Heads, Sand and a bit of Regret
Tuesday, March 8, 2011 at 1:41PM 
There are days I wish I had just been reading Hello magazine and seen if Katie Price is happy now she’s left her boyfriend, or got back with him or which ever she’s done.
So relaxing. All is well with the world.
But I don’t. I’m a fool to myself. I’m somehow drawn to try and find out what is going on in the actual world. Stupid, stupid mistake.
I'd be the first to admit that if we all suddenly drove electric cars then all the problems besetting the world would be instantly solved. It’s obviously just a small part of a much larger change that needs to take place.
Unlike environmental evangelists I’m actually rather good at burying my head in the sand. I know some terrible things are happening, I try to do my bit but it all seems a bit too enormous and what can I possibly do to make a difference? Better not to think about it to much and stumble on as best as possible.
We can look back at our parents and think, well, it was tough for them, but it’s got much better for us.
They in turn could look at their parents and realise things had improved, electric lights, mains sewerage, gas cookers. My grandparents could look back at their parents, in my case peasant farmers in the Welsh borders, and think they had a better life in the city.
However we are the first generation in a few centuries who can look at our kids and think, ‘Oh Lordy, it’s going to be so much tougher for them than it has been for us.’
The scale of the problems building up for all of us is truly enormous, I still believe they are not impossible to overcome with ingenuity, sacrifice and effort, but it’s not going to be easy.
Having just listened to an interview with a man called Lester Brown, it was hard not to end up being a little anxious. Brown is a long term environmentalist, I say long term, he started working in this area when even I was a little baby, so he’s been studying the subject for some time.
I feel ashamed I haven’t heard of him before, although I now realise I have heard a lot about his work.
He is the founder of the Worldwatch Institute (http://www.worldwatch.org/) and he’s published dozens of books on agriculture, the environment and population.
What he says is at once chilling and encouraging. Everything I had a vague feeling of disquiet about he clarifies and explains.
We’re not just running out of oil, we’re running out of water and land that can sustain crops. There is now ample evidence from around the world that climate change is having an effect on our ability to produce food in the amounts we need to.
Rain patterns are changing and land that once used to supply food starts to fail.
I have read about the possibility of a drought in China, I thought it was a possibility, it's not. It's already happening right now.
China is using water from fossil aquifers to irrigate their fields. I didn’t even know there was such a thing. A fossil aquifer is a water source that is finite, water that’s been resting in the depths of the earth for millions of years. When it runs out, like oil, there’s no replenishment, the crops fail. And as we all know, China needs to grow a fairly chunky amount of food.
So the Chinese will need to start importing grain, the price will go up, the exporting nations start to restrict the exports, the world gets a little tense.
The USA is a major grain exporter but if they start shipping truly gargantuan amounts to China, everything gets thrown out of whack. And the USA can’t really say no because China owns most of the USA’s debt, and that is a lot of money. Trillions of dollars. So to say our present day head in the sand, borrow the money and we’ll sort it later attitude is a little head in the sand-ish is a bit of an understatement.
As Mr Brown so aptly put it, "we're doing exactly the same thing as Enron, leaving costs off the books. Consuming today with no concern for tomorrow is not a winning philosophy."
As for electric cars, the sooner the better no doubt. The price of oil is clearly going to go up further and faster than even I expected, but I now feel we really should have been doing so much more for so much longer. Back in the 1970‘s when I first because aware that our habit of ravaging the planet was probably a bit short term, I really tried to live differently. However events and habits meant I did less and less until a few years ago. I’m not an environmentalist, I’m not preaching from some position of knowledge. There’s a big chunk of landfill with my name on it. I have behaved just like 99% of people in the developed world in the last 30 years and made a right mess. I’ve had a great time, travelled the world, eaten wonderful food, slept in amazing houses, used well stocked and cheap supermarkets, driven powerful, oil thirsty cars. I don’t even have a leg hair to stand on, let alone a leg. The only possible difference now is that I can see my behavior wasn’t very enlightened, I accept that I have to change. I was hoping I wouldn’t have to change that much this soon, but it looks like I’m in for a shock. Probably not as much shock as some though.
