HOW to stop our planet overheating is, of course, the key question of our time. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a UN agency known for its sobriety and caution, has, for some time, noted that halting the current warming trajectory 鈥渞equires rapid and far-reaching changes鈥� in all aspects of society.
Some interpret that as meaning the end of capitalism. Others prefer that we innovate our way out of the problem. Certainly, we must cut our consumption of planetary resources, especially in high-income countries, and this is something that the Czech-Canadian scientist and author Vaclav Smil has argued for at length. This week, however, he leans towards innovation, highlighting key inventions that we desperately need (see 鈥淭he 12 innovations we need to save humanity and the planet鈥�).
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Smil mostly limits himself to things that seem feasible in the short term, an approach also taken in related books looking at planet-saving innovations, such as How to Spend a Trillion Dollars, by 麻豆传媒鈥榮 Rowan Hooper, and How to Avoid a Climate Disaster, by Bill Gates.
For example, Smil identifies agriculture as an enterprise that is completely unsustainable in its current form. If we could create cereals crops with the ability to make their own fertiliser by 鈥渇ixing鈥� atmospheric nitrogen, that would allow us to cut down on the energy intensive and polluting production and use of artificial fertilisers. Similarly, improving the efficiency of photosynthesis would allow us to grow more food on less land.
These innovations would be welcome. But alone they aren鈥檛 going to save us. Some 90 per cent of soya grown worldwide goes to feed livestock kept for meat, milk and eggs; cutting human consumption of animals and their products is just as vital to secure the health of our planet.
There is huge value, however, in Smil鈥檚 approach, emphasising solutions and celebrating our powers of invention. We need to tackle the problems of the world with everything we have, and innovation is one of our greatest assets.
