Category Archives: energy

What Permaculture Can Teach Us About Commons

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As a developed set of social practices, techniques and ethical norms, permaculture has a lot to say to the world of the commons.  This is immediately clear from reading the twelve design principles of permaculture that David Holmgren enumerated in his 2002 book Permaculture: Principles and Practices Beyond Sustainability.  It mentions such principles as “catch and store energy,” “apply self-regulation and accept feedback,” “produce no waste,” and “design from patterns to details.”

My friendship and work with ecological design expert Dave Jacke have only intensified my conviction that permaculturists and commoners need to connect more and learn from each other.  The value of such dialogues was brought home to me by a public talk and an all-day workshop that I co-organized with Dave.  The events, which in combination we called “Reinventing the Commons,” were an opportunity for 35 participants to learn about ecosystem dynamics and the commons, and for Dave and me to learn from each other in public.  How might we build better commons by mimicking the principles and patterns of natural ecosystems?

Dave’s talk on the evening of January 20 was a great introduction to this topic.  He started by showing a chart plotting the “industrial ascent” of human civilization as fueled by cheap fossil fuels, growing populations and profligate pollution and waste.  (See the yellow line in the chart; based on a diagram originally by David Holmgren (http://futurescenarios.org.)

Dave’s quick historical overview started with tribal commons in the prehistoric era, a time when people self-organized to obtain enough food and shelter to survive.  Societies began to take the shape of feudal commons in Roman and Medieval times, at least in England and Europe.  Lords owned the land and claimed privileged access to certain resources of the landscape while allowing commoners to manage other resources themselves.

When the feudal system began to collaborate with the budding market system in the 17th century, we saw the rise of a new sort of state and market system with a very different logic and ethic.  Soon a series of enclosures privatized and marketized wealth previously managed collectively.  Enclosures were a violent dispossession of commoners, who were left as landless peasants with little choice but to become wage-slaves and paupers in the early industrial cities.

The commons, once a dominant form of social organization, was supplanted by the state and then the market.  In no time the market and state were colluding to build a new vision of “progress” based on an extractive growth economy.  The market/state system has in fact built the modern, technological society that we inhabit today.   

But can this system continue?  Can the planetary ecosystem – and climate – survive capitalism?  One of the most revealing slides that Dave showed was this one showing the role of different governance systems over history – commons, state and markets.

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‘We’re Number 10!’ Reasons the U.S. Is Losing Ground

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The United States for so long has been a champion of innovation, but because of powerful special interests and also because of some unwise reasons, we are losing a great deal of ground. When I was growing up, we would hear chants that “We’re Number 1!” especially around the time of the Olympics. Americans were proud. We thought, whether rightly or not, that we were or had the best of everything that counted. Travel abroad offers reason for humility. I found a striking example when I visited Germany this past August. There were solar panels everywhere.

German field of solar panels.

The U.S. is known for innovation for a number of reasons. The first is that early on the country was guided by a pioneer spirit. While Europe was strongly controlled by longstanding conventions, in the Americas, so many things were new. Much of the countryside was “wild,” a characteristic that was harmful when ascribed to the native peoples. Considering the wilderness of forests, bears, and other things that could kill you, there was much to do to survive. Innovations were necessary.

Photo of a telegraph controller. Beyond that, as de Tocqueville and later Max Weber pointed out (no relation, by the way), America had an industrious spirit and brought a Protestant work ethic to its industries. While the U.S. had its many troubling capitalist robber barons, it also has long been a land of invention and creativity. It’s remarkable how many inventions came from the United States, like the light bulb, the telegraph, and the telephone.

When you consider that the United States invented the automobile, it seems sad that Ford Motor Company failed to innovate and anticipate the changing market for fuel. With increasing gas prices, which of course fluctuate, demand naturally has risen for smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles. My wife and I bought a Prius. It has a 10 gallon tank of gas, or thereabouts. That might seem small. On that 10 or 11 gallon tank, we can drive 5.5 – 6 hours from Oxford, MS to Altanta, GA. True story. We get there needing to fill up soon, but we get there (I’ve got family there, so we’ve done it several times).

A grey hummer, 2007.It’s no secret that the supply of oil in the world is a limited resource. If there’s any debate about it, the real question is when exactly we’ll have reached peak production that will then inevitably decline. There’s no doubt about the inevitability, just about when we’ll start to feel it. Even if it seems far off, we know that prices will rise again in our future. That’s a force for leading the market to want more efficient cars and sources of energy. Besides, why spend more on getting from A to B? Some people conspicuously consume gas, proud of the Hummers. Hell, I’d love to drive over something in one of those too. When I drive to Atlanta, however, I’ll get there a whole lot faster (not having to stop) and more cheaply if I can take a Prius.

