Sustainability and Future

Carbon Illusion 1 The Carbon Illusion – Part 1: Displacement in the Name of Climate Neutrality 2 The Carbon Illusion – Part 2: The Dark Engine of Charcoal: Burning the Carbon Sink 3 The Carbon Illusion – Part 3: The Myth of the Monoculture: Why Native Savannah Stores Triple the Carbon 4 The Carbon Illusion – Part 4: Certification Compromised: When Audits Ignore Violence and Water Loss 5 The Carbon Illusion – Part 5: From Minas Gerais Furnaces to Hamburg’s "Sustainable" Subway ← Series Home Following the Industrial Footprint The supply chain for “green steel” begins with the massive environmental destruction and social conflict documented in Brazil’s Minas Gerais. It starts where the eucalyptus, planted under carbon offset schemes, is immediately burned in hundreds of charcoal ovens. The charcoal, harvested from trees meant to store carbon, is then loaded onto trucks and transported past vast mining operations, eventually converging at massive industrial complexes characterized by fire, smoke, and searing heat. This is the junction where the charcoal trail terminates, feeding the furnaces that convert iron ore into pellets. ...

The Contested Circle – Part 5: The Mandate of Justice: Governance, Labor, and the Equitable Framework The Unspoken Cost of Circulation The Circular Economy (CE) is widely championed as a pathway to a sustainable and equitable future, promising significant job creation and environmental protection. However, critics argue that the mainstream agenda, often dominated by technical and economic accounts, has a critical blind spot concerning social and environmental justice (EJ/SJ). The focus on material flows and efficiency metrics frequently overlooks how the costs and benefits of circularity are distributed, creating an ethical and governance imperative that must be proactively addressed. ...

The Arithmetic of Sustainability ← Series Home Having quantified the “red stack” of consumption and defined a necessary reduction strategy for transport and heating, we know that the future sustainable society requires meeting an electrical demand of 48 kWh/d per person (120 GW nationally), representing nearly a tripling of current UK delivered electricity consumption. If this plan is to be technically feasible and not a “pipedream,” we must now rigorously calculate the production side—the “green stack”—to determine how much energy Britain can realistically generate from its own renewable resources. ...

The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality 1 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 1: The Fossil Fuel Paradox and the Pace of Decarbonization 2 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 2: Food, Nitrogen, and the Existential Cost of Eating Fossil Fuels 3 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 3: Concrete, Steel, and the Four Pillars of the Material World 4 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 4: Globalization as Technology and the Retreat from Interconnection 5 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 5: Quantifying Risk, Dread, and the Calculus of Catastrophe 6 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 6: The Biosphere's Tightrope and the Price of Ambition 7 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 7: Inertia, Innovation, and the Limits of Predicting the Future ← Series Home The Earth’s Nine Boundaries When considering the future, it is vital to focus exclusively on the only biosphere humanity has, rejecting fantasies such as the grossly premature predictions of terraforming Mars,,. The challenge is ensuring that human activities do not transgress the safe planetary boundaries essential for long-term habitability. These critical limits encompass nine categories, including climate change, biodiversity loss, and interference in nitrogen and phosphorus cycles. ...

The Arithmetic of Sustainability ← Series Home The first phase of our arithmetic journey confirmed the staggering challenge: affluent Britain currently demands 125 kWh/d per person of primary energy input. Our strategic shift to sustainability requires aggressively reducing this demand through efficiency measures—electrifying transport and heating—resulting in a monumental reliance on clean delivered electricity: 48 kWh/d per person (120 GW nationally), nearly a tripling of current consumption. ...

The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality 1 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 1: The Fossil Fuel Paradox and the Pace of Decarbonization 2 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 2: Food, Nitrogen, and the Existential Cost of Eating Fossil Fuels 3 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 3: Concrete, Steel, and the Four Pillars of the Material World 4 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 4: Globalization as Technology and the Retreat from Interconnection 5 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 5: Quantifying Risk, Dread, and the Calculus of Catastrophe 6 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 6: The Biosphere's Tightrope and the Price of Ambition 7 The Seven Pillars of Modern Reality – Part 7: Inertia, Innovation, and the Limits of Predicting the Future ← Series Home Between Apocalypse and the Infinite Discourses about humanity’s trajectory are frequently dominated by two extremes: catastrophism, which predicts imminent societal collapse, and techno-optimism, which promises salvation through singularity and unlimited technological horizons,,. Such dated quantitative prophecies, often detached from physical realities, are generally unreliable as guides for future policy. ...

The Arithmetic of Sustainability ← Series Home Our journey through the arithmetic of sustainable energy has established an enormous deficit. Britain’s future electrified lifestyle demands 48 kWh/d per person of clean electricity (120 GW nationally). Domestic renewable resources max out at approximately 18 kWh/d per person due to a “social ceiling” imposed by land-use constraints. Solar imports offer a potential 20 kWh/d per person, but this introduces major geopolitical dependencies. ...

The Arithmetic of Sustainability ← Series Home The preceding analysis has established the contours of a sustainable energy supply for Britain: a mix of indigenous renewables (wind, tide, solar thermal), imported solar power, and dense nuclear fission. However, the arithmetic of generation is only half the challenge. Electricity from fluctuating sources (wind, solar) does not always match the moment-to-moment demand of consumers and industry. ...

The Arithmetic of Sustainability ← Series Home Throughout this series, we have performed the arithmetic of energy: quantifying Britain’s current consumption, projecting the demand of an electrified future, assessing the realistic contributions of indigenous renewables, evaluating imports, and examining storage. The numbers are clear, if sobering. The challenge is defined: deliver 48 kWh/d per person of clean electricity (120 GW nationally) to power an efficient, electrified lifestyle, replacing the current ~125 kWh/d/p of primary energy consumption. ...

The Arithmetic of Decarburization: A Hard Look at the Energy Revolution ← Series Home The Challenge Recapitulated Over this series, we have examined Austria’s energy system in detail. Let us summarize the key findings: Current state: Total primary energy: 1,381 PJ (~384 TWh) Fossil fuel share: 63% CO₂ emissions: ~70 Mt/year (energy-related) Current renewable electricity: ~70 TWh Target state: Fossil fuel share: 0% CO₂ emissions: Near zero Required clean electricity: ~166 TWh ...