Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Another Earth Day has come and gone. News outlets dutifully shared predictable lists of eco-friendly tips, and environmental organizations doggedly challenged us to “do our part to save the planet.” I’m weary of that refrain.
2023 was the hottest year on record, and 2024 is on a similar trajectory. Around the world people are feeling the real effects of extreme heat, water shortages and natural disasters. It’s time to let go of the idea that we are saving some idealized version of the planet.
The path forward will require us to concurrently mitigate climate change by stopping to produce harmful greenhouse gases while also adapting to the changes already happening. While both are urgent, the latter is receiving less attention and investment, and the more vulnerable people and places of the world are bearing the greatest burden. Adapting to climate-driven transformations like desertification, extreme heat and sea-level rise is going to require us to reorient our relationship with nature, conceptually and physically.
Adapting in Theory Last summer I took a road trip with my then 14-year-old daughter. We drove from the mouth of the Mississippi River in Venice, Louisiana, to the headwaters at Lake Itasca in Minnesota. We were struck by how little of the river we actually saw–it is behind levees for much of its length, from New Orleans to nearly the border of Minnesota and Canada.
(What we did see is a lot of corn. Six .
