“If peak oil occurs, it will dominate most everything else that we do, because energy drives everything.” Financial consultant Jim Hansen’s peak oil filter doesn’t just guide  investment decisions for his client portfolios. He applies it to his personal lifestyle (you may be surprised to learn what car he drives). He’s also concerned about community impacts when fuel prices are higher, like centralized hospitals dependent on people driving to them, rather than many smaller localized facilities. Jim makes an important point: “If I get it right but my community gets it wrong, it could overwhelm everything I’ve done personally.” [ravennacapitalmanagement.com]

BlipTV | Janaia’s journal Applying the Peak Oil Filter | iTunes | Audio

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Novelist Dan Armstrong’s Prairie Fire is a fast-paced thriller whose characters forge unlikely alliances to revolutionize the American food system. It’s spearheaded by farmers squeezed by skyrocketing oil prices while marketeers get whopping price gains. This revolution is unlikely to succeed, yet… well, we won’t spoil it! In Dan’s Taming the Dragon, climate change causes Chinese grain production to plummet, bringing the world to the brink. Dan illuminates the real-world backdrop behind both novels. His solution? Localize food production. Meet farmer Harry MacCormack with exciting results in central Oregon. [www.mudcitypress.com, sunbowfarm.org]

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Futurist Guy Dauncey’s enthusiastic determination is absolutely infectious! The author of Climate Change: 101 Solutions to Global Warming sees multiple environmental crises descending on us all at once. He points to numerous historical examples of our coming together around critical issues. “We can do this!” he insists. We can “change, adapt, innovate and build an entire economy operating in harmony with nature.” Tools like the internet and cellphones enable us to amplify organizing worldwide, so we can follow our ancestors’ lead in “not wimping out.” [earthfuture.com]

BlipTV | iTunes | Audio | Janaia’s journal: Guy Dauncey and Joanna Macy: The Great Transition 

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Caren Black and Christopher Paddon couldn’t find mentors to teach them self-reliant living when they became aware of peak oil. So they created a homestead and opened their doors to training others. People can take a personalized Lifeboat Course online or in person, where hands-on learning includes food production with domestic animals and gardens, renewable energy, and carpentry skills. “We’re all in this together,” Christopher notes, so the couple educate, volunteer and share to also make their community more resilient. [titaniclifeboatacademy.org]

Watch high quality video. Download on iTunes. Listen to Audio. Read Janaia’s journal: Climb Aboard the Titanic Lifeboat Academy.

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This turbulent, troubled global economy is precisely what Chris Martenson predicted in early 2010, “When Exponential Meets Reality” (episode 166). He asserts that we can no longer look at the economy without factoring in the terminal decline of its master resource — oil. The author of The Crash Course: The Unsustainable Future of Our Economy, Energy and Environment believes that, as “the generation that gets to deal with hitting up to resource limits,” we first need a new cultural story to inspire
appropriate action. [www.chrismartenson.com].

Listen to Audio.  Download video on iTunes. Read Janaia’s journal The Economy’s Oily Warning System.

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“My own reaction seemed so crazy to me,” says psychologist Kathy McMahon of her response to Peak Oil. Wondering if she was the only “wacko”, she started the Peak Oil Blues blog to explore her own and readers’ responses. As the “Peak Shrink,” Kathy formulated a delightfully tongue-in-cheek “Panglossian Disorder” — an unrealistic optimism about the future. She is about to publish “I Can’t Believe You Actually Think That!” A Couple’s Guide to Finding Common Ground about Peak Oil, Climate Catastrophe, and Economic Hard Times. (peakoilblues.com, feistylife.com)

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Read Janaia’s journal “Peak Moment meets Peak Shrink Kathy McMahon” about this conversation.

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“Petroleum Man is dead. Infinite Growth Man is dead. Post Petroleum Human is alive,” announced Michael C. Ruppert on May 22, 2011. Members of this emerging “species” know they must live in balance with the Earth, while remembering the lessons of industrial civilization.

The star and subject of the documentary film “Collapse”, Mike founded CollapseNet.com in 2010 to empower people to connect and relocalize. He’s the author of Crossing the Rubicon, and Confronting Collapse.

Watch his full presentation at Green Living EcoFest, May 2011: “Birth of Post-Petroleum Human.”

Watch Mike’s 2006 Peak Moment Conversation, “Pondering our Post-Petroleum Future.”

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Read Janaia’s journal “Mike Ruppert and Dmitry Orlov - presentations and conversations.”

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“There are no real solutions, there are only responses.” So say the expert contributors in The Post Carbon Reader, pointing to society’s complex, interdependent systems squeezed by growing demand and declining resources. Co-editor Daniel Lerch tells us renewable energy will never be able to replace fossil fuels. Thus resilience —  the capacity of a system to withstand disturbance while retaining its fundamental integrity — needs to replace sustainability as a guide to action. [http://www.postcarbon.org/reader]

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Read Janaia’s journal “Daniel Lerch and The Post Carbon Reader.”

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Filmmaker Jon Cooksey is one funny guy, even while presenting the most serious problems facing humanity. In this fast-paced conversation, he gallops all over the map with five big problems, five big solutions, and a playful and heartfelt approach. Wacky, sobering, full of animations, with Jon in dozens of personnas, “How to Boil a Frog” is a film to view and discuss with friends. (www.howtoboilafrog.com).

Download the show via iTunes. Listen to Audio.

Read Janaia’s journal Stirring the Pot with the Filmmaker of “How to Boil a Frog” and The Many Faces of Jon Cooksey with video frames, about taping this conversation.

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Four years ago (in episode 51, “An Experiment in Back Yard Sustainability”), Scott McGuire asked “how much food can I grow in my back yard to feed my family?” In this episode, we learn the results, and that food supply is not an individual project — it takes a community to feed one another. Scott’s garden later became a CSA (community-supported agriculture) for eight families.

Scott is a co-creative gardener — he asks the plants where they want to grow. When plants participate in the design of a garden, they build in energy meridians (like acupuncture lines in our bodies) for optimal vitality and health. (www.scottallenmcguire.com).

Listen to Audio. Read Janaia’s journal about taping this conversation, “Meet Scott McGuire, “Maniacal” Co-Creative Gardener.”

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