For my more detailed thoughts on the book, take a look at this post, or click the play button below for a radio interview recorded just ahead of its release (if you can't see the play button, please enable Javascript).

Reviews

Richard Barnett, New Forest Transition Hub

Dr. John Barry, FEASTA and Queen's University Belfast (pdf)

Paul Allen, Resurgence magazine

Patrick Whitefield, Permaculture magazine

Jamais Cascio, Open The Future

Mark Brown, Transition Town High Wycombe

Dan Benor, International Journal of Healing and Caring

Gareth Edward Jones, Green Guys Global

Jeremy Williams, Celsias.com

Graham Burnett, Southend In Transition

Luc Semal, in the French journal Développement durable et territoires

~ Me interviewed about the book by Blanche Cameron, Clean Slate magazine

~ Me interviewed about the book by Rob Hopkins, Transition Culture

“Peak oil and climate change are two of the greatest challenges we face today; the Transition Town movement is firmly rooted in the idea that people taking action now in their communities can not only tackle these environmental threats but also, in the process of doing so, lead more fulfilling lives. It is about hope in an otherwise bleak seeming future. Above all, it's about the power of an alternative vision for how society could be and not waiting for government or politicians to get it right.

The Transition Timeline is designed to bring that vision to life – with stories of what communities have already achieved, with updates on the latest scientific data, and with ‘maps’ that highlight key landmarks on the journey towards a zero carbon future. It's a hugely valuable manual for anyone committed to turning dreams into reality. Don't just read this book – use it to change your world.”

~ Caroline Lucas MP, leader of the Green Party of England and Wales, and co-author of Green Alternatives to Globalisation: A Manifesto

“Shaun Chamberlin ties down the uncertainties about climate, energy, food, water and population, the big scene-setters of our future, with no-nonsense authority. What we get with The Transition Timeline is a map of the landscape we have to find a way through. Map-making is a risky business: sooner or later someone is going to use your map and come across a treacherous swamp that isn’t marked. So you need to be alert to revisions and reports from travellers. But what matters is that someone has got the key characteristics of the landscape drawn out. This is what we have to make sense of – not in the distant future, but right now.

Don't set out without The Transition Timeline. Take a biro. Scribble updates, comments, expressions of shock and horror, notes to cheer yourself up. By the time your copy has been rained on, stained with blackberry juice, consulted, annotated, used to press and preserve a leaf of our autumnal world, you will have a good idea of where you are, and inspiration about where you are going. It is almost as good as getting there.”

~ Dr. David Fleming, director of The Lean Economy Connection, and author of Energy and the Common Purpose

“Transition has emerged as perhaps the only real model we have for addressing our current crisis – a new, if vital, format for reconsidering our future. The Transition Timeline strengthens a fragile form, something that might, without a trace of irony, be called one of the last, best hopes for all of us.”

~ Sharon Astyk, author of Depletion and Abundance: Life on the New Home Front and A Nation of Farmers: Defeating the Food Crisis on American Soil

“There is obviously no single, magic bullet solution to climate change. But if I was forced to choose one – our best hope of averting the crisis – it would definitely be Transition Towns.”

~ Franny Armstrong, Director of The Age of Stupid film

“Will the future be as rosy as The Transition Timeline suggests it might be? Will the people of Britain and the rest of the world begin immediately to make better decisions, taking the welfare of future generations into account? The answer to both questions is probably no.

Will serious repercussions of decisions already taken (regarding fossil fuel consumption and the structuring of our economy to depend on perpetual growth for its viability) come to bite us hard before we even have a chance to implement some of the excellent recommendations contained in this book? The answer to that one is certainly yes - we are already seeing dire consequences of past economic and energy decisions.

Nevertheless, without a vision of what can be, there is no alternative to a future completely constrained by the past. The ideal future set forth herein is not a useless pipe-dream. There is not a single outcome described in this book that could not realistically be achieved IF we all do things beginning now that are entirely within our ability to do.

So here it is: the map and timeline of how to save our world and ourselves. Whether we WILL take up these suggestions as scheduled is a question for the cynics and dreamers to debate. For us realists, the only relevant questions are, Where do we start?, and, Will you join us? ”

~ Richard Heinberg, Senior fellow of the Post Carbon Institute, and author of eight books, including The Party’s Over and Peak Everything

“The next 100 months will be a very special time for humanity. On numerous fronts, the consequences of the past 150 years of industrialisation are all simultaneously coming home to roost. Even senior experts, scientists, NGOs and political leaders fail to appreciate that the most recent evidence reveals a situation more urgent than had been expected, even by those who have been following it closely for decades. The Transition Timeline provides an invaluable set of innovative approaches, new narratives and creative thinking tools that will prove vital in enabling us to shape a new kind of society and a new kind of economy; stable in the long term, locally resilient, but still active in a global context, rich in quality jobs, a strong sense of purpose and reliant on indigenous, in-exhaustible energy. It should be read by everyone, immediately!”

~ Paul Allen, director of the Centre for Alternative Technology, and project director of Zero Carbon Britain

"Peak oil and climate change are evidently intimately related issues deserving the most serious consideration. The Transition Timeline is brilliantly written and well illustrated, explaining these critical issues in lucid and readily comprehensible terms. In short, it is essential reading for everyone from the man-in-the-street to the Cabinet Minister."

~ Dr. Colin J. Campbell, founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas (ASPO)

“The Transition Timeline builds on the success of the Transition movement in galvanising community capacity and resilience to respond to climate change and peak oil. Using the ‘backcasting’ technique documented in Rob Hopkins’ very successful Transition Handbook, Shaun Chamberlin paints the picture of how we got to a better world by 2027.

Chapters dealing with the basics from food and water through to health and medicine map how Britain made this transition using positive, bottom up community and cultural adaptation combined with innovative public policies and available and appropriate technologies.

