Geoff Dawe, Byrrill Creek
Further to Councillor Dey’s support for coastal retreat and his mention of Venice, the Italian government is prepared to spend $5 billion for ocean gates that shut out high tides to preserve Venice for the short term. The gates are an example of human ability with amazing technologies, and… a great foolishness. In the long term with global warming, Venice is lost.
With a prefrontal cortex three times larger than any other animal, humans are able to perceive that there is a future; that there is a long term. However, if the long term is only noticed to create technologies and not to notice that there is a prima facie case that all technologies create greater long term degradation than there are short term benefits, then there is partial regression to the prehuman.
Five billion dollars could have put a lot of compost heaps on the Earth’s surface or supplied many biochar stoves. Compost heaps and biochar are not just bulwarks against the causes of climate change in that they soil sequester carbon, they are foundations of a sustainable, gardening agriculture, and, because nutrients are in a greater bound form, they are less leachable to watercourses. In short, they aid in repair of air, water and soil, the three bases of life.
The short term shoring up against ocean rise can be seen as a waste of money that would be better spent provisioning the long term and future generations with bulwarks against the causes of climate change rather than a too late attempt to fix effects. Not too long ago, humans automatically knew it was important to provision future generations, but that understanding is rapidly being forgotten. Is it any wonder that Byron is sometimes trashed by youth?
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
