Can climate crisis be avoided?
Can climate crisis be avoided? The simple answer to this question would be ‘no, it’s already here’, but that would be flippant. Asked if there is any real chance of averting climate crisis, US scientist and director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, James Hansen answered confidently: ‘Absolutely. It is possible - if we give politicians a cold, hard slap in the face. The fraudulence of the Copenhagen approach - "goals" for emission reductions, "offsets" that render ironclad goals almost meaningless, the ineffectual "cap-and-trade" mechanism - must be exposed. We must rebel against such politics as usual.’
James Hansen is in his eighties now. His concern is for the generations to come who will have to face the consequences of our failure to throw off our institutional and psychological inertia and act. Hansen’s latest book is Storms of My Grandchildren.
Hansen is correct. The only thing is that his answer in the affirmative rests upon a very big ‘if’. The problem is that too many individuals are hooked on business and politics as usual, not just the politicians but the individuals who comprise what is mis-called ‘the general public’. The problem that we have no public and we have no general interest. ‘The people’ have been atomised. In politics, they are individual voters, in economics they are individual consumers. The sense of politics as a collective endeavour for the long term common good is weak. The structures for such a politics, joining individuals together in a common purpose that has practical effect, are lacking. There is a missing link between the scientific theory presented by the likes of Hansen and the political practice. It’s only active minorities who are giving politicians a cold, hard slap in the face. These politicians will point to their electoral bread and butter and claim that the numbers are with them. Come election time, they are right – for now. The result is a political and psychological inertia which each feeds on the other.
The science indicates that the climate system is being pushed close to tipping points. Much is made of the uncertainty of climate change. There will always be argument and questioning, but the big picture is becoming increasingly clear – carbon emissions as a result of human activity are largely responsible for increased average temperatures of the last 250 years. Further, the uncertainties that do exist can swing both ways: there could actually be more heating than has been predicted by the computer models. Indeed, it is worth pointing out to those who criticise computer modelling that using empirical data without computer models yields a warming rate that is on the higher side of that which is projected by the models.
It is also worth emphasising that the irreducible complexity of the climate system means that it is simply beyond climate scientists to be able understand the earth’s climate as a whole. That is why the IPCC computer models should be treated as only one part of the whole attempt to monitor the climate. They are fallible. Since the earth’s climate is chaotic and non-linear in nature, it is as well to recognise the precarious nature of scientific prediction.
What is certain is that continued high and escalating emissions will create a chaotic dynamic situation for future generations, initiating positive feedbacks that are out of human control and which will ensure rapidly deteriorating climate conditions.
The science is also clear when it comes to identifying what has to be done to stabilise atmospheric composition and climate. Over the next two decades we need to phase out global coal emissions and prohibit emissions from unconventional fossil fuels such as tar sands and oil shale. There is no reason for pessimism. Geophysical data on the carbon amounts in oil, gas and coal show that the problem can be solved. Achieving this goal would result in carbon dioxide emissions falling by 60% or more by the middle of the twenty first century. At the same time, it would be possible to bring atmospheric carbon dioxide back to 350 ppm (parts per million) or less through improved forestry and agricultural practices.
The crisis in the climate system demands that we find the nerve to look reality stark in the face. The cowardice of governments too often mirrors that of the voters. It certainly reflects the greed of the industrial lobbies. James Hansen expresses contempt for such politics. ‘Governments going to Copenhagen claim to have such goals for 2050, which they will achieve with the "cap-and-trade" mechanism. They are lying through their teeth.’
But politicians are lying because they know that their electorates are not prepared, in sufficient numbers, to make the necessary changes in their lifestyles in order to achieve a stable climate. So governments pretend to make the changes, because electorates only pretend to want changes. The pretence goes both ways. Politicians will carry on lying through their teeth for so long as sufficient numbers of voters prefer to go on hearing those lies than having to act on ecological truths.
All that ‘cap and trade’ nonsense is just institutional tinkering to give the appearance that something is being done, whereas business goes on as usual. Short of Russia being forced or persuaded its gas in the ground, and Saudi Arabia its oil, then coal must be phased out and unconventional fossil fuels prohibited.
