Drawdown (book)

Last updated
Drawdown book.jpg

Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming is a 2017 book created, written, and edited by Paul Hawken about climate change mitigation. Other writers include Katharine Wilkinson, and the foreword was written by (hardback edition) Tom Steyer and (paperback) Prince Charles.

Contents

The book describes solutions arranged in order by broad categories: energy, food, women and girls, buildings and cities, land use, transport, materials, and "coming attractions". [1] The book provides a list of 100 potential solutions and ranks them by the potential amount of greenhouse gases each could cut, with cost estimates and short descriptions. [2] [3]

The Guardian notes that the author has had influence in corporate sustainability efforts and that companies such as Interface and Autodesk have backed the project. It was intended that the book be supplemented with an online database, Project Drawdown , which was to compile the numerous types of solutions. [4]

Reception

Drawdown has been a New York Times bestseller and has received favorable reviews. [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] For example, Kirkus Reviews called the book "an optimistic program for getting out of our current mess". [11]

An April 2017 video on C-SPAN described the book as "a collection of policies, plans, and active programs to reduce carbon emissions outside of the purview of the federal government". [12] In the video, Mr. Hawken stated, "the reason we can say 'the most comprehensive plan ever proposed' is that no one's ever proposed a plan... which is sort of astonishing when you think about it." [12] According to an article in Vox, "until 2017, there was no real way for ordinary people to get an understanding of what they can do and what impact it can have". [3]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bjørn Lomborg</span> Danish author (born 1965)

Bjørn Lomborg is a Danish author and the president of the think tank Copenhagen Consensus Center. He is the former director of the Danish government's Environmental Assessment Institute (EAI) in Copenhagen. He became internationally known for his best-selling book The Skeptical Environmentalist (2001).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mariculture</span> Cultivation of marine organisms in the open ocean

Mariculture, sometimes called marine farming or marine aquaculture, is a specialized branch of aquaculture involving the cultivation of marine organisms for food and other animal products, in enclosed sections of the open ocean, fish farms built on littoral waters, or in artificial tanks, ponds or raceways which are filled with seawater. An example of the latter is the farming of marine fish, including finfish and shellfish like prawns, or oysters and seaweed in saltwater ponds. Non-food products produced by mariculture include: fish meal, nutrient agar, jewellery, and cosmetics.

Eco-capitalism, also known as environmental capitalism or (sometimes) green capitalism, is the view that capital exists in nature as "natural capital" on which all wealth depends. Therefore, governments should use market-based policy-instruments to resolve environmental problems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Hawken</span> American environmentalist and economist (born 1946)

Paul Gerard Hawken is an American environmentalist, entrepreneur, author, economist, and activist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jonathon Porritt</span> British environmentalist (born 1950)

Sir Jonathon Espie Porritt, 2nd Baronet, CBE is a British environmentalist and writer. He is known for his advocacy of the Green Party of England and Wales. Porritt frequently contributes to magazines, newspapers and books, and appears on radio and television.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Joe Romm</span> American writer and editor (born 1960)

Joseph J. Romm is an American researcher, author, editor, physicist and climate expert, who advocates reducing greenhouse gas emissions to limit global warming and increasing energy security through energy efficiency and green energy technologies. Romm is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 2009, Rolling Stone magazine named Romm to its list of "100 People Who Are Changing America", and Time magazine named him one of its "Heroes of the Environment (2009)", calling him "The Web's most influential climate-change blogger".

The Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, or Assembly Bill (AB) 32, is a California State Law that fights global warming by establishing a comprehensive program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from all sources throughout the state. AB32 was co-authored by then-Assemblymember Fran Pavley and then-Speaker of the California Assembly Fabian Nunez and signed into law by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger on September 27, 2006.

<i>Hell and High Water</i> (book) 2006 book by Joseph J. Romm

Hell and High Water: Global Warming – the Solution and the Politics – and What We Should Do is a book by author, scientist, and former U.S. Department of Energy official Joseph J. Romm, published December 26, 2006. The author is "one of the world's leading experts on clean energy, advanced vehicles, energy security, and greenhouse gas mitigation."

<i>The 11th Hour</i> (2007 film) 2007 American film

The 11th Hour is a 2007 documentary film on the state of the natural environment created, produced, co-written and narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio. It was directed by Leila Conners Petersen and Nadia Conners and financed by Adam Lewis and Pierre André Senizergues, and distributed by Warner Independent Pictures.

Lawrence Solomon is a Canadian writer on the environment and the executive director of Energy Probe, a Canadian non-governmental environmental policy organization, a member of the advisory board of Rebel News, and a columnist for The Epoch Times. His writing has appeared in a number of newspapers, including the National Post, where he has a column, and he is the author of several books on energy resources, urban sprawl, and global warming, among them The Conserver Solution (1978), Energy Shock (1980), Toronto Sprawls: A History (2007), and The Deniers (2008).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sergey Zimov</span>

Sergey Aphanasievich Zimov is a Russian geophysicist who specialises in arctic and subarctic ecology. He is the Director of Northeast Scientific Station, a senior research fellow of the Pacific Institute for Geography, and one of the founders of Pleistocene Park. He is best known for his work in advocating the theory that human overhunting of large herbivores during the Pleistocene caused Siberia's grassland-steppe ecosystem to disappear and for raising awareness as to the important roles permafrost and thermokarst lakes play in the global carbon cycle.

