Last Saturday, I published a post under the title of Slotting right in! It was an introduction to ten of the most beautiful slot canyons featured on Mother Nature Network.
Then less than a day later, Rob from Transition Town Payson, sent me a link to the following essay. Regulars will recall that Jean and I lived in Payson for a while before moving to Oregon; indeed were married in Payson.
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The Place Where Water Runs Through Rock
Antelope Canyon located in Northern Arizona is well known around the world!
Antelope Canyon lies just outside of Page, Arizona.
Just outside of Page, Arizona lies Antelope Canyon. Located on the Navajo Indian Reservation. The Dine (The People as the Navajos call themselves), manage the use of the canyon as a Navajo Nation National Park. Antelope Canyon is broken into two sections, Upper Antelope is known as Tse bighanilini which means “The place where water runs through rocks” (aka The Crack), and lower Antelope Canyon is Hasdestwazi or “spiral rock arches” (aka The Corkscrew). Both of these canyons are an awesome display of natural forces at work. Carved by flash floods that are common to the area, this Navajo National Park has been accessible only by Navajo Permits since 1997. The permit system came after 11 tourists from around the world were killed by a flash flood in Lower Antelope Canyon!
For more information on these Canyons go to the following links;
The Navajo language is very descriptive and their words often describe things that they see in the natural world. Hence the name for Upper Antelope Canyon “The Place Where Water Runs Through Rocks”. The language was one that was used by a few heroic Navajo veterans to help win World War II. For example, a Battleship was translated into the Navajo word Lo-Tso which means “Whale”, while a Cruiser was Lo-Tso-Yazzie which meant “Small Whale”.
See the following link for the dictionary they used;
The use of Code Talkers was kept secret for many years!
The Code Talkers were kept secret for 23 years after the end of WWII. President Ronald Reagan gave them a Certificate of Recognition and made August 14, 1982, National Code Talkers Day. On December 21, 2000, President Bill Clinton awarded the surviving Code Talkers Congressional Gold Medals and Silver Medals to the approximate 329 surviving heroes.
The Canyon is 140 feet deep at it’s deepest point!
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The Sandstone Walls are Cut into Mysterious Shapes.
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The Canyon is so Narrow in places only two people can walk side by side.
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The Heart of the Canyon.
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The Sands of Time.
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Sunlight lights the exit.
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Just a magnificent set of pictures. If you ever find yourself in Northern Arizona then don’t hesitate to visit the canyon. The address is: Antelope Canyon, 5975 Hwy 98, Page, AZ 86040.
A powerful and compelling post from friend and follower: John Hurlburt.
Anyone who can compose phrases such as “an enlightened interest in the quality of the harvest of our transitory lives” deserves to be listened to! Our friend, John, from our Payson, AZ, days, is a regular author of essays that arrive here in Hugo Road via the mail. It’s always a pleasure to read John’s words and frequently I feel the need to share them with you, dear reader. So it was with John’s latest.
I’ll say no more except to promise you that you will be enthralled.
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Arrogance ‘R Us
We hear the drumbeat of steadily increasing global, national, state, regional and local problems every day. When common-sense solutions are offered for any of these problems, the solutions are immediately demonized as actions which would aggravate the problems they would logically solve. This sort of nonsensical circular argument is both a paralyzing paradox and a guaranteed death spiral for our relatively young biological species.
We imagine that we know far more than we do. The Earth doesn’t need living species in order to regenerate life. Human beings continue to need the Earth from which we are made and which sustains our consciously aware being. Some of us believe that having money is the answer to all our problems. Actually, the imaginary power of human “money” is killing life on Earth from the bottom of the food chain up.
Every government in the world competes with every other government in the world for power and control to one degree or another. The richer the nation, the greater it’s illusion of power. We’ve forgotten about responsibility, morality and faith in the power of Nature. Change is a constant. Failure to adapt to change is a death knell for living beings.
We live to learn. Why? Is death a finality or a new beginning? Both classic and quantum physics recognize Conservation of Information and the exchange of energy and matter at the level of fundamental forces. How much of the energy of our lives is absorbed by the cosmos and how much is recycled as life energy? We have no earthly idea of the answer.
