High time to act

The end of the nice weather Costly consequences of present energy supply

There are more and more and increasingly destructive natural disa-sters. Floods, unusual heat waves, tornadoes - for a long time, naturaldisasters seemed to happen only in places far away. However, in themeantime, scientific proof has been found that we, too, are affected by climate change. The reason is global warming. The greenhouseeffect is mainly caused by carbon dioxide (CO2) that is released inhuge quantities by the combustion of fossil fuels, such as oil, gas and coal. Every gallon of gasoline saved reduces the risk of natural disa- sters occurring on our doorstep and around the world. Dwindling fossil energies and increasing energy demands necessarilylead to a rise in costs. Moreover, the natural disasters caused by cli-mate change lead to annually increasing costs. The insurance industryis already sounding the alarm and is asking for effective measures to protect the climate. According to the global leading insurance com-pany "Münchener Rück", the economic losses caused by natural disa-sters have increased ninefold since 1960. Already today, global dama- ge from climate change amounts to as much as 120 billion Euros and is expected to rise.We are all footing the bill for increased energy prices, higher insuran-ce rates and taxes.
Annual CO2 emissions with and with-out a solar system, based on a house-hold with four people

Oil and gas reserves are limited and dwindling

Based on current consumption levels, oil reserves are expected to last another 43 years and natural gas reserves another 66 years.However, the world population is growing steadily. Latest statisticsshow that it doubled during the second half of the 20th century. More and more people in the so called developing countries are claiming their share of wealth and the natural resources of our planet. As a con-sequence, the global energy demand is rising dramatically. If we continue to consume resources at the present rate, humanity will lose very precious resources in a very short period of time. Coal willlast considerably longer than oil and gas. However, if we burn all thecoal that remains, the consequences will be disastrous on a global scale.
2 Reduction inCO2 emissions kg CO CO2 emissionswithout a solarsystem CO2 emissionswith a solarsystem 2