From 1948 until 1975, cartoonist Walt Kelly drew a daily comic strip, Pogo, syndicated in most American Newspapers. Then, on Earth Day 1971, he gave us a two-panel strip aimed at litter. In the second panel, Kelly shows Pogo and his buddy Porkypine gazing at the forest floor covered with litter. Porkypine says, “It IS hard walking on this stuff.” to which Pogo responds, “Yep, son, we have met the enemy, and he is us.” (Thank you, Wikipedia).
Little did Walt Kelly know how well his words would age and foreshadow our world of 2022, where sadly, we still litter. But today, litter pales in comparison to climate change brought on by our love of consumerism and shopping for more things, our disrespect for the natural world, our addiction to fossil fuels, and our failure to take action in the face of the coming price we will all pay for our self-absorbed lifestyle.
According to Saul Griffith, founder and chief scientist of Rewiring America, you and I (along with the 121 million+ other American households), produce more than 40% of the total of all the U. S.’s greenhouse gas emissions. We do this by driving our cars, heating our water, cooking our food, and heating/cooling our homes. His point is that if everyone were to electrify all the activities above, the U.S. would reduce its GHG emissions by 40%. As long as we continue to burn fossil fuels daily, we are major contributors to climate change. So, 51 years after Pogo uncovers the enemy, you and I are still the enemy.,
Griffith’s solution is simple: As our cars, appliances, and furnaces age and need replacing, replace them with electric versions. In other words, each of us needs to take personal responsibility for reducing the GHG we each produce. No need to wait for Congress to pass new laws or hope for some revolutionary technology to save us. If we all did this, we would cut America’s GHG by 40%.
A few people are already well along the way to electrifying their lives. In this issue, we interviewed Chevy Bolt EV owner Rich Rodriguez a second time (the first was in 2017) to see how EV ownership was going. Turns out, he just recently had his natural gas service disconnected, ending forever, his burning of fossil fuels. We know of others on the same path, but judging by the volume of GHG still being emitted, the future looks bleak. Unfortunately, too few of us are taking climate change personally.
We can all hope Americans will accept personal responsibility for climate change and get on board with the electrification movement. Or will they continue to feel that one person’s actions are futile against the enormity of climate change even as the herd thunders towards the cliff? If the latter sentiment prevails, then the actions taken by Rich Rodriguez and all the others who tried to make a difference won’t change a thing. Instead, we will all pay the price of inaction.
Image courtesy of Wikipedia Walt Kelly. (2022, October 8). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Kelly
