1. Introduction (this article)
2. Mitigation Modeling
3. Demand Management
4. Technological Potential
5. Power Relationships
6. Conclusion: Developing an intellectually and politically active culture

A recent commentary notes that “The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is widely regarded as the most important and authoritative source on climate change, its impacts and how to tackle the rising emissions that drive it.” In March 2022, the IPCC released the mitigation-focused portion of its sixth assessment report (AR6), which explores humanity’s options for addressing the threat of climate breakdown. It is the product of thousands of scientists who assemble a picture of the state of scholarly understanding on climate action every few years. As an activist, I believe that diving into the report can offer useful lessons in climate action epistemology.

Epistemology is a branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. It deals with questions about what constitutes knowledge and claims about what we know and how we know it. For those whose task is to evaluate different approaches to solving the climate crisis, there is a lot of information to sift through and either synthesize into the bigger picture or disregard. And then there are decisions about how much attention to give to each included perspective. The only way we can be sure that the recommendations emerging from the research actually match the scale of the crisis is by trying to analyze that filtering and framing process. This is epistemology applied to the domain of climate action. Activists pushing for a rapid transition away from fossil fuels must be concerned with identifying the limits we face, the opportunities we have, and the likely outcomes of different action plans given the circumstances at hand. The IPCC report should, in theory, capture the views of academics on these questions.

But despite the immense amount of research it attempts to summarize, the IPCC cannot necessarily be expected to provide a perfect analysis of possible solutions. Plenty of relevant sources in books and non-scholarly articles are not consulted in its knowledge-gathering process. A poor picture can also result from issues in the underlying literature cited by the report. Apparent shortcomings of the report may stem from these limitations rather than its authors. Even with these caveats, it remains a 2,000-page encyclopedia of the research that shapes our understanding and discussions about climate action, and therefore deserves our scrutiny.

Before exploring the report’s contents, we should consider some of the foundational ideas highlighted in its first few chapters. When evaluating our mitigation options, the authors attempt to pay attention to several dimensions of feasibility. It’s incredibly important not only for the IPCC to consider these details, but for activists to do so as well. Feasibility analyses ultimately try to answer fundamental questions: what obstacles impede the transition to a zero-carbon economy, and to what extent can technology solve them? Basically, we are asking how hard the transition is likely to be, how much lifestyle change and disruption may be involved, and what level of preparation the public might need to support the process. These are key ideas for anyone involved in envisioning and planning for a successful transition.

The authors acknowledge that previous IPCC reports have tended to ask only what technology can do to address climate change. “While previous ARs dealt with the definition of alternative mitigation pathways mostly exploring the technological potentials, latest research focused on what kind of mitigation pathways are feasible in a broader sense, underlining the multi-dimensional nature of the mitigation challenge.” The six “dimensions of feasibility assessment” considered in the report are:

• Geophysical, not only the global risks from climate change but also, for technology assessment, the global availability of critical resources.
• Environmental & ecological, including local environmental constraints and co-benefits of different technologies and pathways.
• Economic, particularly aggregate economic and financial indicators, and [Sustainable Development Goals] reflecting different stages and goals of economic development.
• Socio-cultural, including particularly ethical and justice dimensions, and social and cultural norms.
• Technological, including innovation needs and transitional dynamics associated with new and emergent technologies and associated systems.
• Institutional & political, including political acceptability, legal and administrative feasibility, and the capacity and governance requirements at different levels to deliver sustained mitigation in the wider context of sustainable development.

The trade-offs of different mitigation options are another vital concept discussed in the report. While co-benefits are often highlighted, like lower air pollution as a result of reduced fossil fuel use, new or exacerbated issues can also result from our attempts to reduce carbon emissions. Acknowledging these trade-offs is a key part of assessing feasibility and developing robust transition policies. The report highlights many possible complications of the large-scale deployment of emission-cutting technologies—“Areas with anticipated trade-offs include food and biodiversity, energy affordability/access, and mineral resource extraction.” These of course are not small areas.

Chapter two examines emissions trends and the forces driving them, suggesting places to focus our mitigation efforts. This is where we begin to see some potentially major shortcomings of the report (or perhaps its underlying literature). The IPCC is clear on the main drivers of increasing emissions over time: economic and population growth. As human numbers and our systems of production and consumption have expanded, so has fossil fuel use. Previous IPCC reports have presented literature that assumes this growth can and will continue, and have explored the feasibility of rapidly reducing emissions almost exclusively through technological solutions. That narrow approach is the one that societies have actually taken. The current report summarizes the results:

“Technological improvements (e.g., improved energy or land-use intensity of the economy) have shown a persistent pattern over the last few decades, but gains have been outpaced by increases in affluence (GDP per capita) and population growth, leading to continued emissions growth.”

Increasing energy efficiency and renewable energy have been overwhelmed by the growing scale of human societies. The ensuing sentence highlights broad areas to explore in mitigation planning:

“The key gap in knowledge therefore is how these drivers of emissions can be mitigated by demand management, alternative economic models, population control and rapid technological transition.”

Those four action areas make a lot of sense to explore. Developing zero-carbon energy systems is in large part a technological matter and it’s clearly essential, but it isn’t the only key topic. Demand management, which examines ways to reduce our resource consumption through changes to lifestyles and more efficient modes of organizing society, is also crucial. Yet 2022 was the first year that the IPCC report included a designated chapter on demand management. The other two topics would address the primary drivers of emissions directly. However, alternative economic models (that presumably prioritize well-being or other goals besides economic growth) and approaches to stabilizing and gradually reducing human population size are almost never explicitly discussed in the report. It’s hard to understand why that is, considering the consequences of leaving them unchecked. For example, the authors note that “The highest emissions scenarios in the literature result in global warming of >5°C by 2100, based on assumptions of rapid economic growth and pervasive climate policy failures.” They also identify “high levels of global population growth” as one of the “high mitigation challenges” that “may render modelled pathways that limit warming to 2°C (>67%) or lower infeasible.” Thus despite its own acknowledgement that technological solutions have never been able to cut emissions sufficiently, the report appears to remain a considerably technology-centric document.

These omissions are huge, because they lead people to neglect any role for alternative economics and population stabilization in addressing the climate crisis. The report could draw on well-established heterodox economic literature, particularly the discipline of ecological economics, which has a non-growing economic system as a focal point of its research. This would get people thinking about the sorts of institutional changes that could shift our economic goal from profit maximization to meeting basic needs within ecological limits. The report could also draw on the work of demographic experts who offer nuanced perspectives on the role of population growth in the ecological issues we face and evidence of the rapid fertility changes that are possible through non-coercive population policies. The IPCC report itself notes how different ideas about mitigation lead to very diverse approaches:

“Different sets of beliefs can shape climate-related policies, targets, and instruments. First, beliefs [may] link climate governance with social justice concerns; policies, targets and instruments may therefore reflect justice issues. Second, climate mitigation may be seen as primarily a market correction issue and mitigation compatible with economic growth, as exemplified by ecological modernisation, climate capitalism, market logics or a global commons approach. Third, climate governance may be understood relative to policies on technological innovation and progress, often conceptualised as social-technical transformations.”

The way we frame climate change has significant implications for what feasibility constraints, trade-offs, assumptions, and opportunities we pay attention to, and ultimately what targets we set and the policies we design to achieve them. IPCC reports have long been built from beliefs that center market logic, limitless growth, and technological responses to human problems.

This series begins by examining the role that climate mitigation models play in the report’s findings. It then explores the two mitigation areas mentioned above that receive significant attention in the report: technological solutions and demand management. Lastly, it reviews the report’s comments on how power struggles impact efforts to address the climate crisis. The analysis draws from many parts of the report that provide a high-level discussion of these areas (chapters 1-6, 12, 13, 16, and 17). One approach taken in this series is to compare different statements made in the report on the same topic, which at times suggest different ways of understanding the transition and how challenging it may be. Another approach taken is to add context by considering questions or consulting sources that aren’t covered much or at all by the authors. The result is an exploration of climate action epistemology.

The next article in this series takes a critical look at the perceptions created by climate mitigation modeling.

The post Climate Action Epistemology Part 1: An Activist’s Analysis of the IPCC Mitigation Report appeared first on Freedom and Survival.

1. Introduction
2. Mitigation Modeling (this article)
3. Demand Management
4. Technological Potential
5. Power Relationships
6. Conclusion: Developing an intellectually and politically active culture

When the IPCC mitigation report comments on the possibilities and likely effects of different emissions reduction strategies, it usually relies on quantitative integrated assessment models (IAMs) to do so. The authors review findings from over 100 models that have produced over 1,000 climate action scenarios. IAMs combine assumptions about the economy, technology, and climate policies to generate emissions projections and explore different types of futures. Models are an important planning tool, but we need to evaluate the assumptions they’re built from, because inputting an unsound picture of the world can lead us towards an inadequate response to the climate crisis. The report acknowledges that global emissions pathways “have to be assessed with the careful recognition of these assumptions.” However, on the same page the authors also state that the “IPCC is neutral with regard to the assumptions underlying the scenarios in the literature assessed in this report, which do not cover all possible futures.” This begs the question: who evaluates the feasibility of the assumptions behind these IAMs if not the IPCC?

Thankfully, some researchers do take on this task, and perhaps no one has done more to expose various implausible assumptions behind many IAMs than climate scientist Kevin Anderson. In a recent paper, he and other scholars point towards the approach taken with today’s climate action models as one of nine reasons why emissions haven’t been seriously addressed after 30 years of study and international negotiations. One limitation they note is models’ reliance on mainstream (neoclassical) economic theory, which tends to reject mitigation actions that could disrupt the current consumption-maximizing economy. Another is models’ increasing reliance on carbon dioxide removal (CDR) strategies that envision drawing large amounts of carbon out of the atmosphere, though the technologies involved remain unproven and face significant barriers to scale. The major issue is how highly questionable assumptions like these tend to delay serious climate action by making marginal rates of change seem legitimate and suggesting that technological innovation will do all of the heavy lifting.

Let’s consider a few implications of some mainstream modeling practices. We know that models increasingly incorporate currently non-existent negative emissions technologies (NETs). They also tend to be global in scope and fail to incorporate international equity—the idea that wealthier nations should decarbonize earlier than those with fewer resources. The result is that the timeframe they suggest for reaching net zero emissions is much longer than what many nations must achieve to meet consensus climate goals. The IPCC report says that aiming for a 1.5°C warming limit requires the world to achieve “50% CO2 reductions in the 2030s, relative to 2019, then reduce emissions further to reach net zero CO2 emissions in the 2050s. Pathways limiting warming to 2°C (>67%) reach 50% reductions in the 2040s and net zero CO2 by 2070s.” Anderson and his colleagues show that when excluding NETs and taking equity into account, wealthy nations must actually decarbonize their energy system between 2035 and 2040—up to 30 years before the global picture suggested by mainstream models. That entails historically unprecedented rates of emissions reductions above 10% year after year, at least double the rate that supposedly “climate progressive” nations are considering.

One of the key assumptions in any model is how it represents the main emissions drivers, economic and population growth. Recall the IPCC’s acknowledgement that high levels of growth are the very conditions that could make it impossible to keep warming below 2°C and even threaten a 5°C increase, which would render large parts of the planet uninhabitable. Across the models assessed by the report, the population is expected to grow from 7.6 billion in 2019 to 8.5-9.7 billion in 2050 (growth of 10-30%) and to 7.4-10.9 billion in 2100 (a wide range from a slight decline to an increase of 40% compared to 2019). However, these figures could be a significant understatement, as the authors observe that the UN’s population projections “include considerably higher values for both the medium projection and the high end of the range.” The economy is assumed to grow 2.5-3.5% annually up to 2050 and then around 1-2% to 2100. The economy is therefore expected to “at least double” in size between 2020 and 2050 and continue expanding throughout the century. There is little discussion about whether these growth assumptions are compatible with maintaining a stable climate.

The idea that we can unlink the longstanding connection between economic growth and emissions growth, called “decoupling,” is behind the assumption that the economy will continue to expand. Relative decoupling occurs when our mitigation efforts cause emissions to increase at a slower rate relative to economic growth. What we’re banking on is absolute decoupling, which is when emissions stand still or even decrease while the economy grows. Interestingly, in different chapters of the IPCC report, statements about the possibility of decoupling become more contextualized and critical:

• Chapter 1: “Recent evidence shows countries can grow their economies while reducing emissions,” the report states assertively. Without further context, it sounds like decoupling is a viable strategy for keeping warming to tolerable levels alongside continued economic growth.
• Chapter 4: A few chapters later, the report is much more cautious about whether decoupling has actually occurred, which throws the initial assertion into question. “While some literature indicates that absolute decoupling of economic growth and [greenhouse gas] emissions has occurred in some countries, a larger systematic review found limited evidence of this.”
• Chapter 2: “Absolute decoupling is not sufficient to avoid consuming the remaining CO2 emission budget under the global warming limit of 1.5°C or 2°C and to avoid climate breakdown. Even if all countries decouple in absolute terms this might still not be sufficient and thus can only serve as one of the indicators and steps toward fully decarbonising the economy and society.” Here a more fundamental point is added. Even if absolute decoupling has been achieved, the magnitude is far from what would be needed year after year until emissions reach zero. The main question is not whether any level of absolute decoupling is possible over any period of time, but instead whether enough decoupling is possible over a long-enough period of time to allow economies to grow as expected while reducing emissions at sufficient rates to avoid extremely dangerous warming. Assumptions of continued growth in IAMs are based on the idea that the answer is “yes.”

Chapter six observes that IAMs tend to “overestimate the contributions by energy efficiency,” which has historically been the main technological counterweight to rising emissions (i.e. larger than the effect of replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy technologies). Achieving deep emissions reductions alongside economic growth would rely in part on increasing energy efficiency. However, the same chapter later states that “Industry has seen major efficiency improvements in the past, but many processes are now close to their thermodynamic limits.” This raises a number of questions. We can ask whether such limits are well-represented in models. If they’re not, that could be one of the reasons why models often expect more efficiency gains than are realized. A bigger question is why thermodynamic limits aren’t recognized and discussed more broadly. That could entail looking into the limits of efficiency not just in industry but across all sectors, down to the very foundation of our economy, which is bound by these same limits and therefore cannot grow forever. If IAMs recognized thermodynamic limits in a fundamental sense—which would be the case if instead of relying on neoclassical economic theory they drew from ecological economics—then assumptions about a doubling or tripling of the economy across this century couldn’t pass without serious scrutiny.

Despite claiming neutrality about the IAMs’ input assumptions, the IPCC report does attempt to assess the feasibility of the resulting mitigation scenarios (i.e. model outputs) in chapter three. The authors write that “Mitigation pathways are associated with significant institutional and economic feasibility challenges rather than technological and geophysical feasibility challenges.” Yet when looking at their assessment in 2050 and 2100, geophysical challenges are expected to grow and become at least as significant as the near-term economic obstacles. Their assessment also anticipates very few socio-cultural feasibility constraints, which only seems possible if the transition doesn’t fundamentally conflict with cultural pillars like consumerism, the unbridled pursuit of personal wealth, and extreme economic inequality. Warnings about the feasibility picture produced by IAMs appear throughout the report:

• Chapter 4: There may be unacknowledged or unrecognized economic or social trade-offs that complicate rapid emissions reductions. “While the technology elements of accelerated mitigation pathways at [the] national level are generally well documented, studies of the economic and social implications of such pathways remain scarce.”
• Chapter 6: There could also be overlooked technological, political, or cultural barriers. While IAMs have underestimated the cost declines of key renewable energy technologies like wind turbines and batteries in recent years, which should help make the transition faster, “they tend to be too optimistic regarding the timing of action, or the availability of a given technology and its speed of diffusion. Furthermore, some technological and economic transformations may emerge as technically feasible from IAMs, but are not realistic if taking into account political economy, international politics, human behaviours, and cultural factors.”
• Chapter 16: Ecological barriers may also not receive enough scrutiny. Processes of technological change occur within societies and ecosystems, and must be modeled with special attention to their effects on these systems. “Simplifications of complex interactions between physical and social systems and incomplete knowledge of the indirect effects of technological innovation may systematically lead to underestimation of environmental impacts and overestimation of our ability to mitigate climate change.”

