Hello World, I am Tom Sinow. This is SolarPunk Prompts, a series for writers where we discuss SolarPunk, a movement that imagines a world where technology is used for the good of the planet. In this series, we spend each episode exploring a single SolarPunk Story Prompt, adding some commentary, some inspirations, and some considerations. Most importantly, we consider how that story might help us to better envision a sustainable civilization.
If this is your first time here, I recommend checking out our introduction episode first, where we talk about what SolarPunk is, why you should care, and why this series came into being. Let's get into it. Today's prompt is the Fire Brigade. There's a military unit which switched from tanks to fire trucks decades ago. Now they're fighting climate disasters, being more engineers and firefighter than soldier, which is a dream for some and a nightmare for others.
The rookies, well versed in the new reality, are struggling to understand the language of the old officer, still clinging to the military jargon in ways. We've given a lot of time and discussion to the role of teachers, scientists, and engineers in the SolarPunk future. It's easy to see a place for the hackers, the cooks, and the librarian, but what about the soldier? We want to envision a world free of martial conflict, but where did those people go?
Sure, your story civilization may still have some guard force, but there's a lot of well -trained people that are going to be out of work. For inspiration, we can look to programs that exist for veterans now. What sort of training is available to port their skills into the civilian world. Did they have some specialty training in the military with a counterpart? When I served in the Navy, I was trained to be an electronics technician and a nuclear reactor operator.
Civilian transitioned for that sort of training straightforward. But there will be many for whom it's less obvious. What does a sonar tech do after service? What about infantry? In our prompt, we see that this military group made such a transition and are now acting as a sort of rescue crew against climate disasters. What sort of activity would that entail? One of the first ideas that comes to mind is search and rescue operations.
Here in Iceland, we have a completely volunteer search and rescue association with thousands of people giving their time and energy to keep the community safe. They operate heavy rescue machinery, helicopters, and rugged winter vehicles. They work by sea, by air, and by land. Their goal is to prevent accidents and save human lives. But it's not just some random people off the street thrown into these situations.
There is extensive training programs, practice drills, and exceptional knowledge of the conditions in Iceland's unique environments. Their activities pay off in rescue situations, but also in education of children of the public. They even have youth groups eager to get the kids involved via seminars and travel. All of this is without a standing military. A military unit moving into this sort of work would bring with them a different type of professionalism.
And that type of background might also give them unique insights into the dangers left behind in this world. Military conflicts have left behind an abundance of dangers long after the fighting has ended. Landmine -free estimates that there are over 110 million landmines in the ground right now and an equal number in stockpiles are ready to be used. More than 5 ,000 people lose their lives to these mines every year, and between 15 ,000 to 20 ,000 injuries and 42% of those are children.
Landmines are also traditionally planted in fields, forests, and around wells, water sources, and especially hydroelectric installations. These are exactly the types of places that attract everyday activity for agricultural societies like we commonly envision as a solar punk. Today we have major organizations working to clean up these dangerous messes lurking in the earth. The Halo Trust, Mines Advisory Group, and Odyssey 2025. But what will those actions look like in our future civilization?
I've been focusing on landmines as an example, but this is a problem that extends to many more areas. Modern warfare understands that infrastructure is essential to military operations and will target it both with conventional attacks and sabotage. Ridge collapsing, power plants down. much more. If your story is transitioned into the future as anything but a peaceful one, your world may be scarred from this past action too, and your Solar Pump community will have to deal with it.
They'll want trustworthy people who know the dangers and who can work well together. Not all the dangers left by human hands directly. In a world of rapidly changing climates, there are plenty of dangers from Mother Earth. There will be great storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, and wildfires. There will be flooding rains and landslides. There will be new things we've never even imagined.
Recent analysis from Climate Brief shows that 71% of the 504 extreme weather events reported over 400 peer -reviewed studies were made more severe by human -caused climate change. 93% of the 152 extreme heat events, more severe by climate change. and more than half of the flooding and drought events both were made worse by it as well.
A fire brigade of highly trained ex -military folks focused on dealing with these problems would be a boon to any community, and would likely be welcome to travel between them as well. Does your world have large communities or small ones, or would this group roam a region? Do they trade their services, and for what? But this brings us into the topic of stylistic hooks. How does their military background come through in your story?
It could be something played lightly, with just the language and jokes of the old officer to paint the background, or you might lean into the hierarchical structure of their group, something that may contrast with the rest of the community's organization. The prompt calls attention to the differences between the old guard, who likely served in military service, and the new recruits, who only know this unit for their current work.
This dichotomy could let you explore both cultural aspects while keeping a very narrow focus on just this unit, rather than jumping back and forth to a solar -punk community. Another hook could be in parallels to our own world. For instance, let's imagine a school setting, where the military comes to present the recruitment pitch, and enlists people into early training programs.
While some countries have banned the practice, and there's even rules against it set by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, many places skirt those rules. Promoting the military is a career path to children as young as eleven. Thankfully, the practice has been in decline in recent years, thanks to dedicated work by NGOs. On writing a solar -punk setting, though, we can play with these experiences and leverage the reader's reactions to really hit them with the differences.
Rather than a military recruitment pitch, our fire brigade could be educating the kids of the new unit. about the legacy dangers of environmental hazards and challenging them to join the training to keep the world safe. Who wants to save lives? the old soldier asks. His voice clipped with an unfamiliar cadence, like his words on a march just like the firemen around him. A scary symbol of nationalism is thus converted into something wholesome while pointedly commenting upon our present world.
The military aspects of this prompt also offer up an unusual opportunity. SolarPunk's vision for the future needs to find different ways to appeal to different audiences. What of the action fan, or even the military story reader? Their expectations for pacing, for drama, and life -or -death scenarios aren't the typical fair. We're so concerned about living in harmony with nature it's easy to sound boring.
you Military and action genres are stuffed to the brim with adrenaline, and that's something we can dip into. The fire brigade of this prompt may not be in a gunfight with a raiding party, but they could be suspended by ropes over a dam that's collapsing around them. There are a lot of people who love this type of story. It doesn't have to be army vs. army to use some of the genre's best qualities. So what are they?
Well, there's a few important aspects of military genre fiction that you could effectively borrow without putting your theme at risk. 1. Background of conflict. This doesn't have to be fighting, it just needs to form a state of urgency for the rest of the action. 2. Politics, strategies, and tactics. Again, those don't need to be about fighting, they could be strategies for diverting the river flood. 3. Training, training, and more training.
Show it directly, show it indirectly through the action and reactions, etc. And 4. Military elemental styles. Jargon, nicknames, acronyms. Regulatory structure.
Of cautioned and previous episodes against blending genres with solar punk, and I'll do it again here, what we're talking about isn't about writing a military solar punk story, rather we want to think of the readers that love the action and drama and say to them, your symbols are great, we're just going to bend them a little bit in this direction. And then we'll lift what we need and use it to deliver a solar punk package deep into their psyche.
It's a type of inclusivity, finding other ways to connect with new audiences while maintaining the core solar punk vision. Now before we wrap up, let's take one last look at that prompt, the fire brigade. There's a military unit which switched from tanks to fire trucks decades ago. Now they're fighting climate disasters, being more engineers and firefighters than soldiers. which is a dream for some and a nightmare for others.
The rookies, well versed in the new reality, are struggling to understand the language of the old officer, still clinging to the military jargon in ways. Until next time, I'm Tomasino, I'll help you join me for the next Solar Pump Prompt. Music in this recording is Sun Syndicate by DMR, from Global Patterns compilation Solar Pump of brighter perspective.