PLANET AQUA

Recognizing the importance of the hydrosphere is the key to adapting to climate change, according to a leading public intellectual.

Rifkin, a prominent adviser to a host of governments, corporations, and organizations, has somehow found the time to write 20 books on technology, energy, and environmental issues. He continues the theme examined in The Age of Resilience: Reimagining Existence on a Rewilding Earth (2022)—how to adapt to a changing climate—this time with a focus on the world's water resources. He argues that the story of civilization is essentially about the control of water, what Rifkin terms “the domestication of the hydrosphere,” from irrigation to electricity generation. The pressures of climate change, he avers, mean that this has to change. There must be a new emphasis on adaptation, regeneration, and technological innovation to deal with rising sea levels and altered weather patterns. He acknowledges that he is talking about fundamental changes to social organization, moving away from life in cities supported by fixed infrastructure and fossil fuels and toward a form of neo-nomadism. He veers between doomsaying and optimism, and his tendency to jump between subjects makes the book hard to follow in places. Sometimes he gives the impression of having seen too many science fiction movies: his proposal to rename Earth Planet Aqua is not something that many people would support. Despite the hyperbole, Rifkin has many interesting ideas, and no one could doubt his passion. “There is only a single agenda before us,” he concludes. “It is making peace with a rewilding hydrosphere and finding new ways to flourish along with our fellow creatures. All else is a distraction.”

An energetic, urgent call for imaginative, radical responses to environmental crises.