Bill Gates' How to Avoid Climate Disaster: What I learned

It was born out of two things: Gates’ interest in innovation and the sciences, and “the irresistible challenge of furthering global development while reducing emissions.”

Essentially the book is about how the world can achieve zero greenhouse gas emissions “in time to avoid a climate disaster”. On the very first page Gates states: “Every country will need to change its ways.”

In June 2006 Gates announced that he was gradually letting go of some of his day-to-day responsibility at Microsoft to spend more time on his charitable foundation, which attends to issues of world health and education. By July 2008 he was acting as part-time chairman and technical advisor to Microsoft.

Gates said "I've decided that two years from today, I will reorganize my personal priorities...I believe with great wealth comes great responsibility - the responsibility to give back to society and make sure those resources are given back in the best possible way, to those in need… It's not a retirement, it's a reordering of my priorities."

Even Gates admits that he is just “another rich guy with an opinion,” and that his carbon footprint is "absurdly high”. Gates confesses that he uses his private jets regularly and has a love of hamburgers. However, by contributing a fortune through his foundation dedicated to world health and education and backing a billion-dollar fund ‘Breakthrough Energy Ventures’ along with other billionaire investors like Jeff Bezos and Richards Branson, he believes he is offsetting his own high carbon footprint.

I was quite surprised by the criticism he’s received on social media. As far as I can see he is someone who is concerned about the future of this planet and the humans on it. Does he really merit such criticism? He’s a billionaire! Why shouldn’t he just retire and sit back and spend the rest of his life engaged in some geeky hobbies? He could just chill out in a humongous solid gold bathtub, smoke cigars and watch cartoons all day if he so desired!

Instead, he’s trying ‘to save the world’ and has been for some time. I for one am grateful for all of the humanitarian work on global health and development he and his wife Melinda have funded from their foundation, not to mention the two billion dollars Gates spent on the coronavirus pandemic.

Who knows? Maybe he does live in a world far removed from the rest of us, mingling with his billionaire buddies, hanging out on yachts and buying the odd island, but in his new book Gates lays out a concrete practical plan of how we can achieve zero emissions, clarifying some of the confusing statistics and illustrating how technological innovations can be harnessed.

The book is well set out and readable. Each chapter deals with a different issue and is written very clearly. Gates wants his readers to understand, there is no pretention and he says let’s just analyse the problem ‘do the math’ and get on with it. We get an insight into how methodical and scientific Gates’ mind is. Each chapter separates and analyses the challenges we face.

My inner geek is allowed to roam freely as I immerse myself in some surprising data while I sip tea. I take in some amazing facts: nearly 40 per cent of the world’s emissions are produced by the richest 16 per cent of the population, and the world has lost more than half a million square miles of forest cover since 1990! We learn that urban areas are home to more than half the people on earth and that The Bullitt Centre in Seattle is the greenest commercial building in the world.

In chapter three the reader is asked how much we are willing to pay to go green? One problem is that fossil fuels are so cheap, which of course keeps our electricity bills down.

Electricity and cars get a lot of attention but what about the steel, cement and plastic industries? What about keeping cool or warm? Chapter eight deals with the problem of air conditioning, which again relies so heavily on electricity, and chapter nine looks at adapting to a warmer world.

Gates tells us that we urgently need to find solutions to all of these challenges. “If a genie offered me one wish, a single breakthrough in just one activity that drives climate change, I’d pick making electricity.”

We discover that transportation isn’t the biggest cause of emissions worldwide. However, there are about a billion cars around the world, and it’ll take time to get our gas-burning cars off the road. He suggests that there is simply no point in having electric cars if they are fired up by unrenewable energy sources, so we need to adopt advanced biofuels and cheap electro-fuels. Ideally, we’ll be driving less and opting for cycling, walking and carpooling.

There’ll be ten billion people to feed by 2100! Raising animals for food is another major contributor of greenhouse gas emission and despite Gates’ love of burgers he is funding research into plant-based meat.

The book is abundant with ideas. If I had to describe it in one word, it would be ‘innovation.’ We need breakthroughs in science and technology. Some space-age innovations already exist, like a solar powered humidifier that takes water out of the air, but they are unrealistically expensive; scaling up and rolling out new technologies and phasing out old inefficient fossil-fuelled equipment like power plants and cars, which will take time. Funding research is critical. Investing in zero carbon technologies like ‘thermal energy storage’ and ‘geoengineering.’ The reality is that innovation will take decades.

Gates mentions climate scientists like Vaclav Smil and Ken Caldeira. Many of those experts he quotes believe that we are in a state of emergency. The key is to spread the word via all forms of media and of course educate the young.

Governments and industry will need to work together to "speed up the innovation cycle” and set out their visions. Technologies, policies and markets need to work in sync, Gates maintains that “we can encourage innovation, spark new companies and get new products into the market fast.”

We need to start preparing for inevitable environmental challenges. Gates uses the analogy of how we didn’t listen to health experts and scientists who had been predicting a pandemic for years. “Then when it happened, we scrambled to make up for lost time. We should not make the same mistake with climate change.”

Gates’ book is a shout out to us all. Gates does not wish to dazzle us nor present a sophisticated or unique treatise. In truth, it is about the harsh reality of what needs to be done, nonetheless, it is instilled with a sense of hope and optimism.

Gates maintains that we need to hold ourselves accountable. We cannot afford to dither, to dilly dally, to insist that one opinion is no better than another. In a matter of decades, we could all be having to deal with limited resources on this planet along with severe storms, snowfalls, hurricanes and scorching heatwaves.

If we prepare, we can make things better. Gates’s idealism is grounded in a plan, in practical ideas.

“I know what technology can accomplish.” There is an urgency to his tone. It’s scary when he states that even if we start now, we will only manage to make the climate ‘bearable’ for the next generation. We have reached the point where saving the planet is not just an act of altruism but of self-interest.

The author wants to inform, reveal and instruct, offering us tools as we each take our place in a brave new world where we will need to be informed and ultimately make a unique contribution to avoid a climate catastrophe.

I suppose chapter 12, “What each of us can do” was my favourite chapter offering practical ways that we can save our planet. “…you are not powerless...you have influence as a citizen, consumer, employee and employer.”

I appreciate him saying that. I don’t see how little old me could help, but the tide is turning now, and millions of people are already calling for action. Gates assures his readers that we can all use our voice – vote to effect change, make calls, contact the mayor or our local council. Sign up for the green pricing programme with our current energy supplier. Reduce our home’s emissions, get an electric car, cut down on dairy products and try a plant-based burger if we dare!

It’s true that many of us have felt sorry for ourselves a few times during 2020, I must admit this book has been like dipping my head in a huge bucket of cold fresh water. Bill Gates, you have my attention! It is time to roll up our sleeves and think more practically now.

As I read the afterword on Covid-19 I felt myself welling up a little. Those in developing countries have been and will inevitably be hit the hardest by the effects of this pandemic. He writes that “Covid-19 has undone decades of progress on poverty and disease”. However, by working together, government researchers and pharmaceutical companies can make remarkable progress, as we saw in 2020 “developing and testing vaccines in record time”.

As I close the book, I sit there seriously thinking about what aspect of ‘getting to zero’ I can help with. What I can do to help this planet and its people? There is no more time for selfishness, getting to zero will take decades and we cannot afford to waste any more of our lives. I suppose the bottom line for Gates is that those “who have done the most to cause this problem should help the rest of the world survive it.”

• Marisa Laycock moved to St Albans in 2000. She enjoys sharing her experiences of living in the city. These columns are also available as podcasts from 92.6FM Radio Verulam at www.radioverulam.com/smallcitylife