You Made Me A Better Person in 2013. Happy New Year!!

My last 2 Christmas' were very lonely. Two years ago, I spent Christmas Day sick and stuck in London Gatwick airport after eating a bad food in Istanbul-Turkey, throwing up miserably and causing so much discomfort to passengers and cabin crew. I was welcomed home in Birmingham the next day drained and dehydrated. Last year, I spent it at home in Ghana with my housemate in our little space in Odorkor. I was very broke after a hectic year of delivering more with less. We didn't cook any decent meal, we bought on the streets— a mirror of the reality of millions who have no chance at a simple Christmas meal of rice, stew and dry fish.

This year hasn't been particularly special and perfect, but I have gone through 2013 coming in contact with people who have loved, cared, taught and supported me in diverse ways, of which I'm grateful about and want to show my deepest gratitude. Gratitude comes from the word 'gratis', which means 'free'. So in essence, I'm grateful for everything all of you reading this note freely impacted and invested in my life. "Gratitude is the freeing expression of a free heart toward one who freely gave".

2013 was like a dragon with a gift in it's mouth. Taming the animal was to take 365 days of learning, living and leading. I am not saying I didn't achieve anything, what I mean is that our maturity as leaders could take our entire lifetime. We will land, but we will still have weaknesses, no one is ubermensch. I've always seen transformation as a complete change from acorn to an oak tree; or like the sight of a giant ultra modern hospital funded by the P.E.A.C.E Plan to replace a torturing former site of genocide in Rwanda. But what about our daily struggles, suffering and sorrows? They are also part of our transformation! So we shouldn't discard them, we should share them. Always focusing and sharing our successes might generate competition, but continuously sharing our struggles promote community.

We've thought about leadership to be all about influence, charisma and having followers. But how about it becoming the other way round— sharing, supporting and serving others with our entire humanity. How about being a servant, leading from a position of weakness? How about being a listerner, the art of influencing people with our ears? How about avoiding unproductive arguments that sap our energy and focusing on winning people rather than arguments. I have purposed in my heart to learn and practice these.

In the year 2014, I have no huge expectations to be honest. I have only a revelation to spend time building my relationships with everyone around me. My good friend John-Son Oei, a recipient of the Augustman Magazine Man of the Year award and one of the most successful entrepreneurs in Malaysia today who builds houses for poor people opened my eyes to an important truth we often ignore as leaders, as we shared our traditional end of year lessons— "the value of a team set in the right foundations of love, trust and emphasis on relationships over performance".

So that will be my priority. And building relationship with people requires time investment. I see time as John Taylor's "Chronophage", outside Cambridge’s Taylor Library of Corpus Christi College. It has a grasshopper with a huge chomping mouth eating up every minute with a half swag. Time is boring but it's the most expensive gift we can give others because they cannot pay for it.

So many things occurred in 2013; I was transformed by the love and focus of Saddleback Church; the Environmental Movement ran a highly successful campaign against coal in Ghana; I attended my first Bar Camp; Ronny got married; My Australia friend living in Ghana, Eleanor made me lasagne after 18months of not eating it; and Anna Rose sent me her first book 'Madlands' from far away Australia which was to transform my activism and convert my friend who was a climate skeptic.

In 2014, I look forward to leading and serving the Ghana Youth Environmental Movement (GYEM), supporting Pass-A-Book-On, Dress-A-Kid, Share-Your-Lunch, Helplan, AYW-G and all the great initiatives up and running here. At GYEM, we call it our 'Year of Growth'— advancing our passion, purpose and partnership and building leaders of courage, competence and character to shift power with tools, techniques and technology. I'm looking forward to our first ever National Power Shift 2014 and Exponential 2014.

I also look forward to the World Cup in Brasil, "the land of keepie-uppies, sarongs & thongs". But before all that, I don't want to miss the reality of thanking everyone reading this note, because throughout 2013 in the midst of the fun, success, pain, pressure, problems, trials, tests, temptations and tribulations, you loved me, you supported me, you chided me, you criticised me, but in all that you didn't make me bitter, you made me a BETTER person.

Happy New Year!!!

Written in the Language of Dead Whales

“The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays is coming to its close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences.”

There are two different kinds of people you are likely to encounter in most ecological dialogues. Those who believe the catastrophes happening to the planet are naturally designed and those who know human activities are largely to be blamed. The first group retreats to the walls of denial, the latter is found within the spheres of activism.

