Digg
Reddit
del.icio.us
What is the single most important subject, that this generation of the worlds mothers and fathers, should be teaching their children about?
//cont..
We should start to learn about energy. And we should take it seriously - as seriously as we take learning about how to manage our money.
What is energy literacy?
CLICK HERE FOR 'WHAT I NEED TO KNOW'
We already know that we need a basic level of financial literacy to balance our checkbooks, to use credit cards wisely, to invest for our kids' education and our own retirement and to avoid financial scams. We also need to form intelligent opinions on taxes, government spending and monetary policy.
In tough economic times, money knowledge is more important than ever, as we have seen in the depressions and recessions of the past.
Today, we may not be facing our toughest economic times. But we may soon see the toughest energy times we've ever known.
With levels of greenhouse gases higher than they've been in a million years, we have little time for business as usual if we want to avert dangerous global warming. At the same time, petroleum geologists say the peak of world oil production is immanent. From now on, fossil fuels will likely enter a period of volatility and price spikes, which means lack of supply will force us to change our ways, global warming or not.
Thus, today it's more important than ever we should develop basic energy literacy. It's the only way each of us can make smart decisions about our own energy use - decisions such as walk to work, or go in the car, big house or small one, gas or electric heat.
We must also be energy-literate to contribute in a positive way to the national and international dialogue on solutions to global warming and peak oil. Should we squeeze Iraq for more oil or try to save gas at home? Should we build more nuclear plants or subsidize clean coal? Should we regulate emission of global-warming gasses?
We've heard a lot about developing new energy sources - wind, solar, biomass to increase supply. But the fastest and cheapest way to solve our energy crunch (and slow global warming) is to reduce our demand for energy. Why haven't we heard more about conservation and energy-efficiency?
If we know more about energy, we can ask these questions, and we can understand the answers.
What is energy literacy? It's knowing the basics about where our energy comes from, how much it costs, how much we use, and what are its impacts on the environment and people at every stage, from production to distribution to end use.