The Power Of You: How Individual Action Can Help Save The Planet

This week, the International Energy Agency released its road map for how we can decarbonize the world within the next 30 years. It had your classic recommendations: Policymakers need to increase clean energy investments, move away from fossil fuels, encourage carbon capture technologies, etc., all on grand, massive scales.

But it also had something you don't often see in climate reports of this scope: a call for individual action. "Achieving net-zero by 2050 cannot be achieved without the sustained support and participation from citizens," the report reads.

The authors acknowledged that while building a healthier future will take work from dirty industries (you know, the ones responsible for the vast majority of our emissions), it will also require buy-in from citizens who have the means of buying in.

"Behavioral changes, particularly in advanced economies—such as replacing car trips with walking, cycling or public transport, or forgoing a long-haul flight—provide around 4% of the cumulative emissions reductions in our pathway," they write.

In order to be model eco-friendly citizens, we need infrastructure and systems that make that lifestyle possible. We need communities optimized for people and not just cars; we need renewable energy to be available and affordable; we need food options that aren't packaged in plastic.

But the scale tips both ways: It's only by taking the smaller action of opting into these new systems and leaving old ones behind that we, as individuals, send a signal to industry that something's gotta give.

"I always think of individual action not in a vacuum but as an essential complement to more macro action, like industrial regulation and policy changes," Ashlee Piper, former political strategist and author of Give a Sh*t: Do Good. Live Better. Save the Planet, tells mbg. "A lot of the positive momentum we are seeking on a larger scale when it comes to government and policy and industry regulation starts with us individually."

In the meantime, as we build that momentum, the path to a more sustainable world will have its roadblocks: It might be a little more expensive and a bit more time-consuming. It's not necessarily a realistic one for those who live in underserved communities to take, which makes it all the more important for those of us who do have the option to change our ways to actually change them—and to encourage others to do the same.

Starting a sustainability movement sure sounds great, but how? Ultimately, Piper says it comes down to finding what you're passionate about first, and going from there.

"There are a lot of different ways people can get involved—they need to figure out what works best for them and what is most important to them."