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Happy Feel-Good Friday! Plus, what to do with broken instrument strings.
Dear Reader,
When most of us think “shark,” we’re picturing the Great White, made famous in Jaws. (Did you know that sharks are older on Earth than trees? They’ve been swimming for 450 million years — since 100 million years before the first trees showed up). Thankfully, as this Bluedot story details, Great White populations are beginning to rebound from overfishing (don’t underestimate the world’s hunger for shark fin soup) and getting nabbed as bycatch.
Whale sharks defy many of our shark-y preconceptions. “Found in tropical waters in the Indian, Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, whale sharks might be dauntingly large, but they are known as the sea’s gentle giants,” reads a story on Reasons to Be Cheerful. “Their interactions with humans are peaceful and curious,” the story tells us. Sadly, like many other shark species, they face manmade threats, including finning, bycatch, vessel strikes, and climate change.
But salvation is appearing in the form of Morari Bapu, a Hindu spiritual leader whose sermons attract millions of followers. When he became aware of the plight of whale sharks, he began preaching protection of whale sharks in his sermons. Dot thinks you’ll love this story about how a spiritual movement is saving a gentle giant.
Last week’s Feel-Good Friday served up the story of a Costa Rican rainforest that has bounced back, thanks to citizens getting paid to reforest landscapes. Today, we have a similar initiative — this time on a West African Island dubbed the “African Galapagos,” where a South African billionaire pays folks to follow an “environmental protection code” that ties conservation to better housing, job training, and more. Hurray for good billionaires. May we see more of them!
And finally, a Feel-Good aspect to the horror of the war in Iran, where the fluctuations of fossil fuel prices is highlighting the independence and security offered by renewables. As one analyst for the think tank Ember put it, “With a stroke, this war has dramatically increased the power and the influence of those who want to go down the solar route.” Among those is Pakistan, where an NPR story reports that, “Because so many Pakistanis now have solar and batteries … the country's electricity sector has more of a cushion in this crisis.”
Spain is another country whose pivot to renewables will likely keep energy prices low. EuroNews reports that “Spain’s electricity price is much less influenced by the ever-fluctuating cost of gas, which increased by 55 per cent the day after the Iran war started and has continued to rise.”
Like so many of you, Dot is devastated daily by news of this war (which was still on when this was being written). However, let’s hope we learn to expedite global adoption of clean energy. As climate activist and author Bill McKibben has put it, we don’t fight wars over sunshine.
Positively,
Dot
Terracycle’s free recycling program with D’Addario offers mail-in and drop-off options to recycle all types and brands of instrument strings.
For more Bluedot Climate Quick Tips, click here.
