Tell me that you didn’t watch the footage of recent events in Japan and think, if only for a moment, “How would we cope?” I know I did.

Tell me that you didn’t watch those pictures of new-born babies being scanned for radiation, the starving families in the sports stadium and toothless old men still tending livestock in the otherwise deserted villages near Fukushima and ask yourself, “What if …?” I bet you did, too.

And tell me that you don’t want a wind turbine anywhere near your house because it will spoil your view, produce background noise and might interfere with your TV reception. (That would be practically everyone with a proposed wind farm in their back yard.) Now tell me whether you would rather live 500 metres from a wind turbine or a kilometre downwind of a nuclear power plant. Not fair?

Okay, let’s make that a more comfortable 30km (the extent of the exclusion zone around Fukushima).

Still not sure? All right then, let’s make it 250km away, which is how far Tokyo is from the devastated power plant. Although, with levels of radiation spiking up 20 times higher than normal, no wonder those that could were catching the first available bullet train out of town.

I know which one I would pick. And, since recent events in Japan, I’m not the only one. There have been massive anti-nuclear protests in Germany, which has now suspended decisions on a nuclear programme. Switzerland has done the same.

Even the gung-ho British Government, which has eight new nuclear generators planned, is now admitting that Fukushima has “cast a shadow over the renaissance of the nuclear industry” which could have “long-term implications” for the UK.

Of course, we don’t have proper earthquakes in the UK. The odd floor-trembler; enough to cause a tsunami of radio phone-ins, but not enough to rip open a power plant.

Still, the spectre of catastrophe looms large in the shape of those nasty ole leaking reactors in Japan. Public concern has forced a safety review, which means future generators will have to be built to an even higher spec at greater expense.

And that’s what is threatening Britain’s nuclear industry: cost.

Britain is relying on a portfolio approach – nuclear, renewables (wind and sea) and carbon capture and storage – to reduce its emissions to the legally required 80 per cent of 1990 levels by 2050. Could it still do it without nuclear?

According to the Department of Energy and Climate Change, it would be possible to achieve this through massive investment in renewables, “but it will require a big effort”.

Perhaps the hardest part of that effort is coming to terms with the fact that business as usual is no longer an option. Climate change is not the only grave threat facing us: oil is running out (according to the International Energy Agency, peak oil passed in 2006) while at the same time the demand for energy from the world’s rapidly increasing population is so great that we would need to discover the equivalent of a new Saudi Arabia every three years simply to keep pace with existing demand.

Like it or not, we face a very different future. And yes, a big effort is needed, by all of us – not just to get our heads around the different sources of energy, such as wind, the technology for which will become a more familiar part of our landscape, much as electricity pylons and mobile phone masts and cooling towers already are, but also to make the lifestyle changes necessary to reduce our energy use in tandem.

In only nine years’ time City of York Council is committed to reducing York’s emissions to 40 per cent of 2005 levels. Meeting that target requires co-operation from us as individuals, and, crucially, at the political level. (Something you might like to quiz potential candidates about when they knock on your door between now and May 5.) The role local communities can play in this is crucial, which is why I’ll be attending the forthcoming one-day conference on Community Energy Projects on Saturday, April 16, at York’s Priory Street Centre.

The event is organised by York in Transition, which, with the University of York’s Stockholm Environment Centre, will host a public seminar, Zero Carbon Britain 2030, on Friday, April 15 at the Friends’ Meeting House, Friargate, 7.30pm). For details, email yorkintransition@talktalk.net or phone 01904 651323