Aye, there’s the rub.
We do know that everything fits together. Otherwise, we’d be random atoms. We also know that the cosmos does not exist for the pleasure of human beings. To the contrary, if the cosmos were even minimally different, life as we know it would not exist. We are an infinitesimally small part of Reality.
Statistically, we’re not alone as consciously aware life forms in our universe. When we release ourselves from the bondage of our biological limitations, we connect with the living energy of our planet in harmony with the geo-magnetic network of our planet, our living galaxy, and our living universe. We realize that other life on Earth shares conscious awareness in varying degrees.
Don’t believe it? That’s a matter of choice. Consider that denying the facts of reality is a foundation for ignorance. Letting go is a gateway to enlightenment.
Those who do not accept change profess to believe that the immensity of a universe beyond our inclusive comprehension has existed since the beginning of time solely for their personal benefit. Their corporate slogan is “Arrogance ‘R Us”.
More precisely, the statistical probability of human conscious awareness being unique in the universe is so infinitesimal that it would be laughable if it weren’t for our present species peril.
Not only have we amassed enough fire power to turn the earth into a burning sphere overnight, we are now proceeding to systematically and efficiently eliminate the natural resources we need to live.
We can’t eat computers or opinions. Clean air, clean water, clean food and clean energy are more than slogans. They’re essential for human life. Are we a swarm of predatory locusts or are we stewards of the blessings of a life we don’t fully understand?
Money has dissolved the human contract with Nature which began about 14 million years ago on a planet that’s been around in one form or another for roughly the last 14 billion years. Preservation, sustainability and natural efficiency are enemies of our present delusional global economic system. No living species on Earth is safe from the ecocide being committed by human insanity. We’re experiencing a systemic failure and treating it as a side-show.
We’re suffering from a fatally immoral addiction to what we may personally consider to be the good life. It’s time for our conscious awareness to transcend self and species. We need to combine our spiritual awareness, our natural awareness, our moral awareness, our cultural awareness, our social awareness and our common sense for the immediate purpose of preserving, sustaining and accepting the natural efficiency of our pale blue dot in a universally remote solar system.
So, where do we begin? We begin wherever we are. Today is the tomorrow we dreamed of yesterday. What is our vision of tomorrow? Is it an Earth that is unchanging in the midst of constant change? Is it an Earth that is scorched and barren? Perhaps it can become an Earth that continues to grow and nurture our existence.
The choice is made by our daily actions. Time is not currently in our favor. Freedom is not the exclusive privilege of wealth. Freedom is everyone’s responsibility. Poverty is the deadliest form of violence. Seven trillion dollars of worthless derivatives tick like a time-bomb in dank Wall Street sub-basements. Environmental bankruptcy threatens all life on Earth. It’s more than past half-time to face our shared Reality. There’s no place to hide.
We grieve our former lives. We begin with the suppressed anger we have self-generated through fear until it has become a traumatic syndrome. The antidote for fear is faith. What do we believe? What are our values? Are we moral, semi-moral, immoral or amoral? Do we believe we are the purpose of the Cosmos or a relatively young animal living on a garden planet far from the heart of an emerging universe? Is our immediate gratification more important than any long-term purpose?
Global recovery depends upon inclusive personal recovery and the ability to recognize the urgency of our common purpose. Personal and cultural recovery begin by surrendering the illusionary cocoon of “self”. Stepping stones include daily humility, hope, study, acceptance, inventory, amends, sharing and compassionate service. The result is a new lease on life.
We surrender our politics. We learn to think for ourselves. We question authority. We test our ideas and follow the evidence. Science belongs to all of us. We reserve judgment. We realize that our imagination is nothing in comparison to the majesty of the truth of our shared Reality. We become creative rather than destructive.
We build a global resource management system based on the concepts of common well-being, strategic preservation and strategic efficiency. Our objective is to maintain, grow and recycle natural resources utilizing our technology as a constructive tool rather than as a weapon.
The concept of ownership needs to be replaced by the idea of strategic access to what we need as opposed to what we may superficially believe or think we want. We stop competing and start co-operating as the result of an enlightened interest in the quality of the harvest of our transitory lives.
