Suing For Survival

George Monbiot.

Our survival is not an afterthought. The defence of the living planet cannot be tacked retrospectively onto business as usual. Yet this is how almost all governments operate. They slap the word “sustainable” on damaging projects they have already approved, then insist this means they’ve gone green. If we are to survive and prosper, everything must change. Every decision should begin with the question of what the planet can withstand. 

This means that any discussion about new infrastructure should begin with ecological constraints. The figures are stark. A paper published in Nature last year showed that existing energy infrastructure, if it is allowed to run to the end of its natural life, will produce around 660 gigatonnes of CO2. Yet, to stand a reasonable chance of preventing more than 1.5°C of global heating, we can afford to release, in total, no more than 580 gigatonnes. In other words, far from building new fossil power plants, the survival of a habitable planet means retiring the damaging projects that have already been built. Electricity plants burning coal and gas and oil will not secure our prosperity. They will destroy it.

But everywhere special interests dominate. Construction projects are driven, above all, by the lobbying of the construction industry, consultancies and financiers. Gigantic and destructive schemes, such as the Oxford-Cambridge Expressway, are invented by lobbyists for the purpose of generating contracts. Political support is drummed up, the project achieves its own momentum, then, belatedly, a feeble attempt is made to demonstrate that it can somehow become compatible with environmental promises. This is what destroys civilisations: a mismatch between the greed of economic elites and the needs of society.

Read the piece by Guardian columnist,  George Monbiot - “Suing For Survival.”

World Needs an Ambitious New Deal for Nature & People

From the fresh air we breathe to the clean water we drink, nature provides the essentials we all rely on for our survival and well-being. The loss of nature threatens these essentials. Loss of biodiversity is therefore not only an environmental issue, but also a developmental, economic, security, social and moral issue. It affects us all and all aspects of our lives.

We need a better deal for narture and people.

Yet, worryingly, a series of recent major intergovernmental scientific reports which will inform policy making all over the world from the IPCC, IPBES and others have issued a siren warning: Our natural world is now under unprecedented pressure. At the current rate of nature loss, we stand to face the extinction of an estimated 1 million species within decades and significant declines of food and water supplies and many other services that nature provides to us everyday, for free.

This is supported by WWF’s Living Planet 2018 report, which has found population sizes of wildlife decreased by 60% on average globally between 1970 and 2014.

Read the story from Medium by the Director General of WWF International, Marco Lambertini -  "World Needs an Ambitious New Deal for Nature & People.”

We have so many ways to pursue a healthy climate – it’s insane to wait any longer

As a broadly trained life scientist, my concern about climate change isn’t the health of the planet. The rocks will be just fine! What worries me is a whole spectrum of “wicked” challenges, from sustaining food production, to providing clean water, to maintaining wildlife diversity and the green environments that ensure the survival of complex life on Earth.

Opportunities to help drive the energy transition are everywhere.

What’s more, as a disease and death researcher, I think of climate change as equivalent to lead poisoning: slow, cumulative, progressive and initially silent but, if not treated in time, causing irreversible, catastrophic damage.

The link between climate change and human health is obvious. The likely success of Dr Kerryn Phelps in the Wentworth byelection also suggests the informed public gets it. More broadly, Doctors for the Environment Australia has campaigned vigorously against Adani’s proposed Queensland coal mine, and has very strong student chapters. Young people are energised and, as they mature and take power, the political and legal situation regarding energy generation could change very quickly.

Read the piece from The Conversation by Peter Doherty  - “We have so many ways to pursue a healthy climate – it’s insane to wait any longer.”

(Peter Doherty was interviewed early in September for the Climate Conversations podcast)

Because of climate change, some birds are nesting earlier

In springtime, baby birds hatch and huddle in their nests, featherless and vulnerable. The survival of these hatchlings is highly dependent on temperature.

Climate change is impacting on the life of birds.

Tingley: “When they are eggs, and when they are sort of helpless, naked young living in nests, those are the periods of a bird’s life when it might be most sensitive to climate.”

Morgan Tingley is a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Connecticut. His research shows that in response to the warming climate, some birds are changing their breeding times.

Tingley: “Over a period of about 70 to 80 years, 164 species of birds in California had shifted their breeding time – so the timing of egg laying and egg hatching – by about nine days.”

Read the Yale Climate Connections story by Diana Madson - “Because of climate change, some birds are nesting earlier.”

An 'Unprecedented crime'

Writing in “Unprecedented Crime: Climate Change Denial and Game Changers for Survival” Dr Peter D. Carter and Elizabeth Woodworth said: 

“In 2013, the year that atmospheric CO2 reached 400 ppm for the first time in over 2.5 million years, 163 elected representatives from the 113th Congress had “taken over $58.8 million from the fossil fuel industry that is the driving force behind the carbon emissions that cause climate change.”

Adani Carmichael coal mine: Former Indian sounds alarm on Adani's track record, mega-mine's viability

India's former environment minister Jairam Ramesh is "absolutely appalled" by the Australian Government's approval of the Adani Group's massive coal mine in North Queensland, which he says will threaten the survival of the Great Barrier Reef, "a common heritage of mankind".

Jairam Ramesh urges the Australian Government
to do thorough financial due diligence on Adani.

Mr Ramesh, an elder statesman of India's opposition Congress Party, also said the Federal Government and Queensland Government have failed to do adequate due diligence on Adani Group's environmental and financial conduct in India before granting environmental approvals and mining licenses.

"Adani Group's track record on environmental management within the country [India] leaves a lot to be desired," Mr Ramesh told Four Corners.

Read the ABC News story - “Adani Carmichael coal mine: Former Indian sounds alarm on Adani's track record, mega-mine's viability.”

New Scientist warns: 'It's even worse than we thought'

Beyond the determined efforts of a few innovative individuals, there is little positive news about climate change mitigation.

In a report headed: “Climate change: It’s even worse than we thought” New Scientist looks at arctic warming, extreme weather, sea levels, food production planetary feedbacks, human emissions and heat stress.

The news in each case is not good and it appears human survival depends entirely upon us changing our behaviours, significantly.

Tom sets the bar high

Tom Blees set the bar high in the opening chapter of his 2008 book, “Prescription for the Planet”.

"Prescription for the Planet"
 author, Tom Blees, speaking
 during a visit to Austtralia.

In the chapter, “A world of hurt”, Blees said:

"What we are faced with at the dawn of the twenty-first century is a struggle for our very survival, but that struggle is not against some hostile outside force. It is against our own institutions, our own inertia, a dearth of imagination, a fear of change and a selfish timidity on the part of our leaders”.

Those who gather Beneath the Wisteria  to consider a response to climate change face, considering the views of Blees, a significant challenge.