Yes, “By all that’s holy, think about what you do!” we cry as the ageing gas of past fires thickens with the new – smothering the living mass beneath. Once, a vast complexity of species inhaled and exhaled, creating a singular being – a terrain and its atmosphere.
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Only connect. We must instantly end the burning, so that the singular being, of which humanity is but one small part, can continue to live and breathe. All the offered dispensations – sequestration, regeneration and so forth, are futile, unless first, we end the burning.
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Once we have put out the fires of both life and fossilised life, then we can look around to discover how best to live inside what remains of living cycles and within dramatically shrunken energy supplies. We’ll learn from our terrains, how best to eat and excrete, live and die, sing and let sing and by our rations of soil and settlement, to make appropriate tribute in return.
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First, we have a great upheaval – all that the fires have given us must end – the family car, aviation, massive shipping, suburbia, commuter culture, the super market, internet shopping, profligate manufacturing, super-human weapons of war… All those things need energy and materials beyond the capacity of a regenerating Earth.
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Claims for the virtue, or vice of various farming systems; of people’s diets; of techniques for “sequestration” and “regeneration”, are all futile if they distract from the urgency of what we face. That is, abandonment of the ways we live today and rapid adoption of ways, in which both work and pleasure are walking distances from everyone’s door. Having removed the need for personal transport, we can more easily find ways to live within our means. In countries such as the UK, personal transport is by far the largest consumer of energy. In many parts of the world, it is the least. In the UK, only a hundred years ago, it was also the least. For most, it was zero. Then, manufacturing outstripped everything. Manufacturing is created by household demand. There, we have two simple lessons. Most say, it’s an impossible and inappropriate lesson. If they are right, then they must accept the mass extinction of nearly all the species, among which, our own has evolved. That means our own extinction. This is not far off. It has already begun. I think that even seventy-year olds, such a as myself, will live to see great tragedies unfold. It is too late for a planned transition. Every year, since the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, CO.2 emissions have continued to rise – dipping slightly in recession – shadowing the expansions of GDPs and GWP. Today, they are over 60% higher than in 1992. Very soon, they will double. Anyone who looks to governments and corporations to find solutions, is plainly crazy. The household holds all the cards.
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