Written by By Davian Views (Traditional Industrial Ecologist)
[You can read Part 6 here, with links to the preceding parts]
To me, our human organisation power structures are upside down. However, even within this top-down hierarchy, there are widely different results. If we use as our two extremes of balance, management that is combative versus co-operative. In my experience, co-operative management is viewed by those being managed as a facilitator allowing the workforce to be able to perform well. In contrast, combative management is corrosive to performance. Over the long run, a co-operative style will out-perform a combative style, because less energy is used to maintain the integrity of the organisational structure.
The key to people engaging is for them to feel part of something; to do that, there are three main factors—a sense of ownership, partnership, and influence. In the case of the commons, ownership is in the form of stewardship. By doing your bit to maintain and enhance the natural habitat, you enjoy the benefits of a stable, flourishing environment, which in energy terms saves your economy from being in a state of shortage and distress. Partnership means that you are not alone, enjoying the sense of community and achievement with others. Influence means you have a voice; you are not powerless and can seek change or continuity in how things are done.
These things are timeless in the human condition; the lack of them causes pain and loss. To illustrate this point, here is an item I wrote some time ago in 2007, since then the peak oil that was due in 2005 has been delayed but not cancelled by, the financial crisis, Ethanol (The Burn Food Plan) and lastly Fracking.
The Carbon Standard 300/30. Member’s experiences. (Projected in 2 years to set up, plus ten years time 2020)
Hi, I’m Dave; I live in a house, consume food, fuel, and manufactured goods, as well as use the infrastructure that delivers these things. Some of these can be measured accurately to calculate their cost in Carbon emissions, but most cannot. I joined the TCS300/30 so that I could enjoy material benefits and benefit the environment at the same time.
My primary power comes from my share in the local “ Mark”. Mark is short for Mirror Ark (A Mirror Ark is different to a regular Ark which floats on top of rising water levels, in that it takes carbon dioxide from the air to make fuel and stops the water level rising in the first place.) that generates electricity using the temperature difference between air and water. The electricity is used either directly via the grid or converted by fuel cells into methanol on which I run my car, and is now used for jet fuel when I go on holiday to Spain.
I heat my house and cook with methane, also produced by fuel cells that use the Carbon Dioxide and water vapour in the atmosphere as the raw materials to manufacture the fuels. In this way, I am carbon neutral by having a share in a Mark. Mark generated fuels are also cheaper because they avoid the green taxes.
My primary source of food is the local Country Club, in which I also have a share. The basic concept is very simple; I own one acre of a thousand-acre mixed farm. On the farm are food storage, a kitchen, and canteen; the farm is organic, producing top quality seasonal vegetables that taste great because the soil has high mineral content. I have a choice of fresh or cooked food that I can eat in the canteen or have it delivered as a ready meal to my house if I am busy at work doing overtime.
Being an owner in the Country Club is my way of helping to pump down and store carbon dioxide by healing the land. When we first started, there was only 30cm of topsoil, but now there are 50cm and a lot more trees. The topsoil acts like a sponge, and we get less flooding from the runoff when it rains heavily.
The mineral ash that we use to build up the topsoil comes from the local coal-fired power station. It is treated first to make sure the mineral content is right, which gives us metals left over, such as Aluminium and Titanium, which go to The Green Garage. The great thing about being an owner of the Country Club is the feeling of being part of a group where things are getting better, in a way you can see, touch, and feel.
The magic of using the coal ash is that we capture ten times the amount of carbon released when the coal was burnt. This means that we get money from selling the Carbon Offsets, which subsidises the farming operation.
The Green Garage is my favourite though, because I have always been a bit of a Petrol Head. One of the easiest ways to save resources is to make things that last longer, are easy to repair and upgrade. We started with cars, which should now run for thirty years, so we only need to build twenty percent of the cars we used to. These cars are not old bangers, they are state of the art because any innovation can be retrofitted, but they are more personal and have a character, unlike the bland, anonymous blobs that roll off the Chinese production lines today.
Finally, there is the money. A bit vulgar, I know, but because I was one of the first to join Bullionaire, the inventions they came up with are now catching on in a big way, I get royalty payments from the various DNAs that were used to develop the technologies. I also get money from the Rownership schemes that are rolled over as we get more people joining. I also made money by saving Fuel bonds, which went well as Peak Oil started to really kick in. I was lucky because I kept my job, and my company did not go under during the recession, so for me, the extra money is like perks, but other members say, without it, they would not have survived financially, especially some of the older members.
