April 8 - Environmental Devastation - Memos

[deholz]

Leave below as comments your memos that grapple with the topic of climate change, inspired by the readings (Synthesis report from IPCC5, IPCC Special Report: Global Warming of 1.5°C, Bill McKibben's “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math”, Elizabeth Kolbert's “Three scenarios for the future of climate change”; see the syllabus for links), movies & novels (at least one per quarter), your research, experiences, and imagination! Also add a thumbs up to the 5 memos you find most awesome, challenging, and discussion-worthy!

Recall the following instructions: Memos: Every week students will post one memo in response to the readings and associated topic. The memo should be 300–500 words + 1 visual element (e.g., figure, image, hand-drawn picture, art, etc. that complements or is suggestive of your argument). The memo should be tagged with one or more of the following:

origin: How did we get here? Reflection on the historical, technological, political and other origins of this existential crisis that help us better understand and place it in context.

risk: Qualitative and quantitative analysis of the risk associated with this challenge. This risk analysis could be locally in a particular place and time, or globally over a much longer period, in isolation or in relation to other existential challenges (e.g., the environmental devastation that follows nuclear fallout).

policy: What individual and collective actions or policies could be (or have been) undertaken to avert the existential risk associated with this challenge? These could include a brief examination and evaluation of a historical context and policy (e.g., quarantining and plague), a comparison of existing policy options (e.g., cost-benefit analysis, ethical contrast), or design of a novel policy solution.

solutions: Suggestions of what (else) might be done. These could be personal, technical, social, artistic, or anything that might reduce existential risk.

framing: What are competing framings of this existential challenge? Are there any novel framings that could allow us to think about the challenge differently; that would make it more salient? How do different ethical, religious, political and other positions frame this challenge and its consequences (e.g., “End of the Times”).

salience: Why is it hard to think and talk about or ultimately mobilize around this existential challenge? Are there agencies in society with an interest in downplaying the risks associated with this challenge? Are there ideologies that are inconsistent with this risk that make it hard to recognize or feel responsible for?

nuclear/#climate/#bio/#cyber/#emerging: Partial list of topics of focus.

Movie/novel memo: Each week there will be a selection of films and novels. For one session over the course of the quarter, at their discretion, students will post a memo that reflects on a film or fictional rendering of an existential challenge. This should be tagged with:

movie / #novel: How did the film/novel represent the existential challenge? What did this highlight; what did it ignore? How realistic was the risk? How salient (or insignificant) did it make the challenge for you? For others (e.g., from reviews, box office / retail receipts, or contemporary commentary)?

[elijahrain28]

salience

According to last class' poll, I'm not alone in dreading this particular apocalypse. Sure, we might blow ourselves up... but the world is hurtling towards the sort of exponential-heating limits that the Rolling Stone article talks about. CO2 pockets releasing from melting polar caps, existing CO2 emissions continuing to heat the planet... etc.

How can we possibly grapple with that? Nuclear warfare at least relies on action-- we can elect officials who seem unlikely to press the button, pass legislation that makes it harder to press the button, get rid of the bombs connected to the button. And as the professors mentioned in the past class, there have been a number of individuals presented with the opportunity to press that button... and they said no. Not worth it, in their eyes. Death of us all.

Climate change isn't like that. All it needs, at this point, is inaction... and that's all we're doing! All of us! Myself included! Our leaders included, even the leaders that say "hey, I'm going to take action here!" end up passing the most incrementalist changes that extend the lifespan of our ecosystem by about two months. And the actions that need to change are hard, and complicated, and will probably result in a substantial decrease in my current level of luxury. Fruits out of season! Plane trips back home! A partner with a gas-powered car that can take us anywhere we want to go.

There's so much that needs to change, so little time to do it, and so many entrenched ideologies/corporations that are opposed to it. I cannot see how we will get out of this one. Honestly, I would be surprised if we did.

Happy Tuesday!

[starmz123]

movie

The Day After Tomorrow (2004) presents climate change as a potentially civilization-ending phenomenon, manifesting through a series of natural disasters that ends with an unprecedented freezing over of the northern hemisphere. I originally watched – and read – this story a couple of years ago, so revisiting it was very interesting. While I still experience a visceral emotional impact to the presented catastrophe, I feel like the narrative hasn’t aged well.

The film clearly highlights the existential threat that climate change might pose. By moving through the perspectives of different characters, who all experience the dangers of climate change in various ways, The Day After Tomorrow offers a variety of perspectives with which one can identify. Particularly effective is the relationship between Jack Hall, the protagonist and prescient scientist, and his son Sam. Their separation during the majority of the film immediately provides an emotional hook for the audience, introducing viewers to the ‘human’ impact of climate change.

