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Solarpunk: a new movement sees the future in a positive light BIANCA NOGRADY ABC Environment 10 NOV 2014 A new theme is emerging in science fiction literature and art: solarpunk. It imagines the future as bright, green and sustainable. “IMAGINE A SUSTAINABLE world, driven by clean and renewable energy. Now imagine large space sailboats driven by solar radiation, production of biofuels via nanotechnology, the advent of photosynthetic humans, and, as there is no perfect society, even terrorism against corrupt businesses and governments. Welcome to the bright green world of solarpunk.”

The past decade has seen a huge rise in post-apocalyptic and dystopian science fiction, particularly aimed at young adults, exploring a variety of unpleasant possible futures, ranging from planet-wide desolation and starvation, to a world in which the uber-rich live in space-borne luxury while the poor languish on a stricken Earth.

But a new theme may be emerging; one that reflects our desire for a more optimistic but also more realistic vision of humanity’s near-future; that acknowledges we have some enormous challenges and changes ahead, but allows us to believe we may yet meet those challenges and survive not only as a species but as a civilisation.

You may not have heard of solarpunk, and given that this sub-genre and cultural movement has so far largely been discussed only on social media sites such as Tumblr and Twitter, you wouldn’t be the only one………

solarpunk’s most important feature is its optimism, at a time when the prevailing winds are blowing due apocalypse.

“When you start talking to people about climate change, it’s very easy for them to hit on the immensity of it all and just freeze up and say maybe it doesn’t mean anything, why should I care if there’s nothing I can do, what does this mean etc,” says Flynn.

“I think there’s a lot that people can do to reframe thinking about how we talk about it and react towards it, and I think art has a role to play in that.”

As billions of people in the developing world begin the rise out of poverty, they are looking for a vision of the ‘good life’, he says, and unfortunately, at the moment, that vision tends to involve fast food, large cars, big houses, and conspicuous consumption.

“We need to have more models of what a scalable sustainable vision of a life lived with human dignity will be.”