Sunday 6 December 2009

Climate change

I’ve just read on the website of the Guardian an editorial which will be published in newspapers all over the world tomorrow about the vital importance of the Copenhagen climate conference. You can read the full editorial here. There are difficult choices to be made for all of us, as this editorial points out:

The era of flights that cost less than the taxi ride to the airport is drawing to a close. We will have to shop, eat and travel more intelligently. We will have to pay more for our energy, and use less of it.

But benefits, too, can come from action on climate change:

the shift to a low-carbon society holds out the prospect of more opportunity than sacrifice. Already some countries have recognized that embracing the transformation can bring growth, jobs and better quality lives.

This conference presents an opportunity which must not be missed, as this multinational editorial says:

The politicians in Copenhagen have the power to shape history's judgment on this generation: one that saw a challenge and rose to it, or one so stupid that we saw calamity coming but did nothing to avert it.

Let us hope that our representatives make the right decisions this week.

On a lighter note …

DSC00400 I think it’s been a while since this wine press was used. DSC00418-1

This morning we went to a wine tasting at the Domaine de Saint Preignan at Pouzolles and tasted and bought some very good wines. There was a range of wines, white, rosé and red and we particularly liked the white Muscat, their top of the range Louise red and the Coteaux de Languedoc red. They have some lovely old buildings and olive trees at the domaine too.

DSC00402 DSC00405 DSC00408

4 comments:

Carol said...

Thank you for writing this! I confess I am not hopeful... not in regards to my leaders... but I hope I am wrong. I love how you end by bringing us to this lovely venue where you sipped wine. Lovely photos. Carol

Heiko said...

Like Carol, I'm not hopeful. I've been banging on that we need to change the way we live for some 30 years now, but people in general, not only our leaders, are just too short-sighted and self-centred. I refused to learn to drive as an 18-year old, because I didn't want to add to pollution (I did of course learn 10 years later), but then and now, I don't know many people who think that way. And as for cheap flights, don't we, including myself, all want to hate them, but use them anyway, because they are so cheap. I couldn't hitchhike to the UK for the price of a flight!

Changes may in the end be forced onto us, but I fear too late.

Stefaneener said...

I have relatives who still pooh-pooh the idea. I don't know why it's so anathema to them. Their political and religious leaders spread lies to serve their own ends and so my country does nothing.

Let us all hope for real change in time.

Jan said...

I'm not very hopeful that an agreement can be reached, but we must be optimistic.

On the wine front, we purchased some very good (and cheap) village vi negre yesterday at the Olive Festival.