Geoengineering, Permaculture and Transition Towns

Introduction

There is increasing concern among meteorologists working with the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) that governments will not curb greenhouse emissions enough to prevent dangerous levels of warming, usually considered to be 2°C by 2100. Many members of the public must share this pessimism, and are also concerned about dwindling supplies of low-cost petroleum.

Among the possible responses to holding such a belief are: denial/avoidance, campaigning and focusing on adaptation. In this unit we will look at three alternative responses, all outside mainstream thinking: geoengineering, permaculture and Transition Towns.

At first sight, geoengineering may seem at odds with the other two, but I see all three strategies as logical responses to a realistic belief: namely, that the large industrial nations will probably not force their populations to reduce emissions to the extent that will prevent dangerous warming, until it is too late to make much difference.

Permaculture was developed by Bill Mollison and David Holmgren as a positive response to industrial systems of production that Mollison identified as destroying Earth's ecosystems. The aim is to build self-sufficient and resilient settlements, and as such it addresses not only climate change but a range of other modern problems.

Transition Towns was a concept developed by Louise Rooney and popularised by Rob Hopkins, who was her permaculture teacher. The focus is to build resilience on medium scales: the scale of about 20 years, and the scale of a small town, the neighbourhood of a city or a group of villages. It has given rise to a movement that is spreading rapidly in the UK and elsewhere.

Geoengineering is the deliberate manipulation of a planet to make it safer or easier for humans to live on in large numbers. There are a number of geoengineering proposals that aim specifically to address the issue of global warming, and prevent runaway climate change or abrupt climate change. The aim is either to prevent some solar heat energy from entering/remaining in the atmosphere/oceans, or to help heat escape faster into space.

Statement by author on his personal bias

Unusually, I am personally sympathetic to both gentle geoengineering solutions (such as wetland restoration) and transition towns/permaculture. I am strongly in favor of using the earth's natural cooling systems to buy more time for emissions reductions and work actively on this through The Global Cooling Project and the Land-Atmosphere Resilience Initiative. I am somewhat negative about:

  1. Conventional agro-industry when there is over-use of fertiliser and high energy use for production and transport – however, I think we will need the best of what the agriculture sector offers if we are to make it to 2060 without global famine.

  2. A slow-and-steady approach to climate change using 'affordable' carbon emissions reductions, only because I believe this will be too little too late, and because I believe it is unjust to many people in Africa and Asia who are already experiencing negative impacts of climate change. In this I am influenced by the recent writing of James Lovelock and a range of warnings from mainstream meteorologists, plus specific warnings from paleo-climatologists on abrupt climate change.

Unit authored by Ray Taylor

Learning outcomes