Solar Gifts: Even a Small Solar Gift Contributes to the Battle against Climate Change
SolarTown announced its annual top solar gifts today. Every year, I am amazed at the ingenuity of new products running on nothing more than the rays from the sun. This year is no different, and we are offering some new and some old products. We think that they are a good way to get your friends and relatives on the solar path.
Of course, using one solar panel is not going to change the world, but you have to start somewhere. If everyone just threw up their hands and said no matter what we do the Chinese are still going to pollute, the Indians are going to pollute and whatever we do won’t make any difference, then we should all move to higher ground as the oceans rise.
This is exactly the conundrum that our efforts in the United States have in comparison to the massive carbon emissions from China and India. I was reminded of what policymakers in California feel like when faced with the reality that a “a whole year of California reductions [are] wiped away in one week of Chinese growth,” according to economics professor Catherine Wolfram in an interview with NPR. Wolfram like others poses the question as whether the US should shift to renewable energy sources that are more expensive than fossil fuels when China and India are not doing their share. The answer is that we can and should because we can set an example of how to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels. If you lived in Los Angeles in the 50’s or 60’s you would know what it is like to breathe the polluted air and you would know what it is like having your kids stay inside because the air is too polluted for them to play in the playground. You would know what many cities in China are facing now as their citizens can barely see down the street because of the polluted air.
NPR also interviewed Stanford University’s Sally Benson, who maintains that the U.S. needs to clean up U.S. emissions, despite China’s polluting ways. “Certainly you do it for the good of the world, but you also do it for risk management,” says Benson. NPR quotes her as saying: “I think there will come a day,” she says, “when it will become so clear that we need to do this right away, that the countries that haven’t prepared themselves really put themselves at much greater economic risk.”
So what does that have to do with solar gifts? Actually, a lot. You have to start somewhere and that means every small step to use solar power helps. As you buy a solar light for your parents’ backyard, a solar backpack to power your friend’s computer, or a solar oven, you can know that you have started them down the right path away from fossil fuels and into the right path to solar energy. Have a happy holiday season!