The energy system we built over the last 100 years or so is in for a big change. In fact, the change looks close to a complete restart of the way we produce and distribute electricity for our everyday purposes. The obvious role model and primary example is Germany’s Energiewende, the transition of the entire German energy system away from coal and nuclear towards renewables. The nature of the Energiewende until now is that of a bottom-up, decentralized change strengthened by the German Renewable Energy Act set up in 2000.… Read more
The End of the Car and the Re-birth of Cities
Three recent news articles spanned an image of how transformation to a post-growth society might look and feel like on the communal level. The first was from the Worldbank (yes, the Worldbank…), focusing on sustainable transportation as a means to battle climate change. Secondly, an article on the increasing restrictions to car use in developing economies. There, national and communal governments engage on what is called “vehicle demand management”, partly for decreasing air pollution in heavily urbanized areas but also for reducing congestions.… Read more
IPAT and the End of Growth
In the early 1970s Ehrlich and Holdren devised a simple equation in dialogue with Commoner identifying three factors that created environmental impact. Thus, impact (I) was expressed as the product of (1) population, (P); (2) affluence (A); and (3) technology, (T):
I = P * A * T
Population is the number of people on the planet, affluence is measured in GDP per capita, and technology is environmental impact per GDP. When looking at the growth rates of each I, P, A, and T the formula changes towards this form:
dI = dP + dA + dT
In order to see how the impact changes from one year to the next one, you just have to sum up the changes in population increase, affluence, and technological progress.… Read more
The risk and promise of business ethics
“The matter has a name: business ethics. And a secret, that is its rules. But my guess is that this matter belongs to the variety of phenomena like the raison d’etat or English cuisine that appear in the form of a mystery, because they have to keep secret that they do not exist.”*
When you look into the real world you can hardly find any substantial objection to Niklas Luhmann’s verdict. Quite on the contrary there is tantamount evidence that business behaves without any reference to ethics, not even to the ethics of rogues.… Read more
Economic Sustainability Revisited
When business people and management scholars speak of sustainability, they most often refer to the idea of a triple bottom line for planet, people and profit – sustainability as the integration of ecological, social and economic goals or dimensions. The focus of research, just as the activities of “sustainability managers”, is on calculating and evaluating ecological and social sustainability. Carbon footprinting, lifecycle analysis, employee motivation and human capital as an asset – these topics are often driving sustainability debates in companies.… Read more