tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4057374005254014040.post5105540124395663539..comments2024-03-28T18:46:32.503+00:00Comments on CIBSE President's Blog: Urban planting and adapting the future through learning from the past.adminhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14807404068837872739noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4057374005254014040.post-91327778126053330162013-12-12T13:04:51.967+00:002013-12-12T13:04:51.967+00:00I think good urban planning gives everyone a chanc...I think good urban planning gives everyone a chance to participate in making their community a better place http://www.climatecontrolse.co.uk/ .Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08441936820113965097noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4057374005254014040.post-92054427389589250662013-10-24T12:44:12.062+01:002013-10-24T12:44:12.062+01:00Dear George
"...accountants and economists c...Dear George<br /><br />"...accountants and economists continue to dictate what our future will be by their view of what is, or is not, a good investment."<br /><br />Economics is often contested not to be a science at all, but a set of political doctrines. I’ve been saying for years that Climate Change shouldn’t be regarded as our only problem. The real problem is limits - widely dismissed in the 1970s. The trouble is that surprisingly, humans aren’t good at complex problems, so we specialise and evolve narratives like QE or the transition to a low carbon economy and miss fundamentals. The steady decline Energy Return on Energy Invested (ERoEI) has crippled a real economy that expanded and became more complex due to high ERoEI energy - cheap energy - and could carry (total) debt. With ERoEI declining rapidly - evident in fuel poverty - energy becomes a painful levy on an economy designed and specialised to run on cheap energy, developing ever more clever financial instruments that would claim never-ending growth. The very high proportion in fuel poverty is a bellweather for an economy that can’t manage declining ERoEI. We should by now be aware that the virtual economy, based upon asset price inflation and derivatives, was saved at the expense of the real economy. With some other complications, it was the end of cheap energy - particularly oil - that popped the bubble and led to today’s austerity-debt spiral. As we’ve seen in recent days over energy prices, the economy is calling on all its resources just to maintain its current level of complexity. In fact, what I think we have to hope for as rational engineers based in the real economy is that crisis and resource limits lead the necessary shift in social values, which will make simplification and energy descent far less painful. <br /><br />Regards<br /><br />Chris <br />Chris Jonesnoreply@blogger.com