The current renewable energy revolution lead by solar power emerges less as a technological revolution and more as human evolution. Call it our next species, where we finally shake the mantle of our caveman selves.
It is the natural selection moment that may save us. Our fifteen minutes of genetic fame. Not elongated toes to support walking upright or more expansive skulls this time. This time it's cerebral.
We have the power to reason that we must change something fundamental in order to save ourselves. It is no less real than using tools for the first time so that we can improve our diet and grow our survival.
The crux is plain as day -- early man burned things to create heat and light, and we’re still doing that. It has been an amazing 400,000 year run, from the warm glow of coals in a chilly cavern on an ancient winter's night to coal-fired plants running a fantastic metropolis. Outstanding, really, but it's still burning things. Time to move on.
As most evolutions, it is required and necessary for a species to undertake or the species goes away.
This fits exactly in with moving – evolving – away from fossil fuel systems and toward renewable energy systems, especially solar, while the ravages of climate change begin to fray the edges of humanity and modern civilization.
We've all heard the dire predictions. It does not bode well for us this enormous challenge called climate change. But if we continue to adopt more and more solar power, we will be reining in climate change and thereby preserving our own species.
We will be embracing the next evolution. We will have evolved as a necessity of survival. It’s not a revolution as much as it’s an evolution, to a better species, a smarter species.
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