[subhed: “Why my climate-blogging sucks“]
Today President Obama makes a speech in the Everglades talking about the effects of climate change on things that we value. The Everglades — like the entire state of Florida are susceptible to sea level rise — thereby brining its waters.
The Everglades are a treasure, and a great location and symbol, ecologically and politically. But as Joe Romm points out at length, climate change is not about the “environment” or a “healthy planet” or somesuch high-minded, altruistic stuff:
Affection and concern for our “precious planet” is misdirected and unrequited. We need to focus on saving ourselves.
Self-defense. It’s about us, and about fundamental blood and guts facts of human existence: whether we can get enough food; whether we have a place to live; whether our shelters can survive the elements; and whether our children will live a relatively easy life, or a hardscrabble, violent life of scarcity.
Don’t get me wrong: Our relationship with nature is one of the fundamental facts of the human soul. Just look at any era of art, music, or poetry and you will find connection to the land, sea, and sky. It’s part of what it means to be human. But with climate change we’re really talking about things lower down on Maslow’s Pyramid — the baser needs of survival.
Meanwhile, most of us find it difficult to even raise the subject of climate change: Only 26% of us actually ever bring it up in conversation. (Even here, most of my climate-mongering lands with a big thud, which squares with my experience — with bona-fide progressives! – in meatspace.)
This makes perfect sense. It’s awkward as hell, for any number of reasons:
- It’s depressing. Yup.
- It’s so huge that we feel that it’s utterly beyond our control. Yes. And powerful interests — perhaps the most powerful special interests on the planet — are arrayed against us.
- We are all “hypocrites” — we all have a carbon footprint, and probably a pretty large one, simply due to living the lives that we know how to lead.
- … which devolves into lifestyle-mongering and one-upmanship, even if we don’t want to! Well I drive a small car, or I eat less/no meat, or etc etc. I mean, even Scott Brown “recycles all the time.”
- We cling to our “climate thing”: That miniscule part of the puzzle we can actually relate to — usually something nature-related. For Jonathan Franzen in his maddeningly half-stupid essay, it’s bird habitat. OK as far as it goes. But not the whole story.
But I keep coming back to this: We have to change systems, not just ourselves. Personal conscience and individual choice plays some part in addressing climate, but it’s not sufficient. We did not ask to be born into a fossil-fuel economy. We did not ask for this particular interaction of economics, politics, and geophysics. You’re not a hypocrite. It’s not your fault.
We have to change systems. That means that — in my strongly held view — the greenest possible thing you can do on “Earth Day” is to write a letter, make a phone call, or schedule an appointment with an influential elected official regarding climate change — as represented by these issues:
- We must put a price on carbon’s ill effects. Advocate for a carbon fee/dividend in Massachusetts.
- Defend, reform, rebuild, and expand the MBTA. Sign up with Transportation for Massachusetts for further actions. (Do we have a volunteer to go to their big Transportation Summit in Worcester on May 1?)
- Lift the cap on solar power production. Utilities are creating a bottleneck in getting household solar panels on line, leaving rooftop and community-based solar-garden projects in the lurch. This will cripple an extremely promising development in the renewable energy economy. Time for them to make the adjustment.
The people who can actually make those big changes are Presidents, Governors, legislators, and corporate leaders. That’s big, systemic change. We’ve got to catch the conscience of the king.
And it’s important to know that we are making actual progress. Last year we had economic growth with lower emissions for the first time ever. We have the President on the United States, many billionaires, and the world’s most highly capitalized corporation on our side. We have more pressure points than we realize.
The byword is to do what we can, as much as we can, as soon as we can. Not for “the earth”. For us.
thebaker says
I thought we just had an Earth Day?
