“Gameau defaults to the position of inspiring people rather than alarming or overwhelming them. You leave the film wanting more, not less, of these sorts of productions.” Film review of 2040 (directed by Damon Gameau, Australia, 2019) by The Guardian newspaper

There is a majority view that positivity is important if you want to effect change.

Nearly 80 years ago, Winston Churchill inspired the British people with a speech that offered “blood, toil, tears, and sweat … many, many months of struggle and suffering”. In 1849, Garibaldi rallied his troops in Rome with the promise of “hunger, thirst, forced marches, battle, and death”. And in a similar vein a modern leader might propose “fire, floods, feuds, and famine … many years of environmental decay, conflict and adaptation”.

But it’s a little hard to imagine. Gameau’s vision – of a fume-free, noise-free green idyll, brought about by the combined forces of clever technology, community spirit and female emancipation – is more in keeping with the modern zeitgeist, and the it-will-be-all-right speeches of today’s politicians.

I largely share The Guardian’s enthusiasm, and recommend 2040 to those who have not yet seen it. I only wish it was more realistic.

Displacement

The film begins with a defensive claim: that all of the carbon emissions caused by its production (largely from the director jet-setting around the world) have been offset by ‘certified carbon credits’. It’s clearly a point that bothers Gameau, as the same claim is made at the end, only this time with a further announcement that additional funds have been donated to pro-active tree-planting in his native Australia.

Carbon offsetting is helpful but there is an essential dishonesty in the message that by spending a few extra pounds on a flight we can carry on with ‘business as usual’. We need to take the measures involved in offsetting – which in large measure would happen anyway, this is the problem known as ‘additionality’ – and also reduce flying, at least until such time as miracle planes have been invented that emit only small amounts of greenhouse gases.

The (non-)additionality of offsetting is one instance of the displacement problem: as climate breakdown escalates, firms will fall over themselves to claim that they are ‘green’ – that their own energy is from nice wind and solar, that they are planting lots of trees, that if only other firms could be as eco-friendly as they are the world would be fine. Essentially many of these green actions have already happened (e.g. the firms are sourcing electricity from renewable power stations that have already been built), or would happen anyway, one way or the other; the eco-friendly firms are attributing them to their own account and displacing others from doing so in the process. Not all actions fall into this category – some are genuinely additional – but we have to be wary of any claims that appear to be an excuse for business as usual. The claims are growing fast.

Too good to be true?

Unless you believe that progress is only possible if we are fortified by delusion, it is worth asking whether some of the film’s claims are too good to be true. For instance, the utopia of shared autonomous electric vehicles doesn’t quite address questions such as: a) how will everyone travel to work in rush hour?; or b) what are the resource implications of the large number of batteries required?; or c) how much energy will be required in data centres to support the constant streaming requirements for the autonomous vehicles? Perhaps there is a harder reality here – that we need to travel less full stop, whether for work or pleasure (bicycles excepted).

We do need a grown-up discussion about the psychological desires behind travel, and the dubious rationalisations given to justify it.

Are we really going to solve food problems by geo-engineering the oceans to grow seaweed? Or is the prosaic advice to eat a largely plant-based diet more realistic as well as less appealing?

Putting solar panels on everyone’s roof yields bigger dividends in relatively sunny countries than in northern Europe. Certainly they won’t provide all of a home’s energy needs (especially heating) as implied by the film. Nor do they provide much security when it is simultaneously cold and dark. Which isn’t to say they aren’t useful, but rather that the problem is much bigger than the film admits. Once again, lower consumption in western countries is part of the answer.

And even if the idyllic world were to come about, it will not be as early as 2040. If humanity stops using fossil fuels within twenty years, then many people will die in consequence, such is our reliance upon them. Yes we need to wean ourselves off, but in a way that is controlled and responsible.

At the risk of being out of step with the zeitgeist, I suggest that some hardship is unavoidable.