While definitely focused on empowering the community rather than the policy makers, this book is much more than a folksy agenda for comfort in the crisis. It is a serious plan to reconstruct society in the light of ecological and energetic realities, informed by the best evidence about the vortex of forces influencing the global crisis.

Chamberlin runs along a knife edge between the harsh realities facing the whole of humanity on the one hand, and hope and pragmatic vision on the other, outlining a pragmatic plan for a society-wide adaptation to the energy descent future. Let’s see if we can run along that knife edge; we have nothing to lose.”

~ David Holmgren, co-originator of the Permaculture concept, and author of Future Scenarios: mapping the cultural implications of peak oil and climate change

“Highly readable and well researched - this book is a hugely valuable contribution to Transition thinking. With grace and wit Shaun Chamberlin ably scopes out the combined dangers of peak oil and climate change and shows us what we can do to avoid their worst impacts. Read it and implement its wisdom if you want to help create a liveable future.”

“Humanity is facing a once in a species crisis. We are approaching 7 billion people and appropriating an increasing percentage of the planet’s net primary productivity, posing myriad and complex problems to our future and that of the planet’s ecosystems. Of all the biophysical limits to continuing our current trajectory, energy surplus per capita looms large. And, as cheap, high quality per capita energy availability declines, our current cultural paradigm of competing for conspicuous consumption must end.

In this refreshingly real and hopeful book, Shaun Chamberlin lays out the many aspects of the limits to our growth, and highlights the fact that cultural change is likely our only successful path forward. Throughout, we are offered vision and hope that mobilising locally and nationally towards civic change does not represent a sacrifice of our health or happiness – indeed, Chamberlin points out that it would be a sacrifice to continue on our Business as Usual path.

We undoubtedly face serious biological and biophysical constraints that our forebears did not. The Transition Timeline gives us a guide on how to best use science and culture in adapting to our new situation.”

~ Nate Hagens, Editor of The Oil Drum, and former vice president of the Salomon Brothers and Lehman Brothers investment firms

Endorsements

John Hemming MP, Chairman, All Party Parliamentary Group on Peak Oil

Caroline Lucas, Leader of the Green Party, and MP for Brighton Pavilion

Tim Yeo MP, Chairman, House of Commons Energy and Climate Change Select Committee

Lord Smith of Finsbury, Chairman, Environment Agency

Colin Challen, Founder Chairman, All Party Parliamentary Group on Climate Change

Jeremy Leggett, author, and convenor of the UK Industry Taskforce on Peak Oil

Jonathon Porritt, Founder Director, Forum for the Future

Rob Hopkins, Founder of the Transition Towns movement

Media coverage

Tradable Energy Quotas: A policy framework for peak oil and climate change – The Oil Drum, 24 January

John Hemming MP interviewed on Simon Mayo’s “Drivetime” show (audio) – BBC Radio 2, 24 January

Now they want to ration petrol – Daily Mail, 24 January

Driver Fury at Petrol Ration Plan – Daily Express, 24 January

Prepare for the return of rationing – The Sunday Times, 23 January

Energy rationing would give ‘common purpose’ in cutting carbon emissions – The Ecologist, 19 January

MPs urged to ration fuel or miss carbon emissions targets – BusinessGreen, 19 January

Will smart energy future require rationing? – Greenbang, 19 January

Parliamentary group advocates ‘energy rationing’ – Low Carbon Economy, 19 January

Brits Ponder Fuel Rationing – Time Magazine, 18 January

TEQ backers predict fuel and energy rationing by 2020 (also see poll on TEQs) – Edie.net, 18 January

Quotas ‘would tackle fuel poverty’ – UK Press Association, 18 January

UK lawmakers call for energy rationing with personal fuel quotas – Click Green, 18 January

UK could need fuel rationing before 2020, warns report – Energy Efficiency News, 18 January

British lawmakers propose energy rationing – Financial Times, 18 January

Report calls for energy rationing within the decade – GreenWise Business, 18 January

TEQs: A policy framework for peak oil and climate change – Energy Bulletin, 18 January

Fuel Rationing in U.K. Needed by 2020 to Cut CO2 Emissions, Lawmakers Say – Bloomberg News, 18 January

Shaun Chamberlin interviewed on “Wake Up To Money” show (audio) – BBC Radio 5 Live, 18 January

Blogs

The Peak Oil Crisis: Tradable Energy Quotas – Falls Church News-Press – 26 January

Tradable Energy Quotas launched in the House of Commons – Transition Culture, 24 January

Tradable Energy Quotas – real green shoots of recovery? – Jon Barrett, 24 January

Petrol rationing looms – The Economic Voice, 24 January

If Britain Starts Fuel Rationing, Could U.S. Be Next? – Countercurrents, 22 January

Life, Liberty, And the Pursuit Of the kWh – .plaid, 21 January

Could energy rationing be introduced in the UK? – uSwitch, 21 January

Tradeable Energy Quotas: Rational Action? – SustainAbility, 20 January

Global warming: a threat akin to Nazism? – Elizabeth Royte, 20 January

Carbon and the common good: values in green policy – Climate Safety, 19 January

Rationing returns to Britain? – Dharma, 19 January

Could We See Fuel Rationing by 2020? – TreeHugger, 19 January

With Fuel Rationing On The Way, Can IT Help? – eWeek Europe, 19 January

TEQs: UK Gov’t Tradable Energy Quotas – Ecological Sociology, 18 January

Parliamentary report: Fuel rationing may be necessary by 2020 – Make Wealth History, 18 January

Fuel rationing “could be necessary before 2020″ says report – and we need Green Party policy to solve the problem – Green Party, 18 January

Video from the launch event, January 18th 2011