#71: Nate Hagens - Planning for ’The Great Simplification’ of Cities

Nate Hagens is a systems thinker and educator focused on a concept he calls The Great Simplification. He has spent the last 20 years studying the systems we live in like energy, ecology and economics. He teaches at the University of Minnesota and speaks widely on these topics, including on his youtube channel called Nate Hagens and his podcast called The Great Simplification. We discuss: • The Great Simplification and what that means for cities • What the end of fossil fuels means for the world • The importance of scenario planning for the future of cities • Why electric vehicles and renewables are not the answer to climate change • Why a post-growth economy is inevitable in the coming decades We discuss some ideas for what post-growth cities might look like. I will follow up with an episode of more ideas, inspired by this conversation with Nate. Nate is extremely honest and clear about the direction he sees the world going. Some of you listening will likely disagree with his conclusions and may even feel defensive. Of course we’re all free to disagree with each other, but I urge you to keep an open mind and consider seriously what he says and follow up with the resources in the episode description. He goes into these ideas in a lot more depth on his youtube channel and podcast, which are really worth checking out. More of Nate’s content: @thegreatsimplification Thanks for listening! Join the Green Urbanist Weekly newsletter: Substack () Support the Podcast by Donation () Contact Ross () Website () Linkedin () Twitter () Instagram ()