The Drowning Earth and How To Save It
Imagine every city that is on, or even near a coast, drowned in the sea. Entire states clean off the map. New York, Los Angeles, Seattle. Gone. That is the future we are creating for ourselves. We burn an ever increasing amount of natural gas and coal. The sea level is rising twice as fast in the last 20 years than the 80 before that. The future will not wait.
We continually burn fossil fuels, which leads to carbon dioxide being emitted, creating a blanket around the earth which blocks its radiations’ path to space, causing the planet to heat up. One major side effect of a warmer planet is that our polar ice has begun to melt, making the sea levels rise. So, if you go about things like we did in 2016, where 127,000,000 metric tons more natural gas and coal were burned than the previous year, the sea level will spike. Over the past twenty years the sea levels have risen 2.6 inches, or an average rate of .13 inches a year. We must act now.
But there is another way. In fact, there are many other ways. Solar power, derived through solar panels, is one of if not the most effective because “There are no moving parts, no parts to degrade or wear with use, it’s simply a phyto-chemical reaction. This makes them last for a very long time,” says Alicia Leinberger, a professional who works in designing, installing, and educating people on solar power. “You can put it anywhere because most places have some amount of solar radiation. This allows us to create a grid with thousands or millions of small generators along the lines. If we did this intentionally we could have much smaller transmission lines that would last for decades instead of just years.” Solar power is as clean as it gets, and doesn’t pollute the environment at all. All it requires is one installation on your roof or in your yard, and then you have enough power to power your entire house.
One major, yet easily deflected, argument against solar panels is the cost. Many would see a $15,000 pricetag and then not even give it a second glance. However the federal government will give you a 30% tax credit, which mean you will receive about $5,000 in tax breaks. On top of that, the solar panels pay for themselves in about 13 years, through money not spent on traditional energy. Keep in mind, Wisconsin gets significantly less sun than other areas of the world. For instance, in South Carolina the system will pay for its self in just six years. Then you will make money off of money not spent on natural gas. “I love seeing how much joy people can get from choosing to follow their values and save money doing it.” said Alicia.
The biggest problem we must overcome is those who profit off the system as it is today. They have a lot of power. Billions of dollars. In their mind, saving the planet is bad news, because their business will lose money. They will not get paid for their electricity, and they will even have to pay homeowners who feed their extra solar electricity into the grid. So they will not only not help, they will fight against it. In Florida, known as the Sunshine State, the Koch brothers, who have heavily profited off the system as it stands today, are doing their best to make it harder to have a solar home.
You may be thinking that none of this affects you. You live in a big city up north, far away from the ocean, and global warming just takes a little bit of the edge off of winter. But it does affect you. For one, flooding can happen anywhere, and because of that and rising sea levels, your insurance rates may go up, because there will be more disasters, and because large corporations have insurance, everything will be more expensive. Soon we could be living in a world where everyone but the top 1% is in poverty.
If everyone in the world used solar panels for just one day it would stop approximately one hundred and ten million tons of carbon dioxide from being released in our atmosphere. If just you and two friends switched to solar panels for just one year, you would save thirty thousand pounds from being released into our atmosphere, making our skies that much less clouded, and our world that much less polluted.
“I’ve always loved the idea of using business to create the kind of world we want to live in, and leave for our kids.” Continued Alicia “Solar energy [solves] a complex problem with a simple solution.”
To paraphrase a great bear: “Only you can prevent Global Warming.”
This story is part of a new Storytelling for Changemakers program for Changemaker Schools activated in partnership with Ashoka’s Youth Venture and Start Empathy.
Individual views expressed in this blog are from individual students at YIHS and not representative of Ashoka, Start Empathy, or Youth Venture.
