I have just seen a very interesting video called Is This the Future of Kamloops? According to CBC Radio One and the Kamloops Daily News the video was produced by Sandra Abraham, Dianne Kerr, Mary Jordan and Bill Ligertwood.
I thought the presentation made some very good points about how the people of Kamloops should be thinking about the livability of their city. The video contrasts the number of permanent jobs that will be generated by the mine with the total number of existing jobs in Kamloops and wonders if those new jobs will be worth the risks to the livability of the city and potential health consequences. The greatest concern is the dust. The dust will be contaminated with numerous heavy metals and carried on the prevailing wind direction into the heart of the city and up both arms of the Thompson River. The video includes an interview with the mayor Tina Sartoretto of Cobalt, ON. She tells a cautionary tale about the unforeseen costs to her community from mining activities.
It’s easy not to like open pit mining but even green energy alternatives can be a difficult choice for communities. CBC Radio One did a documentary on wind farms in Kincardine, ON called Windfall. Kincardine is best known for its nuclear power plant that produces about 25% of Ontario’s power. Now the town has become a battleground over green energy. To listen to the story please see:
There is a very good chance that over the next few decades we are going to see increasing conflict over land use and long term environmental costs. We are going to see increasing conflict over the control of materials and resources. As individuals we might think that these great forces are beyond our control or influence. But this is just not so. As individuals running our households, “on mass” we cause the outcome. We could also “on mass” change our collective course. Are we willing, as a population, to change our values to achieve a sustainable society? What would a sustainable society look like? From my point of view, a sustainable society would be made up of sustainable households.
Maybe the days of the mega-projects are over. Mega wind farm projects or massive mines that make communities feel impotent and set neighbor against neighbor may not be the answer. Maybe we need to turn our societal creativity towards micro-projects that could be managed on the household or neighborhood level. What would it be like to live in a world where we didn’t pay utility bills to some faceless corporation but managed our own micro-utility system?
If we do not change our patterns of consumption on the household level, the greater society will make the hard choices for us, and find a way to satisfy our insatiable hunger for energy and goods. We will never learn the true costs of our consumption until it is way too late. We will leave a poorer world for our children and grandchildren. For more about what individuals can do please read What if?
“The intuitive mind is the sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”
Albert Einstein
