10 reasons you should act on climate
#1 Most people are concerned about climate change, although they tend to keep their worries to themselves, but doing something about it can help relieve climate anxiety. This doesn’t have to be going on a march or demonstration, but you can start by changing your own behaviour to reduce your carbon emissions.
#2 You may have grandchildren or know someone that does, so a good reason for taking action is for their future, and more immediately, so you can look them in the eye without guilt.
#3 By reducing your carbon emissions you can save money on your bills at the same time. Saving energy at home reduces both your carbon and your energy bills. Switching some of your car journeys to walking or cycling saves petrol, so saves both carbon and money. Investing in solar panels, an EV or heat pump has an upfront cost but in the medium and long term will save you money.
#4 In acting on climate you can also benefit in other ways, you might have a healthier diet, you may be more active and improve your fitness, and you might spend more time in the garden or in other green spaces so improving your mental wellbeing.
#5 If you act, others may follow! If friends and family see how you benefit from your actions they may then follow suit. Then their family and friends might do the same, and so on.
#6 You may be thinking that you don’t have to act as technology will save us, but this is very uncertain. Not only are many of the technologies not fully developed or proven (e.g. carbon capture and storage), those that are (EVs, heat pumps) will take time to be widely adopted, time we don’t have. If you act the impact will be immediate!
#7 One of the Climate Change Committee’s recommendations in its 7th Carbon Budget (https://www.theccc.org.uk/publication/the-seventh-carbon-budget/) is to “Develop and implement an engagement strategy to provide clear information to households and businesses about how the UK can meet its emissions targets and the role they can play. It should focus on what actions are most impactful in reducing emissions”, so using information in “How to reduce your carbon emissions and save money on your bills” you can find the most impactful things you can do to reduce your own carbon emissions.
#8 If you live in Britain you may feel you have some responsibility for where we are now on climate change since it all started with the industrial revolution which began in the 1760s in Britain, then fairly quickly spread to Belgium, the Netherlands, America, France, and Germany.
#9 Whether you’re religious or not, it must be worth taking action in order to avoid the risk of an eternity in hell.
#10 Although it may seem impossible to make a difference, you can! Whilst there are no quick wins and everyone is different, everyone should be able to find something worthwhile to do in “How to reduce your carbon emissions and save money on your bills”.
#11 You can no longer use China as an excuse not to act! One of excuses for not acting is that there’s no point because China emits far more and still uses coal to generate energy. However, the “whataboutChina” excuse ignores the fact that in the UK we export much of our emissions by purchasing cheap goods made in China. Importantly though, China is now leading the way in decarbonising as this article explains https://open.substack.com/pub/billmckibben/p/the-world-turned-upside-down?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
In summary “The scale of the renewables revolution in China is almost too vast for the human mind to grasp. By the end of last year, the country had installed 887 gigawatts of solar-power capacity—close to double Europe’s and America’s combined total. The 22m tonnes of steel used to build new wind turbines and solar panels in 2024 would have been enough to build a Golden Gate Bridge on every working day of every week that year. China generated 1,826 terawatt-hours of wind and solar electricity in 2024, five times more than the energy contained in all 600 of its nuclear weapons”.
#2 You may have grandchildren or know someone that does, so a good reason for taking action is for their future, and more immediately, so you can look them in the eye without guilt.
#3 By reducing your carbon emissions you can save money on your bills at the same time. Saving energy at home reduces both your carbon and your energy bills. Switching some of your car journeys to walking or cycling saves petrol, so saves both carbon and money. Investing in solar panels, an EV or heat pump has an upfront cost but in the medium and long term will save you money.
#4 In acting on climate you can also benefit in other ways, you might have a healthier diet, you may be more active and improve your fitness, and you might spend more time in the garden or in other green spaces so improving your mental wellbeing.
#5 If you act, others may follow! If friends and family see how you benefit from your actions they may then follow suit. Then their family and friends might do the same, and so on.
#6 You may be thinking that you don’t have to act as technology will save us, but this is very uncertain. Not only are many of the technologies not fully developed or proven (e.g. carbon capture and storage), those that are (EVs, heat pumps) will take time to be widely adopted, time we don’t have. If you act the impact will be immediate!
#7 One of the Climate Change Committee’s recommendations in its 7th Carbon Budget (https://www.theccc.org.uk/publication/the-seventh-carbon-budget/) is to “Develop and implement an engagement strategy to provide clear information to households and businesses about how the UK can meet its emissions targets and the role they can play. It should focus on what actions are most impactful in reducing emissions”, so using information in “How to reduce your carbon emissions and save money on your bills” you can find the most impactful things you can do to reduce your own carbon emissions.
#8 If you live in Britain you may feel you have some responsibility for where we are now on climate change since it all started with the industrial revolution which began in the 1760s in Britain, then fairly quickly spread to Belgium, the Netherlands, America, France, and Germany.
#9 Whether you’re religious or not, it must be worth taking action in order to avoid the risk of an eternity in hell.
#10 Although it may seem impossible to make a difference, you can! Whilst there are no quick wins and everyone is different, everyone should be able to find something worthwhile to do in “How to reduce your carbon emissions and save money on your bills”.
#11 You can no longer use China as an excuse not to act! One of excuses for not acting is that there’s no point because China emits far more and still uses coal to generate energy. However, the “whataboutChina” excuse ignores the fact that in the UK we export much of our emissions by purchasing cheap goods made in China. Importantly though, China is now leading the way in decarbonising as this article explains https://open.substack.com/pub/billmckibben/p/the-world-turned-upside-down?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
In summary “The scale of the renewables revolution in China is almost too vast for the human mind to grasp. By the end of last year, the country had installed 887 gigawatts of solar-power capacity—close to double Europe’s and America’s combined total. The 22m tonnes of steel used to build new wind turbines and solar panels in 2024 would have been enough to build a Golden Gate Bridge on every working day of every week that year. China generated 1,826 terawatt-hours of wind and solar electricity in 2024, five times more than the energy contained in all 600 of its nuclear weapons”.
