One of the late announcements from the COP26 conference comes from China and the United States who jointly announced an agreement to “enhance ambition”. Huh?  Enhance Ambition.  Anyone know what that means? Let’s go to the dictionary, the first place to go when one is not sure of the meaning of words: Enhance:  “to raise […]

We are all aware of the current inflation situation.  The financial press has spent months wondering if the inflation we are experiencing is short-term or a more insidious longer-term trend.   I have been, and still am, of the opinion that it is short-term and will ease in 2022, significantly.  We are in a perfect […]

In a recent column I wrote that we have left the time of denial and entered the time of disconnection.  It is completely clear to anyone who is aware that something has changed with the climate.  As someone who has, through writings and speeches, been a target of climate change deniers, this year has been […]

If you have consumed any news media in the past few weeks, you know we have entered a climate crisis that is deadly real.  It can no longer be denied. Here are just a few of the stories of this summer: the IPCC of the UN have issued the most comprehensive report on climate change […]

[ a significant percentage of this column was first published in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune] As a futurist, the most important thing to me is to be as right as I can be in my forecasts.  Otherwise I have no value to you my readers, or to anyone in my audiences around the world, or readers […]

[Note:  This post is much longer than usual.  It was first published at The Sarasota Institute where columns are 1500-2500 words.  I didn’t want to break the column in two.] The negative effects of fossil fuels have been speculated upon and known for a long time. The larger scale concerns, awareness, and now actions have largely […]

 “Houston, we have a problem”  – James Lovell, Apollo 13 “Work the problem people, work the problem”  Gene Krause, Mission Control Apollo 13   Hurricane Harvey was a huge disaster.  More than 60 people lost their lives.  There is and will be hundreds of billions of dollars in damages and lost business.  My deepest sympathies […]

Earth Overshoot Day was August 2, the earliest Earth Overshoot Day ever. This is the day when humanity’s consumption of natural resources officially passes the planet’s ability to replenish then in one year.

If humanity lived sustainably on Earth, then Earth Overshoot Day would be at midnight December 31, meaning we would not have consumed more than the finite resources the planet provides for us.  This is why the metaphor of Earth as a spaceship is the highest and best way to think about any aspect of climate change, sustainability, energy use and anything relative to the only place we have to live.

Sea level rise is about to become the phenomenon that will awaken humanity.  Awaken humanity to the absolute, no debate reality that we are the single largest cause of climate change.Climate change is not about “saving the planet” but about “saving ourselves from ourselves”.  The planet will go on for another several billion years.  Humanity might not make it out of this millennium.

[Note: Many of you know that after doing two years of research on my 7th book “This Spaceship Earth” I took much of 2016 off to co-found and launch a global non-profit https://thisspaceshipearth.org/ Please see a time sensitive request at the bottom of this column for the non-profit. Thank you!]  April 2009 “Water-access to, use […]