To sum up, by joining the TCS300/30, I have energy security, food that is both tasty and healthy, I am part of a group that is prosperous and makes the environment prosper too, what’s not to like?
Notes:
- TCS300/30 is an ambition to reduce Carbon Dioxide balance in the atmosphere from the current 400ppm to 300ppm in a 30 year period.
- Bullionaire is a term for an asset that is owned without debt or counterparty risk.
- Rownership allows people to rent and buy simultaneously; Rownership for a house, for example, the monthly payment is part rent and part purchase, over time the proportion paid in rent decreases until the property is theirs.
This little story illustrates how beginning at a local level, without all of the trappings of global summits and high-level political policy, change can happen by people getting together and making a difference. This kind of activity is the essence of Renaissance when such endeavours are emulated by different groups around the world; small changes become big changes.
Davian Views is, I suppose, entitled to his own private fantasies like anyone else. If he must publicise them he would be well advised to first edit and shorten them into a coherent form. Even then I doubt whether anyone would judge them worth actually PAYING to read them, IN ANY FORM OF CURRENCY.
Davian. Was your expenditure of energy PRODUCTIVE of any useful commodity?
I’ve just been looking at our editors related previous posts. I see that a very similar opinion to Davian’s was being ‘pushed’ back in 2016. It was being urged on UKIP as a future policy ‘now that we have secured Brexit’.
Well I suppose every political movement collects a few weirdos along the way!
First I am less interested in the detail than in the why. To establish the importance of “A sense of ownership, partnership, and influence.” is fundamental to Localism. To then use that as foundation stones for environmentally sustainable existence is the structure starting to form.
My work was mundane and there were many facets to it. A few of those interested me which made the core of the job irrelevant other than allowing me to enjoy those parts I enjoyed. They happened to be going to different places, meeting different people, and trying to understand the culture and atmosphere that was created in those places.
The important thing to my mind is using my imagination and enjoying my senses. If one can do this then all else becomes a facilitator. But that then has to be sustainable.
We have a moral duty to ourselves to try and improve or at least, not leave things in a worse state than we found them.
I found your article imaginative and full of ideas or detail, a clever way to demonstrate your meaning. The theme undermines the incentive to those who wish to exploit others. We want to be social but not socialist. We want freedom but in a responsible framework. We must be self-sufficient but how does that work in such a complex society that is already so terribly unsustainable? That is the dark side of your prophesy. We may not want to know how we get there. One step at a time will be the best way.
But there are a lot of forks in the road ahead and hopefully we will find ourselves in a different place in the next decade. The concept that CO2 will destroy our environment has never made sense to me, but that to one side, pollution must be a grave concern in all its forms. I particularly like and agree with the last paragraph. Bring on the Renaissance.
Kim you have described the current position, better than I could!! Thank you.
Regarding CO2 then as with all things, the balance is more important than the presence of a chemical. I have always thought that to make CO2 public enemy number one is a display of ignorance. At the time I was not aiming to rock the boat!!
The Renaissance is on its way, so look out for the Four Oarsmen.
Does my local Co-op count as a ‘Country Club’?
Coal ash is the last thing you want to put on agricultural land.
It is laced with heavy metals and other toxins and may even radioactive.
All of these will find their way into the food chain.
There is no effective way of treating coal ash.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_effects_of_coal_ash#Health_effects_of_toxic_constituents_found_in_coal_ash
I really think you need to do some basic physics about energy (conversions).
After the Russian Revolution, when Lenin took control, didn’t he centralise power away from ‘the soviets’ – the little groups, in eg the putilov factory?
Reading Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia, I gather that Stalin’s USSR, insisted that all Communist Party groups insisted on disarming local, trade union militia, because at the time the orthodox doctrine was to impose bourgoise ‘democracy’ i.e. capitalism. (The ‘civil war’ was not to be known as a revolution – ongoing revolution was Trotskyism – not orthodox.
Here in Britain we have NOT suppressed Co-operatives. We have not Banned trades unions. Only temporarily during wartime (up till now) have we incarcerated suspected groups, political parties or nationalities. When pubs were losing trade due to the smoking ban one near here was taken over by the local people and run as a post office, village store and public house etc. It’s what WE BRITISH do. We do not have armed police or standing army roaming the streets.
But we ARE CAPITALIST Damian. Yes we do still have inequality, maybe injustices. We probably do in some ways damage the ecosystem.
Unfortunately capitalism has evolved into a global program of ‘pretend’ money.
