Massively scaling up Project Drawdown

Buckminster Fuller, by Steve Yelvington, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

If you want to teach people a new way of thinking, don’t bother trying to teach them. Instead, give them a tool, the use of which will lead to new ways of thinking. — Buckminster Fuller

This hot take, from oceanographer Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, caught my attention:

We already have the climate solutions we need. We just need to … implement them.

We already have the climate solutions we need

I like Dr. Johnson’s first statement — “We already have the climate solutions we need” — because Paul Hawken’s *Project Drawdown* proved its accuracy.

Dr Johnson’s statement is accurate because Project Drawdown:

• identified 93 categories of already-existing climate solutions
• that were evaluated to deliver > $97 trillion of cost savings
• plus > 1 trillion tons of avoided greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution for reversing the planet’s climate crisis

Project Drawdown’s proof — that we already have the climate solutions we need — is understated because Project Drawdown evaluated only a very small sample of the climate solutions we already have.

We just need to implement them

I like Dr. Johnson’s second statement — “We just need to … implement them” — because it implicitly asks the question, “How do we implement the climate solutions we already have?”

To answer that question, Project Drawdown brought forth two ground-breaking concepts for the project of ending the climate crisis in one generation.

First, Project Drawdown brought forth the concept of a “climate solution” for meeting human physical needs that people everywhere might decide to adopt.[1]

Second, Project Drawdown brought forth the concept of a climate solution that people everywhere want to adopt because …

• the climate solution delivers performance benefits because it meets a human physical need (for things like energy, water, food, materials & manufactures),
• the climate solution delivers cost savings benefits because it avoids more costs than it incurs, and
• the climate solution delivers climate-crisis-reversing benefits measured by the avoided and/or sequestered greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions delivered by the climate solution …

To accurately evaluate the scale of those cost savings benefits and climate-crisis-reversing benefits:

Project Drawdown formulated a simple benefit evaluation process — which I will call the “Drawdown Evaluation Technology” — that processes data for options for meeting human physical needs (such as energy, water, food, materials & manufactures) — …

… through what I will call a “Drawdown Evaluation Algorithm” …

… for supplying the people at Project Drawdown with what I will call “Drawdown Evaluations of Climate Solutions” in the form of:

• accurate evaluations, comparisons & measurements
• of the cost savings benefits and climate-crisis-reversing benefits
• of climate solutions for meeting human physical needs …

Despite Project Drawdown’s groundbreaking thinking about climate solutions, cost savings benefits and climate-crisis-reversing benefits and …

… despite its formulation of a Drawdown Evaluation Technology and a Drawdown Evaluation Algorithm for quantifying those cost savings benefits and climate-crisis-reversing benefits, and …

… despite its stupendous potential in the form of: (1) cost savings benefits on a scale of $97 trillion, and (2) climate-crisis-reversing benefits on a scale of 1 trillion tons (1000 gigatons) of avoided GHG pollution …

… Project Drawdown did not articulate a process for supplying people everywhere with quantitative evaluations of cost savings benefits and climate-crisis-reversing benefits for all categories of climate solutions that we already have, and …

… it did not articulate a process through which people everywhere want, decide & act to implement all categories of climate solutions that we already have.

Massively scaling up Project Drawdown for solving the planet’s climate crisis

To implement the climate solutions we already have:

• I massively scaled up the Drawdown Evaluation Technology and the Drawdown Evaluation Algorithm
• to supply people everywhere with quantitative evaluations of cost savings benefits and biosphere-healing benefits, including climate-crisis-reversing benefits,
• of all categories of options for meeting human physical needs, including all categories of climate solutions.

Specifically, I invented a simple and easy-to-use technology — called “regenerative information technology” (or “regenerative info tech”) — that scales up the Drawdown Evaluation Technology to process data for all categories of options for meeting human physical needs, including all categories of climate solutions …

… through a “regenerative information algorithm” that scales up the Drawdown Evaluation Algorithm for all categories of options for meeting human physical needs, including all categories of climate solutions …

… for supplying people everywhere with simple “regenerative information services” (or “regenerative info services”) that scale up the Drawdown Evaluations of Climate Solutions to evaluations of benefits delivered by all categories of options for meeting human physical needs, including all categories of climate solutions …

Regenerative info tech supplies people everywhere with the regenerative information services they need for …

… identifying options for meeting human physical needs …

… evaluating the performance benefits, cost savings benefits and biosphere-healing benefits of those options …

… comparing those benefits …

… *persuading themselves what options they want to implement* …

… and deciding to implement “***regenerative options***,” including the climate solutions we already have, that deliver:

• measurable “performance benefits” because they meet human physical needs,
• measurable “cost savings benefits” because they avoid more costs than they incur, and
• measurable “biosphere-healing benefits” (including climate-crisis-reversing benefits) because:
• they scale back extraction flows out of the biosphere measured through increasing the number of species in an area, or
• they scale back pollution flows into the biosphere measured through avoiding more pollution than they incur …

… which allows the biosphere (in deep green) to regenerate itself, …

… allows the creativity, intelligence and regenerative capacity of the biosphere to heal the planet’s ecological crises as a whole, including the climate crisis …

… and allows the biosphere to meet the physical needs of all living beings, including human beings …

Giving people everywhere a tool, the use of which will lead them to implement climate solutions

In the words of systems theorist Buckminster Fuller:

If you want to teach people a new way of thinking, don’t bother trying to teach them. Instead, give them a tool, the use of which will lead to new ways of thinking.

If you want people everywhere to implement climate solutions, don’t bother trying to teach them.

Instead, give people everywhere a tool — such as regenerative info tech — the use of which will lead them to implement climate solutions.

Thank you for reading The Regenerative Transition.

Peace and Aloha!

Erik

P.S. I cross-posted this article on Substack for greater reach.

The Regenerative Transition is your free weekly newsletter for solving the planet’s ecological crises as a whole.

[1] “If we are to engage the bulk of humanity to end the climate crisis, the way to do it is counterintuitive: to reverse global warming, we need to address current human needs, not an imagined dystopian future.” — Paul Hawken