Unfortunately, this family separation being the prime emotional conflict in the film leads The Day After Tomorrow to be a “disaster film” first and “representation of catastrophic risk” (let alone ‘accurate’) second. The climate catastrophe is partly caused because the US then-Vice President, Raymond Becker, dismisses Jack’s warnings about the threat of an ice age, which is not terribly representative of contemporary political views around climate change (nor of how climate advocacy works), but does hint at the barrier that politics may create for addressing climate change. However, instead of delving deeper into the policy solutions that might dismantle those barriers—like setting up more robust global governance systems, or combining economic and technological shifts—the film ends with now-President Becker apologizing for slighting Jack earlier, with no other follow up besides a promise to send helicopters. This essentially communicates that the main cause of this fictional ice age was the failure of political elites to listen to scientists because once Becker acknowledges that Jack was correct, the film takes an emotional turn towards hope and optimism as the storm begins clearing. This completely misrepresents the true risk of climate change, which lies not simply in the raw threat of a shifting climate but also in the difficulty of figuring out solutions that work for many different stakeholders and communities.

For a film aimed at the general Western public, I can accept subpar science and an inequitable + myopic focus on the domestic impact of climate change. But I struggle to justify the film’s implication that perhaps the way to avert climate catastrophe is simply to make politicians listen to scientists.

[dramlochun]

climate #policy #solutions

The Bill McKibben article part of the readings this week brings to light the dire situation we face collectively as humans if we continue along the same path. One particular point made by the author is that humans have selectively adopted green initiatives while ignoring others. For example, a majority chooses to go paperless but many continue to opt-out of purchasing hybrid or electric vehicles for example. In part, this is due to a lack of government initiative in the form of policy – which the author heavily emphasizes. However, in recent times, we have seen this trend reversed. For example, California has pledged to phase out sales of gasoline-powered vehicles by 2035. Is this necessarily a positive? The situation is actually a lot more complicated and nuanced than it may initially appear.

For one, electric and hybrid vehicles require significant electricity generation to function. If this electricity is generated from non-green sources, then how much of a benefit are we really reaping by mandating electric vehicles? For example, in the United States, 60.3% of electricity is generated by fossil fuels, including coal, natural gas, and petroleum. This is approximately in line with the world’s electricity production breakdown by source. Even more worrying, a report from the Union of Concerned Scientists suggesting that electric vehicles powered by dirty electric grids may only provide a 19.3% reduction in grams of emissions per mile over an average, gasoline-powered compact car. These two facts combined suggest that the focus of governments and policymakers should not be solely to phase out gasoline vehicles but to place major emphasis on creating a cleaner power grid.

Further issues arise when contemplating the manufacturing of electric vehicles. The batteries in electric vehicles are lithium-ion, and increased adoption of these vehicles will require significant lithium mining. According to the UNCTAD, mining one ton of lithium requires 2 million liters of water. Moreover, the mines are located in developing countries and cause water depletion, soil contamination, and excavation of toxic metals. All in all, it is clear that the environmental impacts of mining the lithium required for electric vehicles is also extremely taxing on the environment, and especially so in developing countries.

From the above, it is evident that for policymakers to make a real impact through mandating the adoption of electric vehicles, they must also put significant focus on developing a cleaner electric grid and developing greener ways to mine lithium. Politicizing the adoption of electric vehicles and the condemnation of gasoline vehicles will not be enough to help reverse the trends discussed by Bill McKibben in his article. Instead, policymakers must consider all the environmental impacts and the science available to them in order to enact policies that not only look good but have the impact of making real, positive change.

Sources: https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/state-charge https://www.gov.ca.gov/2020/09/23/governor-newsom-announces-california-will-phase-out-gasoline-powered-cars-drastically-reduce-demand-for-fossil-fuel-in-californias-fight-against-climate-change/ https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/ https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics?country=WORLD&fuel=Energy%20supply&indicator=ElecGenByFuel https://unctad.org/news/developing-countries-pay-environmental-cost-electric-car-batteries#:~:text=The%20environmental%20risks%20are%20just,life%20for%20hundreds%20of%20years.

[blakemoss]

climate #salience #policy

The effects of climate change can hardly be called an externality-- the effects will be devastating to all countries and populations, but it’s clear that climate change will most immediately and most strongly affect those who are least responsible for it. That lack of immediacy makes it much easier for those with vested interests in industries driving climate change to deny and downplay its seriousness. In the U.S., climate change is often portrayed as a political issue of dubious existence. According to the Center for American Progress, there are 139 climate change deniers in the current U.S. Congress, making up a little over a quarter of all Congress members. While this is a decreased proportion from Congresses past, it is still highly concerning that over a quarter of our elected officials in Congress flatly deny the scientific fact of climate change. The reasons for this, however, are not hard to ascertain- fossil fuel companies are active in their lobbying efforts, providing a monetary incentive for government officials to publicly deny climate change and to support their scientifically inaccurate claims. These 139 members of Congress have been given over $61 million from fossil fuel industries. It seems unlikely to me that Congress will do anything about this abundance of dirty lobbying and bribery any time soon. According to the IPCC5 report, carbon taxes have been moderately successful in addressing this problem. I’m interested in looking into some more research on alternatives that might be more successful, or more appealing to the climate change denial bloc.

