The Transition Movement discussion

This discussion thread is intended, in the words of the member suggesting it, as a place for information about the "background to the global environmental problems we are faced with ... and ... the history of the concept of sustainable development."

Thanks, Ted! I wonder if a certain member may be so forward as to post a bunch of things in this thread soon? :P Sorry, but this is really one of this particular member's hobby horses, especially climate change. :P

Oh, and do you mind if we link to and mention other books and papers and websites etc, in connection with global warming and so on?

I would hope that those sort of posts would magically appear!

As for hobby-horses, I never really thought about what that phrase (which I haven't seen often) means, until I read Tristram Shandy.

Thought I would post links here to a couple diagrams shown in the Wiki article on Sustainability.

This first one is at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nes...
Its caption in the article reads

A diagram indicating the relationship between the three pillars of sustainability suggesting that both economy and society are constrained by environmental limits[1]

[1] Scott Cato, M. (2009). Green Economics. London: Earthscan, pp. 36–37. ISBN 978-1-84407-571-3.

This second diagram is at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sus...
The caption in the article reads

Venn diagram of sustainable development:
at the confluence of three constituent parts.[2]

[2] Adams, W.M. (2006). "The Future of Sustainability: Re-thinking Environment and Development in the Twenty-first Century." Report of the IUCN Renowned Thinkers Meeting, 29–31 January 2006. Retrieved on: 2009-02-16.

These diagrams illustrate the idea that sustainability is a concept whose successful "instantiation" requires that the economic, social, and environmental aspects of the sustainable entity all be addressed.

Thanks Ted. I was interested to see that Howard County has a Transition group. I have long been interested in environmental justice issues, and the way in which the social, economic and environmental issues impact poorer communities.

Thanks, Ted. The part of the debate that I would perhaps like us to have a look at, is climate change/global warming and exactly what our most up to date models can tell us about this and how the ecosystem's feedback systems work, plus all of the variables involved in the global warming/climate change phenomenon that we have been witnessing in the last century.

I feel this is quite an essential part of the debate, since digital weather models, called General Circulation Models have been used to inform global dialog on these issues. For instance, the first report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) first published in 1990, which was used to inform the first Earth Summit, The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, and all similar reports from that date onwards, relied on these climate models.

At first, conservatives refused to believe that global warming was a real phenomenon at all, and especially used the unreliability of these climate models as an argument against reducing the types of emissions (of which there are various).

However, in the past few years there is a lot of evidence that has made the fact of global warming irrefutable. The climate models have become a lot better, but they still cannot predict with exact accuracy how sensitive the ecosystem's feedback systems are.

I have not read the book under discussion in this group yet, (have acquired and will start soon), so I'm not sure in how much detail this is treated there?

I'd like to make it clear that I am not a meteorologist, so I have to trust what the latest scientific reports say, and from what I can see, scientists are pretty much still arguing on many of these details.

Barbara wrote: "Thanks Ted. I was interested to see that Howard County has a Transition group. I have long been interested in environmental justice issues, and the way in which the social, economic and environment..."

Justice is an important thing with me too. Perhaps just a reflection of my extreme left-wing outlook.

The Howard County group has become quite active since about a year ago. We have a large and growing mailing list, but it's difficult to recruit new members who have the time and interest to become more actively involved.

The other problem with our group in Howard County is that it is really a larger area than most of the well-developed Transition groups (say in the U.K.) are working within. A small town (say 5000-10000 people) is far more conducive to building a local movement, than is a county with 300,000 residents, particularly when most of the jobs held by those people are located in either D.C. or Baltimore.

Traveller wrote: "Thanks, Ted. The part of the debate that I would perhaps like us to have a look at, is climate change/global warming and exactly what our most up to date models ..."

Sorry it's taken so long to reply to this Traveller. I was sort of daunted by the depth of info you're interested in, certainly much more than I can provide.

But I'll give it a try.

One site that you may be aware of is http://www.realclimate.org/ . This is a site that Nate Silver mentions in The Signal and the Noise. (I noticed that you saw my review of the book recently, so I won't repeat anything I said there.)

Silver's chapter on climate prediction would have a lot of information and analysis that you would find interesting. However, while the rest of the book is mainly pretty good, is doesn't have anything to to with Transition topics.

