Teacher Keeps on Giving

He’s officially retired from teaching, but Richard Reble has certainly not stopped educating, and he’s probably contributing more to society now than when he was in the classroom. We gave Richard a special volunteer award at our annual general meeting in March for outstanding service to Environment Hamilton and the community at large.

Richard is a self-taught citizen expert on peak oil, a theory rapidly being confirmed as oil prices climb steeply as a result of an apparent inability to meet growing demand. For more than a year after his retirement, Richard wrote and circulated a weekly email newsletter on peak oil and its implications.

Early in 2007, he approached EH with a proposal to popularize Al Gore’s landmark climate film, “An Inconvenient Truth”. Since then he has organized and delivered more than 40 showings of the documentary – primarily to faith groups in the Hamilton area, and helped EH staff follow that up with a variety of climate change presentations including a one-day conference of group leaders.

In 2008 Richard has returned to the same groups, and others, with a different documentary. “A Crude Awakening” carefully and convincingly explains why the planet is facing an energy crisis – in addition to the climatic impacts of fossil fuel use – and what are the likely implications for our society as fuel prices climb ever higher.

He’s done twenty showings so far and has more booked in June and the fall. Contact us if you know of a group that would be interested in seeing this highly informative documentary and Richard’s well-informed commentary.

Richard also leads several nature hikes a week and gives freely of his time in other positive ways. Some of us used to refer to retirement as re-tiring – putting on a new set of tires. That doesn’t quite work when we’re trying to get people out of cars, but Richard nevertheless wonderfully illustrates the great things that can be achieved when you combine a passion for the public good and the extra free time after the pension kicks in.

Environment Hamilton would love to have more Richards. To help you get involved, we hold a volunteer night at our offices every Wednesday evening. Call us at 905-549-0900 to get more information on you can keep on giving.