PostCarbon Rhode Island

It’s not that bad, is it? The changing role of the “peak-oil aware”

Important piece by Rob Hopkins, founder of the Transition Towns movement and Transition Culture

Things are moving so fast at the moment as we stand on the cusp of $130 a barrel oil and the impacts are starting to bite on everyday lives, and it feels to me like our roles are changing. In the CNN clip [Glenn Beck and Jim Kunstler], it is actually the presenter who is in peak oil panic mode, and Kunstler finds himself more in the role of “whao, slow down, deep breaths now…”. The presenter has clearly either just had, or is having live on air, his End of Suburbia moment, his peak oil revelation, and is turning to Kunstler for some support.

It left me wondering…………about how those of us who have already undergone our peak oil moments, who have sat in the dark place already, and who have re-emerged with our daily lives underpinned by an awareness of the great impermanence of our industrial surroundings, are finding our roles changing as the rest of our friends and neighbours catch us up.

I find that with more and more people my role changes from saying “do you know what, this is really, really serious”, to saying “well yes, given that it is really serious, don’t panic, let’s explore this…” Clearly there are times when a peak oil fire and brimstone talk is appropriate, but I am finding more and more as I travel and give talks that audiences are catching up very fast and need clarification and the placing of their work in the context of the emerging responses, of which Transition is one. No-one seems to have mentioned this to Bob Hirsch though…(see yesterday’s video)