When the Ghana Youth Environmental Movement (GYEM) launched its price for pollution campaign earlier this year and demanded that those who pollute the environment pay for that pollution, an unusual creature was to be the mascot for the campaign—a whale. During the few media encounters, the Movement explained that its research team suspected a strong linkage between the death of whales within the past 2 years and the oil exploration going on at the Western coast of Ghana. Government and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) thought otherwise.

The laughing blue whale, locally named ‘KwaBonsu’ has walked on the streets, hugged people, met government officials, and delivered a simple powerful campaign message—each dead whale carries a strong warning! Just like the melting ice caps in the Arctic, the sum total of what is happening in our waters is written in the language of dead whales.

Several months on, a total of 16 whales have washed ashore in area where oil exploration takes place, and the EPA is still in denial. Protecting the environment shouldn't have been political but denying out rightly the possible and likely cause of something without any evidence to show the actual otherwise cause takes us back into the streets of ritual politics. It renders any public interest in the issue laughingly insignificant.

Photo credit: e.tv Ghana

Campaigners are passion driven and genuinely interested in the impacts dead whales are likely to have on our food chain, so the idea that ‘we have heard your concerns so go home’ is a hard slap on the face. When problems of the environment are brought forward for discussions in this country, the government postpones solutions and the media switches on daily political debates. What happened to hope?

Our profit-driven economic system shuts our eyes to the one important factor that makes economics meaningful—the ecosystem. What are the impacts of this pollution on the communities along the coast and to what extent are they detected and mitigated? What is happening to our fishes down the sea and what kind of food do our fishermen bring to our table? What is the value of the ecosystem services unpaid for and yet been destroyed with impunity? What is the cost of this pollution to public health? The answers are written in the language of the dead whales. 

On the Side of Tomorrow Against Coal Power

"If we want our voices to be heard, we have to shout very loud" - Nana Abena Afriyie Kwarkye

On a wet morning of Monday July 15, about 40 campaigners from the Ghana Youth Environmental Movement (GYEM) embarked on a journey to fight for tomorrow— a battle against coal. The Ministry of Energy had received a proposal from a Chinese Energy Group to construct a 700MW coal-fired power plant in Ghana. The immediate response from the youth environmental movement was a loud big no; coal power isn't the future young people in Ghana deserve. So we lined up in-front of the Ministry’s facility with our placards, signs and messages and rejected coal power. We took the side of tomorrow against coal.

The argument of the coal industry and its supporters is a weak one modeled on economics; having lost the debate centuries ago on the grounds of health and ecosystem. Unfortunately and fortunately for activists, their own economic argument continues to be exposed as a reeking hoopla that flies in their faces no matter how they slice it.

They argue that coal is cheap, readily available and as such a dependable commodity for power. And so when the Communications Director of the Ministry of Energy, who received our submission against the proposal on behalf of the Minister, argued there and then that “coal is not the dirtiest fossil fuel”, we were assured it was another lost debate.

With its devastating effect on human health and catastrophic impact on the environment and planet, coal is now an economic albatross, China as a classic text book example— cost of pollution from coal to the Chinese government runs in excess of $100 billion per year. This is more than twice the GDP of Ghana. How worse can this get?

So why then has the coal industry still convinced people to deny science, reason, facts and reality; choosing profit over people and economics over ecosystem? I leave the answers for you to discern. The reality is that the fossil fuel industry is heavily funded and as an icing on their cake, they enjoy subsidies. Therefore being pitched as activists against dirty energy in a mortal combat is probably equivalent to dismantling a skyscraper with a carpentry hammer.  But not really, we can build a movement that can win the fight for a green future.

We need to build a movement that is commensurate to and/or more powerful than dirty energy to shift power towards tomorrow. Our movement won’t win campaigns overnight but holding hands and standing strong for a clean future, joined by our passion and courage give us a lot of hope and hope is everything we need. We are a movement so we are willing to do the difficult, the different, the dissenting and the daring—that is courage.

In our submission to the Ministry of Energy, we made it very clear that coal-fired plants do not represent the future we deserve; one that is powered by clean energy and to live in a less polluted or a pollution-free environment. And we are going to demand it, not only for our future but for that of unborn generations. That is justice— to choose the side of tomorrow against coal power!