Hey ho. Have a lovely day.
Reader Comments (16)
Let's sit upon the carpet and sing sad songs. Thanks Rob, I feel so much better now. lol
Hi Robert
I believe the fifth word in the fourth paragraph be 'last' rather than 'first'.
Hi again Robert
I believe their should be a 'should' between the ninth and tenth word in my earlier comment.
no, 'would' should be 'wouldn't'
Hello again!
I meant in the second sentence of my earlier comment. I'll get my coat!
Interesting musings. Seems like you have hit the 'existential crisis' stage! Are you having nightmares in which you accidentally kill your children?!
Mike - your a complete arse!
In the field of international security, the notion that we'll be facing a number of "resource wars" in the 21st century has been floating around for some little while. Water supplies have the potential to be a big problem (move to Scotland while you still can!). Various natural resources that are used in microchips and other electronics may well run low. One of the most under-reported stories of the past 12 months has been the fact that there have been food riots in both Africa and S.E. Asia.
It's a tricky situation. There are things that can be done and, frankly, blame for the fact that they aren't being done can't purely be laid at the door of the political Right and the dreaded International Capitalism (says a Right Wing International Capitalist...). People need to be far more open-minded about nuclear. Europe also needs to get over its aversion to GM crops (which is having the knock-on impact of making sure that Africa and large parts of Asia can't look to GM without destroying their export markets). We need to stop investing in biofuels - corn ethanol is a massive boondoggle, as well as an encouragement to farmers to re-purpose productive arable land.
The fact is - and I get the impression you perhaps tacitly accept this, though I don't want to put words in your mouth - that it is very difficult to change the behaviour and assumptions wholesale of a very large number of people. I honestly think that the only way forward with these sorts of issues is to put most of the emphasis on a scientific-technological approach. Hectoring people hasn't worked and there's no reason to believe that it's going to. Maybe it should work. But that's just how it is. I find it startling that the prospect of the electric car hasn't been sold better. Isn't that meant to be the sort of thing we've been dreaming about since we were children? Isn't it a bold science fiction future - today. It should be sold to the public as such. That's my view, anyway. If you want to win the argument, you need to get people excited with possibilities. The bottom line is that too often people can come over as neo-luddites with an inherent Left Wing axe to grind. George Monbiot and co. are never, ever going to sell this sort of thing to Middle England.
Will - shouldn't that be "you're a complete arse" and not "your a complete arse"? Sorry to be pedantic......
Make the electric cars into flying-electric-cars, and then you'll get some attention!
"Make the electric cars into flying-electric-cars, and then you'll get some attention!"
And preferably laser guns that make "Pyoo! Pyoo!" noises. But that can be the promise of things to come.
Thanks, Robert. I enjoyed that in a downbeat Eeyore kind of way.
i'm a complete arse
lol Will
Having recently become a father, I have been spending a lot of time walking down the same paths of thought. For the entire history of our species we have been at the mercy of the environment and, specifically, the climate. In an astonishingly short period of time that situation has reversed. The period from recognising the potenital of a resource to exhausting is remarkably short. But .. I have been lucky - luckier than any previous generation of my family. My standard of living vastly exceeds that even my recent ancestors. It has allowed me to live a life of astonishing richness and it is painful that my children will not have that opportunity. I have been greedy for what life has had to offer and slow to appreciate the consequences. The fact that it was wrong will not prevent me from missing it.
Interesting. I didn't know China was doing the same as India. In India the government subsides petrol to run water pumps for farmers sucking up ancient water depoists deep underground. Every year the farmers have to reach down that little bit deep and therefore need bigger pumps. When the pumps can't reach, these people will starve..
I see North America is slowly getting itself in serious trouble over water shortages in some States.
By cutting down the South America rainforest this is slowly causing weather patterns to alter in the North. Causing droughts.
USA needs to wake up and protect the rainforest before it gets a dry, parched feeling in its throat!