Plan B (eBook)

How Not to Lose Hope in the Times of Climate Crisis

Bostjan Videmsek (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2020 | 1. Auflage
300 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
978-1-0983-3978-4 (ISBN)

Infos

I have spent last 25 years reporting from all major wars and conflicts around the world. The experience has been extremely valid and humble. But also deeply frustrating. Most of the wars I've covered, are still ongoing (Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, DR Congo, Somalia, Darfur, ...). The situation on the ground - and also in our profession - only got worse. I've decided to make a career turn. A turn, not a u-turn. Together with an award-winning photographer Matja? Krivic we decided to focus on the climate crisis. But not in reporting about polar bears and shrinking glaciers - we don't have time for that. Fight against the horrible consequences of human-made climate crisis is the most important, crucial frontline of humanity; of our time. That's why we decided to start a solution-based project. After a due diligence research, we started our long journey, looking for the best community-driven solutions around the world. In the Introduction, I'm trying to explain what has - and what is happening - to field-reporting based journalism and why I made a decision to change the 'frontlines'. And why is it so important to have community based or grass-root projects in the fight with the climate crisis.

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And so, instead of reciting figures and spewing forth yet more apocalyptic forecasts, Matjaz and I decided to highlight the communities and individuals who are bravely taking on the calamity. It is high time to add them all up, the members of the homo sapiens true elite who have chosen not to be swept away in the tide of indifference and arrogance, the visionary women and men who are not banking on miraculous salvation from elsewhere. Our ambition has been to turn this book into a monument for these intrepid foot-soldiers on humanity's key front line, the ones who are amassing the knowledge, experience and technology that we will need if we are to have a prayer at all. From Tilos, the first energy self-sufficient island in the Mediterranean, to the geothermal and thoroughly future-oriented Iceland. From the promising sea-power developments on the Orkney Islands in the north-east of Scotland, where surplus energy is already being converted into 'green' hydrogen, to the biomass-centred Austrian townlet of Gssing, whose inhabitants have taken the progressive route as far back as a quarter of a century ago, and who have by now managed to reinvent themselves as a key hub for the development and production of renewable-energy technology. So here they all are, humbly requesting your consideration. From the Swiss-based Climeworks company, capturing carbon dioxide directly from the air to inject it into Iceland's underworld, to a number of self-sufficient Scandinavian villages and Iceland's holistic transformation. From the lithium constantly travelling between Bolivian salt flats and Chinese electric-car factories to the electric-mobility revolution in Norway. From the waste-incineration plant in Norway that plans to store the captured CO in underwater caves, to all of the individuals and communities who are standing behind these projects, raising their voices to remind us that we must hold on to our hopes at all costs.

Textauszug

Greece: The First 100% Self-Sustainable Island in the Mediterranean

High above the ocean, amid the springtime’s fragrant and colourful plant life, one can easily see the Dodecanese islands and Turkey. The sun is already baring its teeth, almost as if it is already summer. The light bounces sparklingly off the surface of the sea. The powerful wind howls like a wolf. When it dies down for a bit, it is overpowered by the chirpings of countless birds and insects, currently on a procreative work brigade.

Paradoxically, the countless natural sounds coalesce into a deep yet also vulnerable silence. Goats chase each other along shepherd paths reconstructed from the times of yore, precipitous in many places. There are hundreds of goats – both domestic and wild. Their astonished fright quickly reveals that they are not exactly used to human company. The long rainy winter – the rainiest in the last forty years – has ensured a rapturous greening of the island and provided an abundance of food to these insatiable climbers.

Up here, one can easily merge into the idyll furnished by the ancient feel of the surroundings.

***

Yet Tilos, a small island in the southern Mediterranean, only feels ancient. In reality, its tiny local community is surfing the crest of ultra-modernity. The island is the first in the Mediterranean to have achieved energy self-sufficiency – and with wholly renewable power sources to boot! More precisely, this consists of a unique combination of wind and solar energy, which officially became part of the Greek power system (grid) in March 2019.

Tilos’ energy project was granted its funding in competition with eighty other projects from all over Europe. The EU’s scientific research initiative Horizon 2020 has allocated 11 million euros to the project coordinated by the Technological Educational Institute from Piraeus (now University of West Attica). All in all, thirteen partners from seven European countries are involved in the venture.

In January 2019, Eunice, the Greek private company in charge of the project, signed a contract with the state-owned electric network management company, HEDNO. In this way, the green energy from Tilos – history’s first small hybrid network of its kind – was incorporated into the Greek electrical system.

The Tilos energy project, whose special energy-storage battery system (BESS) allows for the possibility of storing up winter supplies, is currently already producing more power than the island needs. The managers of the small local network are even exporting some of the surplus electricity to the neighbouring Kalymnos and Kos islands, via an underwater line.

Previous to this magnificent breakthrough, electricity used to flow to Tilos in the reverse direction, from an oil-powered power plant on Kos.

