A new series: Featured comments and analysis from Price Tags readers. Something more than just another Comment (though there’s nothing wrong with that!).
.
From Penny Coupland:
Having just come back from a week of 31C January weather in Santa Barbara with 3 percent humidity, all this (Why global water shortages pose threat of terror and war) seems very real. I’ve done this train trip many times and watching the reservoir levels fall, land become parched and barren and stands of trees die, is frightening.
.
I gave up flying because like the meteorologist on Slate that you linked to last week, I had an epiphany. I was biking in Morocco eight years ago. It’s great way to connect with locals and really experience the land. Kids appear from nowhere and rush to the road to look at your bike and high-five you. I could stop and pull my drop spindle from my bag and sit spinning with the women tending sheep along the roadside.
Roadside refreshments are to be found at the oases. I stopped for dates several times, but rarely was able to buy any for some reason. Eventually I reached an oasis where a farmer spoke English. He explained that he had no dates because the Sahara is moving north and the oases are drying up. The date palms are either dead or refusing to fruit. He told me that like many other farmers in the region he was going to be forced to move his family to the city to look for work.
And that was my moment. I was a science teacher and had been teaching about greenhouse effect and climate change for years, but here was the reality of it talking to me face to face. I suddenly made the connection between my flight and his plight.