So the best bet might be a library copy.

I could try to present a more comprehensive view of Silver's climate prediction discussion, but I think I'll hold off on that unless someone feels they need that view.

"The ecosystem feedback systems": do you mean things like the carbon cycle, water cycle, etc? It's not a term that I'm sure I have a handle on. It does seem like a huge subject, perhaps if someone could find a book that deals with what you're talking about they could let the group know about it.

Of course we know that the climate system, and all the feedback loops that are involved, make for very complicated models. Likely none of them even now take everything into account (I'm guessing).

As you say, the climate models "still cannot predict with exact accuracy how sensitive the ecosystem's feedback systems are". I realize that you're speaking a little loosely there, but certainly none of the models would claim "exact accuracy" as a goal in their wildest dreams.

One of Silvers points is that he wishes all the climate models' predictions would couch everything in terms of probabilities, or at least in terms of ranges of outcomes, for the simple reason that if "exact" predictions (2.3 degrees temp rise by 2030 for example) are given, the predictors are making the same sort of mistake the economists do when they issues predictions of 1.6% GNP growth for the coming quarter (for example). Predictions of this precision are laughable in economics, yet they continually do it.

The blame for much of this "over-precision" in climate forecasts can probably be laid on the media. Even if the scientific report does couch itself in all the uncertainties that the scientists know are involved, the media seldom want to clutter up a simple-minded summary with all this complexity.

As for the State of the World 2013, this book does not focus on the scientific aspects of climate change. It pretty much accepts it as a given (much like the Transition movement does), and explores issues about what can be done to lessen the impact, what sort of societal responses might be needed, etc.

Ted wrote: "It pretty much accepts it as a given (much like the Transition movement does), and explores issues about what can be done to lessen the impact, what sort of societal responses might be needed, etc."

I need to get my copy of the book, and I'm still hoping and waiting for an e-copy. I'd be interested to see how they deal with the greater weather unpredictability and the increased inability of farmers to cope. The current drought followed by floods in the American mid-west being one example; and the prolonged winter one year and early flooding the next in the UK being the other. We are so out of touch with nature that we forget how much agriculture is deeply dependent on the weather being regular from year to year, decade to decade.

Whitaker wrote: "Ted wrote: "It pretty much accepts it as a given (much like the Transition movement does), and explores issues about what can be done to lessen the impact, what sort of societal responses might be ..."

Chapter 17 (on agriculture) is written by Danielle Nierenberg, who is a very highly respected authority on food and agriculture. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danielle...)

You're certainly right about the challenges facing agriculture, in the developed world as well as (and perhaps more so) in the developing world.

State of the World 2011 was entirely about the challenges of feeding Africa in a warming world (Nierenberg was one of the project directors for the book). I've read quite a bit of it, and although many of the ideas are applicable specifically in Africa, there are quite a few that will in the future probably be found useful also in more developed areas.

One of these is (in both the 2011 and 2013 books) referred to as "agroecological" approaches to food production. I believe this is similar to some of the ideas of Permaculture.

One of the "doomsday" scenarios that people like Lester Brown (Plan B 4.0) have written about is the possible (probable?) disappearance of the Himalayan glaciers sometime this century. If and when that happens Chine and India are both in deep trouble, since it is these glaciers which feed the giant rivers of both countries.

Ted wrote: "Traveller wrote: "Thanks, Ted. The part of the debate that I would perhaps like us to have a look at, is climate change/global warming and exactly what our most up to date models ..."

Sorry it's t..."

Thanks for the reply, Ted! I do, in fact own Silver's book. Been a bit too busy for environmental reading lately, but thanks to you, am starting up again this weekend..-including the book under discussion, of course!

I am not sure in which discussion this comment fits, but just wanted to make a note of a tidbit I heard on the radio today: There was a baby boomlet associated with the government shutdown in the US somewhat over 9 months ago!

Local column from Oct. 8 on garbage disposal:
http://digital.olivesoftware.com/Oliv...

Jan wrote: "Local column from Oct. 8 on garbage disposal:
http://digital.olivesoftware.com/Oliv......"