Constraints within essentially all feasibility dimensions are mentioned as possible complications for the validity of model outputs. This is an issue whenever journalists, policymakers, and the public believe that the message emerging from a model is conclusive. The amount of complexity involved, and the long timeframes over which solutions are explored, mean that there is so much we cannot know. We don’t sufficiently acknowledge the uncertainty involved in projecting the future, particularly when modeling rapid transitions. The IPCC authors point out that “there is often limited discussion of uncertainty and of its implication for hedging strategies in the accelerated mitigation pathway literature.” If we aren’t clear about how much uncertainty surrounds the model’s outputs, then we may not plan for potentially significant obstacles to the transition.

As we have seen, the assumptions from which IAMs are built, if not sound, have massive implications. They would suggest that all human societies can continue growing and increasing their consumption, and can reduce fossil fuel use at a slower pace than is actually necessary to avoid climate breakdown. IAMs may also lead us towards particular emissions reduction strategies without sufficiently considering the obstacles they face. Thus despite the report’s discussion of feasibility, it appears that an excessive reliance on models and an insufficiently critical approach to their recommendations may prolong today’s high emissions rates and make dangerous climate change more likely.

There are ways to reduce the likelihood of inadequate climate planning. One key is to think seriously about reducing our demand for energy and materials rather than assuming it will continue growing. The potential impacts of reducing demand and shifting towards more sustainable societies, considered for the first time in some models cited by this report, emerge as vital for increasing the ecological and technological feasibility of emissions reductions. “Many challenges, such as dependence on CDR, pressure on land and biodiversity (e.g., bioenergy) and reliance on technologies with high upfront investments (e.g., nuclear), are significantly reduced in modelled pathways that assume using resources more efficiently (e.g., IMP-LD) or that shift global development towards sustainability (e.g., IMP-SP).” These benefits are perhaps gained in exchange for greater challenges to political feasibility, but these challenges may be easier to overcome than constraints imposed by physical limits and ecosystem collapse. Given that demand management and sustainability strategies appear crucial to our mitigation plans, we should ask whether other crucial details are currently left out of mainstream IAMs.

Another key is to think about what place models should have in our planning processes. What questions can we attempt to answer with them? What are their limits? It appears that climate policy may currently rely too heavily on IAMs. It’s vital that we consider multiple sources of information to get a more holistic and accurate picture of reality, including analyses of real-world mitigation efforts, studies of relevant issues not acknowledged in the model (e.g. the likely climate impacts of growing emissions), history, theory, and forums for deliberation.

We also need to ensure that the models we use are built from sound assumptions, and that society understands how to interpret their findings. Reading through the critiques from academics and the subsequent responses from modelers is an important part of that process. But who does that? Activists must be aware of these critiques and bring this information to the public to have any chance at informed decision-making. That way we’ll all have a stronger understanding of what action at the scale of the crisis entails, and be able to evaluate policymakers’ climate plans.

Next we examine what the IPCC and the models it draws on say about demand management.

The post Climate Action Epistemology Part 2: Mitigation Modeling in the IPCC Mitigation Report appeared first on Freedom and Survival.

1. Introduction
2. Mitigation Modeling
3. Demand Management (this article)
4. Technological Potential
5. Power Relationships
6. Conclusion: Developing an intellectually and politically active culture

The first IPCC report was published in 1990. Three decades later, in its sixth version, it contains for the first time a chapter on demand management. The chapter discusses ways to reduce our demand for the services that meet our needs and improve those services’ efficiency, which results in lower consumption of energy and materials. Demand-side solutions to the climate crisis are the counterpart to supply-side solutions like renewable energy deployment, which typically receive most of the focus. Many of the interventions are non-technical, involving drivers of demand like culture, infrastructure (e.g. car-centric versus public transit-oriented cities), and lifestyles. The IPCC report is in large part a reflection of academics’ interest in particular topics, and attention to demand management has grown rapidly over time.

The different demand-side mitigation strategies are categorized within an “Avoid, Shift, Improve” (ASI) framework. It refers to avoiding unnecessary consumption (beyond what’s required to meet needs), shifting to more efficient means of need satisfaction, and improving the efficiency of current practices. The largest emissions reduction potential among Avoid options comes from reducing long-haul flights and providing urban infrastructure that facilitates public transit, cycling, or walking. The most impactful Shift option is to switch to plant-based diets. And the top Improve option is increased use of energy-efficient end-use technologies in our buildings (like LEDs for lighting).

How significant is the potential emissions impact of demand reduction? The report finds that demand-side strategies have the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from buildings, land-based transportation, and food by 40-70% globally by 2050. In other words, it’s an impact at the scale of the climate crisis. Yet until now “less attention has been paid to deep demand-side reductions . . . primarily due to limited past representation of such service-oriented interventions in long-term integrated assessment models (IAMs) and energy systems models (ESMs),” which historically “have taken technology-centric approaches.” Low demand scenarios are also notable because they boost the technological feasibility of the transition by dramatically reducing the need for unproven carbon dioxide removal strategies and the renewable energy deployment rate.

Because increased consumption is assumed to always lead to increased well-being, demand-side solutions that aim to reduce consumption are justified by a deeper understanding of quality of life called Decent Living Standards (DLS). It provides “a universal set of service requirements essential for achieving basic human well-being. DLS includes the dimensions of nutrition, shelter, living condition, clothing, health care, education, and mobility. DLS provides a fair, direct way to understand the basic low-carbon energy needs of society and specifies the underlying material and energy requirements.” It “serves as a socio-economic benchmark as it views human welfare not in relation to consumption but rather in terms of services which together help meet human needs.”

The immense significance of the IPCC putting forward DLS as a serious concept for guiding emissions reductions is that it seems to call for an economy whose goal is meeting basic needs rather than maximizing profit, economic growth, and consumption. Consider the following statements from the demand management chapter (five):

• Working to decouple human development and emissions “implies there is a need to prioritise human well-being and the environment over economic growth.”
• The various factors that shape our demand for energy and materials “either contribute to the status quo of a global high-carbon, consumption- and GDP growth-oriented economy, or help generate the desired change to a low-carbon energy-services, well-being, and equity-oriented economy.”
• “Strong sustainability business models are characterised by identifying nature as the primary stakeholder, strong local anchorage, the creation of diversified income sources, and deliberate limitations on economic growth.”
• “GDP is a poor metric of human well-being, and climate policy evaluation requires better grounding in relation to decent living standards and/or similar benchmarks. . . The working of economic systems under a well-being-driven rather than GDP-driven paradigm requires better understanding.”

It is hard to understate how crucial these ideas are. The climate crisis is typically regarded as an issue that can be solved by transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy while leaving the basic structure of the economy intact. But the IPCC chapter on demand management doesn’t simply highlight the carbon reduction benefits of consuming less. It also suggests that creating a fundamentally different economy, predicated on needs rather than wants, is a key part of our response to the crisis.

However, the transformation we need goes beyond the economy. Changes to our culture and lifestyles are also key for turning low-demand pathways into reality. “Most global mitigation pathways that limit warming to 2°C (>67%) or lower assume substantial behavioural and societal change and low-carbon lifestyles,” the report observes. Thankfully, the authors recognize that asking individuals to make different consumption choices is not sufficient for large-scale issues, a point that activists have been highlighting for years. They specify that “behavioural change not embedded in structural change will contribute little to climate change mitigation, suggesting that behavioural change is not only a function of individual agency but also depends on other enabling factors, such as the provision of infrastructure and institutions.” We must facilitate a shift towards low-carbon lifestyles because we need many millions of people in high-emission countries to adopt them.

Ultimately, the report identifies five areas that shape our demand and therefore must be part of the transition: our economy, culture, lifestyles, governing institutions, and technology. When one reflects on just how much could change by pursuing DLS for all, it becomes clear that we’re talking about creating a new society. However, the report doesn’t clearly convey the deep transformation involved in creating a low-demand world. Some of the magnitude needs to be pieced together by the reader. For instance, the authors do not directly and frequently assert the need for an economy focused on meeting basic needs, but rather suggest its necessity through statements sprinkled in the text like those quoted above.

The authors also don’t sufficiently convey the challenges of a DLS transition. A few observations hint at the struggle involved. Many Avoid and Shift options “are difficult because they encounter psychological barriers of breaking routines, habits and imagining new lifestyles and the social costs of not conforming to society.” “‘Avoid’ options that reduce service levels (e.g. sufficiency or downshifting) imply very substantial behavioural and cultural changes that may not resonate with mainstream consumers.” But the report gives no indication of the significant cultural battles that may need to be waged and won to create a sustainable society.

The studies mainly point to one level of cultural change: developing lower-consumption norms. Examples of behavior change explored by models include “heating and cooling set-point adjustments, shorter showers, reduced appliance use, shifts to public transit, less meat-intensive diets, and improved recycling.” But while changes like these would invite their own battles, there is a deeper level of cultural change necessitated by the limits we would need to place on consumption to achieve DLS for all. Many wealthy countries consume at levels far beyond what is required for a decent life, so reducing consumption in these countries could maintain DLS there while reducing emissions and also creating space for countries below DLS to consume more. “A mitigation strategy that protects minimum levels of essential-goods service delivery for DLS, but critically views consumption beyond the point of diminishing returns of needs satisfaction, is able to sustain well-being while generating emissions reductions,” the authors write.

In other words, we’re talking about “the establishment of minimum and maximum standards of consumption, or sustainable consumption corridors.” We would need to enshrine these limits in law, rely on our governing institutions to uphold them, and accept the resulting scale of redistribution. This transition faces cultural barriers that aren’t explored in the report. These include consumerist habits and identities, a belief that there cannot be limits to personal wealth, anti-government sentiment, and lack of community solidarity. We need to redefine what it means to be free on a finite planet.

Perhaps the magnitude of the struggle ahead isn’t highlighted because the low-demand studies themselves essentially anticipate only positive results from carefully implemented reductions in demand. “There is medium evidence and high agreement that well-designed demand for services scenarios are consistent with adequate levels of well-being for everyone, with high and/or improved quality of life and improved levels of happiness and sustainable human development.” It sounds like this transition would simply improve everyone’s life. But as discussed in the previous section, models can’t offer definitive answers to our questions, including whether DLS for all is possible within the planetary boundaries we’ve been eroding. The report cites just three studies when mentioning that “some current literature estimates that it is possible to meet decent living standards for all within the 2°C warming window.” If it turns out that it isn’t possible, then we would either need to accept lifestyles somewhat below DLS at least in the medium term (i.e. during an energy- and resource-intensive transition) or accept some amount of warming beyond 2°C. Part of making the transition feasible is preparing for such challenges in advance.

How do we move towards a DLS-for-all world? One necessity is having a sense of where we’re going. That would require the IPCC report to take a clearer position on the feasibility of economic growth alongside rapid emissions reductions and discuss the workings of a non-growing economy. The authors could address the latter by reviewing the ecological economics literature, which offers decades of thinking on steady-state economic institutions. While overlooking that discipline, they do highlight some literature on degrowth, which examines the deliberate and equitable downscaling of economic production in countries with excessive consumption. Though the report refers to degrowth at one point as “the option of economic decline,” its coverage overall is pretty balanced, acknowledging how crucial degrowth approaches to reducing emissions may be. “Several studies find that only a GDP non-growth/degrowth or post-growth approach enable reaching climate stabilisation below 2°C, or to minimize the risks of reliance on high energy-GDP decoupling, large-scale [carbon dioxide removal technologies] and large-scale renewable energy deployment,” the authors note in chapter three. Chapter six even identifies “the objectives of modern economies and the potentially contradictory dynamics embedded in the concept of ‘green growth’” as an example of the “embedded institutions, norms, beliefs, and ideas that would need to change to support net zero energy systems.” However, in many areas the report suggests that continued economic growth is both possible and a worthy goal for businesses and nations to pursue.

We also need to create space for a DLS society to emerge from the present one. As mentioned in the previous section, what we gain in technological feasibility when following the low-demand scenarios comes at the cost of lower political and cultural feasibility. To realize those scenarios, we’ll need to lay the cultural groundwork for a society organized around meeting basic needs. Part of this groundwork involves public education about how lifestyles may need to change and why it’s so critical for emissions reductions. We’ll need to highlight the ways in which well-being can simultaneously improve and acknowledge the difficulties involved in this transition. Fostering informed public deliberation is vital. The report observes that “the acceptability of collective social change over a longer term towards less resource-intensive lifestyles depends on social mandate building through public participation, discussion and debate over information provided by experts, to produce recommendations that inform policymaking.” This effort also requires us to challenge the core cultural norms cited above that impede DLS implementation (e.g. consumerism). We need to stimulate discussion across society about the misalignment between contemporary worldviews and humanity’s ability to survive and flourish on a finite planet.

Mass movements are the only force capable of driving this societal transformation. The IPCC’s authors frequently mention the need for cultural change, but activists aren’t sufficiently focused on it. We’ll need that to change first.

Despite the inclusion of demand management in the latest IPCC report, technological means of reducing emissions remain the primary focus. Technological potential is the topic we turn to next.

The post Climate Action Epistemology Part 3: Demand Management in the IPCC Mitigation Report appeared first on Freedom and Survival.

1. Introduction
2. Mitigation Modeling
3. Demand Management
4. Technological Potential (this article)
5. Power Relationships
6. Conclusion: Developing an intellectually and politically active culture

Despite the IPCC report broadening its focus by including a chapter on demand management, the rest of its chapters primarily explore technological means of addressing the climate crisis. When climate mitigation literature maintains such an emphasis, it’s not surprising that many see decarbonization as purely an engineering issue. By examining the IPCC report’s discussion of mitigation technologies, we can learn what messages the academic community is sending to the public about the difficulty of the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy.

Chapter six summarizes research on the topic of “energy systems,” and it may be easiest to begin our examination at the end of that chapter. That’s where the authors highlight a couple of frequently asked questions that should directly address what they want lay readers to take away about technological potential. “Will energy systems that emit little or no CO2 be different than those of today?” asks the first question. The authors respond that “Low-carbon energy systems will be similar to those of today in that they will provide many of the same services . . . But future energy systems may be different in that people may also demand new services that aren’t foreseen today.” We’ll start using electricity for services like light-duty transport, heating, and cooking, and incorporate other types of energy carriers for sectors that are harder to electrify. Thus “Electricity, hydrogen, and bioenergy will be used in many situations where fossil fuels are used today,” and “almost all electricity will be produced from sources that emit little or no CO2.” Fossil fuel consumption will be reduced substantially. “All of these changes may require new policies, institutions, and even new ways for people to live their lives.”

The second frequently asked question is “Can renewable sources provide all the energy needed for energy systems that emit little or no CO2?” The authors answer that the energy available from natural sources like the sun and the wind “exceeds the world’s current and future energy needs many times.” However, “that does not mean that renewable sources will provide all energy in future low-carbon energy systems,” for several reasons. They explain that some countries with fewer renewable energy resources may use more nuclear power and fossil fuel plants with carbon capture and storage; or the variability of certain sources like wind and solar may be supplemented by more controllable options; or limits on certain renewable resources might be established to manage undesirable trade-offs like increased mining and biodiversity loss.

