We Can’t Innovate Our Way Out of the Climate Crisis
Some problems are just too big for technology to solve.
Photographer: Eddie Seal/Bloomberg
Optimism, especially about our ability to solve big problems, is in brutally short supply these days. The gloom might be at its worst in the climate change arena, where the Trump administration is in the midst of an all-out assault on green energy and the world is poised to miss the Paris Agreement target of limiting warming to no more than 1.5 degrees C.
Given that backdrop, I was struck by Bill Gates’ recent announcement of a major — and decidedly optimistic — shift in his thinking about climate change. “We’ve made great progress” on addressing global warming, he writes, and he’s confident the changing climate “will not lead to humanity’s demise.” But it’s time to shift our attention from cutting near-term emissions to investing in ways to “improve life in a warming world.” Doing so, according to Gates, will require us to “focus on innovation.”