Alan Pickersgill - The View From Here

(April 01) - People in Guelph and around the world spoke out on climate change last Saturday. For one hour, they told their political leaders to do something about it. If these leaders want to keep their jobs, they better start listening.

Earth hour was a classic case of a local idea growing into a global phenomenon. It began last year in Sydney, Australia with a lights out hour on March 31. Other cities had done similar things at different times on different days. This year they brought it all together for one hour on the same day.

The speed with which climate change awareness is spreading should be a clear message to the Stephen Harpers of the world: they continue ignoring and denying climate change at their peril. They must either mend their ways or get out of our way. It is doubtful that they will change themselves. They had lots of opportunities to do so in recent years, but missed every chance they got.

They will tell you they care. They will cloak the Tory blue in a shade of green and continue to undermine international agreements on climate change.

This sort of duplicity is happening all over the place these days. Businesses everywhere have read the writing on the public wall and developed ad campaigns to match. They are re-branding themselves as champions of the environment.

Even Wal-Mart’s getting in on it. The largest retailer in the world, the contributor to Chinese pollution, the destroyer of local businesses, the impoverisher of suppliers, has a web site called “for the greener good.” They never let the facts get in the way of a chirpy marketing slogan.

The irony does not start or end with Wal-Mart. Take a look at Tim Horton’s. As we were turning off our lights on Saturday, Tim’s was moving into the final days of this year’s roll up the rim extravaganza. Many people who sat in the dark on Saturday evening also sat in the drive through on Sunday morning.

Don’t get me wrong. Before I got hooked on Planet Bean, I was a Tim Horton’s guy. A lot of very good people get their coffee fixes there. A lot of very good people work there. In years gone by I have rolled up rims and recycled please-play-again cups. I even drove through drive throughs. Often I’d park and walk in, but not always. Almost all the time I brought my own mug. This is the point at which you notice the irritating little contradictions.

If you read through Tim’s web site, you will learn that they hate litter as much as you do and they want to reduce it. They even discount a cup of coffee by 10 cents if you have a travel mug. But drive through with a travel mug during roll up the rim month and they will offer you an empty cup to throw on the litter pile. All year round you can call into the loud speaker that you want a “large mug refill, cream and sugar.” By the time you get to the pick up window, one will be waiting in a large waxed paper cup which will be poured into the travel mug and the cup will be thrown on the litter pile.

Tossed out with it should be Tim’s self-serving statements about environmental commitment. That’s without mentioning the effect of all those idling engines.

There’s one other irony worth pointing out. To support the global initiative, Pearson International Airport dimmed the lights in its terminals. It was a nice gesture, but when it comes to climate change the consumption of electricity contributes next to nothing compared to the consumption of jet fuel. Imagine the difference to the environment if all the aeroplanes in the world had been grounded for an hour. Fewer people would have been affected, but the impact would have been much larger.

Symbolic, consciousness raising events such as Earth Hour should move us towards more permanent actions.

We need to examine all the little ironies in our lives and find ways to make better decisions about the things we do every day. We need to think about where we shop, what we buy, how it’s packaged and how it is disposed of when we no longer want it.

Whenever you turn off a light in your home, turn one on in your mind.

# posted by Alan Pickersgill @ 4:52 AM