Sources: Jeff Darcy, "Climate change denial decimated by hurricanes: Darcy cartoon". (https://www.cleveland.com/darcy/2018/10/climate_change_denial_decimate.html) Center for American Progress, “Climate Deniers in the 117th Congress”. (https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/green/news/2021/03/30/497685/climate-deniers-117th-congress/)

[bdelnegro]

climate #movie #origin #framing

Lessons from WALL-E: A Story of Environmental Devastation, Robots, & Redemption

Released in 2008, WALL-E revolves around a lone robot condemned to clean up an Earth covered in trash. One day whilst working, WALL-E finds a fragile stem. The apparent preciousness and fragility of the plant reflect the qualities of the natural environment. However, unlike his human counterparts who have seemingly left the Earth in squalor, WALL-E carefully cares for his seedling. When EVE (an Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator sent to scan the Earth for any signs of life) arrives, he shows her the plant and she secures it away. EVE’s name evokes the original Christian sin committed in the Garden of Eden. In the story of Genesis, Eve bites into an apple and thereby corrupts the natural world. When EVE is recalled to the Axiom (a massive high-tech spaceship which houses all remaining humans), WALL-E joins her. Together, they resolve to save their single stem and humanity.

Although intended to be dystopic and set in the distant future (approximately 2805 AD), the parallels between WALL-E’s Earth and our own are eerily evident. In WALL-E, garbage and waste overwhelm the Earth. Indeed, entire skyscrapers are constructed of compressed trash. According the the EPA’s most recent report, Americans produce 254 million tons of waste each year- enough to reach the moon and back 25 times. When one observes the omnipresence of Buy n Large (the aptly named conglomerate driving all consumerism in WALL-E), its difficult not to immediately recall Amazon, Walmart, or the other 98 companies currently responsible for 71% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. Buy n Large’s motto, “Too much garbage in your face? Theres plenty of space out in space.” (00:05:06) suggests that the planet is simply another good to be consumed and ultimately disposed of. This critique of consumerist culture (albeit at times ironic given that the film was produced by Disney Pixar) is poignant and pressing. The Synthesis report from IPCC5 warns that “vulnerability to climate change, GHG emissions, and the capacity for adaptation and mitigation are strongly influenced by livelihoods, lifestyles, behavior and culture… Shifts toward more energy-intensive lifestyles can contribute to higher energy and resource consumption, driving greater energy production and GHG emissions and increasing mitigation costs.” The concept of abandoning the Earth for space is not entirely fictional either. The first luxury spacecraft is set to launch in 2021. For $9.5 million dollars, travelers can spend 12 days on Orion Span’s Aurora Station cruising over their hometowns, playing zero-gravity ping pong, and enjoying “top-quality” space food. Orion Space isn’t alone. Companies Virgin Galactic and Axiom Space (yes, Axiom as in the spacecraft in WALL-E) are also revolutionizing ‘elite’ space travel.

WALL-E’s message and environmental themes might seem excessively dark and depressing given its G rating (for all audiences and ages). However, its appeal to the mainstream and younger generations is valuable if we seek the same hopeful ending as the movie. With the right information programs, economic instruments, regulatory approaches, and voluntary actions, we too might be able to reverse and prevent further environmental devastation.

Works Cited:

AR5 Synthesis Report: Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Core Writing Team, R.K. Pachauri and L.A. Meyer (eds.)]. IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland, 151 pp.

English, Jennifer A. “WALL-E’s Rhetoric: An Ecological Sermon from a Strange Preacher.” California Polytechnic State University - San Luis Obispo, 2010.

“Land of Waste: American Landfills and Waste Production.” SaveOnEnergy, Save On Energy, LLC, www.saveonenergy.com/land-of-waste/.

MacDonald, Fiona. “9 Ways Today's Society Is Like The One That Filled Earth With Garbage in WALL-E.” ScienceAlert, 19 Sept. 2019, www.sciencealert.com/9-similarities-between-today-s-society-and-the-one-that-filled-the-planet-with-garbage-in-wall-e.

O'Hare, Maureen. “Look inside the First Luxury Space Hotel.” CNN, Cable News Network, 6 Apr. 2018, www.cnn.com/travel/article/aurora-station-luxury-space-hotel/index.html.

“Wall-E.” Disney, 2008.

[jasonshepp6]

In the readings for this week, we examined the risks and ramifications of environmental degradation. In addressing this issue, I will look into how environmental concerns became public and the numbers behind the risk of the situation. From this analysis, I will demonstrate that critical actions are only taken when urgency comes from the people, not the academics.

The article from The New Yorker by Elizabeth Kolbert starts with an analysis of 1988’s wildfire in Yellowstone that showed the United States the danger of climate change. James Hansen from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies even said that “the greenhouse effect has been detected and is changing our climate now.” While decades before there have been warnings, now millions of Americans were feeling the impact to their own lives. And from here, climate change entered the human consciousness. Throughout history, action and policy came when the people, not academics, demanded change.

The numbers behind this public fear were incredibly troubling as well. As academic after academic pleaded with policy makers and people generally for urgency in our response, the warnings became simple one liners and nominal actions rather than decisive actions. The numbers from the Rolling Stone’s “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math” by Bill McKibben highlights the issue of carbon emissions. In particular, McKibben cites how 565 gigatons of further carbon emissions is the maximum our atmosphere coil sustainably tolerate, yet we are on track to emit 2,795 gigatons of further emissions. However, this article was posted in 2012 and the numbers have not driven action.

