Fifteen minutes of fame
In my only experience of celebrity status, the Yellowknife-based magazine Up Here snapped a picture of me heading out on the ice road for a camping trip, and recognized me as “bonkers”. March, 1990...
View ArticleA long-term investment in destruction
A submission to National Energy Board hearings, August 2013: if the Line 9B pipeline leaks dilbit into local waterways, the effect will be locally disastrous. If the pipeline operates exactly as...
View ArticleAn uphill ride through Oklahoma
Originally published in 1987. Travelling by car on gently graded Interstate 35, you barely notice the Arbuckle Mountains 100 kilometres south of Oklahoma City. But traverse these mountains on bicycle...
View ArticlePedalling to the end of the night
Originally published in 1989. Like many long voyages, my trek to the tundra started with a few rash words over lunch in a Toronto restaurant. “If you want to see the northwest, why don’t you try...
View ArticleSlabs of granite, and other bicycle cargo
Some people are sure they need a car for their shopping – a bike just won’t do. That’s probably true, if they go shopping for anything bigger than a sidewalk. This video was uploaded in 2010, based on...
View Article“Slower Traffic Keep Right”
Cycling west out of downtown Bowmanville, I passed a sign – “Slower Traffic Keep Right” – and wondered if I had veered onto a hitherto-unknown expressway. But I soon guessed that there was a story...
View ArticleA neighbourhood expressway
For the past two months I’ve been a very appreciative user of the bicycle lanes on Green Road – while marveling at the grandiosity of the roadway itself. The lanes provide a convenient and comfortable...
View ArticleCan we afford the energy demands of “the fourth industrial revolution”? Don’t...
Also published at Resilience.org. Are you wishing you could be at Davos, Switzerland this week, taking in the stimulating and deeply insightful discussions on the theme “The Fourth Industrial...
View ArticleDoes your city have a future?
In the past, as in the future, local ecosystem resources were the key to the economies of cities. A review of America’s Most Sustainable Cities & Regions. Also published at Resilience.org. Readers...
View ArticleOpen roads of South Dakota
This story of potential restricted access to rural roads has a happy ending. A hat tip to Momentum magazine for news from the great state of South Dakota. A bill proposed in the South Dakota...
View ArticleLong waves
In honour of the discovery of gravitational waves and of the reappearance of winter today, a few images celebrating the echoings of patterns.
View ArticleFreight expectations
Also published at Resilience.org. Alice J. Friedemann’s new book When Trucks Stop Running explains concisely how dependent American cities are on truck transport, and makes a convincing case that...
View ArticleNewspapers, running on empty
Also published at Resilience.org. There isn’t much news in most community newspapers these days. While it’s common to blame the internet for the woes of newspapers, the crisis in the news business is...
View Article‘Are we there yet?’ The uncertain road to the twenty-first century.
Also published at Resilience.org. What made the twentieth century such a distinctive period in human history? Are we moving into the future at an ever-increasing speed? What measures provide the most...
View ArticleSurf culture at Port Darlington
Before I moved to Port Darlington I was told that yoga-on-stand-up-paddle-board was popular here, but I had no idea how varied this behaviour might be. Herewith are just a few of the remarkable...
View ArticleDensity of power
A photo feature to accompany the series Accounting for energy: thoughts on the work of Vaclav Smil.
View ArticleTimetables of power
For more than three decades, Vaclav Smil has been developing the concepts presented in his 2015 book Power Density: A Key to Understanding Energy Sources and Uses. The concept is (perhaps deceptively)...
View ArticleHow big is that hectare? It depends.
Also published at Resilience.org. The Pickering Nuclear Generating Station, on the east edge of Canada’s largest city, Toronto, is a good take-off point for a discussion of the strengths and...
View ArticleEnergy at any cost?
If all else is uncertain, how can growing demand for energy be guaranteed? A review of Vaclav Smil’s Natural Gas. Near the end of his 2015 book Natural Gas: Fuel for the 21st Century, Vaclav Smil makes...
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