“Beyond the Limits” Deals with the Central Issue of our Times
Just in time for Earth Day, this morning I finished up Beyond the Limits by Donella Meadows et al. Gosh, I wish there were a way I could get everyone to read this critically important work with its incredibly wide-ranging implications about our future here on this tiny, beleaguered planet.
Gro Harlem Brundtland, Chairman of the World Commission on Environment and Development writes, “This book is essential reading for everybody who is concerned with the central issue of our times: how to achieve a transition to a sustainable global future.”
I agree, Craig! One of my favorite books, so packed with critical thinking. Reminds me a lecture I once attended by engineer/architect Malcolm Wells who was introducing a talk abt underground passive solar architecture. He said if humans were only a few hundred million in population, we could pollute as much as we wanted, use as much energy as we wanted, because the Earth’s carrying capacity was enough to handle that. It’s the human population, so many polluting so much and using so many more resources each yr, year after year, that has pushed our demands beyond Earth’s carrying capacity, he said (paraphrased). That’s why we needed to learn to use and pollute less. And now, back in the present, this is why I often post that a mere focus on more renewable energy is so inadequate. So much renewable energy implementation today doesn’t include any reduction in use of conventional energy and pollution. Especially grid-tied renewable energy, which I consider to be the least impactful application. This is my 29th year in biz, and all my projects begin with heavy reductions before proceeding to renewables. And I do incorporate storage, since that significantly expands the impact of the otherwise intermittent renewables. No coal-fired powerplants need to run to backup my off-grid solar powered office ! Yet mine is the only similar biz example in my area. 99.99% of modern-day subsidized renewables are storage-free and unaccompanied by usage reductions. So sad.
Yes, it’s EXTREMELY sad. Keep up the good work, John.