TED 2009 Part II – Reconnect / Disconnect

TED 2009 Session 3 (the last session of the 1st day) was called Reconnect, but there was a bit of a disconnect all day – there was an elephant in the room, but we only got a few glimpses of it when someone was crass enough to mention the “D” word. So I will again

(Not to take away anything from the high quality of the talks, but it needed saying imho)

The very few times Depression was mentioned, the data was sobering – not the sort of uplifting, inspirational message one likes to see. The bad news is:

- Bill Gates reckons this is a big one and will be rough for 4 years

- Juan Enriquez noted that with the various bailouts, nearly every Western country will have to start to reel in its citizen entitlements fairly savagely. (It’s no longer a debt we can offset to our kids, its now one we will have to pay). He put up the pictures but in my view he drew a veil over some of the less digestible issues that will inevitably result, to save distress to the gentler souls in the room

Interestingly, he called for the same virtuous cycle loop as we did over here – ie tie Green Energy development into a National Energy Independence strategy, and subsidise and investment in the technology as part of a Recession busting New Deal.

I was also very impressed with a talk by an Atlantan industrialist, Ray Anderson, about how they had re-engineered carpet tile manufacturing to massively reduce energy and carbon usage, and still made a profit. In my view this is the sort of practical advice that is needed going forward, as he noted the only force we have globally that is big enough and structured enough to save the planet is Big Business.

On the Right-On Ecology side, we had an update from Al Gore, and some stirring movies on the beauty of the planet - and how beastly we were still being to its beasts and more besides.

Most interestingly to me though, there were some very good “fringe conferences” going on outside over coffee etc by various people – mainly scientists who are disputing quite a bit of the Green Machine Story in furious discussion. This to me was the real value of TED today – I was heartened that there was a side channel, as many of the issues raised were ones that had worried me – there is worrying lack of systemic thinking in the Green Machine. Some nuggets:

- The melting of the polar ice caps won’t cause see levels to rise, as there is no net gain in volume if ice melts. Its the melting of glaciers that is the issue.

- The energy required to grow food massively outweighs the amount used to transport it across the planet, especially is ships are used – in fact, its more energy efficient to grow lamb in New Zealand and freeze it and send it to the UK than to do it locally on hillsides where the sheep have to be kept indoors in winter

- The most energy efficient car to own is a second hand Land Rover. Its already built, so you consume no new energy to build a new car (this energy saving dwarfs any saving you can make via hybrids’ fuel consumption), and its made of aluminium so it’s going to be around a long, long time thus you can put off the day of buying a new car.

- Global Population growth per se isn’t the problem, Americans are – with the average American consuming c 10,000 kg of carbon a year to the media African’s c 100kg, you can have 1 billion more Africans for the same carbon footprint as 10 million more Americans. 100x more brains for your honey*… (you get 2 Europeans for every American too by the way). The average US domestic dog has a higher carbon footprint than the average African.

OK, OK - the issue is increasing energy use per capita, but you can see the point being made.

Frankly, my impression so far today is that the Save the Planet Movement needs to do its own reboot/reframe/reconnect exercise, I think a lot of the older science used is now looking simplistic and some of the “top of boom” messages just don’t play as well in the new straightened circumstances (Gambolling Dolphins vs Gambling with house repossessions – no brainer) It may be inconvenient, but its probably a truth for 2009 on…

(Although as one wag noted, a good severe 1930’s style Depression and a few major famines will do more for reducing Global Warming than anything else that has been proposed to date. Gaia moves in mysterious ways….).

* We also did Peak Oil, Peak Fish, Peak Crops – but no Peak Bees as yet.