Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Fuguist.

Odd how sometimes things seem to cluster, or coalesce. This morning I listened to David Attenborough ( http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/programmes/who/david_attenborough.shtml ) tell Radio 4 he now believed that climate change was a real phenomenon. I also read an article in Outside magazine ( http://outside.away.com/index.html ) about a bloke called James Kunstler ( http://www.kunstler.com/ ) who is a mouthpiece for the Oil apocalypse squad.

The theory goes like this. At some point 'Peak Oil' will be reached. This is when 50% of the available oil in the earth is gone. Some say it was last year, some say it will be in 15 years time. But if you take a best case scenario, say 15 years then a steady decline with rising costs of oil, I still don't think that is far enough away for the 'new advanced technologies' which are touted to be on the horizon to save our arses, let alone our grandchildren's.

What is the answer? Neither Kunstler, Attenborough or I for that matter know. New Urbanism? Better Public Transport? More fuel economy? More bikes? Who knows...

My suspicion is an attitude change is needed and this needs to be based in practical social change. We'll see.

www.carsrcoffins.com

http://www.howies.co.uk/

http://www.bikesnotbombs.org/

http://www.carfree.com/

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I think you mean a total revolution not just a change of attitude. Whole of society and way we live will have to be different. Would be a brave politician who tried to lead that!!