{"id":3493549,"date":"2022-10-31T13:52:12","date_gmt":"2022-10-31T13:52:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/?p=3493549"},"modified":"2022-10-31T13:52:13","modified_gmt":"2022-10-31T13:52:13","slug":"energy-transition-the-luxury-economy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/stories\/2022-10-31\/energy-transition-the-luxury-economy\/","title":{"rendered":"Energy Transition & the Luxury Economy"},"content":{"rendered":"

That’s great! It starts with an earthquake
\nBirds and snakes, an aeroplane
\nand Lenny Bruce is not afraid.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2014\u00a0<\/em>R.E.M.,\u00a0It’s The End Of The World As We Know It<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I spent a fair portion of my day yesterday listening to and reading\u00a0Simon Michaux<\/a>, whom I now regard as one of the most important thinkers in our world. I really can\u2019t exaggerate his importance. He ought to be a household name. Prior to yesterday, I had had only the faintest acquaintance with the man and his ideas. But now it is as if I\u2019ve crossed a bridge and see the world in a whole new light. That new light is characterized by something as near to certainty as I can have about anything. One is almost never 100% certain of anything. It\u2019s good to keep an open mind. But sometimes some things are very, very near to certain. That\u2019s the light in which I\u2019m now viewing the popular narrative on energy transition. That narrative is just plain\u00a0false<\/em>. It\u2019s not just a little bit false, but it is\u00a0dramatically<\/em>\u00a0false. That is, not only will capitalist industrial civilization \u2014 as we know it \u2014 not continue in a similar shape as it now has, only using renewable energy sources, but it cannot possibly continue at all. It\u2019s basically over. It is running on fumes. It\u2019s days are numbered, and those days are few. Far fewer than most people imagine. Far fewer than we\u2019re prepared for, or yet preparing for.<\/p>\n

I was very much on the cusp of this near utter certainty already, and have been on that cusp for a years, but then\u00a0Richard Heinberg<\/a>\u00a0recently came right out and said that the energy costs of energy transition were such that there would necessarily be\u00a0a \u201c<\/a>pulse<\/a><\/strong>\u201d of fossil energy consumption<\/a>, and associated greenhouse gas emissions, associated with a massive build out of \u2018renewable energy\u2019 infrastructure and devices. If I understand what Heinberg is saying here correctly, he\u2019s saying that for a considerable number of years, as the world builds this \u2018renewable\u2019 energy infrastructure, the result would almost certainly be an\u00a0increase<\/em>, rather than a decrease, in greenhouse gas emissions\u2014rendering \u2018energy transition\u2019 entirely contradictory to its principal stated purpose. After all, as people like\u00a0Kevin Anderson<\/a>\u00a0have been saying for years, emissions reductions must begin\u00a0now<\/em>, not ten years from now or longer.<\/p>\n

What Richard Heinberg didn\u2019t mention in that article is that it is theoretically\u00a0plausible\u00a0<\/em>that all of that renewable energy infrastructure could be mined for, smelted for, manufactured, transported and installed without increasing greenhouse gas emissions\u00a0if<\/em>\u00a0humanity were to dramatically reduce energy consumption rather rapidly in most every\u00a0other<\/em>\u00a0sector of the economy. But are we really the sort of people who would give up automobiles, mass global tourism and a luxury-based, luxury dependent mode of economy for the sole purpose of replacing fossil fuel infrastructure with renewable energy infrastructure? That is, are we really going to place this mass build-out of renewable infrastructure as our\u00a0top<\/em>\u00a0priority as a culture and civilization\u2014to the point of making giant sacrifices in other energy sectors?<\/p>\n

But there is yet another, deeply related question. And this is the one Simon Michaux\u00a0has answered<\/a>. The question is\u2026\u00a0Is it even\u00a0<\/strong>possible<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0to replace enough of the world\u2019s fossil energy with renewables to maintain a capitalist-industrial technological economy such as the one which has encircled most of the globe?<\/strong>\u00a0In a nut shell, Michaux says no. It\u2019s not possible \u2014 certainly not in a time frame that matters. He says we just don\u2019t have an adequate supply of the necessary metals and minerals to do this. And he makes a very strong case for this, with ample documentation.<\/p>\n