10 W/Men Strong can Shift Power towards Tomorrow

“Those who say it cannot be done should get out of the way of those already doing it”

When I spent time with the Occupy Movement at St. Pauls and Finsbury Square in 2011, I learnt one thing that has guided my activism till date— caring is everyone’s business no matter rich or poor, free or oppressed; because a time comes in everyone’s life that you will need someone to fight for you. The moment we stop fighting for ourselves is the moment we lose our humanity.

So when #1SimpleStep was birthed to fight for ourselves, I didn't only think it was just, I thought it was only ethical for me to join.

The only thing that gives credibility to any movement is the same one thing that ensures its sustainability— the grassroots. So on 19^th April, 2013, when 10 of us walked in front of the Flagstaff House into the building to deliver our letters and concerns to the Presidency and leadership, it wasn't about getting masses of people to take that step, it was about that simple step being taken by a community of the masses. We were not 10 strong w/men; we were 10 w/men strong.

What #1SimpleStep achieved was building trust that healed our fears and sharing our struggles that built a community.  To put this into perspective, every grassroot movement that has ever shifted power has been built on the foundations of trust and a sense of community.

That said, corruption is not the cause of our poverty and mess in this country, it is just a symptom of it. The cause is not even apathy which is always on trial in our mouths. The real cause is LETHARGY. We ritualize the ballot box and elect people to represent us in various leaderships without demanding accountability, transparency and sustainability. We do really care but we don’t care so much, we don’t care enough.

#1SimpleStep didn’t only break the spiral of silence; it proved that the only 3 things we need to shift power in this country are faith, love and persistence, which are heavily grounded on a conscience. And by being peaceful in nature, we are a conscience and hence we are stronger. This is the first evidence that we shouldn't just walk the talk; we should also talk the talk and walk the walk.

Organized dissent and peaceful protest are the mother of all transformational change and so we are at the right side of history, change will come as we press on. We don’t only need to talk about hope in dire circumstances, we always have to pursue, practice and preach it.

History was written last Friday and when it is re-written in future, @GHANAmomoni, @MutomboDaPoet, @Kwabena, @attigs, @wrathymarcel, @kinnareads, @ghanabakwabena, @Ek0wMaIsSe, @ganyobisaki, @MawuliTsikata and Sowah would have shifted power towards tomorrow. Keep shifting power!

“Hope is not a matter of personal psychology, in the midst of uncertainty it is the most strategic response, the need to be optimistic is the most important political decision anyone can take”

Will Ghana Ever Change? Doubts and Hope

“Change is a campaign, not a decision”

When the issue of change is discussed in this country, 3 main arguments arise. Below are these and my own counter arguments:

1. “Brighten the corner where you are” and change will happen

It is true that we ought to brighten the corner where we are, but within the context of the mess we have in this country, this quote is anemic to catalyze a transformational change. We need a force that is either commensurate or powerful than the prevailing crisis, rather than a candle light procession (pun intended). We have to deliberately plan for that force to emerge. Its only 2 years more to reaching the target year for achieving the MDGs and we have failed woefully brightening the corner where we are.

2. “We need to change the mindset of people first to see change”

This is a feel-good saying; it pats warm water on the skin waiting for the cold weather to disappear. I’m not saying it’s not true but the fact is that we already have enough people with a mindset to catalyze the transformational change we are looking for. We can’t change the mindset of everyone and we don’t need to do that our entire lifetime. What we need is for the critical mass to drive the rest along in an ocean’s way. We have to be infectious. So far the critical mass is plagued with the deadliest disease in history- lethargy; simply put, we are lazy to stand up and fight for change.  We are still on a journey to la la lands.

3. “Be the change you want to see in the world”

This quote has been one of my personal best since I became an activist as a high school graduate. But the question is would the status quo ever be the change we want to see it be? Would politicians be disciples to this mantra? I represent the naysayer in this context. “Change is a campaign, not a decision”. In short, every transformational change that has ever taken place in the history of this world was campaigned for. It goes beyond making a personal decision and committing to one’s own targets, it is about building a community to persistently demand the change from the status quo.

The above points already made, it is very important for any change maker to note that every transformational change would be a political one, but that change cannot come from politics unless the masses lead politicians to make it. Politicians and businesses are the best of friends; they are both ‘active opponents and passive recipients’ of any fundamental change. They know what to do to bring change but wouldn’t do it because they benefit from the crisis and a transition towards change is very expensive to them.  However they are the ones who will also benefit the most when the change finally occurs.

