Published on 28 Sep 2005 by EnergyBulletin.net / Permaculture Magazine.
Designing Energy Descent Pathways:
One community's attempt at designing a prosperous way down from the
peak.
by Rob Hopkins
Reaching the Peak

There is an emerging consensus now that we are either very close to or
have
passed the peak in world oil production. As someone who has been
involved in
environmental issues for 16 years, and permaculture for 13 years, I
have to
ask myself how I didn't see this one coming. Its implications are
profound.
No longer is it in any way an appropriate response to say ‘we need to
recycle', when the process of recycling require transporting recyclable
waste long distances. We have to look much deeper at the whole waste
question. An excellent recent report by Tim Lang and Jules Pretty “Farm
Costs and Food Miles: An Assessment of the Full Cost of the UK Weekly
Food
Basket”, argued that food could only be called sustainable when it is
grown
and consumed within a 20 mile radius. We have to build a local food
economy
from an almost totally non-existent base. There has been no time in
history
when anything less than 70% of the population were involved in some way
in
the production of food. Nowadays it is more like 6% (in Ireland), and
of
those, a high proportion would have lost much of that knowledge.
‘Green'
building that relies on imported ‘ecological' materials from Germany or
Denmark will no longer be viable, leading to our needing to rethink how
we
will actually construct energy efficient shelter in a lower energy near
future. We are looking at the need for a process of localisation, of
looking
at what is essential to our lives (food, warmth, shelter, water) and
rebuilding the local economy in such a way that it is actually able to
supply these. The process of dismantling our diverse and complex local
economics over the last 50-60 years was a disastrous one – it was easy
to do
but incredibly hard to rebuild.

The recent award winning film ‘The End of Suburbia' is a very sobering
look
at the whole peak oil issue. It makes it very clear that the problem is
of a
scale that is almost unimaginable, and that the solutions are really
not in
place at all, or indeed anywhere near being so. We are so dependent on
oil
for every aspect of our lives, that its gradual (or rapid, depending on
who
you listen to…) but steady disappearance from our lives will force us
to
redesign our communities and our own lives. We need to relearn the
skills
that sustained our ancestors; crafts, local medicines, the great art of
growing food. This is a big challenge. This is THE big challenge.

Becoming Aware
My introduction to all this came through meeting Dr Colin Campbell. He
lives
in Ballydehob in West Cork, and sets up and runs the Association for
the
Study of Peak Oil. He worked in the oil industry for over 30 years, and
since his retirement has devoted himself to researching the real
picture in
terms of oil availability, how much is left, where it is and so on. It
is
Colin who has really brought the awareness of Peak Oil to the world's
attention, untiringly travelling the world, lecturing governments,
investment bankers, energy experts, telling them all the same thing, we
are
about to peak, and you need to re-evaluate what you are doing, because
it is
going to change everything.

Last September Colin came into Kinsale FEC to talk to my second year
permaculture students, who had seen The End of Suburbia the previous
day.
Colin gave them an introduction to petroleum geology, how and where oil
forms, and then went on to look how much is left and where it is. His
presentation was so thorough and well researched that his findings were
compelling. It was a real eye opener, for me and for the students. I
met a
friend the following week who said “what did you do to your students
last
week, they all looked ill for the rest of the week!”.

First Steps
This led on to our planning of the Kinsale Energy Descent Action Plan
project. The term energy descent was originally used by ecologist
Howard T
Odum in his book ‘A Prosperous Way Down ', and was picked up and used
by
David Holmgren in his seminal ‘Permaculture, pathways and principles
beyond
sustainability'. It refers to the time beyond the peak, the downward
trend
in energy availability. Holmgren makes the point that we need to plan
for
this descent, rather than simply allowing it to unfold in a series of
random
and chaotic events. This point is also made by Richard Heinberg in his
book
‘Powerdown - options and actions for a post-carbon future', where he
calls
for a planned descent, an international response to Peak Oil on the
same
scale as a wartime mobilisation, to begin building a low energy future.

Another inspiration for me around that time was a talk I went to by a
woman
from a community organisation in the north of Ireland who was from a
very
dynamic community development group for a small town in decline.
Farming was
dying they felt, and they wanted a new direction for the town with a
sustainability focus. What they did was bring in a sustainability
‘expert'
who told them that they needed to develop ‘eco-tourism', and that that
would
be a sustainable replacement for farming. I was horrified by this; it
seemed
to me to be taking all the community's eggs out of one basket and just
putting them all into another. Also, all the ideas had come from the
‘expert
' rather than the community itself. I thought that actually a lot more
would
have been achieved by running a permaculture design course for the
people in
the village and letting the ideas come from them.

