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It’s official: some of the damage done by global warming is now irreversible. The most severe consequences may take some time to affect us in the developed world, but poor countries like Bangladesh and Tuvalu, which lie close to sea level, are already losing significant amounts of land, leading to large scale human suffering. Ironically, it is also poor countries who are among the greatest polluters, burning up fossil fuels as they rush to industrialise, with fewer resources to spend on long-term investments like using solar energy as alternative power. However, in some parts of the world, poor nations are still making an effort to use clean technologies wherever possible. In the face of this, the small step of converting your own business and domestic power systems to solar may seem hopelessly ineffectual. What use is it for you to make that effort if the rest of the world is going to carry on polluting anyway? Why should you make the effort when nobody else does? The answer is that until you make the effort, other people will feel isolated just as you do. Perhaps your neighbour is thinking about using solar energy as alternative power too, but worries that he’ll be all alone in doing so. If you do it, he’ll realise that there are other people who care, and he’ll be ready to make that investment himself. Then your other neighbours will see what you’ve done and will be prompted to consider it themselves. This is how revolutionary changes occur - they always start with individuals setting an example. Just as you set and example to your neighbours, so the increasing use of social power at a national level can set an example to other countries. People in the third world naturally wonder why they should invest in solar power if developed nations can’t be bothered to. When you make that change as an individual, you contribute to the process of changing the way your whole country meets its energy needs. This, in turn, will set an example to developing countries, discouraging them from building more fossil fuel plants. You may only be able to do a little bit, but it’s lots of little bits like that which change the world.
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