by Kevin Wilson

Recently Immanence published news of a new group, Transition Powell River (TPR), aiming to raise awareness and focus action around climate change, Peak Oil and other resource-depletion issues. Here’s a brief report on what we’ve been up to so far, and what we’re planning.

In May, we held a kick-off meeting, where we gave ourselves the self-teaching Peak Oil lecture, an interesting experience! We learned about what a Transition Initiative is and does, including the 12 steps that would guide us towards creating an Energy Descent Action Plan (EDAP), and the 7 buts or roadblocks that might prevent us from even getting started. A lively discussion about transportation alternatives for Powell River resulted in six people forming a steering group to get TPR moving.

We held our first information booth at the opening of the Hot Summer Nights market on July 16th, and we’ve since had several more. During September you found us at the Community Information Fair at the Complex, at the showing of Food Inc at the Patricia Theatre, and at the Fall Fair, Sep. 26th and 27th. We display information and resources, explaining what Peak Oil is, how it connects to climate change, and how it will affect all our lives and the very basis of our culture and society.

Our first film screening, “The End of Suburbia”, in August, explored how North America created a culture and living arrangements based on the heavy use of oil, and what might happen as world oil supplies decline and prices rise. The film will be be screened again in November. While you might not think that Powell River has much in the way of “suburbs”, there are plenty of areas where it’s a long walk even to the nearest corner store, and a drive to get to anything else. We have a very car-based, fossil-fuel-dependent lifestyle here and this movie speaks directly to the consequences of that.
In September, we held an “Alternative Transportation Smorgasbord” evening at the Unitarian Hall, with short videos showing what other communities have done to create alternatives to fossil-fueled cars, and lots of discussion around how we can do that right here in Powell River. We hoped to spark one or more practical, useful, grassroots projects which will get us moving in the right direction.

The challenge of Peak Oil is a twin to Climate Change: each makes the other worse, and constrains the choices available to solve the other. For example, “coal to liquids” might be seen as a solution to oil shortages, if it were not for the CO2 and climate change consequences. All solutions need to take both problems into account, or they simply take us deeper into the mire.
The Transition model is being used by community initiatives world-wide as a way to respond to these challenges. Transition focuses on (1) relocalisation and resilience-building as tools to reduce our carbon footprint; (2) weaning ourselves off oil; and (3) increasing our capacity to withstand both expected and unexpected shocks—environmental, economic and other—that we’re likely to experience over the coming decades.
Look for displays of Transition information at community events in Powell River throughout the fall season.