As we live and learn together, we realize that love is as important to life as air, food, water and shelter.
Peace beyond all understanding,
an old lamplighter
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Fabulous essay! Breathtakingly so! Making it clear that there is so much for us humans to learn! Yet offering a clear pathway to that learning. Starting with unconditional love and openness! Now where’s a dog to learn from!
Hazel teaching us openness and love through her eyes.
Further information on the subject of being grounded.
Just to set the scene, so to speak, last Saturday week I published a post on our reaction to the book called Earthing authored by Ober, Sinatra and Zucker. I said that we had been sufficiently convinced to order the half-sheet kit. Then on the 23rd., I wrote of our experiences after having spent 5 nights on the earthing sheet.
The half-sheet kit.
I promised to provide more information today. We have now been sleeping on the earthing sheet for eight nights. All the positive effects written about on Monday continue and, frankly, strengthen.
The website GoingBarefoot.org has much information, including real-life experiences from customers. That website suggests it is the work of Martin Zucker, one of the authors of the book. It also offers this testimonial video:
There is another website Earthing.com that offers much the same information as the GoingBarefoot site. (Indeed, I just called the Earthing company and they confirmed that there was no difference in service between the two websites.)
One of the items in the kit, as shown in the photograph, was a 74-minute, professionally-made film that was fascinating. Guess what! That film is available as a YouTube video.
The film was the product of Kroschel Films and their website is wonderful. You must go there. These two pictures came from there.
Isis, January 2013 – Photo courtesy Dr.Vic Walker
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Steve Kroschel spends some quality time with Lennox the Lynx, Nov.3, 2013
Then a web search brought to light a company with the name of Mercola. Their website has a page with earthing products even including, towards the end of the webpage, instructions on making your own earthing mat. The following video comes from that website.
So I do hope this is of interest and, please, if you have any thoughts or experiences, do please offer them as comments to the post.
(Oh, I guess I should mention that I am not affiliated with any of these companies and stand to gain no advantage if you choose to purchase a product mentioned on Learning from Dogs. Please verify for yourself the potential advantages in using any earthing product.)
How to close?
This seems as good a way as any.
Standing Bear.
There is a road in the hearts of all of us, hidden and seldom traveled, which leads to an unknown, secret place.
The old people came literally to love the soil, and they sat or reclined on the ground with a feeling of being close to a mothering power. Their teepees were built upon the earth and their altars were made of earth. The soul was soothing, strengthening, cleansing, and healing.
That is why the old Indian still sits upon the earth instead of propping himself up and away from its life giving forces. For him, to sit or lie upon the ground is to be able to think more deeply and to feel more keenly.
He can see more clearly into the mysteries of life and come closer in kinship to other lives about him.
Hoping that this story of rescuing some young birds may be of help to others.
Last Saturday afternoon we were sitting outside under the shade with the ‘kitchen’ group of dogs enjoying themselves.
Jean and I noticed Casey taking a great interest in something on the ground. Casey is a keen explorer as this photograph from earlier in the year demonstrates.
Casey demonstrating a dog’s focussing skills!
The something that had caught Casey’s attention was a small baby bird that had fallen from a nearby nest. We called Casey away and went across to see the tiny creature whereupon Jean picked up the baby bird.
The patch of ground where the birds were found.
Frankly, we didn’t have a clue as to what to do but called Wildlife Images, just a few miles away from where we live. As the Wildlife Images website explains:
Our guiding principles are the foundation for “why” we do what we do. These principles guide us in our work, our relationships with each other, our guests, supporters, sponsors, and vendors.
PURPOSE
Saving Wildlife
VISION
Wildlife Images Rehabilitation and Education Center is the educational leader of a healthy co-existence with our wildlife neighbors by rehabilitation sick, injured, and orphaned animals.
MISSION
Involve – people to share in our vision.
Educate – children and adults about the personal benefits of taking care of wildlife entrusted to our care.
Inspire – the public to engage in our rehabilitation and education efforts.
Jean and I had previously visited the centre and been impressed with their dedication to saving wildlife.
Over the phone we were told that the best thing to do was try and find the old nest and replace the baby bird within the nest. If all else failed then bring the bird across to Wildlife Images.