Overall, the numbers speak for themselves yet they have no voice without the people. Academics alone cannot force policy change, at least as long as policy makers seeing corporate support as more advantageous than siding with the numbers. The way to force policy makers’ hands is to have the people motivated to counter climate change and demonstrate that. As a result, I suggest that academics redirect their energy from the academic journals to the mainstream. We know the numbers; now let’s give those numbers a voice.

origin #risk #solutions

Source: Yale Program on Climate Change Communication

[blakekushner]

origin #salience #solution

Perhaps one way to approach potential solutions to Climate Change is to start at the beginning and see what evolutionary and cultural features led us to this moment in time. Humans have altered their natural landscapes for as long as we have lived as a species. Early humans manipulated their environments with farming and encouraging their farm animals to graze and destroy grasslands. Humans have also engaged in slash and burn agriculture, or cutting down forests. Humans have always found a way to manipulate the environment around them, not really taking into account the damage it would have on the ecosystem at that time or in the future. The difference between now and back then, is how much technology has evolved. While, our current and official geological epoch is the Holocene, many scientists are pushing to name a new epoch called the Anthropocene in order to recognize the immense impact humans have had on Earth (https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/anthropocene/). There is not a consensus on what date the Anthropocene officially starts, but it ranges anywhere from 5000 years ago with the beginnings of large scale agriculture to the Industrial Revolution to 1945 with the advent of the atomic bomb. Tracing our history back to its beginning makes it clear that climate change cannot be blamed on anything but humans as evidenced by our long history of changing our environments resulting in an entirely new epoch. While current technologies and the use of fossil fuels are certainly making this climate crisis even worse, and solutions that address the usage of fossil fuels in efforts to lower our carbon footprint are very important, perhaps another solution can address human nature and our culture which I believe to be the real root of the problem. It's human nature to focus on one's own survival or the survival of their community, which is not a bad thing as it has allowed us to continue to survive to today. Instead of the long tradition of human self-centeredness and 'survival of the fittest', we should redirect our culture/society away from that and begin working with other countries to begin to salvage all the damage we've already caused. In the New Yorker article, Kolbert mentions how many decades it took for people to really recognize global warming was happening and its deleterious effects, which further highlights how much people like to stick to our customs. Which of course is normal, since it's hard to really conceptualize the massive amount of damage climate change will cause in the coming years since it is "far away". As far as this solution goes it won't change everything at once, but I believe if everyone adopts a mindset like this, it will lead to more and more fruitful solutions to the climate crisis.

[madisonchoi]

climate #solution

As the temperature of our world continues to increase, ocean acidity increases, and ice sheets continue to melt, the effects of climate change continue to impact our world in increasingly drastic ways. In fact, the full ramifications of global warming have not yet come to fruition in the sense that the future of our planet will be grimmer than it is now if we continue to produce CO2 emissions and pollution at the rate we are producing right now. In the article “Three scenarios for the future of climate change,” Elizabeth Kolbert points out that we must ask the question of just how hot and thus bad will the state of the world become? In order to possibly correct the trajectory of our demise, we must consider alternative energy sources to burning coal and fossil fuel. For example, offshore wind turbines are one potential solution, as they could generate twice as much electricity as the US currently uses. In addition to the detrimental environmental effects of climate change, another symptom of warming is the civil unrest that emerges due to lack of resources. Specifically, research shows that one of the major reasons that led to the Syrian war was the severe drought, which causes millions to move out of their villages. This sort of situation could begin to occur on a larger scale among even larger nations on the global stage as resources are depleted and natural sources change due to warming. As a California native myself, I can also personally attest to the horrific effects of the wildfires that have really worsened in the last five years. Included in this memo is a photo of what a drive home on the 405 Freeway looks like when the brush wildfires are raging. The evacuation process that many of my friend’s families have undergone is terrifying, especially because some have actually lost their homes to these wildfires. In the article “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math,” Bill McKibben explains that studies show that carbon emissions will continue to increase by about 3% a year, which suggests that we will surpass the 565-gigatons of carbon dioxide measure within 16 years. Ultimately, all the research points to the reality that we must pivot in significant ways on several fronts in order to prevent the climate from warming beyond repair.

[apolissky]

solutions

After reading this week’s readings, I came away with an unyielding dread. Mckibben’s article makes it very clear, powers that be and the oil industry are colluding. Forget an easy way out, there doesn’t seem to be any way out. Then I remembered a podcast I listened to awhile back with Ezra Klein (founder of the Vox media group) and Saul Griffith, an inventor, who, among other projects, founded Instructables. Saul Griffith has a very very potent point.

We have all we need to solve climate change.

So our dear friend Rex Tillerson is full of fertilizer (or your choice of expletive). Griffith’s argues against a carbon tax, explaining that a carbon tax is not a solution, its just disincentivizing the wrong behavior (in fact, he points out that we subsidize fossil fuel usage in the US). The real solution is already here, and already cheaper than fossil fuels. Switching our grid to a decentralized renewable energy grid would be cheaper than building new natural gas or coal burning plants. He writes, “The actual miracle is that solar and wind are now the cheapest energy sources, electric cars are better than those we already have, electric radiant heating is better that our existing heating systems, and the internet was a practice run and blueprint for the electricity network of the future”. Better still, the process of grid decentralization, decarbonization, and conversion to renewables would yield tons of jobs. We need installers for home batteries, radiant heating, solar panels, electric car chargers, electric stoves, and more. With our newly electrified and decentralized system, we will also be more efficient, reducing our total energy needs! We don’t actually need to charge fossil fuel companies more money (although I have no doubt that is just), we simply need to stop subsidizing them and divert those very same resources to subsidizing electric cars, solar, and batteries.