Thanks for broaching this topic Jan. It is an important one, which is increasingly affecting the budgets of local governments. Not only are land-fills filling up, new ones are very expensive to implement, to say nothing of taking up land. The solution for many communities is to contract out haulers to take their trash away to other places that will accept it. This of course requires enormous quantities of diesel fuel for trucks to haul tons of trash a hundred miles or more on a regular basis.

The county that I live in has a zero-waste long term strategy which is being implemented. The local land fill filled up a few years ago, and we have been hauling our trash into Virginia somewhere.

Several years ago the county implemented a very good recycling system. everyone in the county was given a large wheeled bin into which they are to put all their recyclables: plastic, paper, glass, cans - without any sorting needed. These are picked up once a week.

In addition, usually on the same day, a different truck comes by to pick up yard waste. Branches, leaves, weeds, etc. These are taken by the county to the old land fill, where they have a huge mulching operation that turn all this stuff into mulch.

The old land fill area is still used as a collection point for trash that county residents can bring stuff to. There are many recycling points at the drop off area, not only for the things mentioned above, but also for electronic items, large appliances, tires, and other materials that cannot be put in land fills safely (kerosene, paint, medicines, some batteries, etc.)

The county has started in some areas their next initiative, that of composting food waste. This is now being picked up and taken to a composting area, and will be county wide in a few years if all goes well.

My wife has been composting our food waste for several years now, along with leaves (which we never throw away any more). She also does worm composting, and takes that little project to schools several times a year to introduce it to children.

Europe really is ahead of the U.S. in many areas of waste management. This article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/End_of_L... is about an EU directive that started in 2000 which requires builders of vehicles (car companies) to design them in such a way that when they can no longer be used, the vehicle can be disassembled and most every bit of it can then be recycled/reused.

Here's some other links
http://www.epa.gov/oswer/internationa...
http://www.epa.gov/oswer/internationa...
http://www.zerowasteeurope.eu/categor...

REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE, REPURPOSE!

Ted wrote: "Jan wrote: "Local column from Oct. 8 on garbage disposal.... Thanks for broaching this topic Jan. It is an important one, which is increasingly affecting the budgets of local governments...."

My county isn't doing that well but supposedly do sort recycling. I say "supposedly," because in recent years my county is more infamous than famous (corruption trials and the like). Personally we do compost but you and your wife are admirably more ambitious. Every little bit helps is my mantra.
BTW, glad to hear of Mrs. Ted, maybe for the first time. :)
...oops. must correct spelling error....

I think Mrs. Ted would agree with "Every little bit helps." (view spoiler)[I tend to think of myself often as "Mr. Barbara". She's the one with the Ph.D., the one who volunteers hundreds of hours a year, etc. She's actually a member of this group, but she logs into GR about once or twice a year. Too busy. And most of her reading is newspapers. And she won't review a book, even a few lines. I keep trying to get her to, but so far no luck. (hide spoiler)]

Ted wrote: "I think Mrs. Ted would agree with "Every little bit helps."..."

(view spoiler)[The title thing you describe leads people to invent very creative ways of addressing your mutual snail mail. :) (hide spoiler)]

Jan wrote: "Ted wrote: "I think Mrs. Ted would agree with "Every little bit helps."..."

[spoilers removed]"

That's for sure. I get mail sometimes addressed to Dr. Theodore Schmeckpeper. I always show it to my wife. Of course the worst would be "Dr. & Mrs. Theodore Schmeckpeper"! I think we've seen that on occasion.

Isn't "Dr. and Mr. Barbara...." worse?

Jan wrote: "Isn't "Dr. and Mr. Barbara...." worse?"

Well I can't recall ever seeing that one. It would be surprisingly funny. But it would be more accurate than the one I mentioned, which seems based on an assumption that if someone in a couple has an advanced degree, it surely must be the male! Don't you think?

Ted wrote: "Jan wrote: "Isn't "Dr. and Mr. Barbara...." worse?"

Well I can't recall ever seeing that one. It would be surprisingly funny. But it would be more accurate than the one I mentioned, which seems ba..."

Possibly more accurate and fairer across the board, right. But still could be complicated for affected individuals, although okay with you because of your scrupulous sense of fairness.