Thursday, 12 February 2015

Rob Hopkins: Transition to a World Without Oil, a TED Talk

            Rob Hopkins is an educator: he teaches people practical skills in the everyday world such as basic agriculture, skills for sustainability, construction using local materials, and fostering energy to be used locally. For many years, Hopkins viewed the world through a globalized economic growth model—“moderating what comes in at one end, and moderating the outputs at the other end”—until one day his perspective had shifted.
            On stage Hopkins unveils a liter of oil, and describes the power and the allure which people of the past century have marveled at its output. He explains how the current design of economy, government, and transport have come under “the assumption that we will have this in perpetuity.” For many generations, humanity’s whole way of life revolved around this dark, viscous matter. But the unavailability of oil is constantly increasing. The gap falls farther apart each day, and it is inevitable that one day oil will be gone. Hopkins does not exclaim we are doomed when the last drop of oil has vanished. Human ingenuity has prospered throughout history before, but to overcome this obstacle it will take a clear hard look of where we are and how we approach the situation.
            Stories describe a picture. What stories will be told of us from future generations? Overcoming the obstacle of climate change is not simple. It is a problem that involves many aspects, and much more people are involved than we would like. We cannot necessarily invent our way out of the problem. Hopkins is interested in a transition response—facing the problem of oil head on while “responding with a creativity and an adaptability and an imagination that we really need.”
            Hopkins’ transition model involves people who are excited about an idea. The people use the knowledge they have gained over the years, and work together to raise awareness and form groups to tackle a problem—all the while looking at the challenge from different perspectives and “there emerge a whole lot of projects which . . . the transition project itself starts to support and enable.” Some projects that have emerged for Hopkins were food and agriculture projects, community owned energy companies, and local currency to keep money within the local economy. The key to transition is approaching the problem differently, having plans outside the norm as a precautionary in case a project fails.
            Transitioning does not mean drastic change. It means that change is inevitable and constantly occurring and we should work towards a goal and ask the right questions during the transition. Slow increments of change can influence the lives of generations to come. By leaving and embracing the past of the oil age, Hopkins believes we are able to see the beginning of a world “more resilient, more nourishing . . . more skilled and more connected to each other.”


Reflection

I do not particularly agree with Robert Hopkins’ approach when tackling the problem of oil consumption. Whereas he would like to see the Oil Age peter out into non-existence, I would like to see the flame of the Oil Age extinguished with one single breath. The difficulties that arise on a global scale if oil simply vanished would prevent such a thing from happening. All around the world, people depend on oil as a means of transportation (myself included) and it would be impractical to bite the hand that feeds you when you depend on that hand for the next meal. Hopkins’ approach does have certain aspects which I find appealing. Looking at the problem from many different perspectives and working together as a community to tackle the problem is definitely a prudent approach to finding solutions. But the transition away from oil, I feel, must be more abrupt. When there are oil companies that argue to drill in nature reserves, and a U.S. congress dialectically opposed, more drastic approaches might be preferable in the long run—especially when greenhouse gas emissions have risen the way they have. The transition away from oil may prove more adversarial than what Hopkins’ would like to imagine.


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