I’ve been desperate to write optimistic news about climate change. So this is it – how we can do better – the march to living sustainably with nature.

My perception is that the media is focused on bad news stories. The ones with disaster or blame or conflict or doom in the headlines?

I’m not sure why this is. Maybe good news stories are just a little tame or we don’t remember them? Maybe it is just easier to sell us a hook pointing the finger about things being wrong or missed opportunities……..

Anyway, good news, optimism and hope are what keeps me going so here comes a collection of small glimmers of what I wish for my future.

Book Lovers corner

Last week was half term for the boys (one glorious week off school) so I found myself on short walks around the local roads and footpaths (when I could tear them away from which ever screen they were engrossed in) and a fair amount of reading (while they were on their screens!)

I’m part way through two books (I have no idea how I have two books on the go – does that happen to anyone else?)

First up is Rebirding; Restoring Britain’s Wildlife by Benedict Macdonald. I’m at the very start of it (page 40 something) but already I can see how the changes to land use have caused massive disappearances in nature (not just bird life). Persecution of birds of prey in the highlands and changes in farming practise causing widespread loss of habitat. Changing practises making life easier for the farmer but out of kilter with slow seasonal cycles. It is hard reading at the moment because at every page turn I can see our changing land use, be it farming or industry or house building, wiping out space for nature.

Sorry, this isn’t particularly optimistic! But the book is heralded by reviewers as visionary and a manifesto for restoring Britain’s wildlife so I expect great things by the end!

My bed time reading is book number three from Raynor Winn: Landlines. I’ve read The Salt Path and The Wild Silence both as important for her and her husband’s chronicle of homelessness, declining health and the optimism that meeting new people can bring and this third book takes on another long distance walk. But the echo through her writing are the tales of the land they pass through, the wilderness and the urban and the life in the countryside along the way. One passage in Landlines quite literally stopped me in my tracks and I think captures the chilling plight of nature.

On a walk they witness the cutting of grass for silage.

“Small meadows of grass being invaded by an army of tractors, trailers, tenders and silage blowers, which ravage a hundred acres of land in ninety minutes. The fields are stripped bare of grass and with it every living thing that existed within them,…”

“It feels like we are witnessing an Armageddon for a huge area of biodiversity”

The silage, destined for a large dairy unit away elsewhere. “…………. biodiversity isn’t part of the equation and certainly can’t be balanced against the desire for higher profits”

The author reflects on wildlife pushed to the margins and the reality of the choices we make in the shops – this is what cheap food looks like in the countryside.

“No matter how many wildflower seeds we sow in our gardens, its an equation that can’t be balanced”

Yep, well aware that doesn’t sound optimistic either BUT it pushed me over the edge of complacency and back into motivated mode. You know …… the polite version of getting out of my chair and going to do something……!

Community

So, on Saturday, I called in to one of the zero waste shops in town to talk to a volunteer from a local group called Climate Action Taunton. I wanted to get better connected with the actions going on locally. So I’ve signed up for their newsletter and picked up some information about other local groups and how to get involved with their activities. I was interested to find out there are various citizen science activities going on locally which I didn’t know about. I’m bouyed up by knowing I’m not alone and hopeful these new connections will keep me motivated.

Putting out the recycling

Monday night was the real low point of the holidays – putting out the food bin for recycling and realising how much food we had thrown away. Partly understandable because I’m less organised with a menu through the holidays but I need to try and avoid this happening. So we have had a couple of veggie meals – a curry and butternut squash soup – both used up some rather limp veg! and having leftovers of chicken tagine from the weekend Mr TreadingSofter and I have had portions of that this week. Turning the ‘Must do better’ into progress feels good this week. Progress not perfection

Ever Heard of SolarPunk?

This was something of an “Alice Through the Looking Glass” moment. When I realised there was something on the other side of the feeling ‘I don’t know what the future looks like but I’m sure it isn’t more of the same’.

Out of a casual conversation came the mention of Solarpunk. A spin off of science fiction if you like but with eco credentials. Authors and artists imagining a new way of living, touching on sustainability and architecture and harmony with nature. I totally ‘get’ this is fiction BUT what if some of it is what we might aim for in future sustainable development? Wouldn’t it be exciting to imagine how towns and cities could evolve? I’m a real believer in if you can see it you can be it. Now I have glimpses of a new future. How exciting is that?

These solar trees are in Singapore maybe we will see more of these in the future.

So put “solapunk” into your internet search engine and just imagine what towns could look like in the future.

Then I wondered if any of this is making its way into architecture now because I am still seeing new developments that still look like what we have built already – no solar panels, no room for recycling bins on kerbside, no managing rainwater, no heat pumps, lots of glass and no thought for cooling in summer………….

Real world sustainable architecture

In my searches I came across an image of a high rise development but with tiers of green terracing in an urban picture. Wow! so I followed the link to an article and realised it was real, well, proposed/ i.e. not fiction! A proposed development in Amsterdam entered into Architectural Review: Future Projects Awards 2020.

The best bit is that these are annual awards and last years winners 2023 included a proposed project in Lewes, UK called The Phoenix. This article gives a bit more information from a local point of view. This is the link to The Phoenix website setting out what they hope to include in the development. Maybe times are changing.

And a new to me podcast

And if all that wasn’t exciting enough! I found a new climate podcast. Outrage + Optimism: Behind the scenes on politics, investments and actions meeting the climate crisis head on. I understand this is now part of TED Climate.

The hosts are Christina Figueres, Tom Rivett-Carnac and Paul Dickenson. I listened to the September Stocktake episode. The hosts suggested that culturally we might have reached the tipping point where enough people are moving away from fossil fuels to make change inevitable.

Have a good week

I hope I have cheered you up for this week. If that isn’t enough a little picture of our two new rescue kittens who have been enthusiastically helping write this post! They are sorry for any random typing xx