Everyone is drilling down to the inner circle of hell

George Monbiot’s recent article on the effects of compound growth fills me with despair. Who will fight with me? Stop GROWTH! Start with the fight against fracking.

Monbiot refers to a calculation made by investment banker and philanthropist Jeremy Grantham: over a 3,000 year period one cubic meter of possessions growing at a rate of 4.5% would occupy 2.5 billion solar systems. The mathematics of compound growth make continuity impossible: growth is impossible. We have to change our habits and our values – to stop growth:zero growth

Economic growth is an artefact of the use of fossil fuels. Before large amounts of coal were extracted, every upswing in industrial production would be met with a downswing in agricultural production, as the charcoal or horse power required by industry reduced the land available for growing food. Every prior industrial revolution collapsed, as growth could not be sustained. But coal followed by oil and gas broke this cycle and enabled – for a few hundred years-the phenomenon we now call sustained growth.

Now with the accessible reserves exhausted, we must ransack the hidden corners of the planet to sustain our impossible proposition.

The inescapable failure of a society built upon growth and its destruction of the Earth’s living systems are the overwhelming facts of our existence. As a result they are mentioned almost nowhere. They are the 21^st century’s great taboo, the subjects guaranteed to alienate your friends and neighbours. We live as if trapped inside a Sunday supplement: obsessed with fame, fashion and the three dreary staples of middle-class conversation: recipes, renovations and resorts. Anything but the topic that demands our attention.
NB: We can achieve zero growth by replacing quantity with quality Q v Q

Useful phrases:
“The government fantasizes about turning our leafy suburbs into a new Niger delta.”
“Scouring of the planet has only just begun”
“Everyone is drilling down to the inner circle of hell”