Big, multi-generation projects like cathedrals or other public works test a community’s initiative, skills, wealth, luck and other capabilities—including, sadly, indentured or forced labor. Plus, because they often take hundreds of years to finish, they test faith and belief in a positive future. Can we make this project happen regardless of circumstances?
Though they didn’t require generations, I’d put retooling U.S. industry for World War II and the U.S. moon landings in the same cathedral-type category because they also require huge, conscious, collective and organized shifts toward a common goal by thousands of people in hundreds of industries.
Of course, we’re now facing a problem and project far greater than anything that came before it—transitioning to non-fossil energy sources to reduce CO2 emissions and the impact of human-created global warming. We’re also back on the hundreds-of-years schedule because it will take at least that long for any emissions reduction efforts to put a dent the CO2 we’ve built up in Earth’s atmosphere.
We cover several efforts in this issue’s “Building green” cover article and in many other recent stories. Some are window dressing and some useful, but experimentation will shake out which are most useful. The most popular lately seems to be green-hydrogen, which uses excess solar and wind capacity to electrolyze water, and store their transient energy as hydrogen, However, despite all the attention it’s getting, many technical and scaling hurdles remain.
Of course, all these sustainability efforts and innovations raise more questions. Why just attack the symptom? Why get more efficient at overusing energy and resources? How about using less in the first place?
I’m aware that online suggestions to not cool our dwellings below 78-80 °F are routinely deluged by hate mail. So, let me hear it because, as much as I too love the rush of coming into cool air from the heat outside, I haven’t turned on my central air in seven years. I grew up without air-conditioning, so I try to remember that, as well as everyone in previous generations, who had no option but to live without it.
I also don’t heat my house above 64 °F in winter. That, and working at home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, are doubtless why I’m wearing out more sweaters, sweatpants, knit hats and fuzzy slippers in recent years.
I’d recommend that others try to do the same or similar. However, just like faith, I know austerity can’t be imposed from outside. It must be self-imposed. Each individual must decide to join a group effort, which is another reason why we’re likely doomed. Maybe we can trick ourselves into believing sustainability makes us cool or more attractive?
For now, too many people remain in denial, and we can’t solve a problem we refuse to acknowledge. Too many of us seem more concerned with our immediate comfort than the prospect of our kids and grandkids neck-deep in floodwaters, wildfires and agriculture-killing heatwaves. The heck with them! I don’t like feeling sweaty!
It’s quite possible that global warning can’t be stopped, though most of these rationalizations seem to come from parties seeking to justify not acting. If my interest was only sporting, I’d bet my $2 that they’re right. However, the stakes of ecological catastrophe are so high that I think we must take our best shot at all CO2 reduction measures, net-zero targets and other sustainability efforts, just in case there’s a chance we can succeed. I don’t think anyone in the midwestern U.S. wants to find room for millions of refugees from Florida and other coastal areas when the ice slides off of Greenland in about 20 minutes, right?
However, as I said, it will take lots of willpower to make these changes, and from what I’ve seen so far, I don’t think we have it.
