Imagine a World...

A speech delivered by Amory B. Lovins on August 8, 2007, outlining a vision for a sustainable future achieved through integrative engineering, resource efficiency, and the phasing out of fossil fuels and nuclear energy.

• The Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) uses a parable about the unintended consequences of DDT in Borneo to argue that solving problems without understanding systemic connections often creates new problems. RMI aims to use "hidden connections" to create multiplying solutions that avoid creating new issues.
• Lovins envisions a future energy landscape where oil, coal, and nuclear energy are phased out and replaced by lower-cost, lower-risk alternatives. These include energy efficiency, distributed renewables, combined-heat-and-power, and advanced biofuels that do not use cropland and move carbon from the air to topsoil.
• The document describes a vision of sustainable transportation and urban design featuring cars with fuel efficiency of 120 to 200 mpg that emit only pure drinking water or nothing, alongside the end of mandated or subsidized urban sprawl.
• Lovins advocates for an industrial shift toward a circular economy based on biomimicry and integrative engineering, where industries take nothing, waste nothing, and do no harm, effectively ending "unnatural capitalism."
• The vision includes a global state where carbon emissions decline profitably because saving fuel is cheaper than buying it, leading to a stabilized global climate and the recovery of forests, oceans, and wildlife.

APA

Lovins, A. B. (2007). Imagine a World... RMI. https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_ImagineAWorldOCR.pdf

Chicago

Lovins, Amory B. Imagine a World... RMI, 2007. https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_ImagineAWorldOCR.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite press release |last1=Lovins |first1=Amory B. |title=Imagine a World... |publisher=RMI |date=8 August 2007 |url=https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_ImagineAWorldOCR.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@misc{lovins2007imagine, author = {Lovins, Amory B.}, title = {{Imagine a World...}}, publisher = {RMI}, year = {2007}, month = aug, url = {https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_ImagineAWorldOCR.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }