I would however be careful in your advocacy for individual uptake of EVs and solar panels as these private choices largely depend on being wealthy.
You may have heard of the phrase that what is really required is “private sufficiency and public luxury” ie those of us in wealthy countries like NZ need to drastically reduce our use of energy.
Investment in electrified public transport is a far better use of energy expenditure than individual vehicles.
There is a lot more to be said about how the rich countries exploit the resources in the poorest countries to maintain & expand their extravagant lifestyles, along with their new energy technologies!
Thank you Meg that's a great point, I absolutely agree. There's definitely an interesting tension between managing choices that individuals can make and advocating for systematic change. I agree that the scale is tipped way too far in the individual choices box right now, which is possibly why it’s the most obvious example of a social tipping point to date, but hopefully, if we keep pushing, heralds the coming of deeper structural changes and social changes that will lead to degrowth.
You’re absolutely right that the focus on technocratic solutions like EVs often just pander to maintaining the standard of living in the global north at the expense of the global south. Individual change needs to be much more active and, within transport, focus on public transport rather than EVs – in this case it was mostly an example of something that had huge uptake.
Sorry everyone, wrong link for the private jet petition. Here is the right one, updated above - https://actions.eko.org/a/tax-private-jets/
A wonderful beginning to your story!
I would however be careful in your advocacy for individual uptake of EVs and solar panels as these private choices largely depend on being wealthy.
You may have heard of the phrase that what is really required is “private sufficiency and public luxury” ie those of us in wealthy countries like NZ need to drastically reduce our use of energy.
Investment in electrified public transport is a far better use of energy expenditure than individual vehicles.
There is a lot more to be said about how the rich countries exploit the resources in the poorest countries to maintain & expand their extravagant lifestyles, along with their new energy technologies!
Thank you Meg that's a great point, I absolutely agree. There's definitely an interesting tension between managing choices that individuals can make and advocating for systematic change. I agree that the scale is tipped way too far in the individual choices box right now, which is possibly why it’s the most obvious example of a social tipping point to date, but hopefully, if we keep pushing, heralds the coming of deeper structural changes and social changes that will lead to degrowth.
You’re absolutely right that the focus on technocratic solutions like EVs often just pander to maintaining the standard of living in the global north at the expense of the global south. Individual change needs to be much more active and, within transport, focus on public transport rather than EVs – in this case it was mostly an example of something that had huge uptake.
This says a lot about the way we approach climate change
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2023/aug/28/burning-man-protest-climate-change-environment