That said, what will change this country would not be the latest sophisticated revolution in the ICT industry or an immaculate and unrehearsed analysis of government policy. What would catalyze a transformational change in Ghana would be organized dissent, the mother of all social reforms. ‘The inertia of the status quo requires the inertia of dissent’. We can talk about cohort replacement, argue about the fossil fuel industry internalizing the externalities and discuss how extreme air pollution affects maternal heath and infant mortality. But we all know very well that it took the Occupy Movement to expose the deep cracks of neo-liberal capitalism and ‘subject it to proper scrutiny and challenge, within the context of their own local circumstances’, from Zuccoti Park to the City of London.

Having made the point above, historically, violence has failed utterly in delivering any fundamental change, the reason the Arab rising wasn’t successful though it got rid of some tyrants.  The greatest tools to drive any campaign for change are ‘non violence, love, persistence and faith’. We have a conscience and that makes us very powerful.

“In market-driven societies, the philosopher Herbert Marcuse once said, protest is often treated like any other commodity that’s consumed and disposed of. His advice? Make sure your action can’t readily be devoured, digested and discredited. Instead, be sure that those you’re trying to reach have to deal with what you’re driving at”.

We need to build the movements, we need to run the campaigns, and we need to shift power. The summits, seminars, workshops and conferences are good for capacity building, but to make a transformational change is to win campaigns on the streets. We are doing extremely well with several social action and entrepreneurial initiatives but every transformational change results in a power shift and we haven’t shifted power yet.

Fifteen years ago, Julia Butterfly Hill embarked on a tree-sit, ‘rooted in her acute vision of a wounded world longing for nonviolent healing’, a powerful campaign for change. We read Mahatma Gandhi’s long walk to the sea full of suspense, the Civil Rights Movement’s freedom rides, the Divestment Movement that brought apartheid to its knees and became a model against the tobacco industry.

Currently, campaigns have put on the same hat with the same philosophy and we have the opportunity to learn from them no matter where we live to drive change. Many people argue that ‘clicktivism is the marketization of social change’, we also counter argue that ‘we have found logic at the market place’.

At the Ghana Youth Environmental Movement (http://gyemgh.wordpress.com/), our theme for this year is our ‘Year of Environmental Power Shift’. We don’t know when change will come but one thing we do know is the fact that robust and innovative campaigns will deliver it someday. And with hope on our side, though the future remains unknown, the wind continues to blow in the direction of human progress.

“First, they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win”.

The Accra Waste Math

“In the midst of the catastrophic pollution of the environment by humans, we have chosen to take a stand for and with the environment against humans” – Gideon Commey

A landfill site in Accra, Ghana

If you are terrified by the sight of the disgusting pile of waste in the gutters, on the streets and inside every nook and cranny of Accra, then you probably don’t live in Ghana. The country has a severe environmental crisis and featuring prominently on that list is sanitation.

 When we talk about sanitation in Ghana, the argument is mostly political, social and cultural (attitudinal), but to really grasp the seriousness of the mess, you have to do a simple math to create a powerful story. The Ghana Youth Environmental Movement (GYEM) is building a generation wide movement of young people to solve the environmental crisis in Ghana, and we have done a little math to tell the scale of the sanitation problem and offer a sustainable solution once and for all.

Our simple math has 3 numbers:

1. 2,500 tons

This is the amount of waste that is generated in Accra per day. Out of this number, 2,200 tons is collected and dumped at landfills, the remaining 300 tons find their way into open drains, streets, etc. Multiplying the amount of waste land filled by 365 days gives the total amount of waste Accra produces per year as 803,000 tons.

2. 10 Megawatts (MW)

Officials of the Accra Compost & Recycling Plant (ACRP), has indicated to the government that it is possible to use appropriate technology to produce 10MW of electricity out of 1,000 tons of waste per day. This amount of energy can power several thousands of households. To put this figure into perspective, two (2) waste-to-energy plants or a single one with combined capacity, with appropriate technology can swallow up all the waste Accra city produces in a day and still lack enough waste to power the plants. Simply put, we would run out of waste in the city.

Sweden runs the most effective and efficient waste management system in the world. The garbage generates 20% of the country’s district heating and provides electricity to 250,000 homes. “The only problem with the Sweden Waste Management system is that it is too successful”.  The waste Sweden produces is just not enough that they import 800,000 tons of waste from their neighbors Norway to keep the plants running. The amount they import is nearly equivalent to the amount of waste Accra produces in a whole year.

