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You are here: Home / Archives for Consumerism

Repairing broken economies

Repairing Broken Economies - Local Futures

Sepp Eisenriegler loves giving second chances: to the defunct electrical appliances awaiting repair or refurbishment, the hundreds of unemployed people he’s trained as skilled repairers over the decades and even the two rescue dogs that follow him devotedly around Reparatur-und […]

Filed Under: Climate Change, Consumerism, Livelihoods and jobs, New economy Tagged With: climate change, consumerism, corporations, economics, jobs, new economy, pollution, sustainability

Is Alternative Energy the Best Solution to Climate Catastrophe?

Blog 'Is Alternative Energy the Best Solution to Climate Catastrophe?' by Don Fitz - Local Futures

Environmentalists have known for decades that the “greenest” form of energy available is reduction of useless and harmful energy. Over 50 years ago, the first Earth Day embodied this with “Reduce; Reuse; Recycle.” Today, that seems to have been replaced […]

Filed Under: Climate Change, Consumerism, Economic Growth and Degrowth, Local energy, Localization Tagged With: climate change, consumerism, corporations, degrowth, economic growth, health, local food, renewable energy, well-being

Help needed: 41 servants and counting

A few years ago, when I began questioning what it really takes to write and publish in our digital era, I wondered about electricity’s true costs. I learned that on average, in order to light, heat and cool our homes; […]

Filed Under: Climate Change, Consumerism, Environment, Technology Tagged With: climate change, energy, pollution, technology

Cities and Green Orthodoxy

As the world has urbanized rapidly since 1950, per capita carbon footprint has declined, and so has carbon intensity in economic output, defined as the amount of energy used to produce a unit of economic growth.  But gross material throughputs and […]

Filed Under: Capitalism, Climate Change, Consumerism, Economic Growth and Degrowth, Environment Tagged With: climate change, consumerism, corporations, development, economic growth, globalization, sustainability, urbanization

Thinking Outside the Grid

Thirty years ago, a friend of mine published a book called 50 Simple Things You Can Do to Save The Earth. It described the huge environmental benefits that would result if everyone made some simple adjustments to their way of […]

Filed Under: Climate Change, Consumerism, Environment, Food and Farming, Inner transformation, Local energy Tagged With: climate change, community, corporations, local food, localization, renewable energy

Groomed to Consume

This blog is also available in Russian and Spanish. With Christmas coming up, household consumption will soon hit its yearly peak in many countries. Despite homely pictures of tranquility on mass-produced greeting cards, Christmas is more about frenzied shopping and […]

Filed Under: Consumerism, Economic Growth and Degrowth, Inner transformation Tagged With: community, consumerism, corporations, economic growth, happiness, mental health, sustainability

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