The answers provided for these two questions give only the faintest hint of any difficulty involved in transitioning to an all-renewable energy system. There is no indication that any services might be curtailed. In the future, the main difference is that we may enjoy additional services. The authors suggest that electricity, hydrogen, and bioenergy will successfully replace fossil fuels. And when discussing why some countries may not go 100% renewable, they don’t mention any serious obstacles to the transition. All the energy that we expect will be there, from one source or another. After all, there is far more than enough renewable energy available to meet humanity’s growing energy demands.

The idea of renewables’ overabundance appears repeatedly throughout chapter six. The amount of sunlight that reaches the Earth’s surface continuously is “almost 10,000 times average world energy consumption.” Recent estimates of “potentially exploitable” wind energy amount to “20-30 times the 2017 global electricity demand.” The theoretical amount of hydropower potential globally exceeds total electricity production in 2018. “The geophysical potential of geothermal resources is 1.3 to 13 times the global electricity demand in 2019.” And “wave energy alone could meet all global energy demand.” The general picture is a world awash in harnessable energy—far more than we need today or in the future.

But for those who continue reading past the astounding theoretical potential of these energy sources, another pattern arises. As various limits are factored in, the potentials shrink significantly. Accounting for “competition for land-use” drops solar energy’s availability from 10,000 times the world’s energy consumption down to “roughly double” that amount. That may appear inconsequential to the reader, since any amount larger than today’s energy consumption, from just one source of renewable energy, seems to suggest plenty of availability. But it’s vital to recognize how much solar energy potential was subtracted from its theoretical maximum after accounting for one limit. In reality, we live within layers of limits. A paper by Floyd et al. observes that “the proportion of [renewable energy’s] theoretical potential that can be realised in practice, once the broad spectrum of geographical, technical, engineering, environmental, economic and socio-political factors is taken into account, is far less certain – though certainly orders of magnitude less than theoretical potential in absolute scale.”

Indeed, the picture of unlimited energy painted above and the relatively straightforward vision of the energy transition expressed in the FAQ contrasts with much of the commentary throughout chapter six, which is more critical:

• The report states that “it will be challenging to supply the entire energy system with renewable energy . . . Economic, regulatory, social, and operational challenges increase with higher shares of renewable electricity and energy. The ability to overcome these challenges in practice is not fully understood.”
• As a result of these potential barriers, fossil fuels are projected to maintain a significant ongoing presence in our primary energy mix. “In scenarios limiting warming to 1.5°C (>50%) with limited or no overshoot, fossil energy provides 59-69% (interquartile range) primary energy in 2030 and 25-40% primary energy in 2050 (AR6 Scenarios Database). In scenarios limiting warming to 2°C (>67%) with action starting in 2020, fossil energy provides 71-75% (interquartile range) primary energy in 2030 and 41-57% primary energy in 2050 (AR6 Scenarios Database).” Those scenarios imply a huge reliance on carbon capture and storage (CCS) to prevent fossil fuel emissions from reaching the atmosphere, but our ability to implement large-scale CCS is unproven. By 2100, non-biomass renewables account for just 52% of primary energy in these scenarios, “even with stringent emissions reductions targets and optimistic assumptions about future cost reductions.”
• And then there are several major sectors of the economy that may be difficult to maintain in an all-renewable world, at least at today’s scale. “CO2 emissions from some energy services are expected to be particularly difficult to cost-effectively avoid, among them: aviation; long-distance freight by ships; process emissions from cement and steel production; high-temperature heat (e.g., >1000°C); and electricity reliability in systems with high penetration of variable renewable energy sources. The literature focused on these services and sectors is growing, but remains limited, and provides minimal guidance on the most promising or attractive technological options and systems for avoiding these sectors’ emissions. Technological solutions do exist, but those mentioned in the literature are prohibitively expensive, exist only at an early stage, and/or are subject to much broader concerns about sustainability (e.g., biofuels).”
• In a world powered in large part by intermittent renewables like wind and solar, our ability to store energy for when it’s needed will become extremely important. However, of the 10 storage technologies considered in the report, only three are said to be potentially appropriate for seasonal storage, all of which are designated as “low” maturity. This raises questions about how we’ll deal with periods of weeks or months when sunlight and wind happen to be harder to come by.

As we can see, the takeaways around technological potential could be very different based on the parts of the report one focuses on. But the serious challenges highlighted in the points above are not well-represented in the FAQs that summarize the content in chapter six. Though the chapter begins with a restatement of the feasibility dimensions used in the report to assess each type of energy technology, the discussion often gives the impression that any issues are overall pretty minor and won’t prevent the creation of an all-renewable energy system that operates like the current one.

One interesting point in the chapter is a brief discussion of the “energy return on investment” of fossil fuels. It’s a ratio of how much energy society gets back for each unit of energy invested in setting up the generating system, an important concept we can use to compare different sources of energy. Sources with an energy return ratio of 1:1 don’t produce any energy surplus, and modern industrial societies have been built around fossil fuels with a return currently around 30:1. “The energy return [on] investment (EROI) is a useful indicator of full fossil lifecycle costs,” the authors write. “Fossil fuels create significantly more energy per unit [of] energy invested – or in other words have much larger EROI –than most cleaner fuels such as biomass or electrolysis-derived hydrogen, where intensive processing reduces EROI.” Recall that the authors assert in the FAQ that biomass and hydrogen will play a major role in replacing fossil fuels for various services, like long-distance transport. But the EROI of some biomass, for example, may hover close to 1:1, meaning that it wouldn’t offer much usable energy and may never be used on a large scale for that reason alone. As the EROI of society’s main sources of energy drop, so does the prospect of energy abundance.

Strangely, the IPCC’s authors don’t discuss the EROI of the main sources of renewable energy like solar and wind. Some studies have suggested lower EROI values for these resources than what fossil fuels have historically provided, though others contest that idea. Calculating EROI isn’t a perfectly straightforward process, as different boundaries are used in the literature and debate is ongoing. But if we take EROI figures as a rough estimate, it is possible that an all-renewable energy system would offer less usable energy than a fossil-fueled one.

Another complication arises from the fact that the energy transition will rely on fossil fuels at least in its early stages. As we’ve moved in recent years from more abundant to harder-to-obtain sources, these fuels’ EROI is decreasing, and that will feed through to our transition efforts. Even if renewables ultimately provide as much or more energy than fossil fuels, energy could become scarcer during the transition. A cap on fossil fuel-derived energy would also likely cap economic growth, and would require us to adapt to energy limits we haven’t ever had to face. None of these possibilities are mentioned in the discussion.

The more we improve existing technologies, reduce their costs, and bring nearly mature options to scale, the faster we’ll be able to transition to an all-renewable world. The IPCC report examines the forces involved in this innovation process in chapter 16. However, significant contradictions arise in the analysis. The authors repeatedly observe that countries’ interest in gaining competitive advantages is a driver of technological development, but also note that cooperation is a necessary component. Solar panels are spotlighted as a product of collaboration. “No single country persisted in developing solar photovoltaic (PV): five countries each made a distinct contribution, with each leader relinquishing its lead. The free flow of ideas, people, machines, finance, and products across countries explains the success of solar PVs. Barriers to knowledge flow delay innovation.” Today, the transition to a new energy system based on increasingly complex technologies “requires cooperation.”

Another contradiction arises from countries’ desire to develop new technologies in order to stimulate economic growth, which is a primary driver of emissions and environmental degradation. “Technological change and innovation are considered key drivers of economic growth and social progress. Increased production and consumption of goods and services creates economic benefits through higher demands for improved technologies. Since the Industrial Revolution, however, and notwithstanding the benefits, this production and consumption trend and the technological changes associated with it have also come at the cost of long-term damage to the life support systems of our planet.”

The authors do not deeply examine the implications of these contradictions during their review. But it seems clear that past dynamics around technological innovation cannot continue into the future if we’re to address the climate crisis. We’ll only reduce emissions globally if countries reject possible competitive advantages and cooperate towards a rapid energy transition. They must also not pursue innovation only on the condition that it boosts economic activity and consumption. We’ll need to establish limits to economic growth to ensure that new technologies that generate energy and make our resource use more efficient actually reduce our impact on the environment rather than increasing it.

The IPCC report could go deeper into the feasibility analysis for different sources of energy and broaden the metrics used to compare them. The authors don’t really level with the reader about just how challenging some options may be to implement, and consequently how we should plan for the energy transition. They do assert, however, that “Policy approaches facing deep uncertainty must protect against and/or prepare for unforeseeable developments,” including by “planning for the worst possible case or future situation.” Despite suggestions of energy abundance and a seemingly straightforward transition, “This uncertainty extends to the impacts of low carbon innovations on energy demand and other variables, where unanticipated and unintended outcomes are the norm.”

There is good reason to expect that the transition process will be more difficult than we tend to hear about, and that technological solutions, while essential, aren’t enough to address the climate crisis. Chapter 16 reminds us that “Underlying driving forces of the problem, such as more resource-intensive lifestyles and larger populations, remain largely unchallenged.” The authors of that chapter offer one takeaway in clear terms, stating that “innovation and even fast technological change will not be enough to achieve Paris Agreement mitigation objectives. Other changes are necessary across the production and consumption system and the society in general, including behavioural changes.” We need more nuanced discussions of technological potential and greater focus on changes to our culture and lifestyles as a means of reducing emissions.

Of course, even with an understanding of the various approaches we must take to preserve a livable climate, there is no guarantee that they’ll be implemented. A major reason is the role of powerful interests that block efforts towards change. The IPCC’s exploration of social power is the topic we turn to next.

The post Climate Action Epistemology Part 4: Technological Potential in the IPCC Mitigation Report appeared first on Freedom and Survival.

1. Introduction
2. Mitigation Modeling
3. Demand Management
4. Technological Potential
5. Power Relationships (this article)
6. Conclusion: Developing an intellectually and politically active culture

When the IPCC mitigation report was published in late March 2022, a press conference was held to allow members of the media to ask questions about the report to the IPCC’s co-chairs. With the session’s final question, reporters asked “which political players have been the main obstacles to climate action and how must politics now change to enable the energy transition to occur?” An IPCC co-chair responded by saying “we’re trained to deflect questions like that,” and that the report’s coverage of politics and policy formation downplays obstruction and greenwashing. However, its authors do highlight some of the entities that have fought against climate policies and the methods they’ve used.

The report repeatedly observes that politics and power are actually vital considerations when analyzing the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy:

• Technical Summary: “The interaction between politics, economics and power relationships is central to explaining why broad commitments do not always translate to urgent action.”
• Chapter 1: “Crucially, climate governance takes place in the context of embedded power relations, operating in global, national and local context. Effective rules and institutions to govern climate change are more likely to emerge where and when power structures and interests favour action. However widespread and enduring cooperation can only be expected when the benefits outweigh the cost of cooperation and when the interests of key actors are sufficiently aligned. Investigating the distribution and role of hard and soft power resources, capacities and power relations within and across different jurisdictional levels is therefore important to uncover hindrances to effective climate governance.”
• Chapter 17: “Though the above work tends to downplay politics and business, others suggest that political economy should feature prominently in transitions. Some branches of political-economy research underline how resource-intensive and fossil-fuel industries leverage their resources and positions to undermine transitions. These vested interests can lock in status quo policies in countries where political systems offer interest groups more opportunities to veto or overturn climate- or eco-friendly proposals. Companies with a strong interest in earning profits and building competitiveness from conventional fossil fuel-based energy systems have particularly strong incentives to capture politicians and agencies.”
• Chapter 17: “To date, the debate has had some obvious blind spots, not least considerations of power, politics and political economy. Certainly, the transition will create winners and losers, as well as stakeholders that can frame their economic interests so as to determine the orientation, pace, timing and scope of the transition.”

In addition to establishing power dynamics as a key determinant of climate action, the IPCC report examines those who have used their power to undermine the transition. There are no real surprises. “Fossil fuel industries have been important agenda-setters in many countries, including the USA, the EU, Australia, China, India, and Mexico, with differing positions and impacts across countries.” The authors note that “opposition to climate action by carbon-connected industries is broad-based, highly organized, and matched with extensive lobbying.” “Conservative foundations, sometimes financed by business revenues, have funded a diversity of types of groups, including think-tanks, philanthropic foundations, or activist networks to oppose climate policy.”

A few different methods have been used by economic elites to undermine the energy transition:

• Chapter 5: “A good number of corporate agents have attempted to derail climate change mitigation by targeted lobbying and doubt-inducing media strategies,” the authors write. The absence of any serious climate policy by the US federal government is a testament to the fossil fuel industry’s influence on the country’s political system.
• Chapter 13: Control over information systems and the public’s understanding of the climate crisis is another mechanism of power. “Who dominates the debate on media, and how open the debate can be varies significantly across countries based on participants’ material and technological power. Fossil fuel industries have unique access to mainstream media via advertisements, shaping narratives of media reports, and exerting political influence in countries like Australia and the USA. . . Accurate transference of the climate science has been undermined significantly by climate change counter-movements, particularly in the USA in both legacy and new/social media environments through misinformation, including about the causes and consequences of climate change.” “In the US, the oil industry has underpinned emergence of climate scepticism, and its spread abroad.”
• Chapter 5: A different approach has been to distract citizens from working together to elect a climate-conscious government by overemphasizing personal consumption choices as a climate solution. “Corporate advertisement and brand-building strategies also attempt to deflect corporate responsibility to individuals, and/or to appropriate climate care sentiments in their own brand building; climate change mitigation is uniquely framed through choice of products and consumption, avoiding the notion of the political collective action sphere.”

If we’re not thinking about how to undo corporations’ control over governments, no action will be taken at the scale of the climate crisis. “Overcoming the carbon lock-in is not simply a matter of the right policies or switching to low-carbon technologies. Indeed, it would mean a radical change in the existing power relations between fossil fuel industries and their governments and social structural behavior,” the report reads.

In order to develop enough power to overcome the obstacles presented by economic elites, everyday people need to build social movements. “Civil society social movements are a primary driver of social and institutional change.” They “frame grievances that resonate with society, mobilise resources to coordinate and sustain mass collective action, and operate within – and seek to influence – external conditions that enable or constrain political change. When successful, social movements open up windows of opportunity (so called ‘Overton Windows’) to unlock structural change.” Different chapters in the report highlight the importance of movement-building. “Collective action by individuals as part of social movements or lifestyle changes underpins system change,” the authors write. They point out that recent years have seen an “upsurge in climate activism.”