3. US$ 150m

Waste-energy experts in Ghana indicate that this is roughly the amount of money that can fund the operation of a waste-energy plant with appropriate technology to produce 10MW- 12MW per hour using between 1,000-1,500 tons of municipal solid waste per day. These figures are not perfect but are highly reliable.

So why hasn’t it been done? The excuse the government and municipal waste management officials give is that there is no budget and funds for this. We at Ghana Youth Environmental Movement are saying that we can find that money through a Price for Pollution. (Read about our Price for Pollution solutions here- http://gideoncommey.blogspot.com/2013/01/what-is-price-for-pollution-why-you.html).

We just need the political will to do that.  Yes, we can raise that money over here in Ghana. The solution is a Price for Pollution and it holds the keys to a green renewable future.

Every rapid transformational change requires a movement to drive it, our movement has just arrived and there’s only one thing on our mind – environmental power shift in Ghana.

Gideon Commey (Campaigns Team, Ghana Youth Environmental Movement). 

PLEASE tweet this article with hashtag #Ghwastemath

What is Price for Pollution? Why You Must Support the Campaign

"Those who say it can't be done should get out of the way of those already doing it" 

For the past few weeks, we (Ghana Youth Environmental Movement) have been making noise about campaigning for a Price for Pollution in Ghana in 2013. We have been dead serious about it and very clear in details. As our theme for this year- ‘Our Year of Environmental Power Shift’ suggests, we believe that a price for pollution is the most ambitious and strategic campaign we can ever embark on in this country at this present time to shift power towards our future.

This article serves to explain in very simple terms, what a price for pollution campaign means, why the future of young people in Ghana depends on it and why every person reading this piece and all young people in this country must support it.

So what is a price for pollution?

What we are saying is that industries and everyone who pollute heavily must pay for polluting the environment. A price could be in the form of tax or levy prescribed and imposed by a government’s authority. We are making this a big moral issue. The argument is that if it is morally wrong to pollute the environment and/or wreck this planet, then it’s equally immoral to benefit from that pollution and wreckage without paying for it.

We know the groups that pollute - individual citizens, companies, industries, institutions, etc. We all pollute in this country and as such may feel guilty and defensive. However, as much as  it is very fair to say that everyone pollute in this country, it is equally fair to also say that not everyone who pollute benefit from that pollution and use their riches and power to block progress towards clean and renewable energy. So our campaign is naming the villains – plastics, mining and oil companies - to avoid any misinterpretation of the basic principles that birthed it.

In addition, we believe that activating this topic of paying for pollution automatically activates the broader perspective of the issue at hand - liquid waste from industries, hospitals and faeces been dumped into the sea without treatment, illegal mining (galamsey), the massive air pollution by the burning of e-waste and the importation of these e-waste to flood this country. These are other aspects that the campaign would touch, but we can only start from where we have the strategic capacity to make our voice heard.

Why do we want a price for pollution in Ghana?

1.Plastics, mining, oil companies and other heavy polluting industries currently do not pay for pollution and that is unethical.

They may compensate communities for destroying their habitats as part of their Social Corporate Responsibility, which might not even reach the real beneficiaries. Our argument is that this money should be centralized by an authority for such community rehabilitation and the progress of such projects be tracked to ensure maximum transparency and sustainability. Every oil pipeline is bound to spill and so it is only fair that even before oil companies drill a single barrel of oil, they pay a price on that barrel. We might not understand all the economic issues involved and that is why we are making this a moral issue and not an economic one.

2.It will provide more green jobs and create excitement around plastic waste collection

Every time a country decides to go green, that decision results in the creation of more jobs. There are 1,000s and millions of green jobs that exist in only recycling. In Columbia, plastics are being used to make chandeliers and in our own Ghana empty water bottles to build a couch. The fact is that government knows going green is good but their excuse to cover up the lack of political will has been the fact that there is no budget for that. And so we are saying that charge a price for pollution and use that money to set up the recycle plants in communities.