Frankly, we struggled to find the nest but at least got a ladder up against the likely tree from where the bird had fallen.
It was as we were getting the ladder in place that we discovered another tiny bird on the ground in amongst the dead leaves and ground cover. Now we had two birds and knew we were struggling to do the right thing for these vulnerable creatures.
We drove across to Wildlife Images and they advised us to build an artificial nest and hang that up in the tree. The call of the baby birds would attract the mother and, with a bit of luck, the mother would return to feeding the chicks again. We were also told to speak quietly around the baby birds so that they wouldn’t imprint on our voice. Apparently that was the greater risk of them being rejected rather than the smell of humans on their little bodies.
So back home we went and soon had a makeshift ‘nest’ in place.
Would it work?
Once the ‘nest box’ was in place, it was time to place the youngsters in their new home.
Good luck, my little things.
We left the birds in peace and went inside for a while. Our fear was that they might try leaping out.
Then curiosity got the better of us and we needed to see if they were still alright. So a couple of hours later, I took the following photograph.
Against all odds!
The evening approached and we feared for their fate.
Then miracle of miracles we saw the mother come to them and start feeding her offspring.
We retired for the day content that we had done all we could.
Then on Sunday morning, bright and early, we went outside again. Had they survived the night? Had the mother returned to feed them this second day?
We heard nothing: saw nothing. Feared the worst.
It was no good, I had to climb the ladder and take a peek.
Still alive!
They were still in the land of the living!
Yet, there was still no sign of the mother.
Jean and I sat under our nearby gazebo and tried hard not to fear the worst. My camera was on my lap.
Then Jean saw a flash of feathers. It was the mother arriving to feed her young.
I was able to take the following picture.
Not the best quality picture but so what! It’s proof the birds are being cared for by their mother.
In the scheme of things, rescuing a couple of small birds doesn’t add up to much. But I’ll tell you! When Jean and I saw the mother feeding her young both of us were a little wet around the eyes!
On Saturday, the 14th June, I published a post Are you grounded? That post was a reaction to this book that Jean and I had recently read.
I also explained that we had ordered an earthing sheet for the bed and that I would report further upon our findings.
Today’s post is that further report.
The slim box containing the half-sheet kit was delivered on the 18th June, five days ago at the time of writing this.
The next photograph shows more clearly what was included in the kit.
From left to right: Case histories from users, an earthing rod above, the earthing half-sheet, and below the sheet, an outlet ground checker, the earthing connection cord, the book, and a full-length DVD of a film on the subject of grounding.
It was then a case of laying the sheet on the bed as recommended in the instruction guide.
Then upon testing that we had a safe earthing connection via the ground pin on our nearby outlet, it was a case of connecting the earthing sheet to ground, as may be observed in the next photograph.
I’m writing this yesterday. We have both slept on the earthing sheet for four nights now.
So what are the results so far?
Jean
Jean has had leg muscle cramps each night for months and months. Often just enough to waken her but frequently sufficiently severe to require her getting out of bed and walking around the room. I can vouch for the latter!
Jean has had those four nights totally free from cramps!
Plus Jean has reported sleeping more soundly.
Me – Prostate
In recent months my bladder has been showing ‘old man’s bladder control’! Certainly, over the last year I have been getting up for a pee two times, frequently three times, during the night.
During the day, I could hardly take a hot drink without the need to pee within minutes. It had got to the stage where I would avoid having a drink before Jean and I went out unless I was certain that there would be public restrooms available. I was taking a natural prostate medicine, morning and evening, but still starting to think that it wouldn’t be long before I would need to see a medical specialist.
Since sleeping on the earthing sheet, I have gone down to getting up just once during the night. But it’s better than that!
I have stopped the prostate tablets. During the day, my bladder control is hugely improved. I hold my breath that this is going to continue.
Me – Memory
Like many of my age (I’m 70 in November), my short-term memory is not what it used to be. I have not noticed any improvements in this area.
But I am sleeping much more soundly, which is never a bad thing.
But get this!
Being an old Englishman with a sense of connection to the ancient customs of Stonehenge, especially observing the sun’s dawn on the morning of Mid-Summer’s Day, I had looked up the exact local time equivalent of the moment of the Solstice here in Oregon.
