Gary's views

Gary's weekly views

Each week an article by Gary has appeared in the Plympton Plymstock and Ivybridge News in South West Devon. The articles are published here

SAVE THE PLANET

An elderly man was recently sentenced to 15 years in jail. “But your honour, I’m 87 years old, I can’t possibly do all that!”

“Well, just do what you can,” the judge replied.
Helping to save our planet is like that. It is possible to be overwhelmed with the sheer scale of the environmental disaster that threatens us and to take the view that it is all too much for us to do, so we end up doing nothing. What’s the point of me recycling if my neighbour doesn’t? What’s the point of Britain reducing carbon emissions if America doesn’t?

But we all have to do what we can.

As I have mentioned before, I have become convinced, thanks largely to the evidence produced by the Marine Biological Association in Plymouth, that global warming is genuinely happening and that we humans are probably causing it with all of the carbon we have been pumping into the atmosphere since the industrial revolution and that this is likely to have dire consequences for our planet. As the people of China and India start to enjoy the cars and fridges that we all take for granted, so the problem will get worse. The Attenborough Doomsday scenario could easily kick in sooner than we think.

The only solution is to reduce our carbon emissions: i.e. live in a way that uses less fossil fuels, gas oil and coal. How do we do that? Travel less in our own cars, or buy a more energy efficient car; insulate our house more effectively so it doesn’t take as much to heat it; recycle because it takes a lot less energy to make a Pepsi can from used cans than to start from scratch. If we are really ambitious we can explore the use of solar panels and micro-generation of energy from renewable sources.

At the same time we must increase pressure on government to make environmental issues a priority and to encourage them to advocate for this around the world, so that new enforceable international agreements on carbon reductions are made and kept.

Friends of the Earth have calculated that we need to save 3% of our energy emissions each year to stop global warming reaching the point that almost anything could happen. To me that sounds manageable, something we could all have a crack at, something that could even be fun! I am going to try and do this. Will you?

posted by Nigel on Monday, June 12, 2006