This glowing leaf reminds me that all the energy which supports every single life on this planet comes from the Sun. We don’t get energy from anywhere else. Plants are much better at capturing the Sun’s energy than we animals are. They have chlorophyll in their cells and can turn sunlight directly into sugars to sustain them and to use to turn the carbon dioxide and water which they capture into the structures of their stalks, leaves and flowers. We humans, like other animals, have to eat something which has already done this part of the work – ie plants – or other animals further up the food chain which have taken the energy from plants, and even other animals by consuming them.
It does make me realise that the most direct way for us to get the energy we need to stay alive, healthy and growing, is to eat plants. Yeah, we can eat animals too, but, for the most part, that’s a more indirect and expensive way to get the energy we need.
I wonder if we are anywhere near making the kinds of devices which capture the Sun’s energy directly, the way that plants do it? Imagine if that was our primary source to meet ALL of our energy needs? No more need for carbon based fuels, nuclear power plants and so on. Wouldn’t that be good?
That idea is typical of a whole way of approaching new technologies – it’s called “biomimetics” – learning how Nature does something, then seeing if we can invent a way to either do the same, or to develop technologies using the same principles. I think that’s one of the most exciting potential routes forward for we humans. After all, Nature works on the basis of using all the possible connections, and never producing any waste. The lessons of millennia of evolution are lessons which are surely worth learning….
Heroes Not Zombies 
Good focus.
The capture of Solar energy by PV panels gives a source which will I think transform the ecology of the world, as the cost is falling rapidly (As it has for computer chips). It will become uneconomic to extract oil and coal for energy.
This will reverse the carbon dioxide greenhouse accumulation.
We will develop ways of recycling plastics so that there is no longer the need for oil as a raw material.
Mankind has reached vermin population proportions. The only answer to this is that affluence seems to bring a reduction in procreation, so perhaps this too will be a reversing trend.
The questions are:-
How quickly can the pendulums swing back? Two generations?
How much of the damage caused by global worming is reversible?
Thanks. Yes I think the key is to develop technology not to consume more endlessly but to enable us to adapt, sustain and grow the quality of life for Life on Earth.
You’re right to note that population pressures tend to ease as countries provide improved quality of life and health for their populations.
I guess nobody knows the answers to your questions but the planet as a whole being WILL adapt – better for us, our children and grandchildren if we become active co-creators of that adaptation