Stonehenge at Dawn. On the morning of Mid-Summer’s Day the sun rises exactly over the heel stone.
Early in the hours of the morning of June 21st, ergo Mid-Summer’s Day, I woke unexpectedly. I lay there wondering what had awoken me. It wasn’t to jump out of bed and have a pee. How strange!
I lay there for what felt like ten minutes and then curious as to the hour reached across and pressed the illuminate button on my bedside clock. It read 3:48 am.
3:48 am!! How could that be! I could hardly believe it!
Let me explain.
The previous afternoon, I had been curious as to the exact time of the 2014 Summer Solstice. Had looked it up online. In the United Kingdom that precise moment was 10:41 am. The equivalent time of the Summer Solstice in Oregon’s local Pacific Daylight Time (PDT) was 3:41 am.
I knew that was when I had woken up.
Now that’s what I call being grounded to the Planet!
OK, that’s enough for today but there is much more information about the whole business of being grounded to the planet. I shall return to the subject in Wednesday’s post.
First of all a Very Happy Summer Solstice wherever you are (in the Northern Hemisphere!)
Neighbour Larry sent me a link to a delightful story about solving the problem of a yacht, with a mainmast stretching 85 feet above the water level, passing under a bridge that had a clearance of 65 feet above that same water level.
Here’s a picture to whet your interest. (Notice I wrote ‘whet’ not ‘wet’!)
A case of lateral thinking!
The story was reported in UK’s The Daily Mail newspaper nearly three years ago. So I shall take a chance and republish it for you.
Beats going the long way round! How sailors got their 80ft mast under 65ft bridge
It may not look like an entirely safe practice – but it sure beats going the long way round.
These sailors came up with an ingenious way to get their boat – complete with 80ft mast – under a 65ft bridge on the Intracoastal Waterway. A video posted on YouTube shows how the sailors keeled the boat over by dangling containers filled with two tons of water from the mast.
But it is not a solution for the faint hearted.
Any miscalculation with the weight has the potential to send the whole boat crashing into the water.
The sailor ‘hunterparrot’ who posted the video said he initiates the roll by fixing the containers to the mast and slowly turning to port. The severity of the roll is then controlled by letting the ropes affixed to the mast out gradually with a cockpit winch.
The intracoastal waterway is a 3000-mile network of waterways that run up the Gulf and Atlantic coasts of the U.S. It runs from New Jersey, around Florida to Texas.
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The photographs in that Daily Mail article may be viewed here.
Really? If the bridge clearance is 65 feet and the mast height is 80 feet, then the cosine of the heel angle would be 65 / 80. This corresponds to a heel angle of about 36 degrees; the mast is 54 degrees above the horizontal. Still, a pretty impressive maneuver.
If the bags are full of water, then his setup is self-limiting. As the bags start to immerse, the pull on the halyard is reduced. This means he would be nearly unable to capsize unless he winches the bags WAY too high. I think he has done this trick before.
I think the reason he is sitting on the high side is twofold: He can see the masthead more easily and it is more comfortable
The weight of one person really doesn’t make much difference when you are trying to heel that big a boat that far.
If someone had to do this sort of trick a lot, would it be worth putting a small video camera on the top of the mainmast? This would make it easier to judge clearance.
I have just finished reading a book with the title of Earthing.
It has been an absolutely fascinating read and one, I’m bound to say, that seems entirely plausible.
That is that our modern lifestyle that has us disconnected from Mother Earth for much of our time is the cause of many ailments. As the associated website explains:
CONNECT TO THE EARTH AND FEEL BETTER!
Just as the sun gives us warmth and vitamin D, the Earth underfoot gives us food and water, a surface to walk, sit, stand, play, and build on, and something you never, ever thought about—an eternal, natural, and gentle energy. Think of it perhaps as vitamin G: G for ground. What does that mean to you? Maybe the difference between feeling good and not so good, of having little or a lot of energy, or sleeping well or not so well.
You can’t see the Earth’s energy but some people can feel it as a warm, tingling, and pleasant sensation when they are out walking barefoot along the water’s edge at the beach or on a stretch of dew-moistened grass.
