I HOPE that I am guilty of realism rather than the complacency suggested by Judith Hargreaves in her letter (Craven Herald letters, October 28).

I have stressed the two main points often enough that a situation that is going to continue for 100 years is not an emergency. Also that by moving to zero carbon emissions there is little the UK, or Europe for that matter, can do to change the greenhouse effect.

Another reason why I want to change thinking is that in an emergency people panic, take hasty action that do not help the situation and waste resources and effort; often making the situation worse.

What are the so-called peaceful protesters achieving, acting illegally, disrupting people's lives with loss of time, effort and finance, certainly in one case causing a loss of sales of £1.2 million?

The one sensible thing that Greta Thunberg has done is to approach the United Nations Organisation. That is where effective action has to start.

Judith brings in the loss of species and habitats leading to the Holocene Extinction. Climate change is partly responsible, desertification and warming and greater acidity of the oceans etc. But the common cause has to be looked to.

In my lifetime the human population has almost quadrupled. On top of which we are all on average using at least twice the resources that we did 70 years ago. Our demands are squeezing out other species.

There is complacency - and worse. Maybe the rot set in with our concentration on bettering our lifestyles in the latter half of the 20th Century and our failure to heed the warnings of those who did look ahead.

Bernard Peel, Cross Hills