EARTHFUTURE.COM by Guy Dauncey

When we stand on the edge of the present, looking out towards the future, the looming clouds and lightning strikes of imminent climate change make for a very ominous warning. There’s no mistaking the need for alarm.
But being alarmed never got us anywhere, unless it was associated with action. When a fire alarm rings, we know what to do: Evacuate the building and apply water. But what happens when Earth’s alarm bells ring? We can’t evacuate the planet.
And here’s what’s so amazing. Within my soul, I carry a permanent vision of Earth as a shining paradise where war and poverty exist only in the history books, troubled humans have finally learned to work together and love is a deeply felt presence in everyone’s heart.
I have never thought of this as a fantasy or daydream. I experience it as solid knowledge of what can be – what will be. For all my 40 adult years, ever since I emerged from the emotional isolation of British boarding schools, it has never left me. It is like a seed that lies inert in the desert, a deep, evolutionary potential awaiting the water that will allow it to burst forth and blossom. Some may think this a strange vision to hold in such troubled times, but I know I am not alone.
In practical terms, the vision finds expression in neighbourhoods filled with trees and greenery, backyards full of food, rooftops covered in solar panels and streets full of cyclists, pedestrians and roller-bladers. Electric buses quietly connect the distances, using the energy of wind, tide and deep geothermal rocks. People talk to each other and children play together in the open without a thought for TV. The whole community has become a school.
In this future world, global warming is a threat from the past, not the future. It still plays out its stormy games, but in a world that no longer burns fossil fuels or tears down forests, thereby having removed its primary causes. One day, in the far, distant future, our planet’s climate will return to relative normal.
The threat from global climate change is so dire that there can be no solution except to extract our heads from our fossil-fuelled, competitive, consumer state of mind and step into this vision of a peaceful, sustainable future. The seeds of our planet’s salvation lie dormant within our hearts and the water they need to blossom is all around us.
Wherever there is a garden, we could be growing fresh, wholesome organic food without the need for fossil-fuel-based chemicals and fertilizers, replacing food shipped up by plane or truck from California and Mexico. Wherever there is a family, there could be dinner parties with friends who are working together to step into a climate-friendly future. Wherever there is a building, whether it is a store, art gallery or factory, there could be a team of people working to find a way to heat it without oil or gas. Wherever there is a road, it could be full of pedestrians and cyclists. We will have to work to reclaim the space now allocated for fossil-fuelled trucks and cars. We will have to go to council to argue for carbon taxes, road tolls and long-distance bike trails, but when we work together, small victories encourage larger dreams.
Wherever there are motorists – and whom among us isn’t one? – there could be teams of people working to bring electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles to town. They could be calling the car manufacturers, placing advance orders and urging city councils to do likewise, as the city of Austin, Texas, has done with its $1 million commitment to help the first purchasers of plug-in hybrid cars and its North American project to collect advance orders for the cars. (See www.pluginpartners.org.)
Our planet’s alarm bells are ringing and to answer them we must step forward and apply water to the fire. The vision will then blossom, the threat of climate change will diminish and we will discover the amazing inheritance that awaits us.

Guy Dauncey is president of the BC Sustainable Energy Association www.bcsea.org and author of Stormy Weather: 101 Solutions to Global Climate Change, New Society Publishers, 2001. www.earthfuture.com.