Every age has its own apocalypse. My childhood was spent worrying about how I would cope living on tinned food under the stairs when the Bomb finally went off. My own children’s nightmares will be about living the garden shed after our house is either washed away by floods or subsides into the parched earth of middle England.
Not surprisingly, every book on today’s apocalypse has the kind of cataclysmic sub/title of which the Jesus of Matthew 24 would be proud. Monbiot knows that the elements will not literally ‘be destroyed by fire’ but he also knows that, lest we repent, the earth and everything in it may indeed be laid bare.
Accordingly, Heat begins with a catalogue of woes that we (or, more accurately, the world’s poor) have to look forward to if we don’t change our ways. The list is familiar but shocking. It is not, however, as shocking as the following chapter, ‘The Denial Industry’, which explores how and why so many people still believe climate change is a load of hot air. If what it says about Exxon, Philip Morris, et al is true, it’s the kind of thing that makes Paul’s talk of ‘the powers of this dark world’ seem frighteningly real.
The seriousness of the problem thus established, Monbiot proceeds to outline the enormity of task ahead. Kyoto, as everyone knows, is woefully inadequate. Even the more ambitious target of a 60% reduction by 2050 is not enough. Monbiot argues that a 90% cut in rich nations’ emissions by 2030 is the only target that stands any chance of averting catastrophe.
This will sound hopeful (in the sense that expecting the Rapture by 2030 is ‘hopeful’). As Monbiot observes, ‘nobody ever rioted for austerity.’ He does proceed, however, to show, in considerable detail, how it could be achieved in the UK.
His analysis is thorough and well-footnooted. It’s a little heavy going in places (his section on the cement industry is, by his own admission, not a thrilling read) but the book’s weight is alleviated by a journalistic style and moments of real wit.
In the end the book’s strength is also its weakness. The British could cut carbon emissions by 90% in 24 years but there is absolutely no chance that we will. Heat’s cogent and well-argued strategy founders on the rock of its ambition and will cause some to dismiss it for being too unrealistic.
That would be a mistake. Anyone serious about how we can avert even the worst consequences of our excesses should read it. At a time when books and reports on climate change are published daily, few will be more worth reading.
Heat: How to Stop the Planet Burning by George Monbiot is published by Allen Lane (2006)
This review first appeared in Third Way.