Throughout history humans walked barefoot and slept on the ground. But modern lifestyle, including the widespread use of insulative rubber, or plastic-soled shoes, has disconnected us from the Earth’s energy and, of course, we no longer sleep on the ground. Fascinating new research has raised the possibility that this disconnect may actually contribute to chronic pain, fatigue, and poor sleep that plague so many people.
The remedy for the disconnect is simple. Walk barefoot outdoors whenever possible and/or sleep, work, or relax indoors in contact with conductive sheets or mats that transfer the energy to your body. People who do so on a regular basis say they sleep better, feel better, and have more energy during the day. This simple practice is called Earthing, also known as grounding, and it is both a technology and a movement which is transforming lives across the planet.
Were you aware, for example, that the sole of our foot has more nerve endings per square inch than any other part of our body! And more sweat glands! All from thousands of years of being connected to the Earth.
Curious?
Then watch Part One of a conference video by Dr. Stephen Sinatra, one of the authors of the book:
(The remaining parts of Dr. Sinatra’s talk will be presented in a post on Monday!)
Jean and I have just ordered the half-sheet and I shall be delighted to write more of our experiences over the coming weeks.
And I don’t need to remind you that dogs have been in bare-foot contact with Planet Earth for some time now!
In last Wednesday’s post I included a picture of Jean with Robert who helped us load 60 bales of hay onto our trailer. This photo:
Jean thanking Robert for his great help in loading 60 bales!
Anyway, Tad, who farms the land, mentioned a wonderful place to fish not far from his farm at Wolf Creek.
I’m not a fisherman but Andy, who is staying with us with his wife, Trish, is a keen fisherman.
So last Wednesday we all set off into the high forest lands up above Wolf Creek and after some pretty tough driving up some steep dirt roads found the lake. Here’s a record of our morning at Secesh.
Wow! First sighting!
As you can see, it was a breath-taking oasis in a sea of tall trees and towering peaks.
Still waters!
With crystal-clear waters that just seemed to be calling out to those that enjoy fly-fishing!
Doesn’t get much better than this!
Meanwhile, yours truly decided to walk the perimeter of the lake that is, apparently, some 3.7 acres of water area.
Towards the farthest point of the shoreline, a beautiful stream was flowing into the lake.
Mountain streams.
And not too farther along, a likewise beautiful stream outflowed from the lake.
What flows in … must eventually flow out.
From this vantage point, one could look across the full breadth of the lake.
Tranquility in spades!
And marvel at the wildlife, from ….
Dragon flies.
… the very small, to ….
An American bald-eagle.
…. the stunning eagles of the land. A veritable icon of this country!
Returning in time to see Andy pulling a (small) fish from the lake.
Having our good friends, Andy and Trish, with us for a few days means, quite rightly, that time with them is top of our list; so to speak.
Thus I want to republish a recent post from Paul Gilding that seems to me to be right on the mark.
But first an apology. About 10 minutes ago (07:40 US PDT yesterday) I pressed the ‘reblog’ key over on Paul Gilding’s posting in error. Subscribers to Learning from Dogs will have been sent an email to that reblog and then discovered that I had deleted it, in favour of this approach!
Mr Paul Gilding.
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THE GLOBAL ENERGY MARKET’S MOMENT OF TRUTH
If you want to know what addressing climate change will really be like for business and investors, then take a look at today’s electricity and energy markets. Driven by climate policy, technology development, business innovation, NGO campaigns and investment risk analysis, creative destruction is inflicting itself upon the sector with a vengeance – and the process has just begun.
Value is being destroyed at an incredible scale with just one example being European utilities losing $750 billion in market cap in recent years. Another is the huge losses in value for coal companies and the cancellation of a large number of new coal mining projects around the world as the forecast growth in China and India evaporates. As I argued in my last Chronicle, Carbon Crash Solar Dawn, this is not a temporary market blip but a fundamental shift. Company strategies and business models that have been working for generations are collapsing. In parallel we see the creative side of the process, with new industries being built, entrepreneurs flourishing and massive wealth being created. Now the market is working, as it should, allocating capital to the places where risk and return are best aligned. It is at once a beautiful and brutal process to observe.