Here’s the catch. Ironically, we can’t speak too loudly about this solution. If we do, then climate change will be declared solved before we actually solve it. Therein lies the challenge, how do we point policy makers in the right direction while not foregoing the sense of urgency and direness that is so critical to understanding climate change?

https://medium.com/otherlab-news/how-do-we-decarbonize-7fc2fa84e887

[madelman99]

climate #framing

The Bill McKibben article struck a chord with me this week for a number of reasons. The illustration at the beginning of the article that depicts an enflamed, apocalyptic scene is particularly evocative and the article gets right to the point: "June broke or tied 3,215 high-temperature records across the United States. That followed the warmest May on record for the Northern Hemisphere – the 327th consecutive month in which the temperature of the entire globe exceeded the 20th-century average." The article is written with the second person "you," a word that is used 42 times during the piece.

The article itself is a bit fear inducing, clearly intended to draw emotion out of the reader. It was in this that I began to take issue with the aims of the article and its style of portraying information. The way that information about climate change is portrayed to readers--its framing--is just as, if not more important, than the information itself. With regard to this, I am left disappointed by the article.

This alarmist essay is meant to elicit a sense of terror, which I suppose is in turn meant to create a sense of action in the reader. However, history has shown that action is rarely seen from such alarmist media. In fact, climate change apathy is arguably a bigger problem than climate change denial (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/oct/05/climate-change-apathy-not-denial-threat-planet). Doomsday predictions of climate catastrophes have been circulating heavily for the last 50+ years and none of them have come to pass (https://cei.org/blog/wrong-again-50-years-of-failed-eco-pocalyptic-predictions/). The end result of all of this is an adult population that seems to have lost interest. The cure to this is to convey climate change in a new manner rather than what has been done in the past.

I think this article highlights how the conversation around climate change and the framing of this issue need to change. From the onset of the article, I find myself at odds with its portrayal of climate change. It begins with a discussion of particularly hot days and temperature departures that have been occurring during 2012, the year that the piece was written. This tactic seems disingenuous at best and deliberately deceitful at worst for the simple reason that weather does not equal climate (https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/hot-planet/dont-be-fooled-weather-is-not-climate/). Saying that hot days are being caused by global warming is the same as saying that cold weather is evidence that global warming is not happening. "Climate" is changes over a very long time frame, while weather describes meteorological events over a much shorter time period. In the words of one scientist, "weather is your mood, climate is your personality."

Unfortunately, the conversation around climate change has led to widespread apathy and disinterest among the population. I think that this issue becoming increasingly partisan has further complicated the subject and made it harder for people to stay informed and trust the science. I am not sure exactly what needs to change to correct this, but one area that we could start in is the framing of this problem. Clearly the alarmist portrayal of information has not been effective. One possible solution could be focusing on our successes and using this to branch out to other solutions. For example, raw carbon emissions have been steadily decreasing in the US, down over 10% since their peak in 2007. What has caused that to occur? What are we doing right and what can we continue to do right? What does the future of climate activism look like? I think it is time to look at climate change through a different frame.

[cdrovetsky]

origin #salience

I think a huge problem standing in the way of mitigating the effects of climate change is our relationship to natural resources and wilderness in general. In the U.S. we have specific ownership and distribution laws for natural resources as basic as water. One the one hand, this level of regulation is important to prevent any individual or group from hoarding or misusing these natural resources, but it also normalizes and internalizes the idea of owning, using, and trading the wilderness around us. We have turned nature into a commodity.

I happen to currently be reading Greg Gordon’s “Landscape of Desire,” a book centered around experiential education in Utah on the land use history in the area. It was interesting to learn that in 1880 the state of Utah actually allowed for individual ownership of water. The result was a huge number of disputes over water that led to beatings and even hangings. It eventually became a saying that “more men have killed over water along the Fremont than over women” (Gordon 112).

Apart from simply financial incentives, there are a range of motives that have led to the extensive commodification of nature in the US. For example, Gordon also traces the history of Mormon settlement in the west and reflects on how survival in such a harsh landscape ultimately depended on not only being able to find different modes of production, but a religious devotion to production. Citing historian Patricia Limerick, Gordon writes “In Mormon doctrine, earthly labors carried a direct connection to spiritual progress; one’s exertions in the material world directly reflected one’s spiritual standing” (Gordon 113).

Collective action will be key to addressing the impending climate crisis. But given the number of different groups and perspectives here, with a range of incentives for production, this collective agreement would be incredibly complex and would require a large amount of collaboration and understanding. That being said, the more people that are openly willing to work towards this communal shift in perspective, the more likely it is that we can all work towards a better future.

[abertodano]

risk

It's important to highlight the already large, measurable human cost of available energy sources, even before hitting the 2-degree cliff of climate doom.