As the students and myself started looking around at the books
available on
the subject was that what was lacking was examples of towns who had
actually
started to look at this issue. Had anyone actually started to design
pathways down from the peak for a settlement anywhere in the world?
Cuba is
an often cited example, but we have to remember that Cuba was forced to
localise by circumstance (the Russian oil that had underpinned the
country
until that point being no longer available), and a friend who visited
there
recently expressed a feeling that there was no great enthusiasm for it
among
many people. What we wanted was to try and create an example (as we
were
unable to find one in practice) of a town looking at what Peak Oil will
actually mean to them, and to vision how they want a low-energy future
to
be. As there was no pathway for this in place, we had to make one up.

Starting from Scratch
The first thing we did was to visit a number of good
permaculture/organic
projects in the West Cork area for ideas and inspiration, but also to
talk
to their proprietors about what they saw as being practical responses
to
energy descent that they felt that they felt were tried and tested.
That
proved to be very interesting, and gave us some useful insights. We
heard
about the practical realities of making a living growing organic
vegetables
for local markets and how a changing economy would make that more
viable. We
heard about the realities of living off the grid, and the financial
implications of doing so. We saw the practicalities of the people
trying to
put the first building blocks in place, and their visions for how
things
might change. We began to envisage a 3-4 year process of community
consultation, education and awareness-raising, combined with practical
implementation of projects on the ground and the formulation of a
timetables
plan for making this transition. This plan became christened the
Kinsale
Energy Descent Action Plan. The idea was that this year's second year
students produce the first draft, which is then put out to the
community for
consultation, and then the following year's students revise the
document and
update it. We felt that this would take about 3 years to produce
something
nearing a definitive document, although there would always need to be
space
allowed for the document to adapt to developments, to be ‘tweaked'.

We had brainstorms on each of the different areas we identified for the
Action Plan. These were Food, Youth and Community, Education, Housing,
Economy and Livelihoods, Health, Tourism, Transport, Waste, Energy and
Marine Resources. Future years may add new categories to this, but it
seemed
like a good starting list. We made Mind Maps of the issues raised and
possible solutions to them. We also invited speakers into the class who
had
a lot of knowledge on some of these topics.

Kinsale 2021
On Saturday February 12th 2005 we held an event in Kinsale called
“Kinsale
in 2021 - Towards a Prosperous, Sustainable Future Together”, which
took
place at Kinsale Town Hall. The event was presented as a ‘community
think-tank' in order to hear the community's ideas about how energy
descent
would affect the community and what might be done about it. Before the
event
we sent personal invitations to the people in Kinsale that we had
identified
as being the movers and shakers in the town, drawn from the sectors
identified above. We also left the event open to the public and put
posters
up around the town. From the 60 people invited, about 35 turned up on
the
day. The event itself was opened by the Mayor of Kinsale, Mr Charles
Henderson, who spoke of the importance of energy as an issue and how it
affects all aspects of our lives and our economy. This was followed by
a
screening of ‘The End of Suburbia'.

After the film, Thomas Riedmuller, who teaches Community Leadership at
Kinsale FEC, introduced the concept of Open Space Technology as a tool
for
facilitating such events. Open Space is based on the idea that the most
productive discussion and idea sharing at any event happens during the
tea
breaks. Open Space is, in essence, a long tea break, where groups are
formed
to discuss certain issues, and everyone is free to move between
discussion
groups, based on the principal ‘where you are is where you are meant to
be',
and ‘if you feel you need to be somewhere else, go there'. Those
assembled
took to the Open Space model with great enthusiasm, and it was
extremely
productive. People were invited to identify the specific problems and
issues
that the film raised for them. These were then recorded on large sheets
of
paper and pinned up on the wall. These were then collated into subject
areas, and each of these became the basis for a discussion group. The
groups
covered the following subjects, Food, Rebuilding Communities, Youth
Group/Education, Business & Technology, Tourism and renewable energy.

The groups came up with a wealth of ideas and possibilities that were
then
fed back to the rest of the participants afterwards. The feedback after
the
day was very good. We learnt a few lessons from the event that would be
helpful for people doing it again. Firstly, a lot of people sent
apologies
that they would have liked to come, but they were just too busy to give
up a
whole day. We found it difficult to come up with another model though,
because for us it worked very well showing the film and then having the
discussions straight away while the feeling of urgency that the film
engenders is still fresh in their minds. We were able, thanks to the
generosity of many cafes and restaurants in Kinsale who sponsored the
event,
to put on a sumptuous spread for lunch, which people loved, and which
kept
the energy of the event up. We wondered if it might have been good to
have
had a few screenings of the film in the community first, so some people
could have seen it in advance one evening, and so wouldn't have had to
give
up so much of their time to attend the discussion. We found Open Space
an
excellent tool for getting people talking in a relaxed and informal
way.