The climate change policy of the United States has major impacts on global climate change and global climate change mitigation. This is because the United States is the second largest emitter of greenhouse gasses in the world after China, and is among the countries with the highest greenhouse gas emissions per person in the world. In total, the United States has emitted over a trillion metric tons of greenhouse gasses, more than any country in the world.

Soil management is the application of operations, practices, and treatments to protect soil and enhance its performance. It includes soil conservation, soil amendment, and optimal soil health. In agriculture, some amount of soil management is needed both in nonorganic and organic types to prevent agricultural land from becoming poorly productive over decades. Organic farming in particular emphasizes optimal soil management, because it uses soil health as the exclusive or nearly exclusive source of its fertilization and pest control.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Individual action on climate change</span> What people can do individually to slow down global warming

Individual action on climate change can include personal choices in many areas, such as diet, travel, household energy use, consumption of goods and services, and family size. Individuals can also engage in local and political advocacy around issues of climate change. People who wish to reduce their carbon footprint, can take "high-impact" actions, such as avoiding frequent flying and petrol fuelled cars, eating mainly a plant-based diet, having fewer children, using clothes and electrical products for longer, and electrifying homes. Avoiding meat and dairy foods has been called "the single biggest way" an individual can reduce their environmental impact. Excessive consumption is more to blame for climate change than population increase. High consumption lifestyles have a greater environmental impact, with the richest 10% of people emitting about half the total lifestyle emissions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eric Holthaus</span> American meteorologist and climate journalist

Eric Holthaus is a meteorologist and climate journalist. He is the founder of a weather service called Currently and started a publication called The Phoenix on Ghost. He was formerly a writer for The Correspondent, Grist, Slate and The Wall Street Journal and is known for his mentions of global climate change.

Climate drawdown refers to the future point in time when levels of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere stop climbing and start to steadily decline. Drawdown is a milestone in reversing climate change and eventually reducing global average temperatures. Project Drawdown refers to the nonprofit organization with the mission to help the world reach drawdown and stop catastrophic climate change quickly, safely, and equitably. In 2017, a publication titled "Drawdown" became a New York Times bestseller, which highlighted and described different solutions and efforts available to help reach this goal.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kate Marvel</span> American climate scientist and communicator

Kate Marvel is a climate scientist and science writer based in New York City. She is a senior scientist at Project Drawdown and was formerly an associate research scientist at NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Columbia Engineering's Department of Applied Physics and Mathematics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marine permaculture</span>

Marine Permaculture is a form of mariculture that reflects the principles of permaculture by recreating seaweed forest habitat and other ecosystems in nearshore and offshore ocean environments. Doing so enables a sustainable long-term harvest of seaweeds and seafood, while regenerating life in the ocean.

Dr. Katharine K. Wilkinson is an American writer, climate change activist, and executive director and co-founder of The All We Can Save Project, a climate leadership organization. She co-hosts the podcast A Matter of Degrees with Leah Stokes. Previously, Wilkinson served as editor-in-chief of The Drawdown Review at Project Drawdown and was the senior writer for The New York Times bestseller Drawdown, which documents the "what is possible" approach for addressing climate change. Time named her one of 15 "women who will save the world" in 2019.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Climate change and cities</span>

Climate change and cities are deeply connected. Cities are one of the greatest contributors and likely best opportunities for addressing climate change. Cities are also one of the most vulnerable parts of the human society to the effects of climate change, and likely one of the most important solutions for reducing the environmental impact of humans. The UN projects that 68% of the world population will live in urban areas by 2050. Cities have a significant influence on construction and transportation—two of the key contributors to global warming emissions. Moreover, because of processes that create climate conflict and climate refugees, city areas are expected to grow during the next several decades, stressing infrastructure and concentrating more impoverished peoples in cities.

References

  1. Hawken, Paul (2017). Paul Hawken (ed.). Drawdown: The most comprehensive plan ever proposed to reverse global warming . New York, NY: Penguin Books. ISBN   9780143130444.
  2. Schlossberg, Tatiana (2017-06-12). "How Much Do You Know About Solving Global Warming?". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2019-09-24.
  3. 1 2 Roberts, David (2017-05-10). "This book ranks the top 100 solutions to climate change. The results are surprising". Vox . Retrieved 2019-09-24.
  4. Gunther, Marc (2014-10-22). "First look: environmental entrepreneur Paul Hawken's long-awaited new book". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved 2019-09-24.
  5. "Drawdown". Penguin Random House . 2019. Retrieved 2019-09-24.
  6. Worrall, Simon (2017-05-28). "100 Practical Ways to Reverse Climate Change". National Geographic News. Archived from the original on September 3, 2019. Retrieved 2019-09-24.
  7. Brough, Holly (2017-11-17). "Drawdown - A Book Review". Shelburne Farms. Retrieved 2019-09-25.
  8. "Solutions to Climate Change: A Review of Drawdown edited by Paul Hawken". TreeZero. 2017-06-20. Retrieved 2019-09-24.
  9. Edelstein, Ken (May 4, 2017). "In 'Drawdown,' Paul Hawken ditches the rhetoric to offer 100 practical climate solutions". MNN - Mother Nature Network. Retrieved 2019-09-24.
  10. "Drawdown: Paul Hawken Gets Real with Climate Change by Mic Patterson, PhD, LEED AP BD+C". Facade Tectonics Institute. January 13, 2018. Archived from the original on 2019-09-24. Retrieved 2019-09-24.
  11. "DRAWDOWN : The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming, edited by Paul Hawken". Kirkus Reviews . February 20, 2017.
  12. 1 2 "Drawdown". C-SPAN.org. April 21, 2017. Retrieved 2019-09-24.