Richard Dimbleby Lecture: Prince Charles Facing the Future

Bandidoz · Post by **Bandidoz** » 09 Jul 2009, 11:21

Prince Charles is a f**king legend!

I saw much of this (BBC1 last night, about 10ish). He mentioned there being hundreds of "dead zones" around the planet, and beautifully described how it's caused by modern agriculture. I'm pretty sure I agreed with everything he said.

Summary:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8141490.stm

Programme:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... he_Future/

2 As and a B · Post by **2 As and a B** » 09 Jul 2009, 11:34

Oo! He said "transition"!

"We are standing at a moment of substantial transition where we face the dual challenges of a world view and an economic system that seem to have enormous shortcomings, together with an environmental crisis - including that of climate change - which threatens to engulf us all."

He added: "We must remember that the ultimate source of all economic capital is Nature's capital.

"The true wealth of all nations comes from clean rivers, healthy soil and, most importantly of all, a rich biodiversity of life."

Surely HRH PC is the greatest hippy leader we never had?!

Ballard · Post by **Ballard** » 09 Jul 2009, 23:04

Humm,

A bad case of 'do as I say, not as I do'.

The man's Carbon footprint is probably 400 times bigger than mine, yet he lectures us all on what we are doing wrong.

Possibly if he applied 'one planet living' to himself as an example I would have more respect... Or perhaps he's just more important than the rest of us and therefore exempt.

Bandidoz · Post by **Bandidoz** » 11 Jul 2009, 14:19

Well, actually, he is!

Ballard · Post by **Ballard** » 11 Jul 2009, 20:51

Bandidoz wrote:Well, actually, he is!

Oh ok... He can have your carbon quota then, so turn all your lights off, in fact disconnect your house from the grid, and sell your car

I just find him highly hypocritical... If it was Gandhi was lecturing us all on living within the planet's ability to support us I would listen, not Prince Charles from his 35 bedroom palace.

JohnB · Post by **JohnB** » 11 Jul 2009, 21:30

Ballard wrote:I just find him highly hypocritical... If it was Gandhi was lecturing us all on living within the planet's ability to support us I would listen, not Prince Charles from his 35 bedroom palace.

Trouble is, we live in a world where people respond to celebrities. I can't imagine anyone nowadays even knowing about someone like Gandhi, unless he was a TV/film star, sportsman, or from a rich and famous family

Hairyloon · Post by **Hairyloon** » 12 Jul 2009, 02:47

Ballard wrote:The man's Carbon footprint is probably 400 times bigger than mine, yet he lectures us all on what we are doing wrong.

Is it? By whose calculations?
Have they considered how many acres of woodland he "owns", and how much carbon that is sequestering?
Or are they just looking at the gross consumption of HRH and all his minions to get big numbers and sensationalise the story?

Charles cannot change who he is, and being who he is means he has a job to do, and doing that job has an energy cost.

You have to compare like with like. Somebody has to play on the world stage, how does Charlie's value compare to the other players?

Bandidoz · Post by **Bandidoz** » 12 Jul 2009, 11:59

Ballard wrote:
Bandidoz wrote:Well, actually, he is!
Oh ok... He can have your carbon quota then, so turn all your lights off, in fact disconnect your house from the grid, and sell your car

I just find him highly hypocritical... If it was Gandhi was lecturing us all on living within the planet's ability to support us I would listen, not Prince Charles from his 35 bedroom palace.

I did originally write a huge reply that went into far more detail, but it was lost when the forum went tits up.

Well let's consider David Holmgren. How many people can he influence compared to Prince Charles? David Holmgren's settlement is low-carbon, however he does travel around the world to promote permaculture.

I'd quite happily invest carbon quota in Charlie. Are you also suggesting that money shouldn't be lent to entrepreneurs?

If he just stayed on his farm, the only energy/CO2 savings would be his own, everyone else would carry on regardless. By campaigning, he has the opportunity to encourage others to save energy/CO2. Hence he is being an "energy/CO2 entrepreneur"; he may have a larger energy cost, however the benefit could be much bigger energy savings overall. Not campaigning therefore carries an opportunity cost.