This is not happening. Quite the contrary. Coal-to-oil factories and coal-fired power plants are being built all over the world. The United States has signed an agreement with Canada for a pipeline to carry oil squeezed from tar sands. Australia is building port facilities designed for large increases in coal exports.
‘Governments are stating emission goals that they know are lies - or, if we want to be generous, they do not understand the geophysics and are kidding themselves’ says Hansen. Hansen argues that it is feasible to phase out coal and avoid use of unconventional fossil fuels, ‘but only if governments face up to the truth: as long as fossil fuels are the cheapest energy, their use will continue and even increase on a global basis.’
But the reason why fossil fuels are cheapest energy is because the full price is not paid in terms of the effects on human health, the environment and future climate. Factoring in the full price in those terms, and fossil fuels become the most expensive energy. That’s what should happen. ‘Governments must place a uniform rising price on carbon, collected at the fossil fuel source - the mine or port of entry. The fee should be given to the public in toto, as a uniform dividend, payroll tax deduction or both. Such a tax is progressive - the dividend exceeds added energy costs for 60% of the public.’ The resources generated should be used to invest in the low-carbon economy and energy infrastructure, furnishing the public with the means to adjust lifestyles, much more effective than moral exhortation.
Hansen has no faith whatsoever in cap and trade schemes:
‘Fee and dividend can begin with the countries now considering cap and trade. Other countries will either agree to a carbon fee or have duties placed on their products that are made with fossil fuels.
As the carbon price rises, most coal, tar sands and oil shale will be left in the ground. The marketplace will determine the roles of energy efficiency, renewable energy and nuclear power in our clean energy future.
Cap and trade with offsets, in contrast, is astoundingly ineffective. Global emissions rose rapidly in response to Kyoto, as expected, because fossil fuels remained the cheapest energy.
Cap and trade is an inefficient compromise, paying off numerous special interests. It must be replaced with an honest approach, raising the price of carbon emissions and leaving the dirtiest fossil fuels in the ground.’
Cap and trade is popular with politicians precisely because it is a compromise, it is a pretend change that allows polluting practices to continue unabated. Hansen asks whether we are going to ‘stand up and give global politicians a hard slap in the face, to make them face the truth?’ He admits that ‘it will take a lot of us - probably in the streets. Or are we going to let them continue to kid themselves and us and cheat our children and grandchildren?’
Yes, it’s that mutual pretence again. It’s not just governments kidding the people, the people want to be kidded – that’s why governments fail to act in a decisive way.
I doubt that standing up and protesting in the way Hansen recommends will be effective. The numbers that count and the numbers that impress are gathered in political and economic markets. No matter how many protestors take to the streets, the number of consumers and voters will likely be much higher. Back in the early 1980’s, Alexander Haig, President Reagan’s Secretary of State said ‘they can protest all they like, so long as they pay their taxes’. They paid their taxes, and the megamachine rolled on, all over the people and the planet. That political game is sown up. We need a new game.
Robert F Kennedy Jr. is the eldest son of Robert F Kennedy, the anti-Vietnam war presidential candidate who was assassinated during the campaign in 1968. Unlike many of the Kennedy family, Robert F Kennedy Jr did no go directly into politics, but instead became an environmental lawyer and leader of River Keepers, an organisation formed to protect American waters from pollution. On 7 July 2007, as part of the Live Earth event, Kennedy stood on the stage in New York and called for revolution. His speech is worth quoting at length, given that it has never had the coverage it merits:
Now we've all heard the oil industry and the coal industry and their indentured servants in the political process telling us that global climate stability is a luxury that we can't afford. That we have to choose now between economic prosperity on the one hand and environmental protection on the other. And that is a false choice.
In 100 percent of the situations, good environmental policy is identical to good economic policy—if we want to measure our economy, and this is how we ought to be measuring it, based upon how it produces jobs and the dignity of jobs over the generations, how it preserves the values of the assets of our community and how it averts the catastrophe of global warming.
If, on the other hand, we want to do what they've been urging us to do on Capitol Hill, which is to treat the planet as if it were a business in liquidation, convert our natural resources to cash as quickly as possible, [and] have a few years of pollution based prosperity... But our children are going to pay for our joyride... Climate change is upon us. Its impacts are going to be catastrophic and we are causing it. The good news is, we have the scientific and technological capacity to avert its most catastrophic impacts. We only need the political will...
