The World in 2030

The World in 2030 141
By ‘education’ I don’t mean a series of television ads
exhorting the populace to save energy (although that might
help), I mean continuing education by the media, by
governments, by businesses and NGOs and by industry to
make the public more and more aware of its responsibility
to our planet.
One ideal place to start this process is in schools and
the FuturEnergia campaign 278 being run by PlasticsEurope is
an excellent example of an initiative to encourage young
people to learn about energy conservation.
In essence, we all have to develop a conscience (and a
consciousness) about the cost of our lifestyles.
Energy (by which I mean transport fuel, electricity and
gas) has been so relatively cheap in the developed world
that most of us have used it with an uncaring, rapacious
profligacy that will seem shocking to future generations.
A visitor to the United States who witnesses that nation’s
absolute reliance on automobiles might conclude that
nothing can be changed in US domestic policy without
completely dismantling a society that has become wholly
addicted to cheap energy (which is why, perhaps, so many
American citizens are pig-headed about refusing to accept
that climate change is a serious problem). And I understand
that in societies and communities that were designed
after the automobile was invented a legislative prescription
to restrict citizens using such transport would be doomed
to fail.