Tag Archives: Richard Heinberg

Richard Heinberg: After the Burn

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RichardHeinbergAfter a two-century-long burning bender, the globe is in for a heck of a hangover. Our guest this week on Sea Change Radio is Richard Heinberg, Senior Fellow at the Post-Carbon Institute, and author of a dozen books about growth, peak oil, and energy issues. His latest book is called Afterburn, a collection of essays that center on the impending consequences of what he terms “The Great Burning” – our chronic habit of fossil-fuel binging. Heinberg and host Alex Wise talk about what it will take to truly transition off of fossil fuels, including the need for bold leadership and radically different policies. He explains why the GDP is a flawed metric for success, and talks about why we should move away from the outdated Gross Domestic Product, and toward the Global Happiness Index as a better metric of national well-being.

The Latest Oil Glut: Once Bitten, Twice Shy

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RichardHeinbergIt comes as little surprise that the author of a book entitled Snake Oil: How Fracking’s False Promise of Plenty Imperils Our Future is a critic of the natural gas industry and a proponent of peak oil theory. With the recent plunge in oil prices, it feels like the right time to check back in with Richard Heinberg of the Post-Carbon Institute and get his perspective on how plunging oil prices will affect the energy and transportation industries. Read the show transcript

Richard Heinberg on the Anthropocene

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rheinberganthropThere’s a scientific debate afoot in geological and environmental circles about what to call the current time period. According to the International Union of Geological Sciences, we’re living in the Holocene epoch, but many believe that the term “Anthropocene” would better reflect the impact that humankind has had and is continuing to have on the planet.

This week on Sea Change Radio, we discuss the Anthropocene with Richard Heinberg of the Post Carbon Institute. Along with host Alex Wise, Heinberg looks at why the terminology debate is more than just semantics, and examines a division among environmentalists – between what he has dubbed the “Techno-Anthropocene” proponents and the “Lean Green” movement.

Richard Heinberg on Natural Gas: Bridge Fuel or Fool’s Gold?

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RichardHeinberg_gardensnake-oil-front-coverWe’ve spoken to Richard Heinberg in the past about several problems inherent to our carbon-based economy, from peak oil, to coal to what he has dubbed “the end of growth.”

Now the author and senior fellow at the Post Carbon Institute has a new book focusing on the natural gas industry’s practice of hydraulic fracturing, better known as fracking. This week on Sea Change Radio, host Alex Wise talks with Heinberg about his book, titled Snake Oil: How Fracking’s False Promise of Plenty Imperils Our Future, and delve into the economic and environmental factors behind the natural gas boom, which to some is an important bridge fuel and to others is fool’s gold.

Richard Heinberg: “The Quest” For Truth

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Last year, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and energy consultant Daniel Yergin published his long-awaited sequel to the The Prize called The Quest: Energy, Security, and the Remaking of the Modern World. The New York Times called this follow-up “even better… than the first. It is searching, impartial and alarmingly up to date.” The Prize provides readers with an overview of the modern energy industry and posits that peak oil, the premise that the world’s oil supply is being rapidly depleted, is an out-dated theory and that with new discoveries in shale gas, we’ve instead reached a comfortable plateau when it comes to ferreting out fossil fuels from the ground. This week’s guest on Sea Change Radio, Richard Heinberg, an author, a senior fellow at the Post-Carbon Institute and a leading environmentalist, fundamentally disagrees with many of Dr. Yergin’s ideas. And while both The Prize and The Quest are certainly recommended reading for Sea Change Radio listeners, Mr. Heinberg and host Alex Wise discuss why Dr. Yergin’s view of reality differs so greatly from his own.

An Eco-Literate Conversation With Richard Heinberg

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This week on Sea Change Radio, host Alex Wise talks with Richard Heinberg, author and senior fellow at the Post Carbon Institute who’s written extensively on energy, economic, and ecological issues. The last time he was a guest on this program, he described some of the fundamental problems surrounding our carbon-based economy outlined in his book, The End of Growth.  This week we welcome Mr. Heinberg back to the show as we discuss his latest article published in Energy Bulletin titled, What We Are For. In the next half hour, listen as Richard Heinberg gives us his thoughts on how to promote eco-literacy, why empowering women is good for the planet, and what environmentalists can learn from the Occupy Movement.

Richard Heinberg: A Post-Carbon Conversation

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What will a post-carbon tomorrow look like? Most experts agree that the end of the age of cheap fossil fuels will mark a fundamental change in human history. The question that no one can answer, though, is how well will our species adapt to these new realities. [amazon-product]0865716951[/amazon-product]This week’s guest on Sea Change Radio, author Richard Heinberg, believes that a key to better understanding the current global economic slowdown lies in how we gauge progress itself. The author of ten books, including Peak Everything and Blackout, Heinberg’s latest book, The End of Growth suggests that in order to thrive during this post-carbon transition, we need to realign our goals to promote human and environmental well-being, rather than continuing to pursue the almighty dollar. Sea Change Radio host Alex Wise talks with Heinberg about the policies and conditions that need to be in place for our species to evolve in the face of ballooning population, dwindling resources and global climate change.

From Peak Everything to Resilient Communities

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Richard Heinberg
Richard Heinberg
CWR co-hosts Bill Baue and Francesca Rheannon speak with peak oil expert Richard Heinberg, senior fellow at the Post Carbon Institute and author of The Party’s Over, Powerdown, The Oil Depletion Protocol, and, most recently, Peak Everything. CWR caught up with Heinberg during his northeast speaking tour, where he is addressing local officials in the Pioneer Valley of Massachusetts where Corporate Watchdog Radio originates. In the absence of federal leadership addressing climate change and peak oil, Heinberg has turned his attention to creating resilient communities, and he proposes 10 steps to create local disaster response plans to prepare for peak oil as well as environmental and economic collapse. While the data Heinberg presents paints a dire picture, he also advocates for hope and optimism as a strategic response to existing and impending crises.

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Post Carbon Institute

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