The United States consumes 40,000 TWh of electricity a year. According to [1], 20% of this power comes from coal. Plugging in the black coal mortality rate from the figure below (24 deaths per TWh), we see that coal power in the United States kills almost 200,000 people a year. That's one COVID every 3 years, and it is happening silently.

Really, there is some uncertainty in the 24 deaths per TWh figure. The contribution of pollution to cardiac and respiratory disease cannot be measured exactly, and it will vary based on local factors. This article 2 puts its estimate at only 10 deaths per TWh from coal in the US, but a staggering 170 deaths per TWh from Chinese coal-fired plants.

Looking at energy source mortalities relatively, however, makes fossil fuels completely unpalatable, regardless of uncertainty. If the entire US energy grid ran on nuclear power, we can estimate that only 2800 people would fall victim to it every year, even including Chernobyl and Fukushima in the average mortality figure. Adding shares of wind, solar, and hydropower to this hypothetical energy grid would push the number even lower.

We must also remember that pollution affects our poorest, most marginalized communities disproportionately. This study 3 estimates that deaths from (one type of) pollution affect poorer communities more harshly almost across the board, with the "lower income, black" demographic hit hardest overall. There can be a variety of reasons for this trend: poor individuals and families are pushed into lower-value properties near power plants; racist housing practices can make it harder to move; if they get sick, they are likely to have worse access to treatment. In any case, poverty charges interest, and it seems pollution-induced illness has been one of its key collectors.

Even without climate change, it would be our moral duty to eliminate fossil fuels. Let's stop compromising with ourselves.

Sources: [1] : https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3

[AlexandraN1]

risk #climate

1 in 1000. This is the figure Toby Ord places on the risk of existential catastrophe due to climate change over the next 100 years. If Ord is right, this risk seems unacceptably high.

However, there are three somewhat unique features of this existential threat:

1. Threat Variety: Climate disaster is not a singular occurrence. As the IPCC Report demonstrates, climate outcomes are highly variant, ranging from ocean acidity to glacial size.
2. Threat Progression: Climate change is not an instantaneous disaster, such as an asteroid strike. Instead, it develops across time: Importantly, its pre-existential phases can also be highly destructive.
3. Threat Multiplication: Climate change is an interactive threat. Both its intermediate and existential phases can exacerbate other security threats. Interestingly, we may posit that climate change also exacerbates other existential threats. For example, climate change may produce resource scarcity, which may increase the prevalence of conflict, which may increase geopolitical instability, which may increase the probability of nuclear war.

In one sense, these are actually hopeful facts. Unlike supervolcanoes and engineered pandemics, there are three facets to climate risk which combine to incentivise actors within the present system to evaluate and mitigate the risk.

For example, the fact that climate change is a) various, b) progressive, and c) a threat multiplier, means that corporate stakeholders have an early and continuous motivation to act. The graph below illustrates this clearly: in the pre-existential phases of climate change, businesses face a wide variety of progressive risks multiplied by climate issues.

[JAZ42]

climate #risk #solutions

As emissions continue to destroy our planet and threaten ecosystems all over the world, what can we do now to incentivize cleaner energy sources? Since, as we read in the New Yorker article, it is too late to undo a lot of the damage we have done with new methods of technology? While we wait for new technology and better, cleaner energy sources, it seems like the best option is to--at least temporarily--switch to nuclear power. Unfortunately, as people view nuclear energy as dangerous and destructive due to the Chernobyl and Fukushima accidents, we are scared of what is, in reality, a much safer option. Germany dismantled their nuclear power plants and traded them for fossil fuels. However, this fear of nuclear power can only hurt us in the long run as it is shown that even those that don’t care about the environmental cost of fossil fuels, they are a much more sinister and silent killer as pollution leads to a great number of respiratory related deaths. Even when scaled for deaths per unit of power, nuclear is one of the safest options available. How can we change the perspective about this energy source and lead people into understanding that fossil fuels are the far more sinister killers of humanity and our planet?

https://ourworldindata.org/safest-sources-of-energy

[Samcorey1234]

novel

For this week, I read The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi. The novel tracks three different characters as they bear through the hellishness that is the future of the American west, where all is dry and water is scarce. This produces a more divided, partitioned America, where national passports become state passports, and access to northern states — or California ¬– is a ticket to a more stable, healthy society that has enough water for its citizens. The book emphasizes not just international conflict with corporate capitalism reigning (the Chinese are buying up land in the American west and selling it to large-scale corporations for high-end tourism), but also internal conflict, as the worst of human nature is relinquished when survival becomes the most difficult task.

In the end, the three main characters — a water knife attempting to divert water for corporate interests, a journalist covering the tragedy and corruption, and a young refugee from Texas — all meet up, with the power to sell the water back to the state or take it up for themselves.

The Water Knife, a form of climate fiction similar to The Ministry For the Future, explores the tragedy that will likely unfold for millions of people — including the most vulnerable in the hottest parts of the U.S. – as long as capitalism is the driving ideological and political force. That is, they both suggest that a more collective approach could begin to undo our fast-approaching hell. However, death and destruction is more likely to follow, each novel suggests, because it’s easier to imagine the end of capitalism than the end of the world.