Can we manufacture\u00a0some<\/em>\u00a0of that infrastructure and\u00a0some<\/em>\u00a0of those devices (e.g., electric cars, solar panels, wind turbines\u2026.)? Yes, but they will not exist in a\u00a0quantity<\/em>\u00a0which would allow technological civilization\u00a0as we know it<\/em>\u00a0to continue. Period. Full stop.<\/p>\n

So what does this mean, then?<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Speaking for myself, it means that it\u2019s the beginning of the end of the world\u00a0as we know it<\/em>\u00a0\u2014 in nearly every respect. There can be no easy, smooth transition of our energy systems. Which means it\u2019s the beginning of the end of the economy as we know it.<\/p>\n

The popular version of \u201cthe energy transition\u201d has been a story of maintaining an economic, technological and socio-political regime with only a few relatively minor adjustments, rather than a dramatic transformation. That story just doesn\u2019t hold up to scrutiny. Nor, therefore, does the notion of \u201cclimate action\u201d and climate politics which pervades activist circles today. All of this requires not some minor adjustment, but a rather dramatic revisioning (and transformation) at its core.<\/p>\n

Two key, and deeply intertwined, facts emerge in light of both the\u00a0Heinberg Pulse<\/a>\u00a0and the Michaux Monkeywrench1<\/a>. These are:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Energy descent<\/a>\u00a0(and therefore economic downsizing, measured in GDP\/GWP) is inevitable in the near term.<\/strong><\/li>\n
  2. We\u2019re living in the last days of what I call \u201cthe luxury economy\u201d.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    If you click on the words \u201cenergy descent\u201d above, you\u2019ll be brought to a Wikipedia article on that topic. Energy descent is there defined as \u201ca process whereby a society either voluntarily or involuntarily reduces its total energy consumption.\u201d My contention is that we\u2019re\u00a0already<\/em>, inevitably, entering energy descent on the basis of\u00a0both<\/em>\u00a0voluntary and involuntary processes\u2014, even though global net energy consumption temporarily continues to increase. That is, the increase in global net energy consumption has reached a peak, and we\u2019re just now discovering that this is so. Continued global net energy use will begin to measurably decline in the\u00a0very<\/em>\u00a0near future, whether we like it or not. (But we\u2019re partly\u00a0choosing<\/em>\u00a0to begin this process voluntarily \u2026 even as involuntary processes will force it\u00a0regardless<\/em>\u00a0of our choosing. So there is a bit of paradox here, as we seem neither to have measurably begun energy descent either voluntarily\u00a0or<\/em>\u00a0involuntarily. Think of it as having discovered a major gouge in the hull of the ship we are in. The ship has not yet begun to sink. But the gouge is there, nevertheless. Heinberg\u2019s \u2018pulse\u2019 and Michaux\u2019s monkey wrench are serving as light on the situation we\u2019re in. The ship called Normal will not stay afloat. It\u2019s going down. And pretty soon \u201cthe (popular) narrative\u201d will also shift, and we\u2019ll no longer be pretending otherwise. But we\u2019re presently on the cusp of this insight\u00a0as a civilization<\/em>. The narrative must shift, because it\u2019s\u00a0false<\/em>.<\/p>\n

    What is \u201cthe luxury economy\u201d?<\/h4>\n

    I define a luxury economy as an economic mode of\u00a0access to livelihood<\/em>\u00a0which depends upon luxury goods and services in order to avoid economic and social collapse.<\/p>\n

    I can think of no better way to convey this concept of luxury economy than to begin with this graph.<\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/p>\n

