Jul 22, 2021
Five Techs & Tips for Survival in a Climate Apocalypse
Yesterday I read the existentially-depressing paper “Deep Adaptation: A Map for Navigating Climate Tragedy” by Jem Bendell PhD. He believes humanity is already past the “tipping point” — there’s no chance of halting or reversing our global descent into famines, floods, submerged cities, murderous heat, war, tyranny, desperate migration, raging epidemics, and total societal collapse.
His convincing viewpoint left me feeling helpless, stunned, sad, and anxious for 24 hours. But now I’m bouncing back, determined to adapt to the dystopian future, for myself and my children. What can I do to help my genes survive in a hothouse, hostile world?
Below are five tips and technologies I’ve assembled that will be critically useful in the upcoming years.
#1. Live near a lake. Fresh water is essential for survival, for your own thirst and for potential agriculture. Rivers can dry up or be damned, ponds can shrivel — situate your post-armageddon home on the shores of a large lake, fed by numerous nearby mountain streams. Find one with wild protein included: fish, frogs, crawdads, insects, etc. Where? Here’s a list of nations stocked with thousands of lakes. Canada is the easy winner with 879,000 lakes. Sweden, IMO, is the second-best option, with Norway third and Argentina fourth. Avoid the politics and heat of the other contenders: Russia, USA, China, Brazil)
#2. Extract Moisture From Air or Drink Your Pee. If you can’t situate yourself by water, you need to get the beverage from either the invisible air around you, or your bladder. Four years ago, Belgian scientists developed a machine that turns urine into water. Multiple methods of squeezing drops of water from the air or shown on this YouTube page.
#3. Live Underground. Burrowing a home deep into the soil is the best way to protect yourself from tornados, hurricanes, wildfires, and nuclear missile blasts, plus it helps you hide from hungry beasts and armed human assailants, and it stablizes temperature to a near-comfortable degree. Three types of subterranean dwellings are depicted here; I recommend the “elevational style” because it’s the cheapest -all you’re doing, essentially, is carving a cave for yourself, in a hillside.
#4. Plant Identification. Multiple apps presently exist to help you find wild green stuff to eat. Learn now, while the internet is still working. Are there varied salad materials out there, waiting to nourish you? Yes. Manitoba, Canada, offers 79 plant options for your palate and in Sweden, videos can help you spot tasties in winter, spring, and summer.
#5. Food Dehydrator. The grocery stores are empty; you’re in the woods, in springtime, food is growing all round you. You don’t want the fruit and berries to rot on branches or vines, but you can’t eat everything. What to do? Learn to hydrate food, or buy a machine like this excellent fold-up contraption. After its dried, you can take it one-step-further by transforming it into powder, for a lakeside shake.
