Sunday February 20, 2005
Solo voyage offers a symbol of hope
In his bestselling 1993 book The Celestine Prophecy, author James Redfield argued that coincidences are never just chance. I wouldn\’t go that far – in a universe of billions of possibilities, a certain number of encounters can\’t help being random.
Still, I\’m amazed at how often two events coincide in a way that offers insights into both. Perhaps the human intellect\’s ability to make connections and discern implications makes coincidence seem less random, more purposeful.
Last Wednesday, the Kyoto Accord on Climate Change came into force around the world.
The week before, Ellen MacArthur sailed around the same world in 71 days.
No, the connection is not that the first resulted from hot air moving, the second from cold air!
The Kyoto Accord emerged from an international conference in 1997. So far, 141 nations have signed on. Its own requirement, that countries accounting for 55 per cent of the world\’s emissions must ratify it, delayed the Accord\’s implementation until Russia got on board last year.
So far, the two biggest holdouts are also the worst offenders. According to some sources, the U.S. pumps more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than all other nations combined. Australia runs second – or perhaps third, depending on who tweaks the figures.
Put in perspective, the human race dumps as much carbon dioxide into the air annually as if we had burned every tree in Canada, and do it every year.
Fossil-fuel based economy
Now that Kyoto has some clout, Canada is under pressure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by six per cent below 1990 levels. Which doesn\’t sound like much. Except that since 1990, our emissions have risen steadily at around three per cent a year.
By the target date of 2012, if the business-as-usual scenario persists, we\’ll be 50 per cent above our target.
Cutting back that much at once would, as Kyoto critics charge, devastate our economy.
Since the beginning of the Industrial Age, in the late 1700s, our economy has been based on burning fuels laid down millions of years ago. Coal comes from ancient plants; oil from ancient animals. Transformed by heat and pressure, they form concentrated, portable energy sources.
But the effect on the earth\’s atmosphere is comparable to burning those ancient forests non-stop for thousands of years. Except that because the fuel is now concentrated, it\’s not spread out over thousands of years.
Since the early 1800s, when poet William Blake wrote about England\’s “dark satanic mills,” the amount of carbon dioxide (the primary product of burning any organic fuel) in the earth\’s atmosphere has risen from about 280 parts per million to over 370 parts per million. That\’s the highest level in at least 20 million years.
Nothing but wind power
Previous overdoses of carbon dioxide have had natural causes. The highest level came about 230 million years ago, after massive volcanic eruptions, when the Permian Extinction wiped out 70 per cent of all species on earth. (It far exceeded the better-known Cretaceous Extinction of the dinosaurs, 65 million years ago.)
Today, there is no natural cause. Just an unnatural cause – our addiction to fossil fuels.
Almost inevitably, the prospect of cutting back on fossil fuels evokes wails of protest. Particularly from those who burn it. Or, in Alberta and Texas, those who produce it.
It will destroy our economy, they say.
Which reminds me of the cynical “Mantra of Capitalism,” — “he who dies with the most toys, wins.” But whoever “he” is, he\’s still dead.
Paraphrased in environmental terms, the corporation with the highest profit margins as the planet becomes unliveable, wins.
But it doesn\’t have to be that way.
The week before the Kyoto Accord came into effect, Ellen MacArthur sailed around the world. Alone. Using nothing but wind power. In 71 days, 14 hours, 18 minutes and 33 seconds.
Put that into perspective. She circled the planet faster than science-fiction author Jules Verne could even imagine, in Around the World in 80 Days. His fictional characters used every form of transportation known when he wrote, from the Orient Express to rickshaws. MacArthur used nothing but sails.
And she actually travelled farther than Verne\’s characters. They circumnavigated the globe entirely within the Northern Hemisphere. She crossed the Equator, to the Cape of Good Hope, across the Indian Ocean, around Cape Horn, and back up the full length of the Atlantic. A total of 27,348 miles.
She averaged 16 knots. At times her boat, the 23-meter Castorama B&Q, topped 35 knots. Translated for landlubbers, that\’s about 40 mph, or about 65 km/hr.
At that speed, MacArthur could have passed most of the Canadian navy.
And she did it entirely powered by wind.
High tech, low energy To receive this column regularly via e-mail, send a request to jimt@quixotic.ca. E-mail subscribers also get excerpts from correspondence about these columns. Please forward a copy of this column to anyone who might be interested in subscribing.
If you want to order my books, you can call 1-800-663-2775 in Canada, 1-800-328-0200 in the U.S., or order them on-line at the Wood Lake Books website.
For a lighter look at ethics, faith, and life, I recommend Ralph Milton\’s weekly e-newsletter Rumors. You can subscribe to it at the Wood Lake Books home page in Ralph Milton\’s Site, or by sending a note directly to ralphmilton@woodlake.com.
It\’s also worth pursuing Richard Fairchild\’s United Online site. Another site worth visiting is David Keating\’s \”SeemslikeGod\” page.
I may be a little biased here. I\’ve always been fascinated by long-distance sea voyages, despite an inability to conquer seasickness. My bookshelves include Joshua Slocum, the first solo round the world voyage in his ketch Spray, starting in 1895. Captain John Voss, in a converted West Coast canoe, the Tilikum. Sir Francis Chichester, in Gypsy Moth. Adrian Hayter, in Sheila. Robin Knox-Johnston, in Suhaili, the first single-handed non-stop circumnavigation…
MacArthur\’s B&Q far surpassed her forerunners\’ vessels. Built of carbon fibre, for strength and lightness, it cost $3.5 million. A trimaran, not a monohull. Loaded with high-tech equipment that supplied instant information about wind, weather, and navigation, and that updated her shore crew on her location and physical condition.
But still, she did the trip without using any carbon-based fuels for motive power.
The coincidence of these two events suggests to me that the alternative to a fossil-fuel based economy is not necessarily a return to horse-and-buggy days. The solution may not be to go backwards, but to go smarter.
Ellen MacArthur shows us another possible scenario. Until now, industrial technology has led us down the path of ever-increasing energy use. Perhaps it can now lead us towards less energy use.
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Copyright © 2002 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups permitted; all other rights reserved.
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