    In 1840, roughly 70% of Americans worked in agriculture. In 2020, only\u00a01.3% of Americans<\/a>\u00a0were working in agriculture. Agriculture, as a means of livelihood, is the\u00a0epitome<\/em>\u00a0of needs-based economic activity (economic sector). People must eat, after all. But technological \u2018advances\u2019 in agriculture (mostly in the form of farm machinery) enabled a dramatic shift in the labor intensity of agriculture, and this graph mainly tells a story of the replacement of hands-on human labor with machine labor \u2014 or a dramatic increase in \u201cunits of productivity\u201d per human labor hour. As human labor became less and less necessary to food production, and as technological \u2018developments\u201d similarly impacted most other sectors of needs-based economic activity, luxury-based and luxury-dependent forms of economic activity enabled access to livelihood to displaced workers by providing employment in the production and distribution of goods and services which would have been considered luxuries in 1840 \u2014 or 1900, or 1940. Historically, the USA\u2019s economy has become increasingly dependent upon non-essential economic activity in a downward slope which resembles the same process which occurred in agriculture, making the USA one of the leaders in dependence upon \u201cthe luxury economy\u201d merely to provide access to livelihood among its citizenry.<\/p>\n

    [slide-anything id=’3472166′]<\/p>\n

    Modern luxury economies are machine-centered, and depend overwhelmingly upon\u00a0exosomatic energy<\/a>. Needs based economies are leaner and use proportionally more endosomatic energy. Endosomatic energy is the energy you use in swinging a hammer or peddling a bicycle. Exosomatic energy is the energy used by your car\u2019s engine or your farm tractor. The future economy will use proportionally more endosomatic energy.<\/p>\n

    Of course, people differ dramatically in what they consider to be \u201cessential\u201d and what they consider to be \u201cluxuries\u201d. In my view, if pressed to provide an epitome of energy and materials intensive luxuries I\u2019d have to include automobiles rather high up my list, even though some people\u2019s lives would be dramatically disrupted if they were forced to live without a car. Another prime example of luxury goods and services would be jet travel. And these two items are among the largest factors in fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. Car-free living may be challenging, but it would not result in starvation or abject misery in most cases. And, importantly, we could re-arrange things so that living without a car would be much, much easier.<\/p>\n

    The future of our economies, everywhere in \u201cthe developed world\u201d (a.k.a, global north, rich world) will and must become much less dependent upon the provision of luxury goods and services\u2014and especially those luxury goods and services which are energy intensive, whether or not they use fossil fuels directly.<\/p>\n

    The transition to a smaller, slower and less energy intensive economy will be made vastly more smooth and pleasant if we enact this transformation deliberately, intelligently and voluntarily. If we wait to be forced to do so by unavoidable\u2014but inevitable\u2014circumstances, it will be an unimaginable catastrophe.<\/p>\n

    Unfortunately, governments are not likely to lead the way by adopting policies which enact and enable voluntary energy (and economic) descent. Indeed, they seem very unlikely to adopt such policies\u2014for now. Likely, we\u2019re going to have to begin to act as communities, outside of governments, to imagine and enact this transformation ahead of governments. This will require a paradigm shift in politics \u2014 a shift from the politics of the state to the politics of local communities acting largely outside of government. Only then, I suspect, will governments begin to consider taking this journey with us. But we should not depend upon it, I think. As I often say, a leopard is not likely to change its spots.<\/p>\n

    Let us lead as free people, regardless. To be free, one must be able first to imagine freedom.<\/p>\n

    1 The\u00a0Heinberg Pulse<\/strong>\u00a0is the energy cost of \u2018energy transition\u2019 \u2014 which acknowledges that greenhouse gases must\u00a0increase<\/em>\u00a0in the near term in order to build out renewable energy infrastructure in the near term\u2014, if the popular image of \u2018energy transition\u2019 is adopted.<\/p>\n

    The\u00a0Michaux Monkeywrench<\/strong>\u00a0is the monkey wrench tossed into the theoretical gears of \u201cenergy transition\u201d when we acknowledge that the world can\u2019t possibly provision sufficient rare and rare-ish<\/em>\u00a0metals and minerals to enable the popular vision of \u201cenergy transition\u201d to proceed.<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    Teaser photo credit: By Usien – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/w\/index.php?curid=25951615<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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