This week a generator was installed in the new blockhouse adjacent to Civic Centre 3 in Huddersfield Town Centre.
The idea is to make the building reslient as an HQ during a time when we might have a major loss of electrical power. When unexpected events happen the Council together with the Emergency Services will stand ready to react and as the lights go out across Huddersfield the Civic Centre will stand as a shining beacon of hope. Council Officers will be stoically working to reestablish Western Civilization/'start again' while surrounded by confused citizens wanting answers and reassurance. We will then see what happens next after the meteor/nuclear strike on Heckmondwike or a catastrophic flood, or extraterrestrial invasion or zombie apocalypse.
Disasters and social collapse are mostly of the serious but often mundane, day to day nature like the 'boiled frog' of climate change. The slow but perceptible nature of the change leads the wilfully uniformed/misleading to question whether it is actiually happening at all, but if we don't act it surely will.
The new 'resilient' Civic Centre is all about preparing for the reaction to a crisis. To prevent climate change we need to make all buildings resilient through insulation/ energy efficiency measures and making best use of onsite renewable energy (usually solar). That's not just good for the homes that have such measures but for wider society that is less reliant on dirty and generally imported fuels such such as natural gas and uranium. It puts more money in peoples pockets who have less to fork out for energy bills. This would be a good aim of public policy in so many ways but also ensures that when disaster does strike that half a million people don't turn up at Civic Centre 3 to try to get their phones and electric toothbrushes recharged.
Here's 'Its The End of The World as we know it' by R.E.M.
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