CHF International with partnership from the government ended its 3 years Youth Engagement in Service delivery (YES) project in 2012, which saw the construction of 4 'Buy back' centers for the gathering and buying of pure water sachets to recycling companies for recycling. (http://www.ghanabusinessnews.com/2012/12/20/chf-international-ends-three-year-ghana-youth-project/)

 The plants are situated in Avenor, Nima, Ga Mashie and Alajo. The project costs thousands of US dollars and currently provides employment for young people in those areas. What we are saying is that we don’t have to wait for CHF in order to create jobs and ensure good sanitation in our own country, let us do it ourselves!

3. In the short term, it would encourage investment in renewable energy and provide competition for fossil fuel corporations. In the long term it will divest fossil fuel companies and save our planet.

Renewable energy from sources like solar and wind tend to be expensive and as such they need subsidies to make them affordable to consumers. Our position is that the government should price pollution from these fossil fuel companies and use that to provide these subsidies and not taxes from ordinary Ghanaians. This will make it attractive for investment.

 Africa's largest solar power plant of 155MW is to be constructed in Ghana in 2015 (http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/dec/04/africa-largest-solar-power-plant-ghana) by a British company called Blue Energy through a feed-in tariff that would be borne by our taxes. This is reported to increase our energy mix from renewable from 1% to 10%.

4. It will inspire fossil fuel companies and other industries to shift towards green energy and be careful about pollution.

Industries know what to do prevent or minimize pollution but they won’t do it. A price will make them think twice. Plastic manufacturers would make sure they have recycling plants constructed before they start production. Technology transfer has now ensured that fossil fuel companies can do what we call carbon capture and storage to cut their emissions. Once we strip their social license, they would be responsible!

5. It will decentralize waste management in Ghana as a community responsibility and initiative. This will empower households and communities to manage their waste effectively and improve upon sanitation.

One reason why waste management has become a failure in this country is that we have privatized it wrongly. Communities must be empowered with the capacity and logistics to handle their own waste. A price for pollution when executed strategically with transparency and accountability could reasonably build a recycling plant per community per year. This is not a dream, it is a possibility, and it can work. Communities would take care of their own space and it will provide more jobs.

Government should rather engage private waste management companies in very ambitious waste-energy technology. Sweden runs a wildly successful waste-to-energy program, generating 20 percent of the nation’s district heating and generating electricity for a quarter-million homes. But Swedes just aren’t producing enough garbage for the program and have found a unique solution: importing trash from neighboring Norway.  

Norway pays Sweden to take its trash, Sweden gets the heat and electricity, and Sweden exports the burned debris back to Norway. Swedes aren’t producing enough garbage for their successful waste-to-energy program. (http://edition.myjoyonline.com/pages/science/201212/99153.php).

If Ghana decides to run an ambitious waste-to-energy program, within only 12months, all the waste we have in this country won’t be enough to sustain our plants and we would end up importing more waste to generate more power. This is reality, this is happening. If the government doesn’t have money to run such systems, what we are putting on the table is that a price for pollution can raise revenue to start something now.

How do we get there?

We will campaign and campaign till our voice is heard, till we are listened to. One of the alternatives that we are putting on the table is that there should be an authority to calculate, demand, enforce and run this price for pollution. There is a Ministry of Communication in addition to a National Communication Authority, why can’t we have such thinking for the environment.

We believe that “perpetual optimism is a force multiplier” and above all the impossible is the un-attempted. "Those who say it can't be done should get out of the way of those already doing it" .

What You Must Know Before We 'Kill' This Planet

“One voice can change a room, and if one voice can change a room, then it can change a city, and if it can change a city, it can change a state, and if it change a state, it can change a nation, and if it can change a nation, it can change the world. Your voice can change the world.”

I have been startled in the last fortnight after reading the stunning Rolling Stone article by Bill McKibben, which I believe every young person in this country, and especially all of us passionate about the environment and the planet must know about. I have woken up a couple of times from sleep to ponder about how to craft this piece not only to make sense to you, but also inspire you to action. I don’t know if I will succeed, I just hope that after digesting this, you won’t shelf or bookmark it in a category of some silly end time prophecy. It will really hurt me.

In this landmark article, Bill leads us to Do the Math. It is really a simple math involving only three different numbers telling a very powerful story of our earth at the precipice of destruction by ourselves. Let us all do the math below:

(1)   2°C of warming – this is the temperature that the earth has to stay to at least keep us safe and sane. Above this, life on earth will enter into a period of unprecedented and relentless catastrophes;

(2)   565 gigatons of CO2 – this is the amount of carbon dioxide that we need to burn to stay below the 2 degrees Celsius of warming;

(3)   2,795 gigatons of CO2 – this is the amount of carbon dioxide locked up as reserves of fossil fuel corporations (oil, gas and coal).

