About

Welcome to Transition

Our mission is to increase awareness of Peak Oil & Climate Change, to support local Transition work and to act as a information sharing network ... for greater sustainability and local resilience.

Climate Change makes the transition to a low carbon future essential, Peak Oil makes it inevitable and Transition Initiatives make it feasible, viable and even attractive.

The Transition Movement starts from the belief that the two toughest challenges currently facing humankind are Climate Change and Peak Oil.

CLIMATE CHANGE
is well documented in the media, although it is often not realised just how drastic climate effects may become. Whilst there is much discussion about reducing emissions to curtail Climate Change to an acceptable level, emissions are still growing and showing no sign of any reduction, let alone reduction of the required magnitude of 80-90% of levels measured in 1990.

PEAK OIL
remains under the radar for most people. Peak Oil marks the 'peak' in world oil production followed by steady decline in production causing an economic decline of unprecedented proportions. Discoveries of new oil fields peaked in 1962, half a century ago(!) and have been declining ever since. Nowadays, for every ONE barrel of newly discovered oil we are consuming more than FIVE barrels! It does not take a genius to work out that we are heading for a disaster.

Peak Oil is happening now. Since 2005, after a century of almost continual growth in world wide production, crude oil extraction is declining - for the first time in history for geological, rather than political reasons. This has caused the oil, energy & financial crisis in 2008 and now we can expect to have some 4% of crude oil LESS each and every year. Consequently our primary source of energy will halve every 20 years or so and there is now no prospect of sustained economic growth.

TRANSITION
The Transition Movement aims to alleviate many of the predicted catastrophic effects of Climate Change, Peak Oil and other self-inflicted crises by helping local groups to build sustainable and resilient communities, able to supply much of their own local food and services, local energy, and rediscover the spirit of mutual support.

The purpose of this website is to disseminate information relevant to Transition, to help you set up and run a local Transition Group in your area or Parish, to help you communicate with other Groups and individuals involved in the Transition Movement and to encourage sustainability and local resilience.

The first thing to do is to
register (click on 'create new account' in the left column) and then you can start posting your own comments/ announce your own events and describe your favourite local suppliers for everyone to share.
OR just click on 'Contact us' and ask to be added to our occassional e-mailing list.

Click on 'Individual Parishes' to see what is going on in your own Parish or town.

Click on 'NEWS,EVENTS,INFO' for Transition related news, loads of Events and all kinds of information and contacts to help you along the Transition path.

Have a look at some of the blogs for comments on recent events as they relate to Transition.

Everybody can contribute. Start a discussion, ask questions, insert details of local food or energy suppliers. Use the web space for your Parish Plan, your local Group or to organise a local event - its up to you. Tell everyone what's happening in your Parish so that we can all learn from each other and share the links and resources that have been most useful.

All we ask is that your item is in some way related to Transition, that you are respectful of other users and don't spam the site.

Good luck and watch this space!
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Cheerful disclaimer!

Just in case you were under the impression that Transition is a process defined by people who have all the answers, you need to be aware of a key fact: We truly don't know if this will work. Transition is a social experiment on a massive scale.

What we are convinced of is this:

if we wait for the governments, it'll be too little, far too late
if we act as individuals, it'll be too little and leave us vulnerable
but if we act as communities, it might just be enough, just in time.

Everything that you read here about Transition is the result of real work undertaken in the real world with community engagement at its heart. There's not an ivory tower in sight and no slavish adherence to a model carved in stone.

The transition model is brought to you by people who are actively engaged in transition in a community. People who are learning by doing - and learning all the time. People who understand that we can't sit back and wait for someone else to do the work. People like you, perhaps...