I first really learned of the name Bill McKibben when I participated in the Step It Up thing a few years ago. It seemed like he was the coordinator of the event or something like that, probably a difficult job considering how huge it was. Anyhow, Gerry Gras knew much more about him, and he invited me to ride along with him and Dana to go see the guy on his book tour. McKibben spoke in the First Church of Christ, a liberal church in Berkeley. It was a large church, and they filled it with well dressed people that wanted to hear what he had to say.
In his talk McKibben quickly went over the the things I already knew about, but then went into some detail about what it felt like to be in Copenhagen watching the climate change negotiations go nowhere. It was like all those public servants just didn't have the stomach to do what needs to be done. Then he talked a bit about the book. The blurb from inside the front cover gives you a better overview than I can.




The first half of the book contains lots of detail about how bad the problem really is. Things like long lists of record weather disasters, and comparisons with similar periods of time that were a bit less recent and not anywhere near as troubled. A couple of pages of quotes from celebrities and elected officials (Barbara Boxer, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and many others) saying things like "we need to do something about the problem for the sake of our grandchildren." Simple explanations of why things have changed. Troubling predictions about the future. Things like "right now the glaciers are melting, which means plenty of water in the rivers. When the melt is completed, maybe around 2030 or so, those rivers are going to be much smaller during the dry season." It's likely to spell trouble for places that depend on them now.
The last half of the book is devoted to the kinds of things we can do to help develop solutions to the problem. He spends just enough space talking about all the solutions we should already know are part of it. We need to use a lot less energy. We need to decentralize our energy supply. We need to eat lower on the food chain. We need to eat more locally sourced food. We need to redevelop local communities. We need to move away from industrial agriculture, and towards smaller farms. The guy is a good writer, and a lot of it makes sense. Consider this paragraph on looking at the role of a diner.


Then he talks about some of the challenges the people behind the diner have to surmount to put a plate of local food in front of customers. Things like nobody wants to compete with hog farms in Utah that sell bacon for 69 cents a pound to middlemen who are quite willing to sell the stuff for less than the $7/lb. a small hog farmer needs to get to make a profit in Vermont. Reading the book gives you a sense of the scale of the changes we need to make.
The last part is a gushing endorsement of the web as a part of the solution. He points out that electronic volunteer activism is decentralized compared to old media, and in many cases is more energy efficient than going there to get information. Consider this paragraph:


Then he talks about some great ways to use the internet to build community. Things like a local email list that works as a neighborhood newspaper. As the mainstream media cuts back on local reporting, that may be one of the main things we have to work with soon to build community.

There is some discussion about the global nature of branding. For example, everyone on the planet probably knows what the golden arches are all about. McKibben's horse in that battle is 350, the safe level of carbon in the atmosphere for life as we knew it 50 years ago. (We're already beyond that, to get there we need to cut WAY BACK on CO2 emissions and encourage all the plant life we can.) You can find out much more about that at 350.org.

This book is a must read if the topics I've mentioned spark your interest!
In the book he doesn't mention it, but during his speech he said that we need to find ways to build the movement towards sustainability by working together to make 10/10/10 a day of action for change. I'm thinking about what I can do that day, and I hope you are to.


Usually when I like a book this much I pass it along when I'm done. However, McKibben did such a heart warming job on the personalized autograph for me that I'm keeping this one. If you want to borrow my copy, ask nicely and I'll probably lend it to you.