Now, why are we frightened and scared? It is simple math as well- the amount of reserves of oil, gas and coal is five times (5x) the safe amount allowed to burn, and fossil fuel companies are willing and ever ready to burn them all unless we stop them! They know this math, they play with the figures all day, but they are choosing profit over people so the rest of us can go to hell and somersault. In addition to this, they are paying billions of dollars to their favorite friends- politicians - to hand over the fate of our future. The irony is borat-scale obvious.

Why is this a matter of life and death? We have all been witnesses to the countless catastrophes hitting communities, countries and continents because of global warming. It is amazing to know that all these are happening while we are still under 2°C warming. I will leave you to reconcile the mathematics with the catastrophes of above this ‘allowed’ temperature of warming.

Over a week ago, a poisonous lady called Miss Sandy swept her wicked love across the horizons of New York city causing massive devastation and broke the heart of several men. I don’t want to bring those memories back but it is on record that Hurricane Sandy was truly astounding in size and power. I was extremely dumbfounded to find out that at its peak; Sandy was producing 329 terajoules of energy, or 2.7x as much as Hurricane Katrina. This is an equivalent of 5 Hiroshima sized atomic bombs. This is extremely outrageous!

It is impossible to talk about Sandy without pointing a finger at climate change. Sea-surface temperature is above average and normal and rise in sea level is a big flooding risk factor. For those of us still grappling with the connection, Katrina was a category 1 hurricane till it picked up heat on the surface of the Gulf of Mexico to become a category 3 hurricane, before doing all those unimaginable damage to New Orleans. 1,833 lives were lost and damage amounting to $US108 billion accounted.

In spite of all these adversities and opposition to a clean planet and green future fronted by huge fossil fuel corporations who are in business just to wreck our earth, activists have stood tall. We have fought, and will fight till the cows come home, hoping that one day this camaraderie of businesses and politicians will repent and drop their agenda like bad habit. And when they finally do and the flooding still comes, we will have some compassion to allow them into the ark.

The Key Stone XL

This project is ranking high on top of the fossil fuel reserves that politicians and businesses are collaborating to burn. This will test the commitment of Barack Obama towards the lives of the whole 7billion people on earth. If he approves this project, we are dead! NASA’s leading climate scientist, Dr. James Hansen has called the Keystone XL pipeline “a fuse to the largest carbon bomb on the planet.” He said that if all the carbon stored in the Canadian tar sands is released into the earth’s atmosphere it would mean “game over” for our planet. It is Obama’s call to save or wreck our lives and that of our children and grandchildren.

Why should you bother in Ghana?

Climate change cannot be fixed on one continent and not the other. It is like a ship, if one tiny end cracks, the whole ship sinks no matter where you are. It is obviously very difficult to organize a protest to the castle to stop the drilling of oil in Ghana, most of you will consider that to be extremely insane. I mean, even before we started drilling oil in this country, the population had already calculated each citizen’s share per head. We love the oil, we praise it, but this is danger. Environmentalists in Western countries are calling for divestment from fossil fuel industries in the fashion of the Divestment Movement in South Africa in the 1980s that helped to bring apartheid to its knees. This means that they are encouraging universities and other institutions to cut off depending on fossil fuels (gas, coal and oil) and invest that money into renewables- wind, solar, etc.

In Ghana, this thinking has now been mated, waiting for 9months in the womb to be birthed. But we can start from somewhere. We can organize and mobilize to demand for a green future and the best shot in my opinion is to push for a price on pollution that would affect plastic producers and mining and oil companies. While this won’t eradicate fossil fuels or stop oil drilling, it will make renewable energy competitive and attractive for investment and above all, inspire these companies to skew towards clean energy.

A fee for pollution in Ghana would mean that plastic producers would chase every ounce of plastic they release into the environment and remove them back. Recycling will dominate and that means creating more green jobs. Mining and oil companies will be on the same playing field with renewable energy investors and they will be extra careful on pollution since it can take them out of business.

I don’t want to sound as if all this is very easy; in fact it’s very challenging having even a method to calculate and quantify pollution, not to think about our bad habit of enforcement and implementation. But as I said, we can start from somewhere, because young people have done it before in this country.

