How To Save Our Planet
The title of this book is unsubtle and the ultra-simple way the book has been written also offers no place for ambiguity or nuance. Even the subtitle – “The Facts” gives no wiggle room. Professor Mark Maslin wrote this book during Covid lockdown and he’s pulling no punches.
The author is a professor of Earth System Science at University College London and clearly knows his stuff. He has chosen to write in very short simple sentences (with lots of references tucked away at the back for those interested in fact-checking). His subject is clear. Facts about the current state of the planet and his view of what needs doing about it. All done in a very stripped-back no-nonsense style that took me a only a few hours to read from cover to cover.
There’s a number of these books doing the rounds at the moment and they cover similar ground, albeit in slightly different ways. For How to Save our Planet I’m going to focus on the steps individuals can take because Maslin lists fifteen and I quite fancy using them as a personal check list over the next few months. Before I get to that I thought I’d describe two things in this book that I haven’t read before, and which I found interesting.
The first is a chapter (5) called Potential Futures – Nightmare or Ecotopia, in which the author has a go at describing two visions of the year 2100. The nightmare scenario is full of grim depth and I was interested about whether it will inspire action (which I assume was the attention) or turn people off. This is a careful line to tread and I am completely open and curious about its likely impact. Part of me thinks it is a very helpful, clear description of what awaits our children (grand and great-grand children in my case) if we don’t act. But also part of me wonders whether the pure grimness of it just induces denial and/or depression, neither of which are likely to spark action. The ecotopia scenario is certainly a welcome treat for the eyes and mind when it comes, but it is only a fraction of the size of the nightmare scenario so may not be enough. I would have like ti have seen more of that, more hope, a brighter north star to head for.
The second aspect of the book I hadn’t seen before was a very specific set of recommendations for how the world should be governed going forward (early in Chapter 9). Maslin describes what needs to change in those big international institutions if we are going to make this work, such as UN, WTO, IMF, GATT, World Bank etc. I didn’t find it was something I could personally get on the pitch and help with but I was heartened to read that this sort of thing is being discussed. I guess I believe it is going to be the hardest nut to crack, because it requires us to act as one world and downgrade our local and national agendas.
So, in the spirit of being an eco-citizen, here the fifteen steps the author would like each of us to take. Some of them feel like a group of actions or a theme (I’ve marked these with a *), but you get his gist.
Talk about climate change
Switch to a more vegetable base diet
Switch to a renewable energy supplier
Make your home energy efficient efficient*
Use cars less
Stop flying
Divest your pension from fossil fuels
Divest your investments from fossil fuels
Refuse/reject excessive consumption*
Reduce what you use*
Reuse as much as you can*
Recycle as much as you can*
Use you consumer choice*
Protest
Vote
As I read his descriptions (there a few sentences on each to help understanding) I was mentally auditing my contribution so far. The results were not great but that wasn’t the point. What I liked was the clarity and simplicity. This could be a recipe for being an Eco-Citizen and so I thought I would create a checklist for myself, work on it and then report back with another article at the end of 2021. So watch this space…
PS, my initial self-audit was that:
I am doing well at items 1 and 15
I am improving in item 2
I am trying hard and sometimes failing at 9,10,11,12,13 (these all seem similar)
I have done well at 5 and 6 but only recently because of Covid
I am nowhere with the rest