Published
Western (and other cultures) are filled with children’s stories, myths and fables of great deeds. Whether it be the Labours of Hercules or Dick Whittington, the heroes of these stories triumph, despite apparently insurmountable adversity and (in the case of Dick) at least one false start.
None of these can hold a candle to the challenge of the climate and nature emergencies. As with the monsters of old, they seem both frighteningly real and frighteningly intangible and unimaginable, in equal measure, and they demand of us strength, skills and knowledge that we never knew we possessed and yet …
The powerful impression from the two recent Major Projects Association Roundtables in the run up to CoP26 (Don’t Mention Concrete and Don’t Mention Road and Rail) is the conviction on the part of the delegates involved that we know how to do this, we already have the requisite tools and the economic drivers are extraordinarily powerful. Here are a handful of the comments from these sessions:
“We can do it now, there are already many technological solutions available to us.”
“Climate change is a much larger risk than the other factors we are worrying about such as new material”.
“Monetizing carbon would drive behaviour change for clients and contractors.”
“We should monitor and manage cost, time, quality and carbon.”
If this is the case (and there is no reason to think that it isn’t) then it would seem that, rather like the characters in the Wizard of Oz, the only thing holding us back is our own lack of self-confidence and our fear of the unknown.
Let’s just pull back the curtain. But for once, rather than looking back on this breakthrough and wondering what all the fuss was about (which seems to be our default business response to side-stepping a calamity) wouldn’t it be nice if our achievement could be immortalized in a great moral story; something we all could learn from, now and in the future? I am imagining a concrete giant, a money-hoarding dragon and maybe a Slough of Despond, although since it’s not far short of a hundred years since John Betjeman dissed Slough, perhaps we should find another obliging town to provide our monster.
(On second thoughts, the Oz analogy is not such a good one. I can’t imagine what the carbon footprint is from a Yellow Brick Road, but it can’t be good)