Several movements are mentioned:

• Chapter 4: The authors note “the growing movement for a ‘Green New Deal’—a roadmap for a broad spectrum of policies, programs, and legislation that aims to rapidly decarbonise the economy while significantly reducing economic inequality.”
• Chapter 5: “Indigenous resurgence (activism fuelled by ongoing colonial social and environmental injustices, land claims, and deep spiritual and cultural commitment to environmental protection) not only strengthens climate leadership in many countries, but also changes broad social norms by raising knowledge of Indigenous governance systems which supported sustainable lifeways over thousands of years.” Such knowledge may be crucial for establishing societies that respect ecological limits.
• Chapter 13: “Fridays for Future – the name of the group coordinating this tactic of skipping school on Fridays to protest inaction on climate change – has spread around the world. In March 2019, the first global climate strike took place, turning out more than one million people around the world. Six months later in September 2019, young people and adults responded to a call to participate in climate strikes as part of the ‘Global Week for Future’ surrounding the UN Climate Action Summit, and the number of participants globally jumped to an estimated six million people.”
• Chapters 1 & 17: The concept of degrowth “questions the sustainability and imperative of more growth especially in already industrialised countries and argues that prosperity and the ‘Good Life’ are not immutably tied to economic growth.” Not just a topic of academic research, “the degrowth movement, with its focus on sustainability over profitability, has the potential to speed up transformations using alternative practices such as fostering the exchange of non-monetary goods and services if large numbers of stakeholders want to invest in these areas.”
• Chapter 17: Fossil fuel divestment activists, who work to persuade investors to pull their funds out of fossil fuel companies and thereby undermine the industry’s social license to operate, are also recognized. “The divestment movement has the potential to disrupt current practices in the fossil-fuel industry, shape a ‘disruptive innovation’ and contribute to a strategy for decarbonising economies globally. Divestment is contributing to the political situation that is ‘weakening the political and economic stronghold of the fossil fuel industry.’”

What are the effects of these efforts so far? “Activist climate movements are changing policies as well as normative values. . . Environmental justice and climate justice activists worldwide have called attention to the links between economic and environmental inequities, collected and publicised data about them, and demanded stronger mitigation. Youth climate activists, and Indigenous leaders, are also exerting growing political influence towards mitigation.”

On one hand, the IPCC’s authors state that more research is needed to understand the climate impacts of today’s social movements. Yet they also observe that “Activism, including litigation, as well as the tactics of protest and strikes, have played a substantial role in pressuring governments to create environmental laws and environmental agencies.”

Despite the central role of the fossil fuel industry in undermining efforts to reduce emissions to date, it’s not just the financial interests of one industry on the line. The low energy demand scenarios that envision us keeping warming to 1.5°C without relying on unproven technologies while also achieving decent living standards for all find that these conditions are only possible “at near full equality” of energy use. In other words, it means capping the energy use of the wealthy at much lower levels than today. And the establishment of a non-growing economy could necessitate the same substantial level of redistribution of wealth as these studies suggest for energy use. All businesses would need to be reoriented around meeting basic needs rather than pursuing limitless profits. Creating a sustainable society appears to be a fundamentally anti-elite project, and when this becomes clear, elite opposition will very likely extend far beyond the fossil fuel industry.

Though the IPCC’s co-chair suggested that it’s not the report’s job to comment on politics, the reality is that addressing climate change is inescapably political. Some interests will be served at the expense of others. To not explore the efforts by fossil fuel executives and other elites to block climate policy would amount to taking a political side in their interest. It would also leave a critical barrier to action out of the analysis. Thankfully, the IPCC’s authors do acknowledge this repressive influence, note some of its methods, and recognize social movements as the vehicle for everyday citizens to overcome it. We’ll need a much deeper analysis of both elite opposition and the strategies and tactics employed by social movements, however, to effectively plan to overcome political barriers to the transition.

The final article in this series reflects on the need to cultivate a deep understanding of climate mitigation among the public.

The post Climate Action Epistemology Part 5: Power Relationships in the IPCC Mitigation Report appeared first on Freedom and Survival.

1. Introduction
2. Mitigation Modeling
3. Demand Management
4. Technological Potential
5. Power Relationships
6. Conclusion: Developing an intellectually and politically active culture (this article)

The earlier parts of this essay examined how the IPCC report discusses climate mitigation models, demand reduction, technological potential, and social power. The consequences of what we believe about these topics are immense. If we’re not aware when our modeling assumptions and expectations around technology are unrealistic, we may design a societal transition around technological solutions that have unacceptable trade-offs or aren’t viable at scale. The same consequences could result if not enough attention is paid to demand reductions, and the changes to our economy, culture, and lifestyles they entail. If we’re not analyzing power relationships, we won’t be focused on building a transition movement strong enough to overcome elite opposition. This is why climate action epistemology—an examination of what we know about transitioning away from fossil fuels and how we know it—is so essential.

The influential IPCC report should tell us a lot about how academic researchers understand the task of rapidly reducing emissions, views that then shape policy discussions and public perception. It is therefore an important document to analyze. However, the only section of the report that anyone is likely to read is the short Summary for Policymakers (SfP). Unlike the rest of the report, which only reflects the assessments made by its scientist-authors, the SfP needs to be approved by the IPCC’s member governments before it can be published. As a result, it’s conceivable that major technological or political issues would be downplayed in this section. Indeed, in the SfP there is little discussion of the potentially major energy challenges we may face during a rapid transition towards 100% renewable energy systems, the questionable likelihood of implementing large-scale carbon dioxide removal strategies, concerns about resource availability for batteries, significant obstacles to shipping and aviation in an all-renewable world, and other vital questions.

This essay considered not just the SfP but the text of the actual report, which isn’t subject to political vetoes. But while the sorts of issues mentioned above receive some discussion in the report, it’s not connected together into a clear, contextualized picture often enough. The report does offer lots of vital information needed to understand the climate problem. But several feasibility challenges noted by the authors aren’t explored in enough depth or accompanied by a full explanation of their implications for society.

The following are examples of questions around mitigation modeling, demand reduction, technological potential, and social power that can help to build a high-level understanding of climate mitigation:

• Can we maintain a stable climate without addressing the primary drivers of emissions, economic and population growth?
• To what extent must we simultaneously address other urgent ecological issues like biodiversity loss?
• What do current mitigation models tell us and how much credibility should they have?
• How sure are we that energy will be just as abundant in an all-renewable world as it has been in a fossil-fueled world?
• Even if a post-transition, 100% renewable economy can largely recreate the types and scale of energy services we’re accustomed to, might we face serious challenges during the transition?
• Is there enough discussion of uncertainty and contingency plans for all foreseeable obstacles?
• How much must society change (economically, culturally, and in terms of lifestyles) to realize the low-demand scenarios?
• What ethical challenges are we likely to face during a rapid societal transition and how might we handle them?
• What forms of repression can we expect from vested interests likely to oppose the transition?
• What sort of political groundwork must be laid to achieve low-demand scenarios?
• How do we scale social movements to create these conditions?
• What lessons can we draw from past and present movements?

Answering these questions often requires us to ask and explore several sub-questions. The answers we find cultivate a holistic understanding of the challenges we face and better prepare us to craft a strategic transition plan. Is it reasonable to expect the IPCC report to deeply explore and clearly answer these questions? Should it go further in interpreting and contextualizing the information in contains? If the IPCC doesn’t provide that perspective, then who will?

We’ll certainly rely on individual academic researchers to contextualize their findings for policymakers and the general public. But with so much knowledge across different disciplines required to be fully informed, we need some sort of synthesis report that both incorporates and goes beyond perspectives from the IPCC or perhaps one or more institutions dedicated to generating a comprehensive, nuanced, accessible, and actionable picture of the transition.

However, it’s clear that before we can organize an army of analysts working together to provide society with a deep understanding of the nuances of the transition, we must first achieve a critical mass of people who recognize such an effort to be necessary. There are many observations in the report that point to just how essential holistic knowledge is. “Analysing a challenge on the scale of fully decarbonising our economies entails integration of multiple analytic frameworks,” the authors write. These include:

• “Aggregate frameworks” such as cost-effectiveness and cost-benefit analyses, the dynamics of emitting systems and climate impacts, and welfare economic theory
• Ethical frameworks that “consider the fairness of processes and outcomes which can help ameliorate distributional impacts across income groups, countries and generations”
• Transition and transformation frameworks that “explain and evaluate the dynamics of transitions to low-carbon systems”
• Psychological, behavioral, and political frameworks that “outline the constraints (and opportunities) arising from human psychology and the power of incumbent interests”

“A comprehensive understanding of climate mitigation must combine these multiple frameworks.” Perhaps most salient for activists who are driven by their concerns about justice is the authors’ assertion that these frameworks collectively “underpin ‘just transition’ strategies in diverse contexts.”

If only minor changes to society were necessary, then prevailing views about the climate crisis and the details of its solutions might not matter much. But this issue is much farther-reaching. Several areas in the report discuss the need to shift society’s “development pathway” to fully address it. This paragraph from chapter four helps to convey the enormity of the task ahead:

“Shifting development pathways aims to influence the ultimate drivers of emissions (and development generally), such as the systemic and cultural determinants of consumption patterns, the political systems and power structures that govern decision-making, the institutions and incentives that guide and constrain socio-technical innovation, and the norms and information platforms that shape knowledge and discourse, and culture, values and needs. These ultimate drivers determine the mitigative capacity of a society.”

The faster we must reduce emissions, the more we require changes to all of the institutions and norms that define our day-to-day lives. In other words, acting at the scale of the climate crisis means creating a new society.

Holistic knowledge is crucial if we’re to achieve that level of change. “One of the more direct channels through which transitions spread are climate change education and action-oriented research . . . the acquisition of transformational knowledge and transformative learning contributes to thinking and acting that open climate-friendly development pathways.” Education efforts must reach not only our political representatives but the general public, whose support for the transition will depend on advance preparation and realistic expectations. Recall the report’s assertion that “the acceptability of collective social change over a longer term towards less resource-intensive lifestyles depends on social mandate building through public participation, discussion and debate over information provided by experts, to produce recommendations that inform policymaking.” A major part is creating information platforms up to the task of laying that groundwork.

I believe that a curriculum aiming to cultivate holistic knowledge about the issues we face would explore ecological systems, technology and energy sources, economic institutions, power structures, and socio-cultural change. These areas are essentially identical to the feasibility dimensions that the IPCC suggests for evaluating mitigation scenarios.

Armed with a clear and comprehensive framework for analyzing the transition, we’ll need to build education and discussion networks to instill habits of learning about, deliberating on, and actively supporting it. The report points to two foundational pieces of our information system that we should try to influence: media and schools. “The media shapes the public discourse about climate mitigation. This can usefully build public support to accelerate mitigation action, but may also be used to impede decarbonisation,” the authors write, referring to elites’ well-documented misinformation campaigns. They add that “the updating of educational systems from a commercialised, individualised, entrepreneurial training model to an education cognizant of planetary health and human well-being can accelerate climate change awareness and action.” It’s worth seeing how far this analysis can be spread through existing media outlets and school curriculums, which already reach millions of people.

It may also be important to establish information networks both online and in person in as many communities as possible. Reforming existing systems would allow robust transition discussions to reach people on a much larger scale in the near term, but there will surely be significant resistance and various limitations. Having a means of communication controlled entirely by supporters of the transition may eventually turn out to be the best way to create an informed and active citizenry.

Who will lead this mass education and discussion project?  Social movements seem poised to be the driving force, perhaps in collaboration with academic experts across the many relevant disciplines. Chapter 17 explicitly links “Social movements and education” together as one of the main engines of societal transitions. The authors note that “social movements serve to develop collective identities, foster collective learning and accelerate collective action.” Activists can and must act as educators and facilitators until deliberation about and action on the transition becomes a norm across society.

It’s essential to understand that knowledge is power, to have a solid analytical framework with the right guiding questions, and to work with others to share the significant costs involved in becoming deeply informed. Developing a balanced analysis of climate mitigation and the transition without undue optimism or pessimism is very hard, but it’s a key ingredient for creating a sustainable society. We will only go as far as our own ability to decode reality will take us.

The post Climate Action Epistemology Part 6: Conclusion – Developing an Intellectually and Politically Active Culture appeared first on Freedom and Survival.

Citation: Karp, A. (2022). Educating for Climate Activism, Autonomy, and System Change. In: Peters, M.A., Heraud, R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Educational Innovation. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2262-4_268-1

This article ties together the literacy domains explored in the Climate Activism Curriculum series:

1. Ecological and Energy Literacy
2. Economic Literacy
3. Power Literacy
4. Social Change Literacy

Introduction

Humanity faces an ecological emergency. Wealthy countries have pushed rates of resource use and pollution to levels that threaten to make much of the planet uninhabitable. To significantly reduce the demands placed on the natural world, each nation must transition to a society of sustainable consumption. The changes to economies, political systems, cultures, and lifestyles are likely to be substantial. A lot is known about these problems and possible solutions, but many details have yet to be determined. The transition will rely on dedicated participants who can successfully navigate the many uncertainties, emotional challenges, and power struggles involved. It is the task of education systems to develop a generation of effective navigators.

Though the climate crisis receives the most attention of today’s many ecological issues, climate curriculums remain a work in progress. Those who follow research on climate education often acknowledge that there is no firmly established set of guidelines for the field, and that content can vary widely. With increasing recognition of the systemic nature of the problem, however, there are growing calls for shifting away from models that emphasize individual action as the solution and towards those that center an exploration of system change. It has become clear that if climate breakdown is to be addressed, a core goal of climate education must be to create committed activists who can think strategically about the interconnected systems at its root. How best can educators meet this need, and what sort of framework can help prepare students to drive a transformation of society?

A comprehensive climate curriculum would spend most of the time covering topics besides climate science. The model described below highlights various disciplines and a few key texts that can contribute to a well-rounded understanding of the complexities of the climate crisis and encourage efforts to change systems.

Holistic Climate Curriculum Content

This curriculum model contains five content areas that aim to analyze the major forces that give rise to today’s existential problems and their solutions: ecological systems, energy sources and technology, economic institutions, power structures and politics, and social movement-driven societal change. It envisions the development of literacy in each area and an understanding of the connections between them. This model could be used to guide curriculum development for current educators as well as courses in teacher education.

Ecological literacy: The natural world provides the resources and waste absorption capacity that communities use to meet their needs. The stability of ecosystems is essential for the survival of humanity and all other species, so it’s where the curriculum begins. Because each content area involves systems, and students will need to work towards systemic change, it is important to explore systems thinking early in this section. Introducing students to the tools used in the field of foresight, which incorporates systems thinking, can also encourage critical reflection and a recognition of the uncertainties involved in the transition to a sustainable society. Climate science is of course a component of this section, but it should be studied in the context of Earth System Science and planetary boundaries. The Limits to Growth, first published in 1972 yet still the best-selling environmental book in history, describes the basic components of today’s ecological issues: the ecological limits inherent in a finite planet, exponential growth of the economy and human population, ecological overshoot (when growth exceeds limits, triggering crises of resource depletion and pollution), technological solutions and their constraints, non-technological solutions (such as changes to economies and lifestyles), delays in returning below the limits, and the ensuing threat of societal collapse. Students should recognize that climate change is a symptom of the overarching process of ecological overshoot alongside other issues like freshwater depletion, topsoil erosion, and biodiversity loss. This broader view highlights the need for a comprehensive approach that sees humanity reduce its demands to what ecosystems can sustainably provide. To fully assess these problems, learners must also examine the profoundly inequitable levels of resource consumption between higher-income and lower-income countries, which establish different responsibilities for making deeper changes. A primary message in this section is that ecological limits are inescapable—technology allows us to exceed them for a while, but we must ultimately learn to live within them.

Technological/Energy literacy: Technology can be used in ways that either increase resource consumption and ecosystem damage or reduce them. Technological innovations thus heavily influence humanity’s interactions with the natural world, particularly those that allow us to capture and utilize energy. Energy is the capacity to do work; the types of economic activity we can undertake and their overall scale are constrained by the quality and quantity of energy available. Technological solutions are often regarded as sufficiently capable of addressing every ecological issue, making fundamental economic and lifestyle changes unnecessary. Students must be able to critically evaluate the validity of this perspective. Perhaps the most obvious aspect of the response to the climate crisis is the need for society to transition its primary source of energy from fossil fuels to renewable resources like solar and wind power, which don’t emit carbon. Two crucial questions that students should consider are what the transition process may look like and how an all-renewable society might operate. Many researchers modeling energy futures suggest that a world powered mainly by wind and sunlight will be reasonably similar to today’s, and anticipate a fairly straightforward (though massive) energy transition. However, other researchers highlight obstacles that could result in lower energy availability in the medium term (i.e. during the transition) or the long term (i.e. an all-renewable society may turn out to be less energy abundant). If energy limits do arise, they would necessitate various changes to lifestyles. Richard Heinberg and David Fridley’s book Our Renewable Future: Laying the Path for One Hundred Percent Clean Energy provides a look at some of these possible challenges. Thorough vetting of researchers’ models and our expectations around technological solutions is vital for anticipating how society may need to change economically, politically, and culturally in order to respect both ecological and energy limits.