On Nov 7, 2012, we invaded a room full of ministers, politicians, VIPs and government officials to demand a clean future, what else can’t we do? We shouldn’t underestimate our voice and power. And as Barack Obama said, “one voice can change a room, and if one voice can change a room, then it can change a city, and if it can change a city, it can change a state, and if it change a state, it can change a nation, and if it can change a nation, it can change the world. Your voice can change the world.”

When  you see me on the streets one day munching Bhut Jolokia sandwich, as weird as I may look, if I give you a high-five, kindly donate back a broad smile, and together let’s yell ‘Price for Pollution in Ghana NOW’!!

“I don’t want to survive, I want to live” – WALL- E

What Every Young Person Should Know- Ghana’s Underwhelming Energy Policy

I dedicate this piece to Dan Benefor for opening our eyes to things we didn’t know

“Power and change lies in asking questions”- Kweku Aacht

Earlier today, I sat behind my computer examining Ghana’s National Energy Policy for hours. As I digested the foreword weaved by the Minister of Energy, tears were auctioned from their ducts. I couldn’t control it. I took my phone and messaged my very close friend and team member about how emotional I was growing about how things were looking for the future of young people in this country. All she said was, “sorry”.

Exactly 3 years ago, when I was consumed under passion for environmental activism and stood in the heart of the British Museum in London to pledge my time, strength and resources to save the planet, little did I imagine that there comes a time when activism would just mean shedding tears for the future that looks so bleak and uncertain. As I took my quill to write this note in very simple and plain language, I wished to tell the story as it is, paint the future as it looks now.

This is the math I don’t get, the calculations I can’t wrap my head around. This is the National Energy Policy of the Republic of Ghana planned for me and you and for our future. Please let’s do this simple math:

1.Currently Ghana produces about 2,170MW of power. The mix is about 60% hydro-electric, 1% renewable energy and the rest thermal energy.  We should note that it took this country over 40yrs to produce this 2,170MW. The Akosombo Dam was built in 1961;

2.According to our National Energy Policy, Ghana will produce 5,000MW by 2015. Please note that this means more than a double (2x) of the current production. Infact, the document is literally saying that, we would produce 2,830MW more by 2015. We are in 2013, so technically we have 2 years more to hit this set target;

3. Technically and realistically, the options available to get to this 5000MW are hydro-electric, thermal and solar:

A. Interestingly, the Bui Dam currently under construction has an installed capacity of 400MW and even with that, water level is a major issue because of climate change. In addition to that it has taken us more than 4years to build the Bui Dam;

B. The Aboadze thermal plant has an installed capacity of 550MW and a maximum capacity of 682MW. I would leave you to guess how many years it would take to build one thermal plant;

C. The largest solar power plant in Africa would start construction in 2013 and become operational in 2015. It would produce 155MW and increase the mix for renewable energy from 1% to 10%.

The first big question

The underwhelming question we have been forced to ask is- where on earth or heaven would the 2,830MW come from? This is baffling and shocking. Growing in an environment where it is almost a taboo to ask questions and even a mark of disrespect to question adults, I almost understand why young people haven’t asked these questions. It is our future we are talking about so we deserve to know. The fact is that ‘power and change lies in asking questions’.

Let’s go a step forward.  The life expectancy rate in Ghana as at 2011 was 64.2years. The combined average age of people running this country and making decisions for us, specifically, the President and cabinet, Ministers in Ministries, MPs, Civil servants, foreign missions, high commissioners, technocrats, experts and other government auxiliary should be more than 60years. These people always have 4-8years to make decisions for everyone including young people.

This age bracket of decision makers are supposed to make decisions to affect our future and expected to hand over power to us, at least by the next 10-20years. According to the National Youth Policy definition of youth (15-35yrs), the fraction of our population that is youth is 32.8%. (You might do the math to know the population of youth by 10-20years).

The second big question

The question is shouldn't we, young people, as a matter of fact be a major part of this decision making process as it is our future that is being discussed but not them? My very good friend made a somehow funny but striking comment, “the poor man is being discussed but he is not in attendance of that meeting”.

There are 2 ways to open the doors of any transformational change – presidential leadership and public advocacy and action. We are good with the advocacy but where is the action? For young people to be able to act for change, we need 3 things- leadership, access to information and the ability to speak up. The choice is ours to make.  Act or watch as our future is decided without us.

“If you don’t like something, make any attempt to change it; if you don’t do that, don’t complain”