The greatest challenge of our time is to avoid climate chaos. The
earth is our irreplaceable home, and if we destroy it, we will have no other
place to go. At the rate we’re spitting out greenhouse gases, within a few
decades we may raise the earth’s temperature to the point where the planet
becomes inhospitable to human life. All the money in the world will be
worthless on a planet where the grain belts have withered and oceans have
turned deadly acidic.
We need to start making a rapid and full-scale transition to a new
economy powered by clean and renewable sources of energy. The sun, wind, and
heat of the earth are capable of providing us with all the energy we need. The
main obstacle to date has been the lack of political will, whereby a band of
powerful corporations, lobbyists, and compliant politicians reject the hard
truths of science and even the clear decrees of rational self-interest.
We must stand up
against moneyed interests and press our governments and civil groups to
expedite the transition to a clean-energy future. Our window of opportunity is
closing, and we must act fast before it slams shut. We need a sense of urgency,
as if our clothes were on fire, an urge to act to preserve this precious
planet—a miracle in a sea of cosmic dust, a blue-green pearl teeming with
living forms.