Economic literacy: Like technology, the structure of the economy shapes humanity’s impact on the environment. Economic institutions that promote high-consumption lifestyles tend to destabilize natural systems over time. As it becomes clear that models of a sustainable future rely overwhelmingly on technologies that may or may not live up to expectations, the next step is to investigate ideas for creating an economy that facilitates lower-consumption lifestyles. There is significant risk that explorations of economic issues connected to climate change will take the mainstream or “neoclassical” perspective that often claims to be value-free while tacitly endorsing unimpeded economic growth, anti-redistributive political views, and a conception of human nature as inherently greedy. This can quietly reinforce many ideas used to justify the current economy that students must be encouraged to question. The climate crisis should instead be explored from the perspective of ecological economics, which unlike other economic disciplines takes the reality of ecological and energy limits as a defining condition to which economies must adapt. Policy prescriptions arising from ecological economists offer potential answers to the question of how to reconcile human needs with the limits of a finite planet. Many point out, for example, that achieving a more equitable distribution of wealth could allow society to better meet basic human needs while reducing resource use. Rob Dietz and Dan O’Neill’s book Enough Is Enough: Building a Sustainable Economy in a World of Finite Resources highlights several of these ideas. Exposure to other heterodox economic thinkers is also essential for deepening students’ critique of the existing economy and instilling a sense of its malleability. Beyond the policy solutions arising from diverse schools of economic thought, the main messages this section would convey are that the economy is a human construct that we can collectively reorganize, and that many “economic laws” are simply a reflection of the current structure of economic institutions and the power systems that protect them.

Power literacy: There can be no discussion about how to create a sustainable economy without examining the power disparities in society. Social power can be defined as the ability to influence the actions or beliefs of others. The economy can only change if those who want to change it build more power than those who prefer to keep it the same. In a self-reinforcing loop, the current economy delivers extreme wealth to a small fraction of the population. This wealth then provides disproportionate political and cultural power that the superrich can use to block attempts to transform the economic institutions that benefit them. Change requires struggle. Students must critically evaluate notions of politics that equate democracy with elections while ignoring the political system’s reliance on money; such ideas obscure the reality of plutocracy. Groundbreaking political science research has shown that elections, while a necessary part of democracy, do not on their own allow citizens to exert meaningful control over policy decisions (Gilens & Page, 2014). Those with concentrated wealth are afforded various means of influencing political decision-makers and public opinion, and as a result legislation tends to align with the preferences of the superrich. The answer to such power disparities is for everyday people to engage in collective political action to combine their power and create a government responsive to public interests. In other words, in order to create a sustainable society, students must strive to create a more democratic society. The primary disciplines covered in this section are political economy and history, and the content should explore sources of power, how power is used, and past examples of elite opposition to social change. Because power in freer countries is exerted mainly through ideas and cultural values rather than through force, learners should thoroughly examine how propaganda has been used to sow hatred, doubt, and confusion over political issues and to shape culture in a way that legitimizes the status quo.

Social change literacy: With ideas about how a sustainable economy would operate and greater clarity about the political struggle that may be involved in creating it, students should then investigate ways to generate people power and democratize society. This entails learning about the theory and practice of democracy. What are the pillars of a democratic society, and how can we build them or strengthen existing ones? It also entails learning about activist movements, which have historically acted as a vehicle for everyday people to achieve economic, political, and cultural change. This section would explore the history of mass movements, providing inspiration and distilling lessons for students. The Populist Moment: A Short History of the Agrarian Revolt in America, a book by Lawrence Goodwyn on perhaps the largest democratic uprising in US history, illuminates the movement-building process through which millions of people organized themselves into a widespread political force. This section would also examine the cultural norms of thought and behavior that define the current society, trace their historical origins, and envision alternatives. Examples include notions of freedom, progress, consumerism, individualism, the role of government, and patterns of mass political (dis)engagement. Both economies and power structures shape culture and are shaped by it, thus the struggle to achieve fundamental change is cultural. Students should reflect on the sorts of cultural characteristics that might define a sustainable and democratic society, and those that help build the resilience needed for a challenging energy transition, and examine ways to shift culture in that direction.

The concept of justice is essential and relevant to each of these areas and should be discussed throughout the analysis. A few topics include the uneven responsibility for and impacts of ecological issues, the implications of proposed technological solutions for different groups of people, the extremely inequitable wealth distribution within the current economy, the repressive effects of concentrated economic and political power, and how cultural values affect our perception of what justice entails. The potential tradeoffs that accompany different perspectives on justice—within nations, between nations, between humans and other animals, and between present and future generations—should also be discussed to develop more nuanced views of ethical issues.

Cultivating Students’ Autonomy

Helping students to develop holistic knowledge about the climate crisis is an essential part of preparing them to lead an unprecedented transition to a sustainable society. Informed decision-making is impossible without it. However, it is also vital to cultivate the sorts of abilities and traits that will be utilized throughout the transition process, including self-confidence, critical and nuanced thinking skills, an orientation towards collective action, and the resilience needed to sustain engagement for the long term. Combining deep understanding with these skills can position students to become dedicated and strategic activists.

Qualities that enable an active and effective approach to today’s problems can be thought of as building blocks of autonomy. Instilling a sense of intellectual self-confidence, interest, and commitment will motivate students to continue refining their own analysis of the problem landscape over time. Sharpening the critical thinking skills needed to thoroughly evaluate evidence will enable them to arrive at more solid conclusions. Inspiring an orientation towards collective action encourages students to combine their efforts and develop the power needed for large-scale social change. Cultivating their willingness and ability to explore the challenging emotions arising from this curriculum builds the resilience needed for ongoing engagement with society’s toughest problems. Deconstructing the cultural values and assumptions that influence the decisions we make can help students to consciously choose their own path rather than remaining bound to the norms of the present.

Educators can support the development of those sorts of qualities by, for example, making it routine for students to identify implicit assumptions and collectively evaluate all evidence presented when encountering divergent views in the research, asking questions that reveal the cultural values shaping public discourse, and by providing a supportive environment for emotions to be worked through rather than ignored.

Educators are likelier to advance the transition if they’re fully aware of the dual nature of education: it can be a force for the transformation of society or simply reproduce the way things currently are. For too long, education has primarily operated to preserve the present order. Educators have a significant responsibility to try to make their work liberating and avoid reinforcing limits to social change. For example, it is difficult to see how a sustainable society will be realized if students learn

• They should take individual actions rather than work collectively to change systems.
• The crises we face are so severe as to seem impossible to address (i.e. there is insufficient discussion of solutions and the potential power of social movements).
• Technology alone can sufficiently reduce humanity’s impact on the environment, making it unnecessary to discuss and prepare for any significant changes to lifestyles.
• Economic growth is an unquestionable social good.
• Markets self-regulate and naturally solve any problems that originate from their operation.
• Our society is thoroughly democratic, thus average citizens already exert meaningful control over government policy.
• “Great men” at the forefront of movements are the main reason why social change occurs, rather than the rank-and-file participants themselves.

Each example expresses a way of seeing the world that can lead students to focus on marginal changes to society, feel powerless to make a difference, or wait for someone else to solve today’s crises. However, there are plenty of information sources (including some that are authoritative) that convey those perspectives. It is very possible for educators to discuss ecological systems, energy sources, economic institutions, power structures, and social change in ways that create or reinforce limits to societal transformation. The outcome depends on the quality of the analysis that educators explore with students.

And yet there are many obstacles to forming a high-quality analysis. Educators must sift through lots of information to find the most accurate perspectives across the many disciplines relevant to the climate crisis, which is a huge challenge. Certain details of the problem landscape will also change over time, requiring a reevaluation of possible solutions. As social movements grow stronger, propaganda aimed at sowing confusion and doubt from those who seek to block the sustainability transition will also increase, further muddying the waters.

Given all of these challenges, educators cannot be expected to arrange a perfect discussion of the causes of and solutions to the climate crisis. Even as they aim for liberation, in all likelihood certain barriers to change will be reproduced in the course of education. This need not be as significant of an issue if the curriculum focuses primarily on cultivating learners’ autonomy over any particular interpretation of the evidence. If students come to see that knowledge is power and they have the tools to decode reality for themselves (particularly if they are inclined to work with others to share the time investment required), they will be more likely to explore the topics beyond the classroom. Any shortcomings of the curriculum may therefore matter less.

In the quest to realize a sustainable society, students will only go as far as their collective efforts take them. Along the way, many questions will arise. Various courses of action will be called possible or impossible, and students must have the ability to form their own conclusions. It is vital that they possess the skills needed to handle the demands and uncertainty involved in this unprecedented transition process with a mix of assertiveness and flexibility.

A Few Pedagogical Considerations

Presenting incisive curriculum content is only part of the task of creating activists. Pedagogical approaches also play a significant role in shaping learning outcomes.

Beyond teaching social movement history and elements of strategy, there are other creative ways of building students’ interest in joining or starting a movement. Modern political and economic systems encourage atomization, and collective action feels unfamiliar and difficult to many people. Activities that get students frequently working in groups to build their comfort level and collaboration skills should be part of a curriculum aimed at system change. Bringing in local activists to share their stories and facilitate connections with existing movements could also help students to take the first step towards their own activist journey.

The personal approach taken by each educator also acts as an important model for learners. In response to the challenges of formulating a liberating climate curriculum, educators may be inclined to overstate their confidence with the material in order to maintain their authority in the eyes of students. If educators instead explain that they are co-learning many things with their students, that transparency can establish a more empowering learning environment. Students could more easily recognize that their views matter and will influence everyone’s takeaways, that learning never stops, and that they are capable participants in the analytical process. The result could be a stronger sense of intellectual initiative and self-confidence in each student.

Given that there is currently no singularly agreed upon climate curriculum, all educators are experimenting to find the best way to inform and empower new generations of activists. This means that it could be useful for educators to attempt to measure learners’ sense of empowerment and intent to join social movements, and adjust as needed. Sharing these insights with other educators could also accelerate the development of effective climate curriculums and help them become more widely implemented.

Activists as Educators, Social Movements as Education Systems

The idea that only formally trained educators have the ability and responsibility to help others develop an action-oriented understanding of the climate crisis is a major barrier to social change. Intellectual rigor, dedication, empathy, and humility are needed, but these qualities aren’t possessed exclusively by those with an advanced degree from a university. Most people who care deeply about addressing today’s ecological issues could take on the role of educator.

Furthermore, the task of scaling up this holistic climate curriculum is the very sort of campaign that movements can and should lead. Activists could work to create the pressure needed for schools to adopt this type of curriculum. Movement-organized education and discussion groups that meet frequently in communities and in online spaces could also be a cornerstone of societal transformation. Those employed as teachers should consciously aim to create activists who recognize that they are completely capable of becoming educators themselves.

Conclusion

To meet growing calls for system change, climate curriculums need to synthesize several disciplines. The broad literacies described above provide a foundation that can help students grasp the multiple dimensions of the climate crisis. By remaining focused on the goal of cultivating autonomy, educators can prepare students to become activists who are capable of reshaping the interconnected systems at the root of the problem.

References

Dietz, R., & O’Neill, D. W. (2013). Enough Is Enough: Building a Sustainable Economy in a World of Finite Resources (First Edition). Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

Gilens, M., & Page, B. I. (2014). Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens. Perspectives on Politics, 12(3), 564–581. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1537592714001595

Goodwyn, L. (1978). The Populist Moment: A Short History of the Agrarian Revolt in America (Abridged edition). Oxford University Press.

Heinberg, R., & Fridley, D. (2016). Our Renewable Future: Laying the Path for One Hundred Percent Clean Energy. Island Press.

Meadows, D. H., Randers, J., & Meadows, D. L. (2004). The Limits to Growth: The 30-Year Update. Chelsea Green Publishing Company.

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Ecological Literacy

The better one understands a problem, the greater the chance of solving it. So it is with climate change, a crisis demanding far-reaching social transformation. But just how far-reaching? A broad curriculum that develops activists’ clarity and unity of vision could be an essential pillar to advance the climate movement’s preparation, ambition, and cohesiveness.

The mainstream understanding within the movement is that climate change is the issue—there is no bigger picture—and the solution is a rapid transition from fossil fuels to renewables. An all-renewable society will be more equitable by attending to economic and racial injustice in the transition process, but will largely resemble the present one.

A more comprehensive view recognizes climate change as perhaps the most urgent of several interconnected ecological issues that require us to not only transition from fossil fuels to renewables but also to reshape our economic, political, and cultural systems around the reality of ecological limits.

I believe that which analysis the movement holds will determine how it develops and whether it is able to meet the scale of our issues. A holistic, unified understanding of our ecological predicament is thus sorely needed.

The Limits to Growth framework helps us to see the bigger picture. It shows that as exponential growth of the economy and population pushes global consumption beyond ecological limits, we encounter crises driven by pollution, like climate change, or by resource depletion, such as peak oil. The more recent incarnation of the Limits framework is “planetary boundaries” analysis, which confirms that overwhelming human intervention into global ecosystems is generating multiple crises beyond climate change. Climate activists can draw several lessons here.

The first is that continued economic and population growth is infeasible. A holistic movement for survival would seek to address the overarching threat of ecological overshoot and recognize that whatever special remedy a particular issue requires, such as rebuilding healthy soils to address topsoil erosion, all ecological issues have overconsumption at their root and require wealthy nations to consume less.

A second and related lesson is that creating a sustainable society involves tradeoffs. The lifestyles we know today are based on treating ecological limits as if they don’t exist—a consumer culture made to serve economies that maximize consumption—and this must change fundamentally to restore the natural systems we’ve undermined. Solutions are thus not as straightforward as unplugging fossil fuel plants and plugging in renewable infrastructure. We must embed the reality of ecological limits into our economic and political systems and our culture, and learn to live within them.

The third concerns our priorities. We must maintain enough social and economic stability to carry the massive sustainability transition to its conclusion. Though depletion issues seem to be overshadowed by pollution crises, resource availability challenges must be factored into activists’ plan for transforming society. The depletion of oil, which is currently essential to both large-scale food supply systems and producing wind turbines and solar panels, could threaten the transition if not planned for in advance.

Climate activists must come to see themselves as a “new society” movement—nothing less will meet the demands of the problem. This perspective informs us as we dig into the details of the climate crisis: its severity (what level of threat does it pose to humanity), its urgency (the timeline we must adhere to), and the forces driving the problem.

In terms of severity, we should recognize that current warming of one degree Celsius (1C) since industrialization puts us at the edge of the stable Holocene conditions in which our societies and agriculture developed, and that business as usual would result in 4C+ warming within this century. The previous ice age was about 4C cooler than pre-industrial times, with mile-thick ice sheets covering North America and Europe. Though discussions of “adaptation to climate change” abound, there is no meaningful sense in which humanity can “adapt” to 4C+ warming. Avoiding that outcome justifies large changes in how we live.

