| What makes the whole energy/ climate change issue | | | | resources to get up to speed, we need to fully cost |
| so difficult for people to engage with? I believe it is | | | | fossil fuels to include the cost of the damage caused |
| because it really does challenge us to ignore our | | | | by their use. We use fossil fuels because they seem |
| selfish desire for an "easy life" in order to give future | | | | "cheap", but money is a purely human invention and |
| generations a chance of having a liveable planet. | | | | the concept of "cheap" means something different to |
| The science of climate change isn't new: the | | | | each of us. To my mind, how can something be |
| greenhouse effect was first described in 1824, the | | | | "cheap" if the cost is a trashed environment? |
| first prediction that man's activities could impact the | | | | I do not believe that ordinary people are happy with |
| climate in 1908. The first claims that our activities | | | | the idea that by engaging in their everyday activities |
| were afflicting the climate came in the 1950's and | | | | they are destroying the future life of the planet. The |
| over the past 30 years the evidence has simply | | | | complexity of the change required may be difficult to |
| become stronger and stronger. | | | | imagine: it is hard enough for a smoker or a drinker |
| The real problem is that there is enough oil and coal | | | | to imagine what life might be like without their |
| left in the ground that if we dig it up and burn it, the | | | | chosen vice. But, if human consciousness is to have |
| mean temperature will rise to levels that were last | | | | any meaning at all, then we must make that change. |
| seen when there was no human life on the planet. | | | | The money system is the only thing we have that is |
| Whether human life could survive that is open to | | | | powerful enough to deliver in the timeframes that |
| much debate; personally, I doubt it very much. We, | | | | we seem to need. We need to reinvent how we |
| the current generation, are faced with a choice; find | | | | account for economic activity so that we are |
| a way to reduce our carbon pollution or condemn | | | | rewarded for living with the planet, not on it. |
| future generations to a wrecked planet. | | | | It is going to take a Herculean effort to overcome |
| Fossil fuels are extremely potent and flexible; they | | | | the issue but the great thing about being human is |
| have had the luxury of a 168 million year | | | | how quickly we can react and change, once we have |
| concentration process after all. However, few people | | | | decided that we want to do so. Hercules was once |
| buy petrol, diesel or even A1 aviation fuels. They buy | | | | faced with the choice of virtue or vice. Ever lasting |
| the ability to travel from a to b, light and heat for | | | | fame or a life of earthly pleasure. In these days of |
| their homes or offices, a holiday abroad. In order to | | | | reality TV and X-factor style competition, surely we |
| even up the play field for renewable energy | | | | would all like to be humankind superheroes? |