It’s easy to be defeatist about the fate of our planet. The climate crisis continues, extinctions are in full force, forests are disappearing, water cycles are collapsing and pollution is choking cities and creating ocean dead zones. And there’s also US President Donald Trump, who thinks the science behind climate change is “with jobs“.
But I refuse to be too down. Green energy technologies have already advanced so far and become so cheap that not even Trump can stop them, especially if China is determined to conquer the world with low-carbon technologies.
Call me a prisoner of hope, but pessimism is the enemy of action. So in this spirit, we bring you five reasons to have at least a little hope for the future of our planet.
Reason one: nature is coming back in many places. Even in the most toxic landscapes, it adapts, evolves and reclaims its own territory. Wolves roam Europe and tigers multiply in India. I am not saying that we should stop fearing the loss of biodiversity, but the good news is that nature is not so fragile. And in many parts of the world we give it more space to do its thing. For example, farmers in some regions leave the land to nature.
Reason two: the population bomb is being defused. We used to think that the ongoing baby boom was the main threat to the planet. Almost every measure to stop him was justified. In 1983, the United Nations awarded its population prize to the architect of brutally enforced China one child policy. But today they have couples half as many children like half a century ago – by choice. It turns out that trusting people works better than coercion. Today, the fear in much of the world is extremely low birth rates and population decline.
Reason three: engineering fixes to environmental threats can and do work. When the Climate Change Convention was adopted in 1992, there were only a handful of small wind turbines on a hill in California, solar panels were incredibly expensive devices developed for space travel, and no one had yet imagined the rise of electric cars. Thirty years on, more than 40 percent of the world’s electricity is produced low-cost low-carbon technologies. Change is still not fast enough, but our global dependence on fossil fuels is ending.
Reason four: “top stuff” is happening. Our modern world is becoming less demanding on materials. In this century, the UK’s consumption of materials – in food, metals, fossil fuels and so on – has fallen from 16 tonnes a year. up to 11 tons per head.
Why? Modern manufacturing makes much more for less. And today’s affluent consumers are spending less of their income on things and more on lifestyle: dining out, gyms, concerts. Of course, most of the world still needs the basics – but the “consumption bomb” is also being defused.
Reason five: local wisdom is a shining light. One of the great environmental revelations of recent years is that rural communities are not always enemies of their environment head of deforestationbut their rescuers. Tropical deforestation occurs less inside indigenous reserves than outside of themgo inside many African countriesMost wildlife conservation now takes place outside of national parks.
The idea that our greed means we are doomed to destroy the planet – the so-called tragedy of the common man – is just wrong. My hope is that if communities can act collectively and share nature at the local level, then it can also work for the planet’s great global assets: the atmosphere, climate systems and oceans. Finding ways to achieve this is our biggest challenge.
I admit that the worst can still happen. To avoid this, we have no choice but to act. And that means embracing optimism.
Fred Pearce is the author In spite of everything: A guide to climate hope and former The new scientist environmental consultant
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