Energy
Where Do We Go From Here?
The kinds of energy we use and the way we obtain them have a pervasive effect on our quality of life, whether we’re affluent city dwellers or rural peasants. The saying “you are what you eat” could equally be applied to the kinds of energy on which we rely. As long as the developed nations of the world are dependent on fossil fuels, all of our actions will be driven by unhealthy relationship with their suppliers.
In these first years of the 21st century there is some cause for optimism. First, there is a growing awareness of the fragility of our environment and an apparent willingness to make changes in the way we live to protect it. More citizens are aware of the impacts of his or her actions on the world as a whole. Gradually, citizens of the richer nations are realizing that they must change the way they live and change their consumption of scarce resources.
Second, many nations of the world are translating citizens’ growing personal awareness into political action. The general agreement reached by most of the industrialized nations of the world to drastically cut their greenhouse emissions by 2012 under the Kyoto Protocol, is a good example of a progressive energy policy. There are a number of other international agreements governing energy production and consumption which signal important changes in the way the world looks at how we power our vehicles and run our industries.
Third, the innovative technologies of the past few decades are beginning to offer us some very attractive alternative forms of energy. As individual consumers begin to truly understand the importance of sustainability and renewability as well as the eventual affordability of solar and wind power, fossil fuels will begin to lose their edge. This is already happening in places like San Francisco, California where voters recently supported a measure to install as many solar panels in that city as the entire nation does each year.
The remarkable thing about energy is how it affects every aspect of our lives. As a result, we can make personal decisions about our energy use that have the potential to affect the world as a whole.