SAM NAFTZGER: You’re listening to WNIJ, I’m Sam Naftzger and I’m joined in conversation today with environmentalist and author Bill McKibben. He’s a Schumann Distinguished Scholar of environmental studies and a contributing writer to The New Yorker. He’s also a founder of environmental organizations 350.org and the Third Act movement. Bill’s written extensively on the impact of global warming and climate change for over 35 years, starting with his 1989 book "The End of Nature," which is widely considered to be one of the first books on climate change. Bill is scheduled to be the keynote speaker at Earthrise 815’s Sustainability Action Conference happening in Rockford on Nov. 6. Bill, thanks for joining me.
MCKIBBEN: Well, what a pleasure to be with you, Sam.
NAFTZGER: So, the first question that I’d like to pose you revolves around your latest book “Here Comes the Sun: A Last Chance for the Climate and a Fresh Chance for Civilization.” This book came out last August, and it mainly focuses on this recent surge in cheap, renewable energy. Obviously, there’s a degree of optimism surrounding this uptick in solar power more explicitly, but what should we take away from these developments? And what hurdles really need to be considered?
MCKIBBEN: Well, I think what we should take away from them is that there is a real, technological possibility for rapid, rapid cleaning up of our energy system. And if you look around the world, you can really see it happening. The Chinese have installed about half the clean energy in the world in the last five years. They're winning this battle not just economically, but they've peaked their growth of carbon emissions, and they're going down now, unlike the United States. It's truly remarkable.
There are parts of this country that have done the same thing. California is using 50% less natural gas to produce electricity than they were three years ago because they put up so many solar panels and batteries. So, the possibility for a different, cleaner, cheaper, energy system that you don't have to go fight wars for all the time, and whose price doesn't go up and down and double in the course of six months. That's very realistic now in a way that it wasn't even a few years ago. You know, it's only this decade that sun and wind and batteries have become cheaper than coal and oil and gas.
The obstacle that you ask about is most clearly the Trump administration. They have a pathological hatred for renewable energy. They've tried to shut down wind farms that are 90% complete off the Pacific and Atlantic coasts. They've put all federal land off limits to solar panels, and they engaged us in war after war with Venezuela and Iran, the countries with the second and third largest oil reserves on the planet.
NAFTZGER: So, yeah, here in the U.S., the fight for renewable energy has had to contend with all manner of hurdles over the years from climate change denial, to the wealth and influence of the oil industry, to the anti-wind and solar initiatives of the Trump administration. With inexpensive solar energy finding a foothold abroad in places like China or Pakistan, what might these efforts to stymie renewable energy domestically mean for the U.S. and the globe?
MCKIBBEN: Well, I think that we really have a possibility in the U.S. to do things differently quickly. And I'll note that in Illinois, Gov. Pritzker has been a real voice for figuring out how to try and do this. And I'm grateful to him and to other politicians in Illinois for that leadership. But I think it's going to take a lot of citizen activism to take us to the next level. So for instance, at Third Act, which is this organization that I founded a few years ago for old people like me, it's all Americans over the age of 60. We took one of our goals last year was to get as many states as possible to legalize this stuff we're calling balcony or plug-in solar.
Across Europe, there's now five million households, mostly apartments, where people have gone to, I don't know, IKEA or whatever they call Best Buy in Italy, and come home with a $300 or $400 solar panel designed to be zip tied to the balcony of their apartment, and on the back is a plug. You just plug it into the wall, and suddenly you're producing I don't know 10%, 15%, 20% of the energy that you use.
In America, that was illegal everywhere until this year. We've managed to persuade 12 state legislatures, including California and New York, to legalize this stuff, so there'll be a national market for it soon. That bill fell short in the Illinois legislature in Springfield this year, but we hope that by next year we'll be able to get it approved, along with a lot of other reforms to make it easier and easier for Americans to access the solar energy that people are finding elsewhere.
