On the brink of a new post-fossil fuel era
Provided – a big proviso – we can stop fossil fuels destroying us during the next ten years, we stand on the brink of a wonderful new post-fossil fuel age. Coal and oil belong to the past. There will be nuclear fusion, artificial bacteria performing a multitude of services, levels of automation that will make industrial work a thing of the past, vegetables grown hydroponically in tower blocks in cities. Not only lab-cultured meat and fish but thousands of foods grown artificially from water. Ironically, growing food artificially uses far less water than agriculture. Huge swathes of land will be returned to wild life. The north of England could once more be humming, re-building Britain’s energy base, a new UK electric car industry and thousands of new enterprises. With much less work available we will have to learn to live differently which will present great problems, but we could have much more time for each other and doing what we enjoy doing. But none of this will happen if we trigger catastrophic runaway global warming and the scientists say that at present rates of rising emissions we only have ten years. This is our task now. To halt the rise in fossil-fuel emissions and then phase out coal and oil altogether. Write to your MP and tell him/her to tell Boris to put getting rid of fossil fuels right at the top of the political agenda.