This is the main crux of Bill McKibben’s argument: there is every reason for fossil fuel companies to leave around $20 trillion on the table. The benefits are enormous: Earth will continue to survive relatively intact, our natural resources (parks, rec areas, climate, natural wonders, etc.) will be preserved. But the companies can’t turn away from their rapacious offerings. There is little that will stop them from perpetuating a negative externality, like pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere, from becoming a negative impacting everyone at all times. The Water Knife highlights the type of pain and destruction caused to people in their immediate lives if we can’t convince, or force, fossil fuel companies to move in a different direction.

[shanekim23]

climate #policy

As mentioned in my question, the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (AB 32) was instituted to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and also to provide an easier transition into a lower carbon future. As a result of this policy, the CARB (California Air Resources Board) approved of a Scoping Plan which aimed for a 30% reduction in GHG emissions by 2020. While Californians achieved this mark, I started to question whether this was an effective way to “drastically reduce” GHG emissions. Ironically, setting the goal at such a realistic mark may not actually be that helpful. The CARB’s goal should be to set a mark that they believe will be maximally challenging to achieve, yet still feasible. And while some people may argue that a challenging goal was already set, I don’t completely buy that. I understand that the CARB is aiming for a gradual decrease, but setting loftier goals can’t hurt them. I don’t mean to seem unrealistic; I understand the political and financial implications. However, if the CARB is really pushing for a reduction in GHG emissions, and by extension, an improvement in natural resources, then they should set a lower limit. Human psychology suggests that when you see a goal (especially a concrete number like 427 million metric tons), you strive to achieve that goal, but there is no incentive to achieve that goal by a larger margin. Obviously the incentive should be to make our planet more liveable, but some of the most important sectors seem unphased by this.

Works used: “California Air Resources Board.” AB 32 Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 | California Air Resources Board. Accessed April 7, 2021. https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/resources/fact-sheets/ab-32-global-warming-solutions-act-2006.

[brettriegler]

[jane-uc21]

solutions #salience #climate

It is apparent that the interplay between individual and societal action will be a hallmark of this class. In this vein, I was alarmed by Bill McKibben’s conclusion that “the real enemy is’ the fossil fuel industry. McKibben contrasts the 565 Gigaton carbon budget with the 2,795 Gigatons of carbon contained in the coal, oil, and gas reserves that fossil-fuel companies currently possess and plan to burn. He argues that because the fossil-fuel industry has its eyes on that $27 trillion worth of hydrocarbon assets, it is “a rogue industry, reckless like no other force on Earth . . . Public Enemy Number One to the survival of our planetary civilization.”

I do not dispute that the greed of the fossil fuel industry is driving us off the climate cliff, and I recognize that their exorbitant spending to lobby against and spread misinformation about climate change mitigation (a 2020 study indicated that Exxon and its peers have spent over $5 billion to undercut climate science and mitigation), is sickening. However, I worry that pointing to fossil fuel companies as “Public Enemy Number One” may be used as an excuse for complacency.

While I am of the mind that individuals in power are ethically obligated to use their influence for good- ie. Tillerson and his peers should use their influence to embrace clean energy-they evidently do not share this sentiment. However, by the same token, I am compelled to acknowledge and remedy my own contributions to climate change. Not only not unplugging latent electronics and using plastic carry-out containers, but also my complicitness in economic support of the fossil fuel industry. Shell, for example, is incrementally divesting from oil and investing in plastics and electrical power (still environmental nightmares, no doubt, but a step in the right direction) in reaction to market forces driven in great part by coalitions of investors such as Climate Action 100+ and the Dutch group, Follow This. As summarized by Anne Simpson, global governance director at CalPERS, “Politics might be pretty confused and babbling at the moment . . . But money talks,” by altering public and politic sentiments, as was seen with the economic pressure that helped end apartheid.

I’ve done some digging into my own economic entanglement with the fossil fuel industry and learned of UChicago’s substantial investment in fossil fuels- over $33 million invested in three exchange-traded funds, which combined have over $20 billion invested in fossil fuel companies, and over $40 billion invested in companies involved in deforestation. UChicago refuses to divest on the ground of the Kalven Report. I am also a longtime customer and investor in AT&T, which only recently has begun to commit to renewables due to campaigns by Green America and others.

While “ethical consumption” and “conscientious capitalism” open up other debates, for now I am reminded that my spending and affiliations make me complicit, and I am committing to supporting institutional divestment from fossil fuels, trending up since 2013 (see image).

Sources: “AT&T Progresses on Renewable Energy.” n.d. Greenamerica.Org. Accessed April 7, 2021. https://www.greenamerica.org/victory/att-progresses-renewable-energy. “Divestment Growth.” n.d. Wikimedia.Org. Accessed April 7, 2021. https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Divestment_growth_en.svg&oldid=521715584. Kirk, Karin. 2020. “Yale Climate Connections.” Yaleclimateconnections.Org. January 6, 2020. https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2020/01/fossil-fuel-political-giving-outdistances-renewables-13-to-one/. McKibben, Bill. 2012. “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math.” Rollingstone.Com. Rolling Stone. July 19, 2012. https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/global-warmings-terrifying-new-math-188550/. “UChicago’s Investments Are Tied to Fossil Fuels, Deforestation, and Weapons Manufacturers.” n.d. Chicagomaroon.Com. Accessed April 7, 2021. https://www.chicagomaroon.com/article/2020/5/11/uchicago-investments-tied-fossil-fuels-deforestati/.

