Meeting minutes for last meeting.

[Nacho]

MEETING MINUTES
2008-06-24
18:30 - 20:00

ATTENDEES:
Ignacio (chair)
Jennifer
John
Mark (secretary)

One of our 2 major goals for tonight was to prioritize our
recommendations. We all had similar priorities and it wasn't
difficult to come up with the following list. The initials in
parentheses indicate who is responsible for providing the next draft.



AGENDA ITEM 1: PRIORITIZED LIST:
1) Permanent member in EPC (JC)
2) Family planning (JJA)
3) Tax resource extraction. (mg)
4) Preserve safety margin / worst case planning (jja w input from mg
and IMB)
5) 100% renewable/sustainable energy (IMB)
6) GDP and GPI / Gross National Happiness (MV 2030) (mg)
7) Optional leisure time (IMB)
8) Do not subsidize population growth (IMB)
9) Internalize external costs. (mg)

TOPIC #2

BruceK suggested a few weeks ago that we expand our report and
describe the following:

What does a sustainable Mountain View look like?
What does a sustainable family look like?

We discussed this briefly tonight, but didn't get very far, in part
due to lack of time and in part because the description that we think
is probably the most scientifically realistic is politically
unacceptable at the present time. We don't want to avoid the issue
(since there is no way for the planet to avoid it), but we aren't sure
what to do next.


Ignacio suggested that either the introduction to our report, or an
additional recommendation, or both, should point out that sooner or
later, even ignoring global warming, we must switch to renewable/
sustainable energy (since non-renewable energy is by definition
finite, and since we may well be at or near "peak oil").

We agreed that unless the energy committee has explicitly raised this
point, we will add it to our list of recommendations. [Who is going
to check whether the energy committee already included this? We think
based on their presentation to the steering committee that they did
NOT cover this, but we may want to look at a newer version of their
list of recommendations if one is available. --mg]

Note that although we can't estimate costs and benefits very well, the
cost of continuing on our present course is essentially infinite
because the "do nothing" approach means that civilization collapses.

We did not agree on how to phrase the issue. Mark suggested that the
recommendation be similar to "Eventually, we must switch to 100%
renewable/sustainable energy", but Ignacio pointed out that
"Eventually" does not convey the necessary urgency.


TOPIC #3: Introduction to the SQoL Section Of the Report

We agree that we will provide an introduction. We spent a long time
discussing how to start that introduction with something attention-
getting but that would not seem so extreme that it would "turn off"
any of the council members. Below are several ideas that we had. We
have not yet agreed on actual text.


The first law of thermodynamics says that energy is finite.
Economics and technology can't change the laws of physics.

[The laws of physics state that] "Sustainable growth is an
oxymoron."

Technology is constrained by the laws of physics.

"Smart growth" makes as much sense as "smart cancer."



We also want to try to raise the following points somewhere in our
section. These might get stuck in an appendix, but we don't want to
lose them.

"The real bank is resources, not money."

We are on a treadmill / vicious spiral, in which we need more
growth to generate the income needed to clean up the mess created by
the last round of growth.


TOPIC 4: Faster-than-linear growth of costs or problems

John pointed out that in at least some circumstances, interactions
between people rise faster than linearly with population increase.
For example, Mark pointed out, there is evidence that as cities sprawl
outward, the cost of infrastructure rises more than linearly (although
Mark couldn't remember the source of that claim).

Mark and John got into a long debate over how many effects grow more
than linearly, with John initially saying that all effects do, and
Mark saying that some effects (such as noise pollution, air pollution,
and traffic congestion) grow faster than linearly, while some do not.
(This debate continued after the formal end of the meeting.)

If we can find the source of the statement that infrastructure costs
grow faster than linearly, or can support John's argument in a way
that applies to the city and thatthe City Council will understand, it
should make a powerful argument against the blindly pro-growth
mentality that we see so often.


ACTION ITEMS:

Everyone:
Update the draft recommendations (see the prioritized list to see
who has been assigned each recommendation).

Everyone:
Provide drafts (by 2008-07-04 23:59) to Mark to edit.

Provide drafts (by ???) to Jennifer to suggest organization
changes.

Provide drafts (by ???) to Ignacio to review for content.

Ignacio:
Send Jennifer any current draft of the Safety Margin
recommendation.
Work on draft intro (with input from Mark)

Mark:
Send current partial draft intro to Ignacio to expand. (and cc the
rest of the team, of course).
Send Jennifer any current draft of the Safety Margin
recommendation.
Incorporate idea(s) based on emailed feedback from Cynthia.

John:
Incorporate feedback on the recommendation to put an
environmentalist on the Environmental Planning Commission. Point out
specifically that this has approximately zero cost.
John suggested a couple of things that we would like to add (even
if only an appendix), but I failed to write them all down.