoshock show 111207 9 minutes 2 MB
3. "Global Famine Starts in Texas"
From You tube, excellent rant and demonstration of Texas heat killing off ability of garden plants to set fruit. Above 85 degree F days, and without going below 68 F nights - no tomatoes, beans, mellons, nada. A portent of coming global famine as global warming develops, says this You tube poster "Humptydumptytribe". 9 minutes selected for Radio Ecoshock 111207 Global Famine Starts in Texas 2 MB
Nuts and bolts of how to grow vegetables even in a Canadian winter, with no extra heating. Walter Garrison, host of "Locavore" on CFRU Guelph, Ontario interviews Martin Ronda in greenhouse of Guelph Centre for Urban Organic Farming. Excerpts for Radio Ecoshock 111207 18 minutes. 4 MB
EXTENDED SHOW NOTES:
1. "Winter Gardening with Eliot Coleman"
We want fresh, organic, local food. Now with a sour economy, and rising food prices, that all gets even better. But most of us buy agribusiness produce in the winter, when Nature doesn't exactly encourage growing our own.
Master gardener Eliot Coleman says we CAN grow food year-round - and you don't have to live in Florida or Southern California to do it. From his famous "Four Seasons Farm" in Harborside Maine, Eliot tells us how, in his "Winter Harvest Handbook".
A few notes from our interview:
1.1 Coleman uses a combination of plastic and fabric to keep plants from freezing in the Maine winters.
The first is UV-resistant greenhouse grade plastic over simple hoops made out of plastic piping. This outer "greenhouse" is light and portable. Later, Eliot explains why.
Inside, there is a second fabric cover over the rows of plants. This is "spun-bonded" fabric, sold by seed houses and other garden supply stores. It is easily moved off the plants during the daytime, to allow as much light as possible. But it retains the soil heat during the night, to keep crops alive.
2. There are no pots, and no tables. Everything is grown in the ground. See above.
3. The greenhouse is mobile because:
3.1 it can shelter warm weather crops, like tomatoes, to get the maximum, and then moved over the cold weather crops as needed
3.2 fixed greenhouses, Coleman says, tend to build up problems like insects or moulds. If the ground is exposed to the elements for part of the year, this is far less likely to happen.
4. Aside from heat, the critical element is light. Maine, he says, is on a similar latitude to Southern France. It gets as much light as northern Italy, where everyone expects fresh greens daily. There is enough light in the northern U.S., and southern Canada to grow through the winter. (See also the Guelph interview below). People have winter gardens in Norway and Sweden.
5. For sucess, select winter hardy vegetables. These include spinach, arugula, some lettuce varieties, carrot, beets, kale, scallions, swiss chard, and more.
6. Forget the focus on tomatoes! That is not what winter gardening is about.
7. Coleman used some extra heat for about 5 years, but found it was not necessary. Lately his greenhouses have no wood or fossil fuel heat at all.
8. Grow lights are too expensive to run, considering the value of the vegetables.
9. There is a commercial market for fresh winter veggies. They keep longer for restaurants, than those shipped from further South. The most important point is these cold-hardy vegetables respond to the challenge with excellent taste. People love the taste and freshness.
10. Eliot thinks vegetables from California and Florida will not stop coming. They are just so cheap, even if diesel fuel quadruples in price, it won't add all that much to a head of cauliflower.
11. Eliot lives with Barbara Damrosch, author of "The Garden Primer" and more. He started his "farm" in Bar Harbor, Maine in 1968. At that time, all he could afford was acreage with pine-type forest, not farming land at all. Over the years since, he has worked up the soil into prime shape, about 14 acres in production.
12. The new book "The Winter Harvest Handbook" is an update to his classic "Four Season Harvest" (still an excellent investment). The Handbook has more for commercial growers as well, if you hope to make some extra income from winter greens.
13. Coleman is fascinated by the Transition movement. He's glad to see it.
GUERRILLA GARDENING
All those public lands clothed in lawns and decorative trees, while people go hungry. Why haven't authorities clued into the rising cost of food and poverty?
We live in lost landscapes of the Victorian and Middle Class past. Chris Tomlinson and the "Guerillas of Love" are determined to change all that.
Actually, Chris confesses he is "the guerrillas of love". While there are lots of other guerrillas out there, Tomlinson needed a name to get a couple of grants to buy trees to plant. The Lush Cosmetics shops helped him with a few hundred pounds. Good on them.
So what is "guerrilla gardening"?
Chris looks for waste spaces to plant perennial food varieties. These may be close to where he is staying, so he can water them during the summer.
But his most successful plantings have popped up in people's front gardens, right on private property.
Chris also plants fruit trees in cities and towns. He may put on a jacket that suggests he is a city worker, as he puts in a new tree.
Occasionally, other city crew see them. A few got yanked out. Others were thought to be official, so they get mulched and maybe even get a railing or fence put around them. Success! More public food planted.
Since tree planting can be time intensive, Chris has also scheduled some activity "in the wee hours of the morning."
In Britain, the worst that can happen is a civil fine - no criminal offence. He's been rousted by a couple of cops. One of them was friendly, and had a garden in a community allotment himself.