In light of America’s history of innovation, it was a sad moment when Ford and the auto industry in the U.S. had to be bailed out during the financial crisis. The U.S. Government, which means you and me, bailed out the auto industry to the tune of nearly $80 Billion (yes, with a B). Much of that was recovered eventually, which is the good news, but we saw a loss of $9 Billion dollars that weren’t recovered. Why was there such a failure? Despite clear evidence that the market wanted more fuel efficient cars, Ford and others kept building sport utility vehicles. While Japan and South Korea made money hand over fist on fuel efficient cars, like the Prius, our auto industry defiantly rejected the idea that Americans cared about issues like the environment or fuel costs. You and I paid for that.

German town with solar panels on the houses.In August of this year, when Annie and I visited Germany, we took a train from Munich to Regensburg, in Bavaria, and then another from Regensburg to Berlin. First of all, the U.S. really needs to catch up on train infrastructure. Trains are awesome, even if one leg of our trip had its problems. So do highways (traffic, accidents, etc). As we went through the German countryside, we saw small towns in which houses had solar panels all over them.

The featured image in this post is an aerial view of something we saw in a lot of fields on our trip – solar energy farming. Germany is establishing the infrastructure, the technology, the expertise, and the innovation for new ways of harvesting energy, and they’re way ahead of the U.S. We’ll eventually be buying their tech, hiring their experts. The U.S. has been ridiculous about energy, perhaps because of Gore’s efforts to get people to care about global warming — if one party is more vocal on an issue, it must be a controversial matter, right? Wrong (If you’re a skeptic, be a smart one and read the 2014 IPCC report. Otherwise you don’t know what you’re talking about). Another reason is that the U.S. is an oil producer, so folks might think that it’s a bad thing to go after the renewables for that reason. That doesn’t make any sense of course. There were plenty of candle makers when Edison invented the lightbulb.

Man starting a car with a crank.To anyone who says “Yeah, but solar panels are not so efficient and can’t replace yada yada…” Come on. The early automobile wasn’t perfect either. The glass would cut into you if it shattered. You had to crank the damned thing to get it started, while standing outside of the vehicle, etc. You don’t see advocates for the horse and carriage today. Problems or needs for efficiency and enhancement are precisely the places where the Germans are going to innovate and we’re going to give them our money and follow their lead. This isn’t the attitude of a nation that wants to be #1. It’s lazy and shortsighted.

American reluctance to dive into renewable energies is burying our heads in the sand. It’s counter to the American spirit of innovation. It’s also not wise in business terms. The defiant attitude that leads some people irrationally to dislike fuel efficient cars, solar panels, and preference for investing public funds in energy innovation over extensions of our eventual end of our oil abundance is precisely the reason why Zakaria said we’re living in a Post American World. Another reason is that the rest of the world is getting wise and “rising.” We’ll have oil for quite some time, but responsible people care about their grandkids, even when they don’t have them yet.

A small German city with panels on rooves.It’s time for the U.S. to snap out of this silliness and to want to be number 1 again, especially in terms of smart innovation.

P.S. If you enjoyed this piece, check out my earlier one called “Greening Industries and Green Industries in Mississippi.”

Eric Thomas Weber is associate professor of public policy leadership at the University of Mississippi, expressing only his own point of view. He is the author of Uniting Mississippi: Democracy and Leadership in the South (2015). Follow him on Twitter and “like” his Facebook page. 

Cooperative Co-Production of Solar Power in a Small Town

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A vexing problem for many potential commons is the lack of startup capital to get a project going while nurturing the social structures to organize participation and work.  I recently learned of an ingenious solution developed by a group of “time banking” commoners in West Virginia.  They adapted a traditional Time Bank system of barter-exchange and combined it with common pool of funds, which in turn served as an engine of development for DIY solar power installations -- in the heart of coal country, West Virginia!

Greg Bloom of Washington, D.C., who has a keen interest in cooperatives and commons, alerted me to his case study of the project.  (Thanks, Greg!)  As he tells the story at the Community Power Network website, the tax incentive approach to promoting solar power has distinct limits.  It is too geared to people who already earn enough to benefit from the tax breaks.  But what if you are low-income and have trouble paying your utility bills?  You don’t earn enough to be incentivized, and you don’t have enough to pay for the upfront costs of a solar project.

In the town of Philippi, West Virginia, a local engineer, John Prusa, known locally as a “benevolent mad scientist,” had “designed and built his own home’s solar power array, and then shared his designs with neighbors and helped them develop their own,” writes Bloom.  Prusa and a local minister, Ruston Seaman, of People's Chapel Church, found each other, and decided to start a new group, New Vision Renewable Energy. 

The Church had once been the host of a flourishing Time Bank system with over 300 members, and even a store that accepted the Time Bank credits.  But the system had fallen into disuse for a variety of reasons.  Time Banks are a system by which members can earn credits for work they do for each other, at a rate of one credit, one hour of work. The systems are especially valuable for people with more time than money, such as low-income people and the elderly.  It helps them get their needs met, without money, outside of the marketplace.  Time Banks can serve important needs in areas that banks and markets have abandoned or ignored. 

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