Live Radio
When the Post Carbon Institute was started in 2003, the idea behind its name was a philosophical ideal. Seven years later, it’s become a imminent necessity—one with an accelerating deadline.
This is Miller's Open Letter to President Obama, in response to his 2010 State of the Union Speech.
Dear President Obama,
Your State of the Union speech last week laudably referenced clean tech and renewable energy several times. We ask that you follow your words with action, by leading the transition to a post-carbon economy and a healthier world.
You also spoke of our need to face hard truths.
Hard truth: Our continued, willful reliance on fossil fuels is making our planet uninhabitable. We are evicting ourselves from the only paradise we’ve ever known.
Hard truth: No combination of current and anticipated renewable sources can maintain our profligate energy usage as the global supply of fossil fuels heads for terminal decline.
For the recently released Searching for a Miracle, Post Carbon Institute Senior Fellow Richard Heinberg conducted a “net energy” analysis of 18 different energy sources (including nuclear and “clean coal”). He concluded that the amount of energy available after accounting for the energy used in extraction and production of those sources is—at our current and anticipated rates of consumption—insufficient to get us “over the hump” to a post-carbon world.
Our 29 Post Carbon Institute Fellows—experts in the leading economic, energy, and environmental issues of the day—all agree that this "net energy" deficit is just one of many interrelated crises shaping the 21st century. Each crisis alone creates formidable challenges; in combination, their complexity admits no simple solution. But given their direness, inaction risks tragedy.
Mr. President, we respect you and your advisors and appreciate the enormity of the dilemmas you and all of us confront. When a great leader frames a great challenge, a resilient people will rise to meet the opportunity. And so we ask, Mr. President, that you tell the American people that we must:
1. Face reality. In a carbon-constrained world, true prosperity comes not from heedless growth, but from shared security, community, and liberty.
2. Prepare for the future. Conservation, with an emphasis on building a green economy and revitalizing struggling communities, offers cost-effective “found” energy, and the most immediate and long-term return on investment.
3. Lead the way. A substantial investment in renewable energy, with an emphasis on distributed solar and wind, offers the best hope for moving to a sustainable economy and environment.
Mr. President, lead us in creating a future worth inheriting. Post Carbon Institute and our Fellows will support you and your team in whatever capacity we can. We believe that the American people, and the world’s people, will support you as well.
With hope,
Asher Miller
Executive Director
Post Carbon Institute
Click here to comment on the letter to President Obama. You can also see the complete list of fellows on the Post Carbon Institute website.
A unique instance of hands-on philanthropy, Tom Pringle’s Shovel Project is making life a little better for random households around Tijuana, Mexico.
Perhaps surprisingly, Pringle (seen here in his home workshop) says the germ of the idea for his shovel project was inspired, not by the need or a desire to “make a difference,” but by a high profile public art project.
Tom Pringle will present a slide show and report to the community oh his shovel project at the Peace and Justice Center, 467 Sebastopol Avenue in Santa Rosa, January 28th at 7 pm.
The pathway to sustainability depends on morphing conflict into consensus, and when it comes to food systems, that’s what Sebastopol’s Ag Innovation Network is all about.
Even in areas where there is a history of deep distrust between factions within the agricultural sector, such as Sonoma County with its history around the 2000 Rural Heritage Initiative, Ag Innovations Network CEO Dan Schurman (left) says they are committed to a process that works to heal past rifts.
Endangered salmon and vineyards vulnerable to frost are both depending on flows in local waterways to protect them, but there isn’t enough water available to serve both competing needs.
The vines shown at left have been sprayed with water that then freezes around the budding greenery. This protects the vine by holding the enclosed plant material at exactly 32 degrees, when the surrounding air is colder and could damage the new growth.
Frost is usually not a concern to vineyardists in the fall, as the grapes are usually harvested before the weather turns cold. But in the springtime, explains Nick Frey, President of the Sonoma County Winegrape Commission, a cold spell can devastate the vines, leaving them looking like this.
Using stream water for vineyard frost protection is problematic for local fisheries in several areas in California, says Jeff Miller of the Center for Biological Diversity, but the situation is especially acute in the Russian River’s watershed.
A series of presentations are planned over the next two weeks to alert vineyard owners and growers to the possibility of new rules on water use for frost protection, and begin collecting data on water use for that purpose. They will be held:
- Wednesday, Jan. 6, 4 p.m., at the Kendall Jackson Wine Center, 5007 Fulton Rd. in Fulton
- Thursday, Jan. 7, 4 p.m., Dutton Pavilion at Santa Rosa Junior College Shone Farm, 7450 Steve Olson Lane, Forestville
- Friday, Jan. 8, 10 a.m., Knights Valley Fire Department, 16850 Spencer Lane, Calistoga
- Friday Jan. 8, 4 p.m., Healdsburg Community Center at Foss Creek Elementary School, 1557 Healdsburg Ave., Healdsburg
- Thursday, Jan. 14, 10 a.m., Dutton Pavilion (see Jan. 7, above)
A summary of the history of this issue, as monitored by the California State Water Resources Control Board, can be found here.
It's well known that many of the oldest wineries in Sonoma and Napa Counties predate Prohibition, but the story of how they got through the 14 dry years when the 18th amendment was in effect is only now being fully told.
{mp3remote}http://media.krcb.org/audio/nbr/7-6-09.mp3{/mp3remote}
Dry laws were never supported in northern California. Several statewide ballot initiatives were unsuccessful, due in part of strong opposition in San Francisco and the surrounding counties. So when Prohibition was enacted in far-off Washington, D.C., author Vivienne Sosnowski says that folks in the north bay almost unanimously took to bootlegging.
{mp3remote}http://media.krcb.org/audio/nbr/bootleg.mp3{/mp3remote}
Our poularized cultural history paints Chicago as the epicenter of the battles between federal prohibition enforcement agents and rumrunner, bootleggers and others who flouted the law. But similar episodes played out in many areas. Sosnowski recounts one she was told of, which happened near Geyserville.
{mp3remote}http://media.krcb.org/audio/nbr/still.mp3{/mp3remote}
Sosnowski (left) was able to talk with a number of elderly members of Sonoma and Napa county wine-making families, collecting their oral histories of the Prohibition years. She says she came away from the project with a great admiration for what they all went through.
{mp3remote}http://media.krcb.org/audio/nbr/susrvivors.mp3{/mp3remote}