Now you've heard today a lot of people say that there are many little things that you all can do today to avert climate change on your own. But I will tell you this, it is more important than buying compact fluorescent light bulbs or than buying a fuel efficient automobile.
The most important thing you can do is to get involved in the political process and get rid of all of these rotten politicians that we have in Washington, DC, who are nothing more than corporate toadies for companies like Exxon and Southern Company, these villainous companies that consistently put their private financial interest ahead of American interest and ahead of the interest of all of humanity. This is treason and we need to start treating them now as traitors...
And I want you to remember this, that we are not protecting the environment for the sake of the fishes and the birds, we are protecting it because nature is the infrastructure of our communities... The air we breathe, the water we drink, the wildlife, the public lands, the things that connect us to our past, to our history, that provide context to our communities and that are the source, ultimately, of our values and our virtues and our character as a people and the future of our children.
And I will see all of you on the barricades.
Quoted in Stop Global Warming Change the World, Jonathan Neale 2008 (the text of Kennedy's speech is taken from an email that circulated widely on the day.)
Indeed, yes. After reading that, I feel inclined to start building the barricades myself. I agree wholeheartedly with Robert F Kennedy jr. Every point he makes here is a winner. He is right to argue that the technical solutions are available to us and that all that is lacking is political will. He is also right to point to the ‘many little things’ that we can all do to avert climate change. Worldchanging in pursuit of the common good is a teamsport and there is a place on the team for everyone. (World Changing Alex Steffen ed 2008 Abrams New York). We stand on common ground and have no need to go to extremes. The real extremists are those who are violating the planet and uprooting communities for private commercial gain.
The problem is that it is too easy to pose this question in terms of an opposition between governments and the governed. The problem is not just governmental inertia, it is the psychological inertia of the governed. If the climate problem was external, like an asteroid, then governments and governed would mobilise quickly and marshal all available resources. But climate change is not just an external threat, it is internal. The problem is not the climate, it is us. The problem comes from within the species and so is less easy to identify and fight. I don’t think we will be seeing Kennedy on the barricades at all. I don’t think we will be seeing any physical barricades at all. The real barricades are the psychic barricades that separate us from each other, the world around us, our own inner nature. These barricades need to be dismantled.
We need a worldchanging that develops an eco-citizenship through lots of little actions all over the world. This is to develop an eco-praxis. In changing the world, people come to change themselves. They become eco-citizens of the new ecopolis.
At present, people are not citizens, they are private individuals separated from the public good. We need extensive public spaces that enable individuals to act as citizens, to engage in concerted action in order to bring about the ecological society. These public spaces are currently lacking. Instead, the market model rules and people have little option but to act as individuals, to choose, as voters and as consumers, as individuals. We need to build networks across civil society to enable individuals to join together and change the world in an eco-praxis.
Hansen concludes with a demand for a universal, intergenerational, planetary ethic: ‘Intergenerational inequity is a moral issue. Just as when Abraham Lincoln faced slavery and when Winston Churchill faced Nazism, the time for compromises and half-measures is over. Can we find a leader who understands the core issue and will lead?’
That capacity for leadership exists in each and all of us. I agree with what Lao-Tzu said about leadership:
As for the best leaders, the people do not notice their existence. The next best the people honour and praise. The next the people fear, and the next the people hate. But when the best leader’s work is done the people say, “We did it ourselves.”
We need to build more than physical barricades; we need to build the ecopolis, creating the conditions which allow the people to lead themselves.
Catastrophic climate change can still be avoided. But this means finally, once and for all, rejecting the half-measures and evasions which are the stock-in-trade of governments and politicians. The time for false promises is over. It’s remarkable that this shilly-shallying has gone on for so long now. Back in the early 1980s US President Ronald Reagan kicked the climate question into the long grass. Climate change deniers are still engaging in the same delaying tactics. We need to build extensive civil networks and structures so as to be able to exert much stronger public pressure on government, putting some political spine into politicians and forcing them to exercise much greater political leadership than they have to date.