I think part of the reason why BAU is doomed to persist is because a lot of the world is now run by accountants, who see the cost of everything and the value of nothing. "The man's Carbon footprint is probably 400 times bigger than mine" is typical accountant-speak.

2 As and a B · Post by **2 As and a B** » 12 Jul 2009, 14:29

Given that Prince Charles was born a special person and is required, in his role, to travel a lot, what does he actually do to reduce his carbon footprint whilst performing all the duties required of him? Just curious whether anyone knows.

Ballard · Post by **Ballard** » 12 Jul 2009, 17:58

Bandidoz wrote:
Ballard wrote:
Bandidoz wrote:Well, actually, he is!
Oh ok... He can have your carbon quota then, so turn all your lights off, in fact disconnect your house from the grid, and sell your car

I just find him highly hypocritical... If it was Gandhi was lecturing us all on living within the planet's ability to support us I would listen, not Prince Charles from his 35 bedroom palace.
I did originally write a huge reply that went into far more detail, but it was lost when the forum went tits up.

Well let's consider David Holmgren. How many people can he influence compared to Prince Charles? David Holmgren's settlement is low-carbon, however he does travel around the world to promote permaculture.

I'd quite happily invest carbon quota in Charlie. Are you also suggesting that money shouldn't be lent to entrepreneurs?

If he just stayed on his farm, the only energy/CO2 savings would be his own, everyone else would carry on regardless. By campaigning, he has the opportunity to encourage others to save energy/CO2. Hence he is being an "energy/CO2 entrepreneur"; he may have a larger energy cost, however the benefit could be much bigger energy savings overall. Not campaigning therefore carries an opportunity cost.

I think part of the reason why BAU is doomed to persist is because a lot of the world is now run by accountants, who see the cost of everything and the value of nothing. "The man's Carbon footprint is probably 400 times bigger than mine" is typical accountant-speak.

Ok, I agree that he has been born into a privileged position (whether or not I think that position should exist at all!), and in such a position he is by no means the worst.

I do think that if we are talking about limiting the effects of our lifestyles on damaging the planet's ability to support human life you have to have some basic premise of equality.

In my mind the only way I could reconcile this would be (in an ideal world that I concede will never exist!) to have an equal share of the sustainable capacity of the planet for each member of the human race (not forgetting the rest of the animal kingdom).

Otherwise each country (America and the UK for example) will claim privileged status for some reason or another to pollute/consume more than their neighbors. Likewise individuals will claim ‘special’ status to do likewise. Therefore we will never come to any agreement about actually limiting our total impact, and as such are all doomed. Dooommed I tell you.

biffvernon · Post by **biffvernon** » 12 Jul 2009, 20:36

So here we have a guy at the absolute pinnacle of our hierachical society (give or take his mum) questioning the acceptance of BAU and saying we need to go in another direction. We live in a kingdom where the Prince of the land is on our side. What more could we ask for?

RenewableCandy · Post by **RenewableCandy** » 13 Jul 2009, 12:59

JohnB wrote:
Ballard wrote:I just find him highly hypocritical... If it was Gandhi was lecturing us all on living within the planet's ability to support us I would listen, not Prince Charles from his 35 bedroom palace.
Trouble is, we live in a world where people respond to celebrities. I can't imagine anyone nowadays even knowing about someone like Gandhi, unless he was a TV/film star, sportsman, or from a rich and famous family

We're back to my "style of great leaders" musings.

The problem with being Chazzer is that the wealth he handles is, in a way, not his own but is in fact the property of the institution of Royalty. So, it's not his to give away. What he can do is run it as ecologically-sound-ly as possible to inspire the rest of us. Managed woodland, biochar, renewables for electricity and heat, low mpg vehicles, not using plastic, etc. And as Biff says, to have the heir to the throne on-side is really good. One advantage of Royalty, not being elected, is that it can inspire them to take the Long View.

PS_RalphW · Post by **PS_RalphW** » 13 Jul 2009, 13:29

RenewableCandy wrote:... low mpg vehicles....

That would be his bioethanol Aston Martin DB6

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europ ... index.html

Unfortunately I can't find the official mpg figures.

caspian · Post by **caspian** » 13 Jul 2009, 14:44

He may be right about some things, but that doesn't stop him from being the fecking idiot. He's a classic dimwit who thinks he knows better than everybody else.