United we stand, divided we fall
- Unknown
We have a whole spectrum of vastly different approaches to solve this perfect storm of problems but one thing is certain: if we do not agree on which one is the “right” one, we are going to divide ourselves and we will not have any solution. That’s the quagmire that caused the Kyoto Protocol to fail. This time, there’s no second chance.
Banking on the purely big technology/industrialization approach is dangerous. There are a number of huge challenges with this approach:
- It banks on scientific breakthroughs which have no predictable timeline
- Technocrats do not seem to know how to do proper Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) so that very large hidden embodied energy and pollution costs are hidden from view
- Consensus from policy-makers has proven to be very difficult…look what with the Kyoto Protocol fiasco
- We are already facing two huge impending crisis, Peak Oil and Global Warming, each of which are being fought tooth-and-nail by Big Oil, Big Business interests. We cannot muster the resources or unify to solve one of these problems, let alone two!
For this reason, many, including the esteemed panel of MIT scientists who did the original Limits to Growth study suggest that it is too late to try to save our overconsuming way of life; they have effectively ruled out “Sustainable Development” as an achievable result…we have squandered the 40 years we had to do something about the problem. Prevention is out of the question and now, the only sensible is treatment and preparation for the inevitable trillion pound gorilla bearing down on us is to make our communities more resilient to the impending crisis.