The carbon budget concept helps us understand the urgency of the crisis. While any greenhouse gasses emitted by burning fossil fuel and land use change warm the planet, carbon dioxide persists in the atmosphere for hundreds to thousands of years and thus determines long-term temperature rise. A long-term warming limit corresponds to a finite “budget” of carbon dioxide emissions. Activists tend to focus on ramping up the supply of renewables, but the carbon budget concept emphasizes changes in energy demand rather than energy supply—we need to lower emissions in line with our budget even if that means reducing energy use by phasing out fossil fuels faster than we can replace them with renewables.

Our carbon budget helps establish the timeline we must follow in getting to zero emissions, which is shaped by our approach to the different emissions drivers. The Kaya identity breaks down total emissions into its constitutive parts:

Emissions = Economic output (GDP/person) x Population (number of people) x Energy intensity (Energy/GDP) x Carbon intensity (Carbon/Energy)

If growth is sacred, then the only way to decrease emissions is by reducing energy intensity (through increased efficiency) or carbon intensity (by installing non-carbon sources of energy). The models projecting a 66% or greater chance of limiting warming to 2C envision emissions reaching “net zero” around 2070 (by matching any remaining emissions with deliberate reabsorption strategies). They assume continued economic and population growth, and that the last two factors alone can save us. But can these technological interventions overcome the effects of growth?

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) points out that energy efficiency increases over the past 40 years were overwhelmed by economic and population growth. Models assume continued increases in efficiency, but physical laws ultimately limit how much more efficient we can become. And bioenergy with carbon capture and storage, a supposedly carbon-negative energy source crucial to the IPCC’s 2C scenarios, doesn’t exist at scale and isn’t likely to. Through dangerous assumptions, the primacy of growth is built into climate models. With these assumptions stripped away wealthy nations’ emissions would need to reach real zero around 2035, and the need to degrow would be clear.

A holistic understanding of our predicament would clarify activists’ sense of the timeline, solutions, priorities, and complexity of their task. It would make the notion of continued growth obviously untenable. It would highlight a global decarbonization date for 2C (without significant negative emissions) around 2040. Maintaining enough social stability to make the transition possible would emerge as a priority—in particular, focusing on relocalizing agriculture in anticipation of slowing oil production. A more complex and realistic understanding of the transition that illuminates the reality of tradeoffs, like reduced consumption, would reveal the need to prepare for the challenges of creating a new society. With a shared understanding of this analysis, activists could develop a plan to meet the scale of the crisis.

Energy Literacy

To those pushing for a rapid transition to an all-renewable economy, energy literacy is just as important as ecological literacy. Physicists define energy as the capacity to do work—without energy, nothing happens. That goes for both biological systems like ourselves, which need energy to survive, and for economic systems, which constantly require energy to accomplish any activity. Though climate change is mainly understood as an energy problem, activists’ transition plans haven’t yet incorporated the work of energy analysts who explore the societal implications of large-scale conversions from one energy source to another.

The Industrial Revolution came about because human beings unlocked the concentrated energy available in the form of coal, followed eventually by oil and gas. The ensuing changes to society cannot be understated: mass-production of goods, previously unthinkable mobility, time-saving appliances—millions of people shifted from agrarian lifestyles into cities where jobs now served the mass production process. This process and the lives we know today were born from energy sources that developed over millions of years—finite conditions we’ve come to see as normal.

The most prominent transition studies, undertaken by researchers Mark Jacobson and Mark Delucchi, give no indication that these conditions will change in a society powered completely by renewable energy. But energy analysts like Richard Heinberg and David Fridley highlight issues that suggest an all-renewable society will be different than the one we live in today.

Because wind and solar are intermittent, we need to develop strategies to have energy when weather conditions are calm and overcast. But infrastructure solutions like batteries and long-distance transmission lines require energy to build, and the energy costs of making renewables controllable may cut too far into the energy we want for transportation, construction, educating students, and many other things. To some extent we may need to learn to use energy when it is available.

Replacing oil, which powers 95% of transportation, is also a challenge. We’ll need to use batteries to power our vehicles in an all-renewable world, but their energy density is much lower than oil, and heavy vehicles would require prohibitively large batteries. It’s therefore unlikely that we’ll have battery-powered heavy trucks or planes, and we may need to adjust to a less mobile society.

Finally, it always takes energy to get energy, a ratio energy analysts call “energy-returned-on-energy-invested” (EROEI or EROI). Some studies looking at the net energy generated by an all-renewable system suggest that the EROEI may be significantly lower than a fossil-fueled system. If that turns out to be the case, it means that we would have less energy available in a society powered only by renewables, and thus a smaller economy.

Activists must incorporate these analyses into our transition plans and educate the public about the likelihood that an all-renewable society will be different than the one we know today. This is vital to making the transition possible. Whether looking at our problems through the lens of ecology or energy, it appears likely that establishing a sustainable society will come with tradeoffs. I believe that if we do not foresee these tradeoffs, plan for them, and educate the public about the challenges ahead, then the unprecedented, massive, and sustained coordination we need to transition in an orderly way may not be possible.

Ecological and energy literacy are necessary if we’re to understand what is happening to us and why, and to develop productive ways to respond. However, additional analyses are also essential. We must have knowledge of how the economy currently works and how it could be restructured to work in the context of shrinking consumption and energy use. Beyond that, we’ll need to understand the power systems that oppose the transition and how to build a movement that can overcome them. Nothing less than a new Enlightenment will do.

Read the next article in the Climate Activism Curriculum series: economic literacy. Or check out this curriculum model that ties each literacy domain in the series together: Educating for Climate Activism, Autonomy, and System Change.

The post Towards a Climate Activism Curriculum: Ecological and Energy Literacy appeared first on Freedom and Survival.

Attempting to look ahead towards the ways in which the movement must develop is not only useful, it’s vital. Activists recognize that even as we are pushing forward, time is not on our side. The more complete our plan for addressing climate change, the faster we may be able to implement it. In addition, let’s keep in mind that we’re proposing an unprecedented transformation involving every layer of society. Just as important, if not more so, are attempts to foresee and avoid major obstacles that could threaten to derail the transition to a sustainable society. The better we plan for the transition, the more likely it is to be completed.

Of the variables in our control, humanity’s ability to prevent climate catastrophe will be determined by two things: the ideas that shape our understanding of needed solutions and the type of movement we build to implement them.

Let’s first talk about the ideas.

Limits to Growth

What kind of a problem is climate change? Activists have described it as an issue of economic justice, racial justice, or intergenerational equity. Some call it a technological issue while others insist it’s a matter of political will. A solid case can be made for these descriptions and countless more, suggesting that climate change is humanity’s all-encompassing problem. It doesn’t seem to get any bigger picture. But even after incorporating the idea that economic and racial justice must accompany all attempts to address the crisis, it remains, in the mainstream analysis, an energy problem requiring a transition from a society powered by fossil fuels to one powered by renewable energy. That task is understood to be unprecedented and massive, one that requires a social movement to break the political power of the fossil fuel industry to enable governments to commit to the transition. The end result will be a society largely resembling the one we live in today, except more just and powered completely by renewables.

However, there is another perspective that is quite revealing, though it has received much less attention: that climate change is perhaps the direst symptom of ecological overshoot—of human activity expanding beyond ecological limits. Leading a group of interconnected emergencies including mass species extinction, freshwater depletion, topsoil erosion, and others, the climate crisis could and should be recognized as an expression of limits to growth. This understanding brings into view essential ideas that would expand the mainstream analysis of what solutions to this crisis must look like.

What may be the most consequential question about climate change was raised over 10 years ago. In 2008, climate scientists Kevin Anderson and Alice Larkin published a paper warning that in order to limit warming to two degrees Celsius (2C), fossil fuel use would need to be reduced at rates that had previously only occurred in the context of economic recession. The paper noted that a planned economic contraction would seem to be necessary to reduce emissions fast enough. As time passed and emissions continued to rise, even keeping warming to 4C came to require rates of decarbonization said to be incompatible with continued economic growth. For context, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) described the likely impacts of 4C warming as “substantial species extinction, global and regional food insecurity, consequential restraints on common human activities [including growing food and working outdoors], and limited potential for adaptation in some cases”—truly an avoid-at-all-costs scenario. And yet attempting to understand and resolve this apparent contradiction between economic stability and serious climate action didn’t become a core matter for climate activists.

The GND envisions a transition to 100% renewable energy over 10 years, with the presumption that a massive buildout of renewables will sufficiently displace fossil fuel use. Rapidly ramping up the supply of renewable energy may seem like the same thing as rapidly reducing fossil fuel use, but it’s not. Historically, new sources of energy have usually layered on top of those already used, and this has been the case for wind and solar installations whose numbers have grown alongside increasing emissions. The finite amount of carbon we can emit to maintain a specific probability of keeping warming to a chosen level, say 2C—our finite carbon budget—must be the focus. Any plan to address the climate crisis must reduce emissions in line with our budget.

While science tells us the total carbon budget, a host of considerations based on our values determine how that budget is divided between and within countries. That’s why the public must have a basic understanding of how our national carbon budget would be derived, so that it is subject to both scientific and democratic influence. But these are topics for another article. Let’s say that a fair budget was established and a plan committed to adhering to it—we already know that the rates of emissions reductions needed are so high as to make the prospect of continued economic growth unthinkable and contraction necessary.

Why is that? It has to do with falling energy use. Economic activity and energy use are intertwined—without energy, all the parts of the production chain grind to a halt. There are a couple reasons why energy use would decrease in the course of reducing emissions in line with our carbon budget. The first is that historically, the large-scale integration of new energy sources has taken 40 to 60 years. Even with a concerted effort to deploy renewable technology, we may not be able to displace fossil fuel plants one-to-one. To avoid catastrophic climate change, fossil fuel use may need to drop faster than it can be replaced with renewables, and this would entail a drop in energy use. Second, if we are able to deploy renewables as fast as we hope to, it will be because the process is driven largely by fossil fuels. Currently, renewables’ whole production and deployment process depends on fossil fuels—we haven’t seen renewables bootstrap their own rapid expansion, and energy analysts have raised doubts about whether renewables’ power (ability to deliver energy per unit of time) is sufficient to do so. Thus in order to keep to our carbon budget, as fossil fuel use is directed towards the energy transition it will need to be diverted from other economic activities.

A major reason these challenges haven’t been highlighted is because any suggestion of limits to growth or the need to reduce energy demand and consumption are met with assumptions that technology will always provide a solution. The savior technology in the IPCC’s scenarios that see humanity keeping warming to 2C is bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS)—burning plant matter (which is assumed to be carbon-neutral), capturing the resulting carbon emissions, and storing it permanently underground—which is expected to enable us to remove carbon from the atmosphere while becoming society’s new major energy source. However, BECCS does not exist and both bioenergy and CCS have overwhelming obstacles to their development at scale—not least of which is that cultivating plants to burn for energy is not inherently carbon neutral. In the course of learning about the reality of ecological limits, one also becomes aware of the limits of technology in putting off our need to adapt to them. There are no serious prospects for addressing climate change while maintaining economic growth.

Under the current economic structure, reducing energy use and the consumption it enables causes economic distress. We need to cap fossil fuel use and reduce it in line with our carbon budget, but we also need to ensure that the population is taken care of and the economy doesn’t fall apart in the process. Thankfully, the discipline of ecological economics has been developing over the last several decades to determine how to organize the economy in light of our finite planet. Activists have thus far experienced economics as a marginalizing force, as those defending the status quo argue again and again why the sustainability transition (or any form of economic intervention aiming to help the public) is economically infeasible. Ecological economics, however, is the only branch of economic thinking to take seriously the reality of limits, which in fact forms its analytical basis as the defining condition to which humans must adapt.

While allocative efficiency—directing resource use to the highest-value uses—is considered the primary goal of mainstream (neoclassical) economics, ecological economics has it as a third goal. Of higher priority is achieving a just distribution of resources among the current population, and between future generations and other species. This is in part accomplished by the first goal: to maintain an economy of sustainable scale relative to the global ecosystem that contains and sustains it. Such an economy is called a “steady state economy,” which neither grows nor shrinks and maintains a near-constant level of consumption. This non-growing economy is an essential solution to all of humanity’s ecological crises, which have overconsumption at their root, though as a “necessary but not sufficient” achievement. The climate crisis requires a rapid transition to renewable energy, but that can only come about if the economy is structured to operate without growth and avoid collapsing in the course of the transition.

Articles about the GND and statements from activists often contain the phrase “transform the economy,” but it largely refers to the energy transition and not to establishing a steady state economy. If activists don’t recognize climate change as a limits issue, and continue to assert the mainstream view that economic growth is an absolute good—even arguing that the GND is “fiscally responsible” because it could boost growth—then we will reinforce the very ideas we must be questioning. If we continue to talk about a “sustainable economy” and the word “scale” never comes up, we’re missing the core of the discussion.

Climate activists ought to take some direction from ecological economics, which outlines the policies that would define a sustainable economy. The foundation is a cap on resource consumption (called throughput), which climate activists would largely achieve by establishing a binding carbon budget at the national and ultimately international levels. Limits on other resources could follow. These conditions could in part be met by implementing Tradable Energy Quotas, a policy that has undergone rigorous review by the British government, which would cap carbon and ensure all have access to energy as the cap shrinks. In reducing consumption, this cap would produce a recession under the current economic structure, so certain institutional changes would also need to take place to maintain economic stability and the well-being of the public. Establishing a democratically directed federal job guarantee (JG) and a democratized monetary and financial system would accomplish those goals. We must also dampen the forces pushing the economy to grow. We could transform corporations into cooperatives, changing their legal purpose from profit- and consumption-maximization to meeting community needs. And we could stabilize the population size by addressing drivers of growth like women’s lack of economic opportunity and voice in reproductive decisions and by instilling a more ecologically minded culture. In my reading of ecological economics, these four changes are the institutional pillars of a steady state economy. Other policies—including reforming trade deals and international monetary structures to prevent corporations and other countries from escaping steady state policies, and minimum and maximum incomes to limit inequality—would also be important, but the aforementioned pillars along with a cap on throughput would seem to establish a stable and democratic steady state economy.

A limits perspective shows why a JG (mentioned among the GND resolution’s “goals and projects”) and a democratized monetary system (one possible version of “public financing”) are not simply aspirational but essential. The JG not only ensures that each citizen will have an occupation that advances the renewables transition, but the private sector’s control over employment means that job prospects are currently tied to continued economic growth. If growth ceases and consumption shrinks, which must happen, businesses would cut their expenses by laying off the workforce and reducing wages—forcing the population to demand we restart growth to obtain a job. The JG could decouple employment from growth and eliminate the fear of joblessness. And with popular control over what jobs we create, we can reorient economic activity towards less resource-intensive tasks like restoration of ecosystems, education, and caring for others.

In the GND resolution several options for financing the energy transition are mentioned: “community grants, public banks, and other public financing.” Popular education about where money comes from, who controls it, and how it is created is sorely needed. The public must understand that there is a private channel of money creation which injects new money into the economy as private banks make loans (and accounts for 95% of new money creation, which drives economic activity) and a public channel provided by central banks whose existence is obscured. During the Great Recession, the Federal Reserve and other central banks created trillions of dollars to bail out the private banks that caused the collapse, while populations were told that there wasn’t enough money to finance public goods. I think that gaining popular control over the Fed is vital, not just because the public could then decide to generate all needed financing for the transition, but because the current privatized system of money creation creates unrepayable debts and leaves the financial system unstable. It isn’t difficult to imagine a financial crisis equal to or larger than 2008, produced by the same unbalanced privatized system, disrupting the transition as it unfolds over many years. There are books dedicated to educating readers about how money is created and how that investment power could be made to serve the public interest, and a thorough explanation cannot be provided here. But with public control over money creation, private banks and businesses that oppose the transition won’t be able to block it by starving the country of needed investment funds. The financial instability threatened by the carbon bubble will also be better managed by publicly accountable monetary institutions forced by movements to take the climate crisis seriously and ensure public well-being. And like the JG, a democratized monetary system can decouple the link between working class interests and growth, since continued corporate growth is currently necessary in order to have sufficient retirement savings, whereas public money can simply ensure a sufficient pension without growth.

