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Dear Diary
It’s been another day of long lineups at the grocery store. Our new carbon rationing cards have just been issued, and the Youth Environmental Corps volunteers, in their colourful green uniforms, are checking everyone very carefully as they pass by the checkout counters.
The new cards were issued by the federal government, and the Youth Environmental Corps was established, as a part of its carbon consumption stabilization plan. My card allows me only so much carbon consumption for my personal use. I have to flash my card every time I purchase something; and each time I do so, I use up carbon consumption points from the total allocated to me. Everyone gets a card, including parents on behalf of their young children.
For example, I am allowed 50 points per month for food consumption. All my potential purchases are carbon rated by a points allocation. So a pound of locally grown mung beans will cost me five points off my carbon allowance, but a pound of hamburger will cost me an extra 10 points, because growing, killing and grinding the meat uses that much more carbon. It means I can afford a burger about once a month. Frivolous foods like Vachon cakes cost an arm and a leg in extra points because they are just that—frivolous.
I am also allowed 50 points a month for transportation. That base is equivalent to the cost of a monthly bus pass—which doesn’t do me a heck of a lot of good in the County. You can apply to the Carbon Consumption Board for a rural extra points pass, which raises my permissible points level—but only to equate to the cost of running a plug-in micro sedan. The days of running a half-ton truck through the County’s back roads are long gone.
For running my home, I have to pass an inspection conducted by a volunteer from the Youth Environmental Corps. I can be compelled to spend my own money, by way of additions to my tax bill, retrofitting my house to eliminate cold air leaks and install solar panels and electric heating. I lose more carbon points if I am living in a bigger house than the Corps think is suitable for me, or if my thermostat temperature is set too high. If I don’t meet the standard, the Corps can order me to fly the black flag of carbon shame; and if I don’t comply within one year, my house can be expropriated and sold to a buyer who is prepared to fall into line.
Garbage continues to be a flash point. Single use plastic has been outlawed since 2021, which means we can’t even take our garbage out onto the street in a plastic bag anymore. We are limited to one cubic metre of garbage per person per year; any excess we have to bury, burn, wear or eat. It now costs $100 to take a piece of furniture to the dump—$200 if it has been bought from IKEA within the last five years. And we are required to compost all our own food scraps.
Travel to the sunny south for a week in Cancun is off the books since the government closed down Pearson airport to almost all discretionary travel. You can apply to the Carbon Consumption Board for a permit to visit an ailing relative or take a necessary business trip, but the paperwork is tedious, and the few available flights are largely filled with carbon consumption people doing important national business. The system is obviously designed it so that people will choose to just stay home and vacation in their back yards. Of course, that will limit you a bit since motorboats have also been banned, heated private pools have been disallowed, golf courses have been closed, and cutting lawns other than with hand tools has been forbidden.
Thank goodness we all have access to a few discretionary carbon consumption points. We can sell them to rich people, who can then use their combined personal and purchased points to, say, take a vacation in Cleveland. But our flexibility is limited; purchaser and seller must still operate under a fixed total points limit.
I am making this carbon consumption stuff sound pretty ominous. But it could be a lot worse. Young people have found some purpose in life with the Youth Environmental Corps. Staying put lessens the risk that we could be exposed to another coronavirus outbreak. Fewer people are coming to vacation in the County, so the demand for short-term accommodations has lessened, and properties are being returned to family use. Our sense of belonging to a community is increasing. And my health is improving by consuming more mung beans in place of hamburger—although I do miss my Vachon cakes.
If I had the choice, I would have started the transition to a less carbon consumptive lifestyle back in 2020, rather than voting for a government that had to impose such draconian measures over us. But we don’t always do what’s good for us until disaster is staring us in the face; such is the human condition,
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