This week we talk about a movement that’s growing across the globe in response to the impact of how we humans are trashing the planet. Whether it’s our use of petrochemicals or the consequence of some of our food production practices or our insatiable appetite for stuff, we are consuming more resources than earth can provide.

Inevitably we are facing situations that are new. This year’s intense heat and droughts are just the beginning. Just look at the dramatic melting of the Greenland ice cap, which has shocked even the most aware climate scientists.

To some, this all seems so far away. You may ask, why does this matter to me? One reason it could matter is there could easily be a disruption of power or food or water in your community. We are interconnected so if the power goes off in New York, the impact can be felt across the country. Now the fact that the power goes off isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it’s just that we aren’t prepared for it.

If there was a hurricane coming our way, we’d hurry down to the supermarket and buy provisions and fill our gas tank and make sure there was water stored away. We don’t have this type of early warning system in place for the situation we are facing. Don’t despair, there are a number of groups who are working on preparedness. Not like the scare of the 60s when we put in bomb shelters.

This time, people are coming together in small towns and neighborhoods of big cities to put attention on self-sufficiency. It is our self-sufficiency that is our best approach to the uncertainty we face.

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Guests

Daniel Lerch

As Publications Director of Post Carbon Institute, Daniel is the lead editor and manager of the Institute’s major print publications—most recently the four-book Community Resilience Guide series (2012), a report series on shale gas production (2011), and The Post Carbon Reader (2010), a sixteen-author compilation on our interconnected sustainability crises. He is also the author of Post Carbon Cities (2007), the first major local government guidebook on the end of cheap oil.

Daniel has presented to professional, government, and public audiences across the United States, as well as in Canada and Europe. He has been interviewed in numerous radio, video, and print outlets, and has been quoted in major publications including The New York Times and Business Week. He has a Master of Urban Studies from Portland State University in Oregon, and has worked with urban sustainability and planning issues for over fifteen years in the public, private and non-profit sectors.

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Carolyne Stayton

Carolyne Stayton is the Executive Director of Transition US. She is adept at aligning community activities towards unified goals, a skill honed from over thirty years of working with nonprofit organizations and educational institutions. She has successfully galvanized communities around various social issues and has particular expertise in program development, participative leadership and “learning†organizations.

Her background includes serving as Director of New College’s North Bay Campus for Sustainable Living, an innovative educational institution that promoted advanced studies in leadership, community-building and developed the nation’s first “green†MBA program. Carolyne has a master’s degree in Nonprofit Administration, resides in Sebastopol, California and is passionate about stewardship and protection of the natural world.

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Ted Trainer

Dr. Ted Trainer is a Conjoint Lecturer in the School of Social Sciences, University of New South Wales. He has taught and written about sustainability and justice issues for many years.

He is also developing Pigface Point, an alternative lifestyle educational site near Sydney, and a website for use by critical global educators, which can be viewed at: http://socialsciences.arts.unsw.edu.au/tsw/

You can find some of Ted’s writing at The Simplicity Institute’s publication page.

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