A focus on limits helps climate activists recognize that we must be planning to maintain economic stability. If the economy begins to falter, with growing numbers of people without work and a loss of the savings they need to retire, then the population won’t be able to support the transition even though no future is possible without it. And limits analysis reminds us that not only is excess pollution a cause of collapse on a finite planet, but so is the depletion of the resources our economy relies on. In the present fossil-fueled economy, oil is used everywhere. It is a key input to industrial agriculture—generating fertilizers, powering the cultivating machines, and fueling the trucks that carry produce all over the country. It is involved in producing both coal and gas, and in the manufacture of wind turbines and solar panels. But conventional oil production has stagnated since 2005, and the “unconventional” sources like fracking that are keeping production rising are of dwindling supply, according to independent geologists. Without prospects for continued increases in oil production, economic growth is poised to end soon anyway—not on our terms, but in some form of collapse. This suggests that an economic crisis driven by oil depletion—another obstacle that could derail the renewable energy transition—must be accounted for in our planning.

Limits of Renewables

If climate change was understood as perhaps the direst manifestation of the limits to growth on our finite planet, it would reinforce the need to create a non-growing, steady state economy. But even when viewing climate change as an energy problem, activists have yet to incorporate analyses that argue there are fundamental differences between fossil fuels and renewables, with important implications for the energy transition and the feasibility of continued growth.

Before the 18^th century, humanity’s primary sources of energy were wood combustion and a combination of human and animal muscle, and most people were farmers. As coal came to replace these energy sources it transformed society, enabling the Industrial Revolution. Followed decades later by oil and then gas, these cheap, highly energy-dense fossil fuels led to the mass production society we know today, with a seemingly endless supply of material goods, an array of electric appliances that save countless hours on time-consuming tasks, and the ability to travel incredible distances in short periods of time. Fossil fuels come from ancient sunlight stored in plant matter that was trapped underground and converted into concentrated energy by intense heat and pressure over millions of years. We’ve lived our entire lives in the midst of an energy surplus produced by these long-term processes and have come to regard the resulting lifestyles as normal. As we transition away from these energy sources to forms generated by sunlight and wind in real time, our lifestyles and modes of organizing society will likely change again.

We are accustomed to using energy whenever we want, with the flip of a switch. However, renewables like solar and wind provide energy intermittently, only when the sun is shining and the wind is blowing. We can install batteries to store energy for use when it can’t be collected, long-distance transmission lines to transport energy from sunny and windy areas to overcast and calm locations, and redundant generating capacity aimed at collecting far more than our total energy demand to address intermittency and make renewables act like controllable fossil fuels. We tend to focus on the financial costs of new infrastructure, but the most fundamental and important costs are physical, like the energy required to build out these strategies. As we commit more energy to the infrastructure needed to make renewables controllable, less is available for the things we actually want energy for—making goods, renovating buildings, educating students. As the energy cost of our energy system increases, we may find that there are limits to how much renewables can become “on demand” before too much energy is exchanged for control. Instead, we may have to restructure how and when we work to utilize energy when it’s available.

Replacing oil is also likely to present a challenge. Oil currently powers 95% of transportation because it is uniquely suited to propel cars, trucks, ships, and planes. It is a liquid at room temperature, making it easy to store, and is extremely energy-dense. There are about 45 Megajoules of energy per kilogram (MJ/kg)—a single barrel contains the energy equivalent of over 10 years of human labor. Renewables like solar and wind produce electricity, which must be stored in batteries for use in our vehicles. However, current batteries have a fraction of the energy density that oil has, 0.5Mj/kg, and even the best theoretical battery would max out around 5MJ/kg. This means that for large or long-distance vehicles that require more energy, the necessary battery would be very big and heavy. Powering large vehicles like tractor trailer trucks with batteries will be impractical, while electrifying commercial planes is likely to be impossible. Crucially, heavy trucks carry most of our goods, including food, across long distances over the highway system to the communities where they’re consumed. This means that we urgently need to relocalize agriculture. And with energy costs in mind, we’ll need to cut down on cars, live closer to our places of work, and expand public transportation. In general, we’re likely to have less mobility in an all-renewable society and relocalizing much of our economic activity will become vital.

Having alluded to the importance of energy costs, we should understand that it always takes energy to gather or generate energy we can use. Energy analysts have developed a ratio called “energy returned on energy invested” (EROEI or EROI) which tells us the relative amount of energy available for economic activity from different sources. When we first discovered oil, it would flow from wells under its own pressure and had an EROEI of 100:1—for every barrel of oil we invested, we would get 100 back. This immense energy surplus allowed us to create amazing societal complexity and the marvels mentioned earlier. But after using the most easily available sites, we’ve had to move towards “unconventional” sources of oil like deep-sea drilling and fracking, which have a much higher energy cost. Today, the net energy of oil is around 20:1 worldwide. Though establishing this net energy ratio is inexact, much can be learned from looking at the relative EROEI of different energy sources. Studies suggest that on average, wind provides somewhere around 19:1 while solar provides 10:1, and these numbers would decrease as we account for the energy costs of other infrastructure that will be necessary, like batteries or other forms of storage. These findings suggest that we’ll likely have less energy in an all-renewable world and thus a smaller economy. That’s right—both carbon budget analysis and energy analysis suggest that we’ll need an economy that can thrive with reduced consumption.

There are several other significant implications of establishing an all-renewable society described by energy analysts, and these analyses ought to be a central input to any energy transition plan. It’s understandable that climate activists wouldn’t have any interest in acknowledging what humanity has accomplished through fossil fuel use or suggesting that using only renewables may require changes to our lifestyles, since the fossil fuel industry has already pointed to these ideas to disparage the demand for a transition. We know, however, that whether the reason is peak oil or climate change, the transition must take place. Perhaps counterintuitively, I believe this information doesn’t threaten the transition but rather makes it more likely to be completed. The public must be made aware that an all-renewable society may be different in significant ways from the fossil-fueled one we know today. The structure of our society and our lifestyles are shaped by our main sources of energy, and adaptation may be necessary. There is danger in painting a picture of a straightforward energy transition that arrives at a society nearly identical to the current one, when evidence suggests that this may not be the case. We won’t have prepared ourselves and others for the challenges involved, and elites will seize upon any unforeseen obstacles to bolster their attempts to derail the transition. Most of all, we need to be consciously and forcefully advancing a culture that recognizes and respects ecological limits and thoroughly understands the innumerable shortcomings of a society ruled by elites, who’d prefer that citizens aspire to meet their needs through consumption.

Limits of Corporate Culture

Climate activists are well-aware of the efforts of the fossil fuel industry to create doubt within the public about the reality and seriousness of the climate crisis. However, there is a bigger picture here as well. Many of the ideas and habits we have received as authentic culture were at one time visions arising in corporate PR and advertising firms. Consumer culture was a necessity that arose as mass production developed in the 1920s, and corporations sought not only to turn a thrifty American population into one embracing constant consumption but to legitimize their own existence by defining this hierarchical, consumptive economy as a system of freedom in the public mind.

After a century of corporate PR and advertising campaigns, we have learned to have an outsized role for consumption in our lives. Citizens have come to define their identity through their consumption choices, searching for a sense of self through the offerings of the market rather than their own goals and actions and the relationships they share. Unable to meet basic needs like connection and meaning in this society oriented towards the empty goal of quantitative increase, consumption also serves as a form of self-medication—a replacement for the human desires that are left unfulfilled. Consumption choices have also become the primary means of political participation for some, who have been convinced that citizens only have enough power to change their individual behaviors and can’t imagine themselves joining in collective action to change the systems that shape the behavior of millions.

In addition to the propagation of certain cultural ideas by sustained, billion-dollar campaigns, the experience of living in a society in which citizens are so far removed from the decisions that concern them exerts its own pacifying force. It leads to a domesticated mindset and habits of passivity that keep the public from taking control of its own affairs. Faced with existential crises, we tend to make bystanders of ourselves.

The economy and the culture are connected. A population groomed for a spectatorship role seems paralyzed exactly when a mass mobilization to create a sustainable society is most needed, and consumer culture legitimizes the present economy, making transformation unthinkable for many. Leaving core cultural ideas unquestioned ensures this malaise remains undisturbed and allows elites to easily defend the status quo. Our ecological crises demand that we consume less, and this would seem to pit activists against citizens’ current means of identity formation, sense of well-being, and feelings of political empowerment. But this is only a problem if activists don’t forcefully articulate that these dependencies reflect how the consumptive society undermines authentic human development and relationships, and fosters isolation and hopelessness.

Perhaps most significantly, elites will argue that to reduce consumption is to destroy freedom. This is where activists must be most vocal in pointing out that the image of humanity as a consumer is an ugly distortion stifling the rich complexity of human nature. It is a caricature meant to cause the public to willingly conform to corporate interests. Elites have needed to monopolize the definition of freedom, equating it with limitless consumption, to distract the public from the fact that it has been denied the freedom to shape the economy.

A sustainable economy can only be brought about in the midst of a supportive culture that aligns with and champions its values. Foremost among these values is an ecologically compatible definition of freedom that activists and the public need to cultivate. I think this definition should emphasize the right of citizens to collectively participate in the most fundamental economic and political decisions that shape their fate and include a thorough recognition of the importance and benefits of limits. Unbridled freedom to consume has driven humanity to the brink of societal collapse, demonstrating that freedom without limits destroys both freedom and survival. When maximizing consumption is no longer the goal, humanity is encouraged to prioritize intellectual and moral progress and develop aspects of human nature that are undermined by the consumer society.

We need to recognize that we live on a finite planet of interconnected webs of life and that our actions inevitably affect one another. No species can think itself so exceptional as to dominate the planet’s life-support systems, nor can any group of people; we must learn sufficiency—the meaning of enough consumption—and a moral skill parents try to teach us in childhood: how to share resources. The idea that a life defined by self-interest is most fulfilling or even possible must be exposed as a myth; society is only possible because we rely on one another, and freedom arises from these relationships of interdependence. We must be willing to navigate the challenges of living within limits, driven not just by necessity but by the recognition that we develop more authentic culture and liberate ourselves in the process.

An ecological culture must emerge, revealing the illegitimacy of the old economy and the legitimacy of the new one. A comprehensive sustainability transition will only be carried out if this cultural battle is being fought and won, and activists must be conscious of that. We cannot avoid these battles, and after learning of the extent to which elites have shaped culture in their preferred image we should be eager to fight them.

Limits of Our Current “Democracy”

A plan that is truly aimed at stopping climate change and our other ecological crises must establish a steady state economy with a fundamentally different goal: the fulfillment of basic human needs within ecological limits rather than the pursuit of short-term profit. However, an economy that functions without growth threatens not just the fossil fuel industry but all of private economic power. Economic growth has historically been used as a substitute for equality, allowing elites to claim that all are benefiting even as they capture nearly all of the financial gains of ongoing resource extraction. Redistribution of wealth and power would become a central discussion when society is no longer under the illusion of limitless growth, thus the owners and managers of the economy will fiercely oppose this plan. The sustainability transition is therefore only conceivable if we bring about a truly democratic society in which the public gains the freedom to restructure the economic institutions that shape our fate.

A basic impediment to creating a more democratic society is continued belief that the people are as free as they could ever hope to be. In reality, the ability to make economic and political decisions is constrained to a small percentage of the population, and decisions are made on the basis of elites’ financial self-interest. Activists must educate the public about the authoritarian foundations of our society. We must understand all the ways in which the public is marginalized from decision-making and the many obstacles that elites are likely to place in the movement’s path.

We should expect that the process will generate political tumult unlike any that we’ve witnessed. Corporations are familiar with their latest profit opportunity being opposed by the public, and respond with deception, character attacks, infiltration, and other tactics to break movements. These institutions are almost never forced to justify their existence itself, and we should expect corporate media to overheat with narratives about the illegality, immorality, and cataclysmic implications of activists’ program.

Taking single-issue campaigns as a model is inadequate for the task ahead. Elites face an existential threat to their power, thus after flooding national discourse with endless stories meant to delegitimize the movement they will use the only remaining option: force. Activists should thus recognize that this transition may more closely resemble those popular efforts throughout history which aimed to fundamentally change a government, which ultimately require the security forces called in to repress the movement to refuse their orders. This extreme solidarity, as with the rest of the transition, will only be achieved if the groundwork is laid in advance.

Because this effort requires that the public create means by which it can shape society, we must also be able to envision what a more robust democracy would look like and how it would work. First is the existence of a critically and independently informed public that understands its own interests and can evaluate paths forward. Next is a culture of regular participation, in which informing oneself with critical sources of information, having frequent discussions with others on important topics to refine our understanding, and building movements to champion our priorities are the norm. We also need institutions that facilitate participation—systems that make it easier to become informed, to gather with others, and to directly weigh in on major decisions. Not only should voting be encouraged and made easier, but increasing the number of referenda in which the public can vote directly on issues following a thorough education and discussion process would be a step towards increasing democracy. Maintaining powerful movements outside of the formal political system is also important, so that the public has an accountability mechanism for the decisions it makes. And finally, instilling a spirit of equality within the population is perhaps most fundamental. Belief in inherent human hierarchies gives rise to and justifies systems of domination; the principle that all people are equal and deserve to be treated equally by society is a defining justification for democracy in the first place. Advancing all of these elements of democracy should be recognized as climate activism.

Building Autonomy

To this point I have touched upon many of the main ideas that I think must shape any comprehensive plan to construct a sustainable society. But this plan will remain a collection of ideas without a movement powerful enough to implement them.

The need for a rapid, national energy transition (that ultimately becomes international) seems fairly obvious. Though some started thinking about a large-scale climate mobilization a few years ago, activism has mainly been aimed at isolated local or state efforts (outside of a coordinated national or international vision) and sought change at the edges of “political possibility.” Why then, after several years of climate movement organizing, has the movement’s focus on this idea only emerged now? I think a primary reason is growing autonomy. Activists hadn’t been asking what the problem itself demands or may not have had the self-assurance to fight for an obviously necessary national transition plan. We may have been limiting ourselves. That the idea of this plan has been put forward and is being discussed is a sign of increased autonomy, a characteristic of a movement becoming more intellectually active and showing more political initiative—something that we must recognize and quickly cultivate further.

Affirming the need for a national plan is one thing, but what policies will it incorporate? For far too long, activists have demanded that people in positions of power develop a plan to address climate change. Implicit in that demand is the implausible assumption that political elites could or would do so, but perhaps most dangerous is the assumption that they should. Between the constant cultural grooming for highly self-interested, consumerist lifestyles and day-to-day exclusion from participating in decisions that shape our lives, we the people have internalized a sense of ourselves as passive spectators, a domesticated mindset that I think gets peeled away as one becomes more involved in a movement to change society. A thoroughly domesticated population makes no demands; this movement is beyond that stage. Activists, in consultation with the numerous thinkers whose work helps us envision how a sustainable society would operate, now need to develop this plan for ourselves.

