It’s 2050 and we made it to net zero. So how did we do it?
Az alábbiakban Toon Vos, a Perspectives Journalists-in-residence programunk résztvevőjének anyagát közöljük, amelyet az egy hónapos budapesti tartózkodása alatt hozott létre. A munka egyfajta multimédiás, adatvizualizációra épülő, interaktív felület, ezért nem tudjuk adaptálni az EPER honlapjára, csak az eredeti platformján működik. A anyagról a szerző, saját szavaival (angolul), eképpen nyilatkozik:
“Storytelling about climate change easily gets bogged down by the severity of our situation—and for good reason. But on the flipside of the crisis lies a potential energy utopia which is being invented and deployed as we speak. The problem, in my opinion, is that politicians and the media have become so caught up in the moment that they forget to paint a picture of 2050 if things go well. How can we form an opinion of something we cannot imagine? So I looked into the myriad ways energy is cleaning up its act around the continent and asked experts what needs to happen for us to make it to net zero on time. Most of them hadn’t been asked this question before.
What I found was not what I expected. I imagined that I would be told it was going to be impossible by a wary realist, or that it would be easy if only we deployed this or that technology by some techno-optimist. Reality combines both views: it will be the most intense challenge of our era, and yet, we have most of the tools we need—like solar, wind, grid technology, and improved energy efficiency—while other industries are clambering to catch up—like energy storage and hydrogen. None of these solutions will prove to be a silver bullet, and they don’t have to be. Together, they provide the building blocks that will carry most of the weight of our future societies’ energy needs. A world that doesn’t function fundamentally dissimilar from ours, but is powered differently.
I admit that this approach to multimedia storytelling isn’t conventional but I believe it’s needed to address today’s negativity bias in the media. Not because everything will be rainbows and unicorns, but because there are legitimate reasons to be optimistic, even when the backdrop looks so bleak. I wouldn’t have been able to tell this story without my residency with the Perspectives Programme in Budapest, where I was hosted by the Goethe Institut and EPER Radio. They went out on a limb by allowing me to make a digital and narrative piece of journalism filled to the brim with data visualizations and 3D graphics for which I want to thank them.”
Check out the work here:
https://www.curiosityodyssey.info/net-zero-2050/start
About the author:
Toon is a versatile data journalist and educator who loves to learn new things—to translate them into data stories that make you curious for more. Over time, his work as a journalist has become less text-heavy and more data-driven, visual, and even interactive. Using innovative approaches, like incorporating 3D in his visuals, he hopes to get readers to “aha!” before they can say “uuh?”
To push for new ways of communicating science and climate change, Toon founded Curiosity Odyssey—a platform for curious people. He has worked with the likes of Are We Europe, Clean Energy Wire, VoxEurope, and other outlets. In his free time, Toon likes to read sci-fi that’s not about space, show people around his local natural history museum, and catch (and release) wild bees.
This content was published as part of PERSPECTIVES – the new label for independent, constructive and multi-perspective journalism. PERSPECTIVES is co-financed by the EU and implemented by a transnational editorial network from Central-Eastern Europe under the leadership of Goethe-Institut. Find out more about PERSPECTIVES: goethe.de/perspectives_eu.
Co-funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are, however, those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Commission. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible.
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