Charley on the MTA says
http://www.google.com
NorthShoreGrandma says
Excellent post, Charley. In my circles, the topic of climate change isn’t avoided, but the conversation quickly veers to personal choices — what you aptly label “lifestyle-mongering and one-upmanship.” For me, this approach is all too familiar: before we moved to the Boston area, North Shore Grandpa and I lived for many years in southern Vermont, starting out in a passive solar house we designed ourselves, with wood heat from a Defiant stove, and so on. I’m glad we had that experience (just as I’m glad to have had the experience — in NYC, even longer ago — of living in what would now be styled a “micro-apartment”), but I’ve also been a political activist of one sort or another since the ’60s, and I know that this type of sniping around the edges, holding one another to ever-higher standards of righteous living, isn’t really the answer. I think a lot of it is expressing honest frustration (and fear), but ultimately that’s no excuse. The three issues you identify seem like a good starting point. Personally, though I can’t attend the Transportation for Mass. conference, I’m going to put some energy into T4MA’s efforts to, as you say, “defend, reform, rebuild, and expand the MBTA.” Sadly, we’re up against not only our Republican governor but much of our Democratic legislative leadership. It’s a high-stakes fight, and as “green” an objective as anything else we can take on right now.
jconway says
I had no idea they existed until now, but I will be sure to get in touch with them. I think part of the problem is the siloing on our side of the aisle, it would be great for BMG to have a better presence with them and for them to have a presence here. But too many activists fall into specialized buckets whether it be for marriage equality, reproductive rights issues, criminal justice reform, health care advocacy, education, or foreign policy. This is the single issue that touches on all of those issues and then some, since it is an existential issue.
It really should be wrapped underneath national or Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness and not consigned to the ghetto of ‘save the whales’ and the EPA. It’s about protecting our existing communities from the disasters of Tacloban and New Orleans, or the disasters that will befall Holland, Venice, and already is eliminating the Maldives. Countries, cultures, and communities gone. Those are the futures at stake. It’s not a niche issue, a silo or a bucket-but a cloud over our collective future.
Christopher says
That’s about the dumbest thing I have heard. With limited possible exceptions where it isn’t feasible there’s no reason I can think of why every new building, whether residential or commercial, shouldn’t be equipped with solar panels. It should be as routine and expected as hooking up a building to the electrical grid, unless there’s a factor I’m completely missing.
Christopher says
…such should be required by state and local building codes. If we can’t go that far there should at least be a hefty tax rebate for businesses and residences which install panels on their roofs. All energy subsidies should be transferred from traditional energy sources to clean and renewable ones. These things just sound to me like the ultimate no-brainers and low hanging fruit.
centralmassdad says
There isn’t a cap on solar production, there is a cap on “net metering” which allows you to sell excess power back to the utility, and get a credit on your bill for that sum. The amount of the credit is capped.
Because the ability to sell power back to the utility is something that makes an investment in solar panels more viable, a cap on that ability effectively reduces investment by making it tougher for any particular project to be “worth it.”
For example, it would be super-easy for me to install a very expensive system on my roof, if I was sure that all of the summertime daytime power produced, that I don’t use because no one is home, would get credited back to me. As it stands, that isn’t so.
But it isn’t like someone goes and asks for a bulding permit to install a big solar panel on their roof, and gets refused because they exceed the cap.
kirth says
It is so. Residential solar PV installations are exempt from the net-metering cap. I get credit for 100% of my excess production year-round.
Trickle up says
Since we live in a capitalist economic system, getting paid for the things we produce (such as electricity) is the difference between producing it or not.
Capping the ability to sell effectively caps the thing itself.
Deep in the weeds, your distinction might be important. At the top level, not.
thegreenmiles says
I’d add a bullet: Any energy bill must include the most offshore wind possible and not subsidize or incentivize coal plants or fracked gas pipelines.
And some tips for talking climate: http://blog.nwf.org/2011/12/tips-for-talking-climate-change-at-the-holiday-party/
thebaker says
Just printed them off!
Thanks thegreenmiles
ramuel-m-raagas says
Thanks for the Matthew Damon flick. [Adonay] bless him for recording an official 2012 radio advertisement endorsing our Senator who beat our Colonel Scott Philip Brown. Yesterday, I drove my car zero nanometers, emitting zero molecules of carbon dioxide. My not driving spans for forty hours running now.