[TimGranzow7]

Movie #climate #origin #risk

Hayao Miyazaki’s 1984 film, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, imagines the future of a world devastated by pollution and “nuclear” war, in which the remnants of humanity are encroached upon by a spreading toxic jungle, full of gigantic insects. One thousand years after humanity wiped itself out in Seven Days of Fire by use of massive, biomechanical God Warriors, a small community in the Valley of the Wind, one of the last pure, habitable environments on the planet, is caught in a war between two feuding kingdoms that seek to destroy each other and the Toxic Jungle that threatens humanity. This jungle is where we first meet our morally infallible and incredibly skilled protagonist, Princess Nausicaä. She does not fear the jungle, and instead navigates it (while masked to protect herself...), finding resources for her people and showing great respect for the insects that live there, especially the gigantic, semi-sentient ohmu. A major revelation occurs in the realization that irrigating the toxic jungle spores with pure water causes them to grow into more familiar plants that actually cleanse the environment and produce breathable air. The toxic jungle is thus toxic because of something in the soil and water that makes it so. It becomes quite clear to the viewer here that the ground and water are still irradiated from the Seven Days of Fire, with the God Warriors clearly representing nuclear armageddon, but Miyazaki brilliantly fuses the climate crisis with this, which was picking up great traction in the Cold War era of the 1980s. When nurtured with unirradiated water, the plants grow normally, and remove toxins from the air, similar to the ways in which plants take in CO2 and produce oxygen during photosynthesis. This ends up being part of what saves humanity, and highlights the importance of living in harmony with nature, responsible resource use, and international cooperation. The movie provides a clear and universal message: nature is far stronger than us, and the only way we can survive over the long term is through sacrifice, by replacing conflict with cooperation, and by respecting nature and its resources. Global conflict will lead to naught, and human nature will cause history to repeat itself, which is why change must be made now, before it is too late, to preserve some of the purity of the world and stop the spread of the “toxic jungle” of global warming, pollution, and irresponsible land use The movie is largely allegorical, and Miyazaki is likely not suggesting that plants will be enough to draw down the “toxins” in the atmosphere and save us from global warming, but his message that natural processes will ultimately always prevail is important to recognize when viewing the modern climate crisis. The long residence time of CO2 in the atmosphere has already put us in a precarious position, but it is not too late to make changes to minimize the devastating effects of warming, climate change, ocean acidification, and rising sea levels. Miyazaki presents these truths in an approachable, exciting, comedic, and utterly beautiful story, which should be seen by everyone, if not for its environmental messages, then for the fearless protagonist who we should all strive to be like, Nausicaä herself.

[chakrabortya]

The Summary for Policy Makers did a great job highlighting key data sets and visualisations in a way that would be easy to think about in terms of policy. I would even go so far as to say that this was especially suited to public consumption because of the attention to minimise jargon used and the simplicity of the projections. Nevertheless, I wanted to discuss some of the scepticism I have of the time-series data presented in the report.

Climate change time series data came to the forefront of world news in 2016 when scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) were accused of producing models that purposefully made global warming in the early 2000s seem worse than it was. Prominent scientists like John Fyfe claimed that there is an undeniable slowdown in the rate of global warming post-2000. Fyfe believes that the NOAA's climate change models do not consider this decline. Tom Karl, the lead author of the NOAA study under question, believes that his model was not able to successfully predict the hiatus because it focussed on decade long variability by comparing “the past 15 years with the long-term temperature trend between 1950 and 1998 (48 years).”

Climate debates like this have been going on since the late 17th century when people started recording climate and precipitation data. A fundamental problem seems to be the lack of homogeneity in climate change data.

I am under the impression that these models are as accurate as they could be. Partly because I have faith in the scientific infrastructures and partly because I believe that the methodologies being used are representative of the best predictive methodologies we have access to. How do we move past this inherent scepticism created by diverse sources and diverse analytical methodologies given our current distrust of media and authority?

Sources: JONES, P. D. & BRADLEY, R. S. (1992a). Climatic variations in the longest instrumental records. In Climate Since A.D. 1500, Ed. R. S. Bradley and P. D. Jones, London: Routledge. pp. 246ā68.

Vaidyanathan, Gayathri. “Did Global Warming Slow Down in the 2000s, or Not?” Scientific American. Scientific American, February 25, 2016. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/did-global-warming-slow-down-in-the- 2000s-or-not/.

[Junker24]

climate #accounting

"Global Warmings Terrifying New Math" is a fantastic article published with the intent of informing its readers on the dangers of Climate Change in the world today. What was so nice about this article, was the fact that it presented many of the numbers associated with Climate Change in an accounting format which gave me the impression that it was intended to target individuals like me. "You can have a healthy fossil-fuel balance sheet, or a relatively healthy planet – but now that we know the numbers, it looks like you can’t have both. Do the math: 2,795 is five times 565. That’s how the story ends." This quote is directly from the Author of the article, and it shows a fraction of what is said in the whole article. I love this quote in particular though, because it addresses exactly the core question that many people face when looking at Climate Change. