| Don't tell me you think we are making pretty good progress with solar. Don't tell me that we just need more time, that change happens slowly. Tell it to the moms who have already lost everything & see what they have to say -- Tell it to Patrcia -- whose daughter Angela was torn out of her arms & died when flood waters ripped their home apart during Hurricane Sandy. Tell it to Jahanara, who was forced to sell 2 kids into slavery after their home was washed into the sea by Hurricane Aila -- leaving her with nothing but farmland ruined by saltwater & no way to make ends meet. I don't think they'd agree we're making good progress or its ok to take our time. |  "Fields are dusted white with salt" New York Times, 3/28/14 |
| In recent testimony to the US Senate, prominent scientist James Hansen very simply and clearly summarized where the world's energy is coming from and how that needs to change over the next several decades. As his chart shows, fossil fuels currently generate about 85% of the world's energy, while renewable energies (other than hydropower) deliver about 3%. Although the use of solar and wind power have grown quickly over the past few decades, coal use has increased even more. So, not only are we changing too slowly, we aren't even moving in the right direction overall. Global carbon emissions are not decreasing at all -- they are still going up. I obviously can't sum it up better than James Hansen himself: "The carbon budget for the planet has been nearly used up, implying that the world as a whole needs to phase off fossil fuel energy as rapidly as practical." |  |
