Nils Birkeland
IT-Ingenieur
Yes, you can make a difference (and decarbonize)
Talk in English
What can you do to be part of the solution, not the problem? Dedicate yourself to the problem and find that place where you can make a difference. Some people will tell you that you are too small to make a change, that we can keep going and simply enjoy life. Some will tell you that climate-change is not real and make fun of you when you rationally try to explain some basic deterministic physical effects by changing the chemistry of our atmosphere. But the challenge to tackle climate-change is too big to let yourself be distracted by this noise and ignorance. I found I must not invest my energy into convincing others to understand the circumstances that lead to the climate-crisis but rather work on the solution with people that support this mission.
Bio
Nils Birkeland has been a professional snowboarder before he worked on his degree in computer science to become a software-engineer. He lives in the mountains of the Glarus region with his family and enjoys canoeing in the lake, wintersports and walking through the trees.
He became part of the people that got inspired to put all their energy, time and professional experience into solving problems that emerge from the climate-crisis. “We’re the first generation that faces the challenge of the climate-crisis and it looks like we are the last generation that can fix it.” is what Nils says and adds “But the speed we have to decarbonize, our collective slowness to adapt and the individual price-tag of each decarbonisation-change makes me wonder if we can make it. But we must still try as hard as we can and as long as we can.”
His background in innovation, agile software-development and leadership Nils is one of the persons that reflects people's behavior towards change and knows how to reach seemingly unreachable goals. “If you can not act worldwide nor nationally you may act locally and make a tiny difference.“
Today Nils works as an IT-engineer in the field of photovoltaics, electric-mobility, hydrodynamics and heat-distribution-grids in a regional clean-energy utility and in one of the 1000+ international “Solar Impulse Efficient Solution” companies.
