Ive not done this before, but I think this is worth posting. I just wrote a short article about climate change for the Buddhist group newsletter I am involved in, and here it is: Investigating Climate Change Ive been investigating climate change this winter, reading two books, watching documentaries on YouTube, and viewing some recent blogs. Its been a fascinating journey, as well as alarming, frustrating, depressing, upsetting and galvanising by turns. I thought Id share a little of what Ive been looking at, and make some recommendations for those of you who are interested in this stuff. One book is called Storms Of My Grandchildren by James Hansen, a very well known American climate scientist, who has been investigating the effects of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases on the earths climate since the early eighties. Published in 2009, his book provides a very interesting account of the science that has been gradually revealing how burning fossil fuels is warming the planet. If you want to check out a well reasoned scientific perspective that isnt too difficult to read, then try this book. It left me in no doubt as to the veracity of human made climate change, and the dangers it involves. He also tells the story of the poor response from American and international governments to warnings from the scientists, dating back to the eighties. I found this aspect of the book depressing and deeply frustrating; if governments had taken heed of the scientists and really worked to reduce carbon emissions, wed be in a better place now and the transition would not have been too drastic. Now, it seems, drastic measures are needed. Hansen still has hope however, and Im left feeling very moved by the author and his determination to do something to stop runaway climate change, which, as he points out so clearly, could certainly ruin human civilisation as we know it. The other book is This Changes Everything by Naomi Klein. This is a more up to date account of the current situation, published in late 2014. She particularly looks at the politics involved, and why the warnings of the scientists seem to be going unheeded by the worlds governments. She devotes quite a bit of time to this and its well worth reading: basically she sees that the large energy companies, particularly fossil fuel companies like Exxon Mobil, BP etc. are so powerful that they influence government policy through intense lobbying, in order to protect their huge profits. She also movingly describes situations where social activism has won battles against these big companies, and encourages us to get involved in a social movement to stop these companies getting their way, and start penalising them in ways which will reduce carbon emissions, e.g. one simple thing that could really change things would be for governments to introduce a carbon tax, effectively taxing carbon emissions, and giving both companies and people incentives to find alternatives to burning fossil fuels. One discussion I found particularly interesting in her book, was around the increase in climate change denial in the last seven years. If you go onto you tube and put in climate change these days you are likely to find videos from scientists denying climate change is a serious issue, and criticising those who are alarmed by it. As Naomi Klein points out so clearly, there has been a lot of money put into this effort to spoil the climate change debate, and that money has come from the big companies and right wing, mainly Christian, America. She does not give their arguments any credence, at least 97% of scientists agree that climate change is a serious threat to our civilisation. Instead she argues that the big companies and the Christian right have a huge investment in denying human made climate change because if they were to agree that it is happening then it undermines the neo liberal free market political ideology of the last thirty years, brought in by Thatcher and Reagan. Basically the policies that have driven the worlds economy over this time are leading to disaster! And that is a big thing to admit to, hence the denial. She argues this very eloquently and in convincing detail. Unfortunately, she also points out that this climate change spoiling has had an effect so that western governments are still not doing enough to reduce carbon emissions, and people generally seem unaware of the dangers threatening us. This brings me to some even more disturbing documentaries on YouTube about the possibility of run away climate change. Ive been looking at whats been going on in the Arctic in the last few years. According to the Arctic methane emergency group, a group of scientists studying the Arctic, the film Arctic Death Spiral and the Methane Time Bomb, and Professor Guy Mcpherson from Arizona University, things are getting very close to run away climate change indeed. The Arctic is heating up a lot quicker than the rest of the planet, and this is bad news as there is a lot of methane in the Arctic, which if it releases, will increase global temperature by between one and two degrees, in a very short space of time. If this happens climate change will start to runaway, with all sorts of terrible consequences for humanity and life on this planet, e.g. the worlds grain crops could quickly fail, and the ice caps will melt. The sea level will rise by 7 metres if the Greenland ice cap melts, by 70 metres if the Antarctic ice cap melts, either will put many coastal cities, islands, and fertile lands underwater. Back in 2005 a film came out called Six Degrees Could Change The World, which looks at some of the computer modelling of what might happen to the planet with each degree of warming. This is on YouTube, I think it is worth watching, and it gives some idea of what we could be in for. Sadly, the last comment in the film from the main scientific modeller, Mark Linus, is that we have until 2015 to change things. It is 2015 now and carbon emissions are still rising! The Greenland icecap is already melting at rates far quicker than climate change models predicted. And already, it seems there is evidence that methane is being released and a team of Russian scientists studying the East Siberian Ice Shelf have said that a huge release is very possible at any time. So, if these scientists are to be believed, and I dont see why not, then we are teetering on the edge of a disaster of truly apocalyptic proportions. Guy McPherson is predicting that the planet will become uninhabitable for humans between two and twenty years from now. Others are more conservative, but still say it could happen by 2050. This is a truly enormous idea to take on board. Ive been wandering around feeling like I am in the matrix! Doesnt anyone realise what is going on here? Its like we as a species are all on the Titanic and its just about to hit the iceberg, and pretty much everyone is still just going about their business as normal. It makes the actions of the big fossil fuel companies, and the worlds governments, appear to be complete madness. What could be more crazy than sending the whole of humanity and most of the species on this planet down the tubes, just so people can get rich in the short term? I dont know what the best thing to do is in the face of all this. Naomi Klein thinks we have a few years to turn things around but it needs a huge social movement to do so. I hope she is right and that we do it. If Guy McPherson is right then there is nothing we can do to stop this disaster and the planet is in for a mass extinction, including humanity, and all our lives will be cut short by it! I talked with my chapter about all this last night, and one thing came out of our discussion that may be helpful. Its easy to feel intense anxiety around this stuff, but my experience from putting time into investigating it is that I feel more informed, clearer, and very galvanised. I dont feel anxious, I feel very sober, and I want to do something about it. If climate change concerns you, and, if you didnt already know it, hopefully you can see by now that it directly concerns all of us, I would recommend that you look at this stuff yourself, you may find it helpful. So what to do as a response? Im trying to work that out. I wrote to my MP today to ask him not to support the Infrastructure Bill, that will enable oil and gas companies to frack under UK homes without our permission. That felt good! In order to avoid runaway climate change, the fossil fuels need to stay in the ground and opening up the UK to fracking is a very bad idea! If Naomi Klein is right, its time for us all to start writing to our politicians, and get involved in the movement to stop this disaster happening. Im certainly considering spending a lot more time doing that and I would encourage others to do so too. The alternative, that we are beyond the point of no return, is appalling but also worth considering. I find it hard to work out a creative response but I do want to meditate more, go on retreat more, love more, and live with more urgency generally. Guy McPherson, who has had plenty of time to consider the worst case scenario says the way to respond is with love, and he recommends valuing the present moment, and helping other people. Good advice. Anyone got any other ideas?
Posted on: Thu, 15 Jan 2015 11:47:24 +0000
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