Dear Readers!
We could have had it so much easier. Everything we need today, we could have built and prepared long ago. But we knew, or at least suspected, that it might eventually come to this. The Club of Rome had prophesied exactly this scenario already fifty years ago.
When the Club of Rome’s first book was published in 1972 it caused quite a stir. A report on the state of humanity, “The Limits to Growth” was penned by Donella and Dennis Meadows, two scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology MIT in the U.S. Even back then, the two authors were able to demonstrate that each person’s individual, localized behavior not only has an impact locally but has global repercussions and that these repercussions extend beyond an individual person’s time frame and sphere of activity. Since then it’s become clear that the excuse of “what I do here doesn’t bother anyone” no longer stands up to scrutiny.
Climate change is very unpleasant. But it also becomes uncomfortable to do something about climate change. In Germany, the Coal Commission was formed with the task of conceiving and planning the phase-out of coal. It can last up to twenty years, it’s been agreed. The affected regions painfully fast, and the climate protectors unbearably long. Germany’s withdrawal from coal is not enough for global climate protection. Around 1,300 new coal-fired power plants are currently being built or planned worldwide. And 90 percent of all new coal-fired power plants are built in developing countries. Those who understand these figures will think that the game against climate change has long since been lost.