What is Solar Punk?

“Solar Punk” is the festival theme, which envisions a future where community and technology are integrated to create a self-sustaining system. In this event, attendees will learn about alternative self-sustaining ways to work and power their daily lives. You might not know this but you have probably  seen a Solar Punk film, Black Panther is a Solar Punk film. If you recall from the movie (Spoilers Alert) Wakanda the Country lead by the superhero Black Panther utilized advanced science to create a futuristic city and society. But the way they use tech, that is important. Wakanda is not importing or exporting oil to fuel their society, The source of the energy is the mountain the country is built on. In fact,the city is built into the mountain as a part of it rather than through it. The Energy shields are built into and designed within the fabric instead of another or external device. The collaboration of technology with culture and environment is why Back Panther and Wakanda are a Solar Punk . But the key is Solar Punk is a practical version of the future. We have existing technology ,like solar panels that give us all the energy we need. In the world we all live in, at this very moment ,we have the ability to generate all the energy our world would need without the need to extract and exploit a community and environment where those finite resources are abundant. We can also create clean ,drinkable water from the air, the tech is real and it exists and you can buy a unit off of Amazon. In fact you can buy most of this futuristic and science fiction tech off of Amazon right now. The future is now, if you're reading this then you most likely are reading on a phone or computer, using the internet. That means you have access to the internet, which is a new technology. In 1950 the concept of the internet or a cell phone was beyond comprehension. Even concepts like TV and the Radio are very recent inventions that have fundamentally changed the way we live. So the future is a lot closer than you think. And technology is coming faster than you think. In fact, in the book Faster than You Think they state: “The Law of Accelerating Returns,” Ray Kurzweil did the math and found that we’re going to experience twenty thousand years of technological change over the next one hundred years. Essentially, we’re going from the birth of agriculture to the birth of the internet twice in the next century. This means paradigm-shifting, game-changing, nothing-is-ever-the-same-again breakthroughs — such as affordable aerial ridesharing — will not be an occasional affair. They’ll be happening all the time.” Our Sci fiction of yesterday is the existing technology today. That's the whole point of this event is to give you an opportunity to see this technology up close and  personal.