Thanks to The Echo for the Sustainability Feature recently. While many feel that there is a sad and terrible slowness in our responding to the climate emergency, the good news is we don’t have to wait for the government and industry to save the planet, we the people, we householders can! Smart and positive people like Saul Griffith (Rewiring Australia) say that if households electrify now we can meet our targets.
We need to change, adapt, this is not business as usual. We have to learn about new ways, new technology and choices, know our carbon footprint and decarbonise our lifestyles. We are the solution. Australia’s per person emissions are more than three times the world average; we punch above our weight in creating this climate emergency.
As Saul Griffiths points out, to electrify is a bonus for people in terms of efficient use of electricity and will lead to cash savings to individuals and the community. We have had a 40kW Nissan Leaf for almost four years, bought second hand from Japan for $36,000. We have spent $1,345 (six new tyres, one set of windscreen wipers), $0 on maintenance. We have not spent at least $17,000 on petrol. Almost 100 per cent of our charging is at home using our rooftop solar; power that was previously dumped by our system is now going into our car. One of the fears around EVs is battery life but the Leaf is now almost six years old and battery capacity is down only 10 per cent. But many people’s first comment to us is ‘I can’t afford one’. While many cannot afford the initial outlay, or require four wheel drive for work, many could easily get an EV.
Post pandemic, people are resuming overseas travel. This source of greenhouse gases is rising and it is us, the industrialised countries, producing it. 80 per cent of the world’s population do not fly. If you have to fly you should work out your carbon footprint, reduce it, buy into carbon credit schemes, plant a lot, a lot, of trees.
The Fijian villagers who, with profound sadness, have to move their homes away from sea level rises, are now asking us for compensation (See ‘Fiji: the Last Resort’ Dateline 6/4/2023).
Your one-way economy ticket to London means you will produce about two tonnes of CO2, more than Fijian villagers would produce in a year. Look closer to home on the north coast for heaps of evidence of an emergency; thousands are still homeless 16 months after the worst climate-induced disaster we have seen in Australia. There is so much that individuals need to do. Embrace the ‘great transformation’ (Tony Sebu) we are lucky enough to have. Just as most would agree Australia cannot dodge its obligations, individuals cannot either. Stop the strollout! Let’s act like this is an emergency.
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. 