I mean, if you want an example of what it could look like, go to Australia. Or at least read about it. In Australia now, thanks to good government policy, 40% of homes have solar panels on the roof. There's so much solar power in Australia that all Australians get free electricity now every afternoon between noon and 3:00 p.m. And they've all been buying batteries with their government's help to store that free energy in the afternoon, so they can run their homes at night.
NAFTZGER: There’s obviously plenty that has evolved and changed with regards to climate change, geopolitics, and just broader technological innovation since you began your began your environmental activism in the 1980s. As someone who’s been at the forefront of this environmental campaign for decades now, how have you navigated this shifting landscape? And what is that defines this moment in history with respect to the climate?
MCKIBBEN: Well, I think this moment in history with respect to climate is very grim. The temperature is now rising very fast and we're getting droughts, floods, fires. The next 12 months will be particularly difficult because the El Nino, now aborning in the Pacific, is riding in on this tide of higher temperatures. So, we're going to see higher global temperatures than any member of our species has experienced at any point in our history over the next year, and it will be difficult.
On the other hand, we're at a moment when we could be seeing a huge renaissance in manufacturing and deployment of all this really, really interesting technology. One of the reasons I'm eager to come to Rockford is, A, I wrote about it a lot in this book, "Here Comes the Sun," spent several really interesting days there reporting on the rapid development of solar in surrounding counties and within the city itself. But B, because I'm intrigued by Rockford's history.
You know, there was a moment in the '50s and '60s when it was a workshop for the nation producing all kinds of the stuff that we need. And there's no reason that with sound government policy, we couldn't be doing just that again in places like Rockford. Instead of just writing a check to Texas or Saudi Arabia for our energy every month, we could be doing this close to home.
NAFTZGER: You know, I like to know what you think the path forward for northern Illinois explicitly is in this fight against climate change. If you could issue a call to action to Illinois legislators, manufacturers, and concerned state residents, you know, what might it be?
MCKIBBEN: It might be that this is a moment of extraordinary opportunity, but you need to seize it quickly. The climate crisis is breaking over our heads right now, but also so are the crises that come with dependence on fossil fuel. As long as we depend on an energy source that's only available in a few places, the people who control those places end up with too much money and power. And what do you know? We end up in an endless series of wars to try and maintain what our president calls energy dominance. Meanwhile, the sun is pouring down energy every day. There's wind sweeping across the plains every day. We know how to capture this and we'd be foolish not to.
NAFTZGER: One of the things I find remarkably interesting and also really frightening as a young person today is the proliferation of misinformation, especially on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, or Tik Tok. You know, it’s easy for people to get sucked into these highly partisan echo chambers that can just inundate someone’s personal feed with a ton of misinformation. I’m curious to know the extent to which the rise in video reels and podcast culture has changed conversations around climate action within the past decade or so.
MCKIBBEN: It’s made it easy for the fossil fuel industry to figure out new ways to do their old task of spewing nonsense. We know now that the fossil fuel industry knew everything there was to know about climate change back in the 1980s, but just set out on a strategy of straight up lying about it for decades. And now they've got a new tool. But we also know that that misinformation doesn't stand up when it runs into actual people and actual experience.
I remember being out in that farmland around Rockford and talking with people who said, you know, when we can bring in a farmer from another part of Illinois who's put up a successful solar farm, that tends to drive away all the negative images that people have because they'll trust someone saying, "here's my experience."
That's why at Third Act, we've started this Solar Advocates Project, where we've trained up a lot of people to attend county board meetings and that kind of thing and just explain what the actual facts are about this new technology. And, you know, those facts are so clear once you get down to them that you have a cheap, clean energy source that allows for local control instead of long-distance dependence, that's usually all it takes.
NAFTZGER: Once again, author and environmentalist Bill McKibben will be the keynote speaker at the Sustainability Action Conference Earthrise 815 is hosting on Nov. 6. Make sure to visit their website earthrise815.com for more information. Bill, thanks again for today’s conversation, and I wish you the best with next month’s conference.
MCKIBBEN: I'll look forward to getting to Illinois. It's always a pleasure to be around Rockford. So, take care.
Earthrise 815 is an underwriter of WNIJ.
