Imagine driving a very long distance: You're driving from Cape Town to Paris, to Beijing, and back. - You're only going to refuel the car - do no other maintenance. If you're lucky, you won't need to replace the windshield washer fluid. For the first 5000km, there is no problem. After, your oil starts collecting too much grit from gears rubbing together, and starts acting like a sandpaper grinding away your engine internals. However, you won't start noticing this for a long while. Your engine will just get progressively louder, almost un-noticeably so. After 20 000 km, your air filter will get clogged and you'll start wearing your engine faster. 30 000 km and your break pads could start wearing. With each missed milestone, your car will start feeling the slow affects of mal-treatment. One day, you'll be driving down with plenty of plans for the day. Bang! You will slowly roll to a halt. If ever someone would ask, you would say, "It's been like this forever, it really couldn't have been prevented."
This is precisely what we have been doing with the planet. We've been running it, but only looking at one or two of its symptoms. We need energy, or the fuel. CO2 emissions are really only like the windshield washer fluid. There is a plethora of other symptoms that we need to look at. The most important of these are:
Waste & Consumption
Water & Oceans
Climate Change
Biodiversity & land use
Energy production, consumption, and transmission
Energy is inter-related into each of these issues, and is by no means the biggest issue currently on hand. However, we have quite a bit of control over it - and we can use it to drive change in each and every one of these other issues. Waning away from foreign oil now can solve an eminent economic crisis - but we need to diversify, and have an all of the above attitude now - with greater and greater investment in green and clean energy infrastructure, research, and development.
There is not going to be a secret to having greener energy management. We will simply have to look at the thousand of different ways that we need to change our point of view, and understand how each single change now will pay dividends in the long run.
We need to start changing our oil, tires, break pads, air filter, engine coolant, and start doing the regular maintenance necessary to extend the longevity of the earth. We may not know where we are going - we can't predict with great accuracy what will happen to the planet, with all its external influences, but we do know how to make sure we get there, and not break down along the way.
This is precisely what we have been doing with the planet. We've been running it, but only looking at one or two of its symptoms. We need energy, or the fuel. CO2 emissions are really only like the windshield washer fluid. There is a plethora of other symptoms that we need to look at. The most important of these are:
Waste & Consumption
Water & Oceans
Climate Change
Biodiversity & land use
Energy production, consumption, and transmission
Energy is inter-related into each of these issues, and is by no means the biggest issue currently on hand. However, we have quite a bit of control over it - and we can use it to drive change in each and every one of these other issues. Waning away from foreign oil now can solve an eminent economic crisis - but we need to diversify, and have an all of the above attitude now - with greater and greater investment in green and clean energy infrastructure, research, and development.
There is not going to be a secret to having greener energy management. We will simply have to look at the thousand of different ways that we need to change our point of view, and understand how each single change now will pay dividends in the long run.
We need to start changing our oil, tires, break pads, air filter, engine coolant, and start doing the regular maintenance necessary to extend the longevity of the earth. We may not know where we are going - we can't predict with great accuracy what will happen to the planet, with all its external influences, but we do know how to make sure we get there, and not break down along the way.
No comments:
Post a Comment