IT must be Christmas. Mr Haskell has at last given me a compliment. I am worldly. If by that he means I think of the planet, he is right.

We have only to watch the news most nights to see proof of the devastation being caused by man-made climate change. Raging bush and forest fires in Australia and California, drought in many parts of Africa, severe flooding in South East Asia (not to mention Yorkshire) and melting glaciers.

All have been attributed at least in part to our continuing burning of fossil fuels inevitably raising the level of CO2 in the earth's atmosphere. If we are to avoid reaching a tipping point when runaway climate change becomes unstoppable, we must reduce and ultimately end the burning of fossil fuels. Increased reliance on renewable energy is inevitable.

It is undoubtably true that there will be days when there is no sun and no wind. But there are others when we have both in abundance (in Pembrokeshire particularly wind). It's interesting that the Government's official figures show that in the third quarter of 2019 renewable energy was responsible for 38.9 per cent of our electricity. It was the UK's biggest individual source of power.

The more clean renewable energy we produce, the less we need fossil fuels and the less CO2 is pumped into the atmosphere. Battery technology is continually developing. It is only a question of time before effective storage of renewable energy becomes possible and then hopefully all forms of fossil fuel power generation will become redundant.

Interconnectors also make more clean power available. Particularly important currently are those with Ireland and France. 2021 will see the commissioning of the new interconnector with Norway. In your letters column a few weeks ago we were recommended to visit the public consultation for the proposed Greenlink interconnector with Ireland.

I did, and was very impressed by the lengths this company would be going to safeguard the environment. Horizontal Directional Drilling would be used to prevent any damage to both the beach and sand dunes at Freshwater West and all construction beyond the dunes would be scheduled to avoid the most popular holiday periods. It would provide clean green energy. This may not be in the quantity some would like but it would mean some reduction in CO2 emissions. Every little helps.

We are already seeing the effect of global heating on our own climate. The hottest day in British history occurred on July 25, 2019. The Office for National Statistics has reported that on this day 200 more people died than would normally be expected. There was also a much higher number of deaths than usual on July 26. In total the heatwave is likely to have caused more than 900 deaths. The young, the old and the sick are most at risk. Is this a price worth paying for our continued reliance on fossil fuels?

I am reminded of lines from the famous poem written by John Donne. It starts: 'No man is an island entire of itself' and ends: 'Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.'

We have a climate emergency and must treat it as such.

Better a live wise monkey than a dead dinosaur.

VIAN ROBERTS,

Saundersfoot