Super Eco

Photo credit: Earth Policy Institute's Plan B 3.0

Remember Rosie the Riveter and the War Effort during World War II? Well, me neither, as I wasn't born until the late 60s but I've seen her image many times and heard about the work that 6 million women did to help drive technology forward during the war.

Many scientists believe that we need another such war effort to combat climate change. They've even decided what needs to be done and they've called it Plan B (since Plan A of hoping the problem will go away on its own doesn't seem to be working).

With this plan, the Earth Policy Institute believes that instead of increasing energy usage 30% by the year 2020 (our fate according to the International Energy Agency), we can actually cut usage to below 2006 levels (an 80% reduction).

Sounds pretty far-fetched, doesn't it? With manufacturers fighting energy-saving legislation, governments unwilling to commit to Kyoto or other international agreements and the general public around the world willfully blind to the problem, drastically cutting energy usage seems like a pipe-dream.

Not necessarily. In his book, Plan B 3.0 , Lester Brown offers practical solutions that are not just environmentally sound but economically responsible as well.

In the book he compares the threat of climate change to the threat offered by Germany, Italy and Japan during World War II and shows how the threat is at least as serious if not worse. Add in the current economic crisis and the need for public infrastructure works and you have the perfect environment to make sweeping changes.

Simple actions such as changing all traditional light bulbs to compact fluorescents (or LEDs for those who don't like the mercury in CFLs ) could result in a world-wide energy saving of 12%. The plan also includes other ideas such as retrofitting buildings for better insulation or developing more energy efficient appliances.

So, why aren't we implementing it? It's not the cost of the plan—if you compare Plan B's worldwide budget of $190 billion a year to the worldwide military budget of $1.2 trillion a year, the climate change plan comes in at a bargain. It comes down to political will and unfortunately the problem is too abstract for most people to see the need for radical changes.

Let's just hope we see the (low-energy) light before it's too late.