But a neighbour does still manage to grow some of her own food in the garden of her ‘social housing’. Another has solar panels so makes some of his own energy.
Somehow I still think our British way of doing things, on the whole, has stood the test of time and will continue.
Davian, how does a Traditional Industrial Archaeologist differ from an Industrial Archaeologist?
Davian I’ve been fascinated by many of your interesting (and to me new) ideas and in agreement with most.
However, I’m struggling a bit with your concerns relating to carbon dioxide because this wonder molecule is at the heart of what keeps our country-side so lovely and green. Plants use it to make the sugars that store the solar energy they absorb from the sun.
During the last glaciation of the ice age we’re currently in, carbon dioxide’s concentration in the air dropped to levels low enough to stress land-based plant life. It’s my understanding that the next glaciation is almost due. (We’re talking geologic time here so perhaps in the next thousand years or so.) When it happens if the pattern continues where each minimum temperature reached is lower than the one before, and with it the atmospheric carbon dioxide level (sea-surface temperature controls atmospheric CO2 concentration) the next glaciation could presage a significant die-off of plant life.
Burning fossil fuels is hugely beneficial to plants which is why CO2 is used to enrich the air in greenhouses.
In my view we should be extremely thankful that, while we are either blowing up coal power stations or feeding them with freshly grown trees (woodchips) rather than fossilised trees (coal), communist China is still burning copious amounts of cheap Australian coal which they use to generate the world’s cheapest electricity which together with the world’s cheapest labour enables them to manufacture all the things we need that we once manufactured ourselves.
As a result, rather fortuitously from a plant’s point of view, human generated carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere is still showing a healthy increase.
The funny thing is that when a group of small islands in the North Sea now known as Great Britain once did exactly the same thing it grew to be the world’s richest most powerful state.
So, is fossil-fuel energy a currency? Because it’s use (or not) certainly does determine the nature of an economy.
You won’t grasp it because it’s pseudo scientific drivel in it’s entirety.
Michael. A very good point. So Coal started life as a plant, The plant used sunshine, died and was compressed over time eventually becoming Coal. The Coal is the product of vegetation. so you could measure the amount of energy from the Sun needed to make the Coal in Kilowatt hours and also the kilowatt hours of heat energy released when it is burned on a fire.
A currency such as I describe is based on a fixed amount of energy i.e.1 kilowatt Hour. The performance of this is measured using the EROEI (Energy Return on Energy invested) formula. If you spend more energy than you get from the Coal in delivering it then you lose energy. and create a loss.
I’ll still look at fossil fuel energy as a commodity and not a currency though, you have by you question created a number additions to the dynamics and nature for me to ponder on. Thank you very much.
Davian views,
I have to say, I have honestly tried to follow this all through.
I cannot accept it in its entirety, or in large chunks. Some parts seem reasonable but in my opinion, these are not in any way.connected. I would be interested to know who does endorse it. I suspect a bunch of college lefties hugging themselves with glee.
I would love to be shown wrong please.
TGS Yes, I’ve come back to look at it and find that the college lefties have not answered my comment, though they have replied to Michael. I wonder why.
Wednesday 3/6 10.37am. Still no reply.
As of this point in time, there is interest that endorses “financial rehab” as far as I am aware, However this been the case since since 2015 when my patent was granted. I approached various companies that were involved with Platinum fuel cells etc but none of them responded after I sent them a short summary Pdf. even to say “Thanks but no thanks”.
However since I started writing for “Independence Daily” People such as yourself posting comments has revived my faith that people are naturally curious, and do look for ways to improve the quality of life and the future for the younger generations. that is my aim too, the difference is that I include the whole of the web of life, in that ideal, not just humans.
Being seen as green, leads people to surmise that I am a leftie. I was a UKIP member up until the leadership changed too frequently. I do not think that the ballot box is the way forward. as our needs are ignored by Mps who think we are stupid. I will take your point on connected. “Joined up thinking” will be tried by me when I write JUT as the first three letters of a title will indicate that connecting thoughts are included. I will try soon, but this will not be for three or four more titles.
Thank you for your candor.
I am all for sustainability and the removal of real pollution but the Great Global Warming Scam is yet another tool of the globalists to exert control.
All the tools of the globalists are pollution. in that they poison the natural order of events and the environment.
Davian, how do you poison “events” (occurrences) or the “natural order” (habitual sequence) of those “events” ?
Geoengineering has proved an ideal tool to use for that purpose.