Much has been made of politicians endorsing the GND, but it is mainly a slogan for now and doesn’t foreground the need to adapt to limits to growth. With this idea incorporated, no corporate political officials will support the plan. We should note that politicians expressing support for a vague populist idea they can later ignore or coopt is the rule in US political history. Activists’ power lies with an enlightened public. After developing its own platform, this movement will need to commit to the hard work of cultivating an independently thinking and politically active population, until the base for an authentically representative political system exists across the country.

As this plan develops, I envision activists consciously developing their own autonomy and involving millions of people in everyday movement-building. We should aim to enlist 3.5% of the population in this effort, a percentage that has never failed to achieve fundamental changes to governments in the last century of nonviolent revolts, which in the US would amount to about 11 million people. For context, 13 million people voted for Bernie Sanders in the 2016 primaries. One measure of movement autonomy will be the extent to which each participant and the broader public understand the transition plan and can clearly articulate its rationale to others, rather than a model in which the leadership knows the details while the rest follow. The public needs a thorough sense of what is necessary and possible, since elites will relentlessly argue that we don’t understand our own interests and that our ideas are infeasible. Preserving the movement’s clarity of thought is crucial.

Autonomy also means cleansing ourselves of guardianship, of the sense that those in power have some special ability to make the decisions that shape our fate, if we’re to successfully expand democracy and enable public control over these decisions. We must not hold ourselves back with unfounded deference to power systems that will tell the people they have no right to change society in fundamental ways. We must unlearn our tolerance for illegitimate economic institutions that force us to march towards collapse. The social transformation we need will only be implemented by a movement comprised of individuals who are ready and willing to take the reins of their society, which will require major collective self-confidence in the face of a media marginalization deluge.

As we expose the illegitimacy of our social institutions and reject the limits they impose, we also open political space in our society that could be filled by worse forms of authoritarianism. The more that each participant understands the society we’re working to create and the better organized our efforts, the better chance that the movement will maintain control of the process.

Remember, for elites force is a secondary option. Ideas and information are the primary tools in the war for the future. A wide-reaching communications and self-monitoring/survey system and a sustained public education campaign are therefore foundations of an autonomous mass movement. These institutions would enable the movement to maintain constant touch with the population and be aware of the knowledge, attitudes, and mental state of its own participants. This would protect and insulate movement culture and allow the movement to speak for itself as the corporate culture machine ramps up. As the Sunrise Movement continues to inform the public about the GND, this program could be expanded to spread literacy in multiple areas that would allow ordinary citizens to develop a fairly comprehensive understanding of our problems. What would that curriculum look like? I think it would organize information into five broad areas:

• Ecological reality: An introduction to the severity and urgency of ecological overshoot; The limits of using technology to solve the problem; The need to establish a steady state economy (and why growth may end soon anyway)
• Energy reality: The differences between fossil fuels and renewables; How these differences are likely to require changes to how we live and organize society; The energy availability challenges we must overcome during the transition
• Institutional reality (political-economic platform): An introduction to ecological economics; The major institutional changes and policies needed to establish a steady state economy
• Reality of power: The extent to which our economic and political systems are undemocratic; How societies with concentrated decision-making power are pushed toward collapse; The history of corporate propaganda; How elites have historically repressed social movements
• Building autonomy: The need to establish a liberated culture that celebrates human development rather than increasing consumption; Ways to create a more authentically democratic society; Social movement strategy and history; Rapid community resilience development (relocalizing agriculture, public transportation, etc.)

For years I have been writing a book that attempts to tie these issues together into a broad, coherent narrative that can quickly deepen the political-economic understanding of new activists and create the autonomous mass movement I think we need. I was a fossil fuel divestment activist who stepped away to develop my own thoughts, always planning to return to the movement with an analysis encompassing the scale of the challenge. But after bringing these ideas to a handful of climate activist groups, I found that they had defined themselves too narrowly—these issues didn’t fit within existing movement narratives and appeared irrelevant to their work or seemed abstract in comparison to the local-scale action they were accustomed to. These experiences taught me that how the movement defines itself and the problem it’s attempting to solve is critical.

Climate change needs to be recognized as a manifestation of limits to growth, requiring that we establish a steady state economy alongside the energy transition—otherwise, that transition may be fatally disrupted by major obstacles before it is completed. In reality, it may never truly begin at the necessary scale if the movement isn’t prepared to develop an authentically democratic society and end corporate rule. And we’ll have overlooked the broader reality of ecological overshoot in the last few years that we can set a different path. Recognizing the need to develop a highly informed public, cap consumption and embed ecological principles into our economic institutions, expand our democratic institutions, and initiate a cultural rethink in light of ecological limits, the climate movement could quickly launch new campaigns in these areas. It could expand beyond the narrower vision of itself, claiming its full identity as a movement aiming to create a new society.

It’s fascinating to think about the forces that turn an idea into a social institution, a way of life, a revolution. Though other factors play a role, belief seems to be a key. The GND slogan was floating around for years until a small group of young activists seized upon the idea of a comprehensive, federal climate plan, believing it to be necessary and possible, and turned their belief into action. They then found their belief confirmed and supported by a representative elected by popular movements, further elevating the sense that it could be achieved. In the same way, the ideas presented here won’t impact the plan as they should unless people believe in them enough to act.

This moment also demands that we believe in ourselves. We must shed a domesticated mindset and develop a liberated identity, taking ourselves seriously enough to prepare for a social transformation that will only come about if we consciously lay the groundwork for it. To take control of society, the public needs some understanding of the physical reality—outside of our belief—to which we must conform. Belief in a straightforward energy transition won’t overcome the very likely physical obstacles to that straightforwardness. A self-governing citizenry would be thinking about topics like this, because they’re not technical ideas best left to others but the details of the transition we need to survive. There are ecological limits, and we must learn to live within them. Then there are man-made limits on democracy, which we can no longer continue to accept and must overcome. To all believers: let’s make a truly comprehensive transition plan and fight to take our rightful place as society’s collective self-governors.

The post Limits and Liberation: The Next Steps of the Climate Movement appeared first on Freedom and Survival.

Michael Löwy’s essay on ecosocialism brings up several vital topics that prompt us to have a deeper discussion and form a more detailed understanding of the outline of a sustainable society.

Envisioning and Building a Deeper Democracy

Early on, Löwy states that “The core of ecosocialism is the concept of democratic ecological planning.” It’s great that this vision incorporates a much more participatory democracy, as this often seems understated in ecological activism. Attention is regularly paid to the fossil fuel industry’s role in dictating various priorities within national and state politics, and activist campaigns often revolve around gaining support for climate-friendlier legislation—useful to be sure, but there is much less emphasis on establishing the constitutive pieces of democracy like a culture of critical thinking or public campaign financing. These things are de-facto left to those who think of themselves as “democracy activists.” But how many people describe themselves this way? How much activism is dedicated to creating a truly democratic society? A major part of the challenge is questioning the assumptions and cultural messages suggesting that the present society is “what democracy is.” Attempts to envision a more broadly democratic society are an important contribution of ecosocialists like Löwy. Climate change and other existential ecological crises demand large-scale changes to society that are only conceivable if we live in a society in which citizens, not corporations, make fundamental decisions. If ecological activists do not involve themselves in fashioning a much more functional democracy, including the ability of the public to legislate their country’s sustainable level of consumption and a rapid energy transition (and the accompanying economic changes that would be needed) as a binding national plan, then our needs will be constrained by the narrow limits of our present “democracy.”

With that in mind, democratizing money creation and investment must be recognized as an essential part of ecological activism. Löwy writes that “for investments and technological innovation to serve the common good, decision-making must be taken away from the banks and capitalist enterprises that currently dominate, and put in the public domain.” As Mary Mellor’s work shows, just a decade ago trillions of debt-free dollars were created by central banks to bail out the private banks whose recklessness led to the Great Recession, while populations across the world were subject to austerity and told that there wasn’t enough money to finance public needs. Though unlimited sums can be deployed to aid those in power, today the public is told repeatedly that society simply cannot afford to finance the rapid transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy. The economic instability inherent in the current financial system (i.e. the sort that could lead to recession and derail a national or international energy transition) and the control by private banks over what society invests in are conditions that, if left out of ecological activists’ analysis, would seem to present fundamental barriers to any large-scale economic transformation. Addressing climate change and other ecological crises requires that democracy extend to money and finance.

A central challenge will be finding balance throughout the process of establishing a much more democratic society. As Herman Daly points out, it doesn’t make sense for the public to vote on the smallest details of everyday life. And yet, we are experiencing existential crises because the public, which tends to prioritize values such as care for others and living meaningfully over maximizing short-term profit, has little to no say over the structure of the economy—a deficit of democracy. Clearly the public must gain the power to make fundamental decisions about how society works, and that will require a certain amount of knowledge about our crises as a prerequisite. But finding the balance between this hard-won freedom and the ability to spend one’s life outside the voting booth is part of the transition process. Delegation of tasks through representatives is a way to make political work more efficient, but vigilance and accountability mechanisms are essential for oversight and adjustment. Daly makes a strong case for how markets could serve the public as another form of delegation, and it may be possible for other institutional changes to eliminate the anti-democratic and anti-ecological characteristics that markets currently exhibit.

Foregrounding Ecological Limits

Turning to the “ecological” part of “democratic ecological planning” at the “heart of ecosocialism,” I believe certain ideas should feature more prominently. Foremost is a discussion of limits to growth. Löwy writes that “The issue is not excessive consumption in the abstract, but the prevalent type of consumption, based as it is on massive waste and the conspicuous and compulsive pursuit of novelties promoted by ‘fashion.’” However, the ecological crises we face are all rooted in overconsumption—“excessive consumption in the abstract.” While waste and fashionable consumption are clearly areas that can be targeted to reduce human demands on this finite planet, the ultimate goal is to attain a level of consumption that meets the population’s basic needs while avoiding the destruction of the natural systems necessary for survival—and this seems likely to fall below what’s achievable by eliminating waste.

Another important discussion is the need to stabilize the human population and allow it to gradually shrink over time. Löwy quotes Barry Commoner, who emphasized that “the capitalist system and its technology—and not population growth—was responsible for the destruction of the environment.” But total consumption is a product of both consumption per person and the number of people. When breaking down carbon emissions trends, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change identifies economic and population growth as the fundamental drivers of emissions. Population growth in wealthy countries increases throughput today, and if we aim for a tomorrow defined both by sustainable and equitable levels of per capita consumption, then we must recognize the need for a gradual reduction in population size.

Incorporating Ecological Economics and Energy Literacy

If the goal of ecosocialism is to achieve a sustainable economy, it seems to me that it should take some direction from the discipline of ecological economics. Strikingly, though the essay invokes “the growth question,” there is no discussion of a steady state, non-growing economy as a necessary goal of ecosocialist work. It shouldn’t go unnoticed that though we face several ecological crises (a sixth mass extinction event, eroding topsoil, freshwater depletion, etc.), only climate change has any semblance of a social movement addressing it in the US, and those committing themselves to creating a sustainable society don’t universally recognize the insights of ecological economics or a steady state economy as a centerpiece of their efforts. It’s true that the analysis and ideas within ecological economics tend not to sufficiently incorporate an explicit discussion of power and the opposition that elites would present to the realization of a steady state economy. This is where the discussions and attitudes generated by ecosocialists and other activist groups can provide a necessary complement, as well as the means of implementing these ideas (and keeping ecological economics from being a largely academic tradition). These groups need one another.

One last, essential topic not discussed is energy analysis. Work from Charles Hall and others, further developed for a public audience by Richard Heinberg, suggests that renewable energy is fundamentally different than fossil fuels and will provoke changes in how we organize society. Perhaps most significantly, studies of “energy returned on energy invested” (EROEI) suggest that wind, solar, and other forms of renewable energy yield significantly less net energy (what we can use to power economic activity besides generating energy, itself) and can only support a smaller, non-growing economy. This would also mean that human work would have to substitute for certain tasks previously reliant on fossil fuel energy, preventing a drastic reduction in working hours in an all-renewable society. For reasons of energy, it may not be the case that “ecosocialism heralds a substantial increase in free time.” But the better able we are of foreseeing the challenges of the energy transition, the more prepared the public will be to deal with those challenges and the likelier that the transition is completed.

Firmness, Flexibility, and Clarity in Movement-Building

I’ll end with a few comments on firmness and flexibility, and about the role of education in activism. Many responses to Löwy’s essay call for more detail, either about the type of society ecosocialism ultimately aims to achieve or how to get there, or about ecosocialism’s stance towards varied issues of oppression or ways of thinking. Surely there is some threshold level of detail that promotes or inspires action around a vision, and yet it is often contention about the details that keep those who broadly agree from working more closely together. Clearly there are some aspects of our vision for change that must remain firm in order to have integrity and meaning, while other aspects should be kept flexible in order to promote collaboration and resist splintering, and to deal with unforeseeable challenges as they arise. Those who believe that a mass movement is necessary to accomplish a Great Transition may be served by thinking about these questions.

I believe that clarity is a characteristic of strong movements, and in the interests of clarity we should leave aside labels except where they serve a clear purpose. Instead, let’s be explicit and encourage direct discussion about our ultimate goals. Work to be aware of and open about your own ideology. If you’re committed to a certain principle or solving a problem, try to be open to all evidence that may impact these things and change your mind accordingly. Being too rigid, too narrowly self-defined and not open to change, or believing that broadening a movement’s vision would dilute its focus are all tendencies that threaten to keep activists’ sights aimed lower than what our crises demand.

My concern is that too much rigidity will prevent a more transformative vision from being adopted by current activists. What is the vehicle for the types of ideas expressed in this essay? There is a growing democratic socialist movement, so it would seem that the more this movement can be infused with an analysis of ecological crises, the more likely these ideas are to be implemented. Environmental justice groups have potential, but their sphere of concern will have to expand beyond local or regional issues to encompass larger-scale goals. The climate justice movement may be another vehicle for a broad transformation of the sort Löwy describes, but this depends on activists recognizing that addressing climate change requires us to create a non-growing economy and a truly self-governing society. Degrowth is a developing movement that appears to have the broad vision demanded by these crises, but currently too few adherents.

If a sufficiently powerful rationale for far-reaching change is not presented or if existing movements define themselves too narrowly to accept a broad vision of social transformation, the ideas presented here will not change society. They will remain ideas.

The Central Role of Education in Activism

“What guarantee is there that the people will make ecologically sound decisions?” Löwy asks. “None. Ecosocialism wagers that democratic decisions will become increasingly reasoned and enlightened as culture changes and the grip of commodity fetishism is broken. One cannot imagine such a new society without the achievement, through struggle, self-education, and social experience, of a high level of socialist and ecological consciousness.”

Education is a central task of activists. In order to build a movement autonomous enough to transform society, those seeking this transformation must cultivate individuals who understand how our various ecological crises reflect humanity consuming beyond natural limits. Current ecological activists don’t see an absolute need for a non-growing economy—this must change. I continue to feel that a significant number of ordinary citizens must also develop a healthy obsession with creating an authentically democratic society. And the better we can foresee the challenges associated with the transition, both the inherent difficulties and those purposely created by elites who seek to maintain the status quo, the more likely we are to make it happen. An independent system of popular education appears to be an essential movement institution.

We must develop within ourselves and others the autonomy to overcome the limits placed upon us by those in power. The US has not yet seen an informed, critically thinking public organized enough to challenge for authentic representation. Let’s see how responsive our existing decision-making structures can be in the context of this public autonomy, and which structures are simply anti-democratic. Let’s reveal the limits of our present “democracy” and, if we find that these limits keep us from the social transformation needed to preserve the natural world and the life it makes possible, fashion new institutions with a steady hand.

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