Notes From TED Talk Featuring Environmental Icon, Stewart Brand
I just watched this fascinating TED talk given by environmental icon, Stewart Brand. The thoughts he shares on urbanization, nuclear energy, and geo-engineering are provocative: I highly recommend listening to his talk above. For more in-depth analysis of these ideas, be sure to also check out Brand’s most recently published book, Whole Earth Discipline. My notes from Brand’s talk are summarized below:
Notes:
On Urbanization:
- By 2050, 80% of people will live in cities.
- History is driven to a large degree by the size of cities.
- The drivers of history are urban centers: Cordova, Constantinople, Kyoto, Cairo were among the most populated cities in 1000 A.D. They were also the drivers of civilization and culture in their day.
- The 10 largest cities in 2015 are: Tokyo, Mumbai, Lagos, Dhaka, Sao Paulo, Karachi, Mexico City, New York City. (Note that only 2 of the cities are currently developed countries.
- The rise of the west is over.
- 1.3 million people a week are moving to cities. People are following opportunities and a cash economy in cities.
- 1 billion squatters are building the urban world. They start flimsy and get substantial bit by bit.
- Working slums help create prosperity: in Mumbai which is 50% slums represents 1/6 of India’s GDP.
- People are valuable as a group and that is how they work in slums.
- Famine is mostly a rural event.
- What squatters don’t worry about: housing, phone service (everyone has a cell phone), unemployment (everyone works), access to health care, starvation.
- What squatters want: security of tenure, location (near work), water, sanitation, electricity, protection from crime.
On Informal Economies:
- People living in slums are not people crushed by poverty, they are people busy getting out of poverty as fast as they can.
- People in slums are getting out of poverty through the informal economy.
- 60% of employment in slums takes place in the informal economy (services in unlicensed, untaxed businesses, rent/construction of undeeded property).
- Slums provide ad-hoc schools. Education is more possible in the cities, and education changes the world.
On Importance of Proximity:
- Connectivity between the city and the country keeps the country good. Example of a train passing right through a market in Thailand. Once the train passes, the tracks become a pathway for people in the market.
- 1 billion people live as squatters today, and an additional 1 billion are expected.
On Population:
- As more people move to the cities, they have fewer children (population decreases).
- Going forward, population growth will come from older people, not infants. More “older cities” in the Global North, and younger people in brand new cities in the Global South. Guess where the action will be?
On Climate:
- Expected increase in climate refugees in coming decades.
- Example is drought in Darfur that caused conflict. Drought = war.
On Energy:
- Baseload electricity is what it takes to run a city.
- So far there are 3 sources: fossil fuels (coal and gas) – 70%, nuclear – 20%, and hydro – 6%.
- Coal is causing the climate problems. Everyone will continue burning it since it’s so cheap, until the government changes that.
- Wind and solar don’t help because so far we don’t have a way to store that energy.
- Only nuclear and hydro are green.
- Nuclear waste in a person’s lifetime = 20 tons => Compared to coal waste in a person’s lifetime = 8,000,000 tons CO2.
- Good news, reports Brand, is that the whole world is building nuclear reactors which is good for the atmosphere and their prosperity.
- Micro – reactors are promising. Russia is building floating ones and selling them to developing countries.
- Nuclear energy is doing more to dismantle nuclear warheads than any other activity. 10% of the 20% total nuclear energy comes from dismantled warheads.
On Genetically Engineered Food Crops:
- These should not be controversial. Crops are the most successful agricultural innovation in history: they increase yield which allows agricultural area to be smaller, they reduce pesticide use, they keep less CO2 going from soil to atmosphere, and allow no-till plowing whick keeps the soil in place to allow it to get healthy.
- Biotech is moving rapidly in Africa.
On Geo-Engineering:
- Harsh realizations will force geo-engineering to be more seriously considered.
- Building the necessary million square miles of renewable energy sources will be expensive and destructive.
- Ever more and worse climate-driven emergencies are coming.
- Scientific news from climatologists keeps getting more alarming.
- Geo-engineering is comparatively cheap. But how will international agreements work?
On Successful Geo-Engineering:
- Sulfur dioxide from Mt. Pinutubo, Phillipines cooled the earth by 1/2 degree. The following year there was so much ice that there was a bumper crop of polar bear cubs. To put this much sulfur dioxide in the atmosphere would cost $1 billion dollars – cheap compared to other activities.
