On The Ground
It’s Not Game Over, It’s Game On by L. Hunter Lovins
Pixabay
Planetary Emergency We are in a planetary emergency.1 Make no mistake about that. As the twinned crises of climate2 and biodiversity loss3 worsen, apocalyptic messages become more common.4 Yet is all really doomed?5 Mathis Wackernagel of Global Footprint6 puts it best: It’s not game over; it’s GAME ON! There is no doubt we are in a global emergency. Emergencies happen every day, somewhere around the world. And emergency responders know what to do, and they do it. When a fire threatens, when a flood is coming, they act. Emergency responders train, frame plans and are prepared to act when the worst strikes. Emergency 56 | Solutions | Fall 2019 | www.thesolutionsjournal.com
does not mean the end. It means we all act to fix what’s gone wrong. And help is on the way, in the form of economics. My colleague Eban Goodstein calls it the Solar Dominance Hypothesis.7 It will transform essentially everything about how we live, how we do business and how we solve the climate crisis—most all for the better. Yes, polar bears are threatened,8 Yes, a million species are at risk of extinction. Yes, there is a true moral imperative to preserve a habitable planet for future generations. What will solve the emergency we face today is the fact that it is now cheaper to use renewable energy, than it is to burn carbon-emitting
fossil fuels. When the Kentucky Coal Museum puts solar on its roof, rather than hook to the perfectly good, coalfired grid at its doorstep, you know that change is upon us.9
When the Kentucky Coal Museum puts solar on its roof rather than hook to the perfectly good, coal fired grid at its doorstep, you know that change is upon us.