Tzeporah Berman, co-head of the climate and energy campaign at Greenpeace International, gives a TedX talk about the solution to our current and future energy needs:
Founding principles
The Energy [R]evolution is based on five founding principles:
* Increase human well-being without fossil fuels.
* Fair energy access for all, including the 2 billion people that are left without power in our current fossil-fuel based energy system.
* Respect for natural limits: use no more resources the Earth can provide us and don’t emit more than the Earth and the atmosphere can take back (in particular CO2 emissions).
* Phase out dirty, dangerous fuels like coal and nuclear.
* Use proven, existing renewable energy. Every technology described in the scenario already exists and has been proven to work.
How it works
In this scenario, an ambitious energy efficiency program along with massive development of renewable energy happen in parallel, so that by 2050, the global energy system is 95% powered by renewable energy. Energy will move towards a decentralised system using local renewable sources such as wind, solar and geothermal.
We recommend you also watch the following videos:
1. Dr. Helen Caldicott: “Nuclear Power is not the Answer”
2. Amory Lovins looks at the economic problems of nuclear technology and its negative impact on alternative strategies to mitigate climate change:
I agree with all of the above, but want to reiterate one of my favorite caveats: climate change intervention will be heavily coopted by “Disaster Capitalists” (Naomi Cline, Shock Doctrine).
False conspiracy: Climate change is a hoax manufactured to justify a vast geoengineering and genetic engineering scheme to increase government power and confiscate private property.
Real conspiracy: Climate change is a real problem that will be cynically exploited to justify a vast geoengineering and genetic engineering scheme to increase corporate power and wealth.
I tend to think we are looking about natural climate cycles here, not man-made changes, but with or without climate change, we should be smart enough to realize that we are being had by an energy monopoly that has NO notion to let any energy technology emerge that is not firmly under their control.
Anything that’s too big to do in our own backyards is OK for them. So we have hydrocarbons and atomic energy, and we have huge hydroelectric projects and increasingly large windmills. All of those are under the control of big finance and aren’t accessible to ourselves. We buy … they sell … in perpetuity.
The mix of their chosen technologies is both highly polluting (oil, coal) and highly dangerous (uranium). Those that aren’t either polluting or dangerous are made so large that they fit into a “mix” of monopolized energy that we have no chance of changing.
So what to do?
miniaturize and adapt – do it ourselves – strive to become energy independent – provide technology that is adaptable to single household size and to small community size – organize for distributed energy production.
For sure, the monopoly will not give up easily, but we can demand that polluting technologies are phased out from their “mix”. Abandon atomic energy, severely limit hydrocarbon based fuels.
Let’s just take solar. It is a safe, non-polluting technology and it can be used in all settings, from the industrial to the single household. Concentrating solar thermal technology can supply the high power electricity needed for industrial applications. It can be scaled down to community size and even to farm and household applications, where space is not an issue. Solar panels can be on everyone’s roof. But the conversion needs to be driven forward. Not because the climate is changing but because it’s good economics, it’s good environmental stewardship, and it makes sense.
Who wants to live in a world where you can’t breathe the air because it’s full of soot and you can’t eat the food because it has a radioactive glow to it?
Let’s do it. Let’s give out grandchildren a world that isn’t toxic.