Adaptation and Mitigation amid the Consequences of Failure

Societies once could choose between changing direction or dealing with climatic disaster; now it is necessary to do both at once. The best‐laid plans for mitigation would be hard enough to fulfill in a stable climate, but they will be vastly harder in the climate chaos ahead. If simultaneous mitigation and adaptation are still achievable, such a difficult balance cannot also take on the burden of supporting unrestrained economic growth. The failing efforts so far have been dominated by a search for synergistic ways to mitigate, adapt, and grow economies at the same time, while wishing away the predictable trade‐offs between these goals. Wealthy polluting countries have enforced this optimistic spirit in international climate debates, in part to counter the language of loss and damage, which they have seen as a direct challenge. Key to their effort has been a reframing of adaptation that flips the focus from the vulnerability of exposed populations to their resilience. However, the reality of implementing plans for resilience is running into problems, and those populations are instead taking up the banner of climate justice. Debt‐ and disaster‐plagued Puerto Rico illustrates the failure of both adaptation and mitigation through growth and the promise of climate justice as a means to articulate other forms of balance. Part I: The Major Challenges: Climate Change and Energy Descent The first section deals with the overall situation faced by humanity from the combination of climate change and energy descent. Climate change is an unprecedented challenge that is disrupting the material systems on which modern societies depend. Rising sea levels, hurricanes, disease vectors, droughts, forest fires, and ocean acidification spell disaster for a large portion of the world's population. They will interfere with crop production, forestry, fi shing, transportation, water supply, mosquito abatement, electricity production, healthcare, and many other essential services. But national leaders have avoided either mitigation (cuts in emissions) or adaptation (projects to deal with the consequences) in a meaningful way. They have been crafting diplomatic language to delay a serious response. In addition to the climate crisis, we are also suffering a second global problem: the decline of net energy to power industry and agriculture. (Net energy is the energy that remains after energy is used to extract and transmit energy.) A decline in net energy will restrict the ability of