The climate change choices that we are all facing in Mayo
We are leading our children and grandchildren into a catastrophe not of their making - shocking really
By Barbara Daly
UN Chief Antonio Guterres recently said that current policies on the reduction of carbon emissions, and primarily our use of fossil fuels, will lead to a 2.8°C temperature rise by the end of the century, which ‘spells catastrophe’.
“We are hurtling towards disaster, eyes wide open," he added.
That is with all the efforts being made by governments including our own. They and we are leading our children and grandchildren into a catastrophe which is not of their making. Shocking really.
Huge changes are being asked of us and they are difficult to get our heads around; they are not easy changes – they require effort and most likely expense. It is easier to bury our heads in the sand and pretend it will never happen or never affect us.
It is easier to put the responsibility onto big businesses and governments.
So should we as a household, for example, be burning gas and coal in our home this winter? No we should not. But will we?
My first reaction is, no to coal – we can do without it. However our central heating system is operated by gas.
Can we afford to change our entire heating system away from fossil fuels? No, but listening to Mr. Guterres’ dire warning, how can we afford not to?
These are the difficult decisions climate change advocates are telling us we now have to make.
Mary Robinson was in Ballina last week for the Mary Robinson Climate Conference.
She spoke of our need to make these difficult choices now. For example she suggested that we need to holiday at home rather than travel to foreign destinations. To only travel abroad if essential. How many of us would be willing to stick to that?
It is time to look at our everyday decisions and choices in a way that we never have before. On our next trip to the supermarket, could we do without our exotic fruits and vegetables imported from South America?
Could we only buy fruit and vegetables grown in Ireland and even grown locally? When we pick up an avocado from Chile how many of us stop to think what was involved in getting it to the west of Ireland?
Similarly many of our clothes and children’s toys are made in Taiwan and China. We buy vast amounts of them and then when we no longer need them or want them they have to be disposed of.
I could look around our house now and find at least 10 broken plastic toys that are of no use to anyone and cannot be fixed. They certainly were not made in Ireland either.
My wardrobe holds far too many clothes for one person to ever wear, even though fashion is not my thing and I do often look to second hand shops. Still I have too many and often they are cheap, imported clothes.
There will be radical changes to our choices and lifestyles asked of us in the coming years and even forced upon us, if the governments do their job right. Our children will not know the world we know when they are adults.
Most of us, myself included, are only starting to consider these changes as a reality that will soon be upon us.
Politicians need to be brave enough to step up and enforce change and as individuals we have to be brave enough to accept and embrace it.
Then maybe, just maybe, catastrophe could be averted.