The climate crisis is not for faint hearts. Evasion may be a tempting short run strategy, but it will make the problem much worse and more costly in the long run. After the Stern report, governments have no excuse. To have even a fifty-fifty chance of keeping global temperature increase the safe side of the 2C threshold, the developed nations need to adopt binding targets for a 40% reduction of emissions by 2020, based on 1990 levels. And these reductions should be made within each nation and not outsourced to poorer countries, the cowards path sought by several governments. There should also be substantial funding for developing countries to allow them to make the transition.
Politically unrealistic? It’s time to get serious about resolving the problem of climate change. If politicians and people lack the nerve and the nous to face reality, let’s be honest enough to say so. Half-measures like cap and trade will not suffice. They are pretend solutions to avoid addressing real problems.
Setting more ambitious and binding targets for reducing emissions should be considered part of a cultural and psychological shift. This is more than institutional restraints demanding sacrifice. Rather, it is to make clear that investing in alternatives to polluting and finite fossil fuels will be of positive benefit to society and the economy, as well as the environment. The challenge is not just to obligate individuals in environmental praxis but to motivate them, inspire their effort, willing and support by a vision of a healthier, happier society in which people are able to relate to each other and act together in a common endeavour. This is to build a new eco-public as an alternative to the atomistic political and business markets that currently prevail. It is important that the message on climate change is not one of doom and gloom. The whole point of drawing attention to the problems associated with climate change – droughts, floods, heatwaves, etc – is not to worry people with respect to their inevitability but to encourage people to act and take the future in their own hands. The familiar list of climate problems can dispirit, demoralise and demotivate individuals. The situation can appear to be so back that it would seem that nothing can be done to avert eco-catastrophe. Climate problems should always be accompanied by a compelling, inspiring vision of a healthier, happier zero-carbon ecological society. It is a call to individuals to act as eco-citizens.
Governments should be providing the framework which makes it easier for individuals to reduce their emissions, installing smart electricity meters, for instance, and other such practical initiatives. One can emphasise warm homes as an alternative to global heating in a nationwide programme of energy efficiency. This is technically, institutionally and financially feasible, embedding the principles of Kyoto: binding emissions reduction targets, uniform accounting rules, strong compliance mechanisms and common but differentiated responsibility – a new democracy as an active eco-sovereignty as opposed to the current idiocracy. It’s time for individuals to live up to the ideals of citizenship, taking responsibility for the world we live in and playing an active role in reducing the carbon footprint. The end in view is not just a liveable climate and Earth, but a happy habitat in which to live and flourish.
Cynics get a good deal of mileage out of the problem of China. Nothing we do will matter so long as China continues to grow. The cynics talk as if China is doing nothing on the environment. This is lazy. China is doing plenty. In 2005, the Chinese government set a target for the country to have 10% of its energy coming from renewable energy sources by 2010 and 15% by 2020. Even setting such a target amounts to a recognition of the value of renewable energy. It’s a step in the right direction.
There is evidence that the Chinese government is acting on its commitments. Take wind energy, for instance. In the last four years, the wind power market in China has grown by more than 100% each year. Whereas the Chinese government originally planned to install 30GW of wind power by 2020 as part of the renewable energy target, the figure is now 100GW of wind by 2020. Two wind turbines are being made every hour in China.
The same goes for other renewables. There have been more solar water-heating systems installed in China than in the rest of the world put together. More coal-fired power stations have been closed down in China in the last three years than the total electricity capacity of Australia.
So the next time someone uses the example of China to imply the pointlessness of environmental measures in other countries, it should be emphasised that a clean energy revolution is taking place in China alongside an economic revolution. The Chinese government is playing a proactive role in this development because it realises that it generates growth and employment, ensures energy security, reduces pollution. China is playing a part in moving the world away from climate catastrophe. So the onus is thrown back on those who cite China as an excuse for doing nothing. China is moving, why aren’t you?
In an interconnected world, the scope for unilateral action is limited. The climate problem requires concerted action from every nation. China is the largest producer and consumer of coal in the world. The world needs a development path that weans every country from fossil fuels, from coal.
That’s a matter of coordinated international action, not unilateral decision.