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20 April 2024
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Global Warming: a definitive pain(t)ing
by Fernando Agudelo   
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This state of affairs can't last.
"Art is the Permanent Revolution" - memo to Culture Change

Jan Lundberg, founder of Culture Change and Sail Transport Network, said "Fernando Agudelo is a concept artist, designer, and creative illustrator living in Hollywood, Florida. He proves that a piece of art such as the right picture paints a thousand words, and it does even more. In offering his new painting Global Warming, out of the blue, to be shared on CultureChange.org and SailTransportNetwork.org, he explained:

 
Rolls-Royce Revives Age of Sail to Beat Fuel-Cost
by Jan Lundberg   
ImageThis major news article got the attention of folks in the sail transport movement: Rolls-Royce Revives Age of Sail to Beat Fuel-Cost Surge: Freight, by Bloomberg's Robert Wall - July 10, 2013

It is a boost to our movement when it is seen that some of the vast "oil money" from the corporate global economy starts to be transfered to sustainability. This confirms what more and more people are aware of: sail transport is on the rise and cannot fail to fulfill the promise of ultra-efficient, clean energy for travel and trade.

 
Understanding the worsening vibe of violence in the U.S.
by Jan Lundberg   
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United Paved Precincts

It certainly feels to me more peaceful and convivial in Germany and Holland, for example, than in the U.S. Aside from the oft-heard complaint of the U.S. as a crime-ridden and crazy place, here are three factors out of several offered in this article that contribute to significant cultural and physical-environment differences:

• The threat of physical violence posed by police and associated agencies that can instill fear without even making direct contact with civilians

 
Holland's Sail Transport Success Today
by Jan Lundberg   
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unloading sailed rum

Voyage of the Tres Hombres, June 3-6 to Amsterdam

A sailboat can be part of nature, a living state that no motorboat can ever accomplish. This makes intellectual sense, but you feel it on the sea especially in a wooden boat under sail. The relationship between a human being and the sea is intimate and deep. It is also the basis of the current revival of sail transport.

 
Cities: Potential and Reality at the End of Growth
by Jan Lundberg   
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On a rainy day in Berlin there's wonderful reason to be indoors on the Internet or writing a song. I didn't manage any time in nature due to the weather, so I took my meditation break outdoors on a crowded but peaceful, umbrella-crammed street. Not surprisingly, a thought came to me.

 
Sail Transport for New York City Takes Shape
by Jan Lundberg   
ImageInterview with Andrew Willner of HARVEST - Harbor and River Vessel Transport Company

Editor's note: Andrew Willner is a key environmental activist for the New York City region, with a long track record in conservation and political alliances. Baykeeper and the Waterkeeper Alliance are prestigious groups he has helped lead that have been templates for other regions' progress.

 
Why we might not go extinct
by Alice Friedemann   
The case against extinction
Image I think the end of fossil fuels and all that they enable us to do, e.g., microchips, global supply chains, etc., has a 95-98% chance of saving us from extinction because:
1. Carbon dioxide and methane will start to go down due to peak oil and coal (Hart, Heinberg, Höök, Nel, Patzek) and natural gas: Shale Oil and Gas Will Not Save Us.
2. Our ability to do any kind of harm to any resource will diminish drastically once oil and oil equivalent fuels diminish because so many large vehicles and any other equipment with combustion engines won’t operate anymore:
 
Financial Security Ceases to Exist: Good for Low-Energy Survival on a Changing Planet
by Jan Lundberg   
Image The changing world leaves behind the money = wealth syndrome. We can see the trend gaining momentum in accord with the slow but sure shift in values toward universal ecological living.

The too-successful human species catches up with nature-based realism upon questioning the side-effects of destructive technologies. We are not yet all on the same page, but human consciousness may turn on a dime, like global climate when it reaches a tipping point. The latter may have to happen to enable the former.

 
Climate is Everything: The Stage Sets for Triage and Transformation
by Jan Lundberg   
-- a voice in Berlin with an update on the new age of sail

What a place, what a time: Berlin's transition from a hard winter to a welcome summer.  No time for springtime; we've all arrived at the global warming cook off. Who wants to contemplate such a thing? Yet, posing that question has a purpose here, to tell of progress on Culture Change's sail transport transition. The backdrop of Berlin is significant as a unique city of keen interest to those involved in social change and who are chafing in more stressful urban scenes.

 
Building the Vermont Sail Freight Project
by Erik Andrus   
Image How a group of farmers, high school students, and community volunteers are launching a little ship with a big message

Imagine boarding a flat-bottomed sailing barge for a 300-mile voyage from the shores of Lake Champlain to New York harbor. The hold is laden with twelve tons of locally produced wheat, flour, dry beans, maple syrup, apples, cabbages, and hard cider. This is not a historic re-enactment. This is the future!

 
Where next for the renewable energy European Supergrid?
by Julian Jackson   
ImageThe Supergrid is a massive project to connect renewable power and decarbonize Europe over the next four decades. With its rallying cry of "No Transition without Transmission" the supergrid consortium intends to link up all the national grids in Europe to facilitate the large-scale use of renewable power. Some of the visionaries behind this, like Mainstream Renewable Power's Eddie O'Connor, visualize a Europe generating 100% renewable electricity, without any fossil fuels or nuclear reactors.
 
Why the U.S. is F'ed up, and what to do about it
by Jan Lundberg   
Mysterious massacres, homelessness, astronomical debt, nonstop topsoil loss, genetically modified crops, wars, mounting nuclear waste, etc. -- these seemingly unrelated crises are part of an unprecedented onslaught by the U.S. against itself and the world. The outrages are becoming less tolerable, as they appear out of control with no end in sight. But we are supposed to accept them all in the name of "society" or "civilization." "Hope" is offered as a way to magically take care of matters.

At some point, many a discerning citizen comes to say "This nation is f---ed up!"  The danger of this mindset is that it shuts down further analysis and any constructive action.  But it also counts as as open-eyed, justified alarm.

 
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