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This is a significant impact on nature, but as Indian activist and musician John Trudell observed: "It would be presumptuous to say that humans could destroy nature--humans can't. But humans are destroying the natural conditions needed for human civilization to continue."
And as Jared Diamond, author of Collapse: How Societies Choose or Fail to Succeed, notes: "History warns us that when once-powerful societies collapse, they tend to do so quickly and unexpectedly. That shouldn't come as much of a surprise: peak power usually means
peak population, peak needs, and hence peak vulnerability."
The question, then, becomes: What are the conditions necessary for continuing human civilization? And how are we promoting or undermining those conditions?
As Robert Costanza notes, "sustainability" turns on questions of prediction: will the course society is pursuing result in conditions that will not allow for that society to continue?
One key area of concern is humans' role in climate change--primarily through human use of fossil fuels. Scientists have established that humans are contributing to global climate change. In fact, fossil fuel use needs to decrease 70% in order to stabilize atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide. At present, though, humans' fossil fuel use, rather than decreasing, is increasing! And the longer we delay in reducing this consumption, the higher the carbon dioxide levels will be, and the greater the risks from climate change. (Examination of ice cores indicates atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide are higher today than they have been in over 420,000 years.)
Some of those risks were explored in the Pentagon-funded study "National Security Implications of Abrupt Climate Change"--http://www.ems.org/climate/pentagon_climate_change.html.
Environmentally sustainable human society depends in large part on our transitioning to environmentally sustainable energy.
What is sustainability for the North Coast bioregion?
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Specifically, the Klamath River can be restored to its former abundance of salmon and other wildlife, largely through the removal of the hydroelectric dams that currently block salmon from more than 80 miles of spawning habitat. As the dams come down, renewable energy can come on line from wind power and from biomass power plants supplied by trees thinned from wildfire-prone, formerly clear-cut areas, where fires have been unnaturally suppressed for too long. Native peoples' traditional practices of controlled burning of black oak woodlands can create habitat for increasing populations of elk. A return of the legendary salmon runs means economic benefits for the area as well.
To advance sustainable practices in northwestern California, people can become more knowledgeable about and supportive of the area "behind the redwood curtain." You can start by visiting the following websites: Jefferson Sustainable Development Initiative, www.jsdi.org, Klamath Restoration Council, www.pelicannetwork.net/klamathrestoration.htm, Klamath Heartlands, www.ecotrust.org/publications/klamath_heartlands.html
Ecotrust Salmon Nation, www.salmonnation.com.
Stay informed about the issue of decommissioning of the Klamath River dams, which is reaching a critical stage as the current 50-year license expires in early 2006. Contact CEED (ceed@humboldt1.com) and others about ways to be a friend of the Klamath and help restore this area as one way to renew the world.
The nonprofit Center for Environmental Economic Development (CEED) was established in 1993 with affiliated offices in Ashland, Oregon, and Anchorage, Alaska. It serves as a catalyst for environmentally sustainable and socially just communities, through several projects promoting forests and watersheds, energy and climate change awareness, material use and recycling, sustainable agriculture, and sustainable economic development (see www.ceedweb.org). Working in collaboration with diverse organizations and traditions, several of these projects involve restoration of the Klamath River.