The Action Plan
After the event we collated the information that had come in from the
day
and pairs of students selected different subject areas. I supplied a
wealth
of reading material for background research, and the students did a lot
of
internet research of useful ideas and examples from around the world.
The
final result is the ‘Kinsale Energy Descent Action Plan – Version.1.
2005'
which is our first attempt at a year-by-year plan for the town. Each
section
of the report begins with a section called ‘The Present'. This attempts
to
succinctly summarise what is the problem now, in 2005, with regards to
the
subject in question. This is followed by The Vision, which is written
in
such a way as to give the reader an idea of how Kinsale could be, if
all the
recommendations up to that point had been implemented. Part of the
challenge
with permaculture I feel is how we convey to people the concept that a
lower
energy future could be preferable, more fulfilling and more abundant
and
more fulfilling than the present. This section aims to do that, so that
people can see in their minds eyes what it would look like.

This is then followed by a list of suggestions and recommendations, in
chronological order. These are meant to be ambitious but also
achievable,
given a good deal of ambition and support. Each section is then rounded
off
with a collection of resources and internet links. The last section of
the
Action Plan is a proposal for a Kinsale Sustainability Centre. The idea
is
that the Centre would be formed with the brief of implementing the
Action
Plan, and would create 5 posts for students at the end of their second
year.
They would, in effect, be Community Permaculture Field Workers, out in
the
town helping the community to put in place the steps of the Action
Plan. The
Sustainability Centre would act as a focus for the work, running
courses and
training, but also providing a service, providing initiatives such as
an
urban market garden.

Next Steps
Next years second years will take the Plan as it is and develop it
further.
The idea is to set up a series of Think Tank events, like the Kinsale
2021
day, but which are more specific to different areas of the Plan, for
example
one on health, where they invite all the people in Kinsale working in
the
field, and another on education, inviting teachers, parents and other
people
with an involvement. These events would be based around what has
already
been proposed in the Plan, but getting feedback as to how practical our
suggestions are. These events will serve a dual purpose, firstly
they'll act
as an essential community sounding board for the Plan's ideas, and
secondly
they open doors into the community for the project, all kinds of new
practical projects are proposed and contacts made. They also serve to
bring
this work to the community, rather than expecting it to come to us, or
sitting around thinking “why is no-one doing anything”. The great thing
with
being based in a college doing this work is that you can call on 30
pairs of
hands if the feeing is to go and build a garden somewhere. 30 pairs of
hands
get a lot done!

Final Thoughts
These are early days for this project. We have had no models to work
from
and have had to invent this process as we go along. It has not been
conducted by professionals or by a respected research organisation. It
has
had no external funding other than the ability to use the college
facilities. It is a student project, and we make no claims for it being
a
complete and thorough document.

What it is though is a very important and far-reaching piece of work.
It
does something that I think is very bold and powerful. It invites
people to
look beyond where we are now, and beyond simply allowing events to
unravel,
and to look towards where they would like to be. It allows people to
dream,
but not in a woolly ungrounded way. It is rooted in practicality,
looking at
the building block, we can't put the second one in place before the
first
one. In the same way that in permaculture design we aim to make our
mistakes
on paper first so as to avoid costly mistakes in the landscape, with
Energy
Descent Action Plans we aim to clarify a step-by-step way down, so as
to
best focus our energies.

I also think it is important to be realistic. For example, I don't feel
it
is realistic to imagine that anything approaching a majority of the
population will start growing food without a massive crisis to force
them
into doing so. However, what we can do is start putting in place the
infrastructure that will be needed (seed saving clubs, excluding a
certain
proportion of land in urban areas from development, preserving skills
and
knowledge, teaching skills to younger people, creating community
compost
schemes so we have a resource of compost for growers). When people say
“but
where will our fruit come from?”, we can say “from the 5 acre orchard
over
there that we planted 7 years ago”. We can begin to build systems
around
people. At the same time we need to engage them as much as possible,
and see
our work as being of service. I feel this is fascinating work and
should be
begun in every settlement. It is big picture thinking, town-scale
permaculture, and needs to be rolled out across the country as a matter
of
great urgency.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Editorial Notes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Rob Hopkins is a permaculture teacher and designer, who founded The
Hollies
Centre for Practical Sustainability in Ireland and developed the
Practical
Sustainability course at Kinsale Further Education College in Ireland,
Europe's first 2 year full-time permaculture course. Since developing
the
Energy Descent Action Plan approach he has moved to Devon, Uk, where he
is
now researching a PhD at Plymouth University looking at this approach,
refining it further into an approach that can be done anywhere. He will
shortly begin this process for the town on Totnes in Devon. He can be
contacted at robjhopkins-at-gmail.com. (replace -at- with @ to email)

Copies of the Kinsale 2021 document can be bought from Kinsale FEC,
contact
kinsalefurthered-at-eircom.net for full details.

This article originally appeared in Permaculture Magazine No. 45,
avaiable
at www.permaculture.co.uk

[ UPDATE 5 December 2005: The Kinsale Energy Descent Action Plan is now
available online, on Rob Hopkins' new blog:
transitionculture.org/?p=129 ]