This is an important inflection point to acknowledge, with significant implications that should reframe our thinking about these issues.
For a start it means, climate policy and its economic consequences have now shifted from future forecasts to present reality. This reality, with all its brutality for existing businesses, give us important insights into what to expect as the world wakes up to climate change. Business is already waking up to what that means in a market economy – creative destruction unleashed to destroy slow responders.
This suggests that traditional corporate responsibility, which argued sustainability was good for all businesses, is outmoded and not helpful. We have moved into an era of win/lose rather than win/win, and with that, sustainability is shifting from ‘environmentalists vs business’ to ‘business vs business’ as I covered in this earlier Chronicle.
Taken together this means we need to change the way we talk and think about climate change and business. Sustainability is not good for many businesses – in fact it means they’ll have to go out of business. This is what sustainability at its core is all about – things that are unsustainable will stop.
While on the one hand this is blindingly obvious, it is a conversation many in business and politics don’t want to acknowledge. So when the previous Australian government brought in its carbon pricing scheme, it went to great lengths to argue that Australia would still have a healthy coal industry. And President Obama’s new regulations on CO2 emissions in the US power industry are likewise being positioned as being as much about health and air pollution as climate policy.
But as Michael Grunwald argues in this Time Magazine piece on “Obama’s War on Coal” – a phrase used by the coal industry to suggest this is unfair and unreasonable – it’s time to face up to the reality of climate action. It is a war on coal, pure and simple. Grunwald calls it the “just but undeclared war ”. But rather than “just” with its moral overtones, we could simply argue it is “necessary” based on any objective analysis of what’s good for the economy and for society. What is necessary is to move a range of companies out of the economy and replace them.
Coal is first in the firing line. As a major cause of CO2 emissions and with the lack of market support for Carbon Capture and Storage suggesting “clean coal” is either a delusion or at best an expensive PR campaign, coal simply has to go. That means coal companies will go out of business, and then oil companies and gas companies will follow them.
This is not a problem at all for the economy, as they will be replaced with new companies and new industries, which will create new jobs, new wealth and new innovations. But it is a major problem for the incumbents who will cease to exist and for their owners who will lose their money. Unless we have that conversation honestly and openly, we are setting ourselves up for pain and suffering we can easily avoid or at least minimise by thinking through the consequences and being better prepared for their departure.
Of course the best way to minimise the pain would be for fossil fuel companies to transition to new areas of business, to use the great wealth they have created to diversify into sustainable sources of profit. But most of them won’t. It’s not that they couldn’t – it’s just that they won’t. And it’s not just coal but also oil and gas who are, for the most part, in strong denial about what’s coming and so won’t be prepared, as well explained in this article by Giles Parkinson at RenewEconomy.
We shouldn’t be surprised. History shows how rare it is for companies to transform and survive major market and technology shifts. That’s why the average life expectancy of a successful multinational is only 40-50 years. And that’s why the financial markets – who act without ideology based on looking at the data – are rapidly responding. They are stripping value from fossil fuel exposed utilities and the resource companies that provide their fuel. They are also downgrading credit risk, with Barclays recently issuing a warning the investors should no longer see utilities as a “sturdy and defensive subset of the investment grade universe”. The report concluded: “We see near-term risks to credit from regulators and utilities falling behind the solar plus storage adoption curve.” No doubt Deutche Bank considered these risks when they recently announced they wouldn’t consider funding a major new coal port next to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.
So while the idea of “war on coal” is in some ways an accurate summary of the momentous threats the industry faces from a range of forces that are consciously and deliberately coming after them, we could also just see this as how markets work.
Fossil fuels provide us with energy, but they also destroy value across the economy – by driving climate change, damaging health and increasing costs for taxpayers while imposing unmanageable risks on other companies who rely on a stable climate for their business success. So the market is simply doing its job, pricing in some of these costs using the proxies of regulatory, credit and technology risk.
The market is working …. and fossil fuels are losing.
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Hope you agree with me that it’s a great essay and, also, I hope you followed the links – they are all very interesting.
Those of you who are not familiar with Paul Gilding can find out more about him here. Plus the following TED Talk by Paul is highly recommended viewing.
Learning from Dogs 