Chris moves to different communities. He was in Nottingham for a while. Now he's moved on to places unmentioned.
Tomlinson said he became depressed, partly about the state of the world, a few years ago. "Gardening saved me" he says. Looking back, I think gardening might have saved me too, when I went back to the land (as polluting civilization drove me a bit crazy...)
Many, many people have found balance and satisfaction from gardening. Perhaps you would like to become a guerrilla gardener too? Try http://www.guerrillagardening.org/ for more info. That's Richard Reynold's site in the UK.
Our cities seem purposely hostile not just to nature, but to the citizens. We pave over as much as we can, to save maintenance costs. Then we plant the most boring ground cover, and trees with no possible help for the population. How did we get into such a situation?
When I was in Morocco, the avenues were lined with orange trees. Everyone had free oranges. When will we rethink the ban on creating an edible landscape?
As the economy tanks, Peak Oil kicks in, and climate spikes the food prices, I can see a new department of food and agriculture opening in every city.
With very tough economic times coming, we'll need the food, especially for the poor (which will be most of us). Plant now, and plant often.
GLOBAL FAMINE STARTS IN TEXAS
I was surfing You tube just this past week, and found a gem in the new uploads.
"Humptydumptytribe" (a.k.a. Hambone Littletail) says he is going to show us the first sign of the start of global famine, due to global warming.
He starts out with his frustration with the deniers in Austin Texas. Then I expect a tour of the dried out caked ground, maybe with dead cows, after the record drought in Texas.
Nope. Not about that. His camera stays on a lush green garden. Why?
On closer inspection, the plants grew big, there are lots of blooms, plenty of bees, and hardly any fruit.
For example, the first row of tomatoes planted in April grew tomatoes only on the very lowest branches, and nothing after that. The second row of about nine plants look grand, and have just ONE tomato.
Searching on the Net, for "poor fruit set on tomatoes" - he found out: if the daytime temperatures are above 85 degrees during the time of fruit set, and night temperatures stay hot (above 68 degrees) no fruit will be set.
This applied not just to tomatoes, but to his melons, and his pole beans. If Mr. Littletail needed this garden to survive, he would starve.
Countless scientific studies and food experts confirm and warn this is coming. In just one example, Lester Brown of Earth Policy Institute, a recognized expert in grain crops, said rice is within one degree of its tolerance. If the rice growing areas go up one degree of average temperature, they may not set fruit. No rice, or greatly reduced rise equals mass starvation in Asia.
On our current course, various experts and institutes warn, we are headed for a global mean temperature rise of at least 3 degrees C., maybe 5 or 6 C.
In the You tube video, Humptydumptytribe wonders if the 2010 record increase in carbon dioxide emissions is responsible for the heat and drought in Texas this year. It isn't proved, he says, but it looks like good circumstantial evidence.
In any case, a lot of studies have shown the U.S. south will get around three months of days over 100 degrees every year, or every second year, within a decade or two. Texas almost got that this year. Maybe it has come already?
"I host a radio program called Locavore! on CFRU 93.3 FM, based out of Guelph, Ontario. On this show I talk to farmers, processors, restaranteurs, chefs, retailers, brewers, winemakers, researchers, nutritionists, politicians, pretty well anyone who has an impact on the food system as we experience it.
Fifteen years ago I grew fruits and vegetables for a local restaurant in the Rocky Mountains in Alberta. Some people did not believe I could grow field tomatoes commercially in central Alberta. I did.
The Guelph Centre for Urban Organic Farming is located on-site of the University of Guelph. The farm provides a place for students from the university and the local school board to obtain practical experience in learning how to grow food. It is intended to be a trial garden for urban food production. Martha Gay Scroggins oversees this initiative. A few years ago, Dr. Ann Clark and a number of others on campus decided that they wanted an organic farm on campus. The university donated the northwest corner of the University of Guelph Arboretum for this project."
Martha Gay Scroggins at the University of Guelph has been one of the driving forces behind this experimental greenhouse.
The interview was posted on radio4all.net last winter, but now I can't find the original link. It was broadcast on CFRU on January 27th, 2011.
The guest is Martin Ronda. He laboriously dug up the compacted soil in the greenhouse, and hauled up many wheel-barrow loads of water from a stream, before a well was installed.
They get electricity from an extention cord from a nearby parking lot. The power runs two fans which blow air to inflate the two layers of plastic on the outside of the greenhouse. It is a fixed base building.
Like Coleman, Ronda uses a second sheet of row covering which can be drawn over the plants at night. Unlike Coleman, the Guelph crew use black water barrels to absorb heat during the day, and keep the temperature up at night.
Most of the same hardy vegetables are planted. There is good advice on timing in the interview. For example carrots and beets might be planted in late August, and then again in September, to give at least two crops. Planting of other vegetables might go on into mid-October.
During the winter, with less light, in fact during the 6 week around the Solstice, plants hardly grow at all. They need no watering at this stage. They they take off again as more light returns. You can still eat most of them right through the winter.
Host of syndicated weekly Radio Ecoshock Show - the cutting edge with top scientists, authors & activists.
Eight years on the air. Previously a researcher for global environment group, print journalist, homesteader, world-traveler, musician, and private investigator.
