It’s not (always) easy being green
8 June 2008
I’ve just finished watching the environmental documentary The 11th Hour and I’ve been left in tears. This incredibly powerful examination of the environmental problems facing the world today has shaken me to my very centre. Going even further than Al Gore’s Oscar-winning An Inconvenient Truth, the film exposes just how much danger we as humans are putting ourselves in through the extreme impact we are having on the planet. Never has climate change seemed so real to me, and never has it seemed such a genuine threat, not just to our way of life but our very existence.
It wasn’t the scenes of despair-inducing environmental devastation that caused me to well up, however; it was the affirmation that we, as a species, have the ability to do something about climate change. According to the film, the technology already exists to reduce human impact on the Earth by 90 percent. When put like that the task of halting our impending self-induced doom doesn’t seem so impossible.
We live in an age of industrialisation, globalisation and advanced technology, and while this means that huge forces influence our lives in ways we can only struggle to comprehend, it is also the case that virtually every decision can have an effect on our environment, from turning on the light in the morning to brushing our teeth at night. We can effect change in each of these small aspects of our lives without too much hassle or sacrifice, and while individually they might seem relatively insignificant, if enough people take part they can all add up to one planet changing whole.
Of course there are some other, larger issues we need to seriously consider as well, things that require determination and a willingness to make a major lifestyle change. That’s why it’s not always easy being green. But by taking things one step at a time, perhaps we can ease the transition to a greener, more sustainable way of living, becoming so used to making environmentally conscious decisions that they don’t seem like a chore. These decisions won’t always be the simplest or cheapest but in the long term they will probably be they best.
So with this blog I intend to document my quest to green up my life without completely rejecting the modern world and resorting to moving to a shack in the middle of nowhere. It will require willpower and an acceptance of limitation of choice but when the solution is to generally become less materialistic and self-centred I would be ashamed to imagine I could not achieve these aims.
It was the realisation, while watching The 11th Hour, that we do have the power to make a difference that turned my fear and anger into determination. The human race has achieved so much in its relatively short history, and much of that has come in just the last 100 years. Surely we have it in us to rise to the challenges presented by climate change and stop it before it’s too late. Perhaps we really can save the world.
