Post Carbon Institute (PCI) is a

501(c)(3) A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, Trust (business), trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of ...

non-profit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...

based in Corvallis, Oregon, focused on

sustainability Sustainability is a social goal for people to co-exist on Earth over a long period of time. Definitions of this term are disputed and have varied with literature, context, and time. Sustainability usually has three dimensions (or pillars): env ...

. It specializes in

fossil fuels A fossil fuel is a flammable carbon compound- or hydrocarbon-containing material formed naturally in the Earth's crust from the buried remains of prehistoric organisms (animals, plants or microplanktons), a process that occurs within geologica ...

renewable energy Renewable energy (also called green energy) is energy made from renewable resource, renewable natural resources that are replenished on a human lifetime, human timescale. The most widely used renewable energy types are solar energy, wind pow ...

, food, water, and population. Since 2009, it has published articles, reports, and books. It has also served as a speakers' bureau for its Fellows.

History

2003–2008

Post Carbon Institute (PCI) was founded by Julian Darley (President) and Celine Rich (Executive Director) in 2003 to implement programs which would educate the public on issues surrounding global fossil fuel depletion, such as the release of a film called "The End of Suburbia." PCI has promoted the concept of '' Relocalization'', a strategy to build community resilience based on the local production of food, energy, and goods, as well as the development of more localized governance, economy, and culture. The group also promoted the concept of

peak oil Peak oil is the point when global oil production reaches its maximum rate, after which it will begin to decline irreversibly. The main concern is that global transportation relies heavily on gasoline and diesel. Adoption of electric vehicles ...

, along with groups such as the International Forum on Globalization, the

Transition Towns The terms transition town, transition initiative and transition model refer to grassroot community projects that aim to increase self-sufficiency to reduce the potential effects of peak oil, climate destruction, and economic instability through ...

movement, and websites such as EnergyBulletin and The Oil Drum. PCI also operated an online network focused on community responses to peak oil and climate change called th
Relocalization Network
Major activities included:
Global Public Media
Audio and video interviews about the issues surrounding fossil fuel depletion.
The Relocalization Network
A network which attempts to educate local communities and help develop programs to re-localize food and energy production.
The Energy Farms Network
A demonstration and partnership program to explore production of feedstock, fuel and electricity by local farmers.
The Oil Depletion Protocol
(

Rimini Rimini ( , ; or ; ) is a city in the Emilia-Romagna region of Northern Italy. Sprawling along the Adriatic Sea, Rimini is situated at a strategically-important north-south passage along the coast at the southern tip of the Po Valley. It is ...

): An outline for an international agreement to avoid volatility problems associated with oil production.

Since 2009

Asher Miller
became Executive Director in 2009, and PCI restructured to concentrate its program activities on research and publishing. It broadened its focus to include

natural resource depletion Resource depletion occurs when a natural resource is consumed faster than it can be replenished. The value of a resource depends on its availability in nature and the cost of extracting it. By the law of supply and demand, the scarcer the reso ...

climate change Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in Global surface temperature, global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. Climate variability and change, Climate change in ...

economic growth In economics, economic growth is an increase in the quantity and quality of the economic goods and Service (economics), services that a society Production (economics), produces. It can be measured as the increase in the inflation-adjusted Outp ...

, and

human overpopulation Human overpopulation (or human population overshoot) is the idea that human populations may become too large to be sustainability, sustained by their environment or resources in the long term. The topic is usually discussed in the context of wor ...

. Most of its earlier programs were consolidated or discontinued, and it entered into partnerships wit
Transition US
and EnergyBulletin. Its roster o
Fellows
was significantly expanded to include notable figures such as

Bill McKibben William Ernest McKibben (born December 8, 1960)"Bill Ernest McKibben." ''Environmental Encyclopedia''. Edited by Deirdre S. Blanchfield. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale, 2009. Retrieved via ''Biography in Context'' database, December 31, 2017. is a ...

, Wes Jackson, David Orr, and Majora Carter.

Projects

Resilience.org
is a resource platform for communities building local self-reliance. It was launched in 2012 as the successor to the peak oil website EnergyBulletin.
Think Resilience
is an online course on building community resilience.

Articles

Energy articles

Richard Heinberg Richard William Heinberg (b. October 21, 1950) is an American journalist and educator who has written extensively on energy, economic, and ecological issues, including oil depletion. He is the author of 14 books, and presently serves as the senio ...

(2013) * Report
''Drill Baby Drill: Can Unconventional Fuels Usher in a New Era of Energy Abundance''
by J. David Hughes (2013) * Campaign: Th
Energy Reality Campaign
with various allies * Book
''ENERGY: Overdevelopment and the Delusion of Endless Growth''
edited by Tom Butler and George Wuerthner, published b
Watershed Media
with th
Foundation for Deep Ecology
(2013). With essays by Lester Brown,

Amory Lovins Amory Bloch Lovins (born November 13, 1947) is an American writer, physicist, and former chairman/chief scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute. He has written on energy policy and related areas for four decades, and served on the US Nation ...

and others. * Book
''The ENERGY Reader''
edited by Tom Butler, Daniel Lerch, and George Wuerthner, published b
Watershed Media
with th
Foundation for Deep Ecology
(2013). With essays by Winona LaDuke,

Vandana Shiva Vandana Shiva (born 5 November 1952) is an Indian scholar, environmental activist, food sovereignty advocate, ecofeminist and anti-globalization author. Based in Delhi, Shiva has written more than 20 books. She is often referred to as "Ga ...

, and others. * Report
''Will Natural Gas Fuel America in the 21st Century?''
by J. David Hughes (2011) * Video
300 years of fossil fuels in 300 seconds
Winner of a

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

br>DoGooder
best non-profit video award (2011) * Report
''Searching for a Miracle: 'Net Energy' Limits & the Fate of Industrial Society''
by

, with th
International Forum on Globalization
(2010) * Report
''Preparing for Peak Oil: Local Authorities and the Energy Crisis''
by The Oil Depletion Analysis Centre ( ODAC) and Post Carbon Institute (2008) * Book
''Post Carbon Cities: Planning for Energy and Climate Uncertainty''
by Daniel Lerch (2007)