***

Maria Kamma has been serving as Tilos’ mayor for seven years. In her modest office in the ancient, charming, white-blue townlet of Megalo Chorio, she replaced the ‘irreplaceable’ Tassos Aliferis, who brought the island back from the dead. During his tenure, the permanent population doubled, ecological tourism underwent a rapid boom, the ancient shepherd trails were reconstructed and many roads were built. All of this only begins to sum up his contribution.

Tilos was the first Mediterranean island to abolish hunting in 1993, transforming the hill-strewn natural paradise into a sanctuary for numerous birds and other species. Long before it was legal in Greece, Tilos – with the help of the late Aliferis – saw its first same-sex marriage in 2008, along with countless other progressive developments. Between 2016 and 2018, the islet was home to the Tilos Hospitality Centre for refugees and migrants. Within its walls, the local community provided care for the exhausted and shell-shocked people who, fleeing war on tiny rubber boats, were fortunate enough to have struck upon this small humanist island, an exception confirming the basic heartless rule.

The island was also gradually transformed into a sanctuary for tourists, most of whom come carrying books instead of smartphones and tablet computers. Printed books – talk about culture shock! As many as two-thirds of the tourists return here on a yearly basis. The local brand of peace and quiet, which after a few visits I can heartily recommend, is proving incurably addictive.

The island recently saw the opening of a new communal cheese factory. The main aim of this social enterprise is to provide employment to a number of refugees as a part of their integration. Tilos’ residents are well aware that they are currently too few in number – they are in dire need of reinforcements. At the same time, they remain largely uninfected with the prejudice that is picking up steam elsewhere. According to the mayor, the number of permanent residents on the island needs to exceed one thousand for the local community to become ‘economically and demographically sound’.

***

“We’re all the time looking for new solutions. Life on the island should be amenable for all its inhabitants,” the visibly tired mayor nodded after slightly toning down the rock music blaring from her laptop. During the time of our visit, Tilos was playing host to numerous political and business potentates closely connected to the self-sufficiency project. Maria Kamma had long become used to working in peace, but her days were now a never-ending parade of meetings and other get-togethers.

I asked the mayor what was so special about her island that had turned it into a vision of the future as it should be.

“I find it very hard to reply. I cannot really fathom all this wonder about our way of life. To us, it’s nothing special. We live in harmony with nature. We’ve developed a bond with our environment. We don’t splurge on anything, we don’t overstrain our resources, we live a frugal modest life. We function as a community. Every major problem is talked over until we can all decide what to do. We are doing the best we can. Our aim is justice – between ourselves and for the environment. This, we believe, is our duty,” the mayor spontaneously summed up the islanders’ ethos.

According to Mayor Kamma, the energy project is merely one part of this communal tale. “We have almost reached our goal. Very soon, we will be entirely green and self-sufficient. The goal is one hundred percent. We shall push on without rest. The benefits for the island are already phenomenal,” the mayoress promised.

She went on to predict the next phase of the green energy project would be the electrification of the island’s traffic.

Recently, the island saw the construction of its first electrical charging station. The authorities have already used some of the subsidies to purchase an electric bus, soon to be followed by a pair of electric trucks. By next summer, Tilos’ public traffic system – not that there’s a great deal of it – will be wholly powered by electricity. Much the same goes for the entire public infrastructure, from public lighting to the water pumps crucial for the island’s survival.

Maria Kamma is convinced that Tilos’ winsome green-energy story could trigger all of the Mediterranean to follow suit. “The battery storage of energy is what makes our case unique, but this concept can easily be transplanted to the other islands! A number of Greek islands have already expressed an interest in our know-how. We have convinced them that positive change is possible. We’ve also stirred up a lot of interest in Germany, Poland and Corsica. But for all of us, this is only the beginning. We haven’t really accomplished that much yet. These are but the first steps …” the mayor explained modestly.

It is worth noting that Maria Kamma functions completely outside the existing political structure, preferring to consider the local community as her ‘party’. Her many supporters immediately adopted the green-energy project as their own.

***

“We have beat everybody to the punch! We are the first! This is a source of great pride,” nodded Zisimos Mantas, one of the key technicians who the Tilos energy project employs from the Eunice company. Standing by the rows of solar panels on a warm late-spring day, he looked for all the world like a vintner in his vineyard.

Most of the solar panels were constructed by the sides of the roads that connect the island. “It may sound unusual, but my greatest wish is for our project to be copied as soon and as many times as possible. Our technology is ready to benefit all. I hope we can inspire the other smaller islands! As we speak, something similar is being prepared at Icaria,” the engineer explained as we strolled around the ‘sunny’ part of the hybrid wind and solar farm, which currently contributes around a third of all power to the communal energy banks.

For the last three years that Mantas has spent with the Tilos project, time sped by in fast-forward. At the outset, he had his doubts about the venture’s feasibility. There were so many obstacles to overcome, especially bureaucratic ones. It was pretty rough going, for a while. At times highly frustrating. Yet the teething problems are now behind them and the project clearly works.

“Having the right vision and seeking out the right partners proved key for our efforts. Before our arrival, the island...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 15.11.2020
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Biologie
• ISBN-10: 1-0983-3978-9 / 1098339789
• ISBN-13: 978-1-0983-3978-4 / 9781098339784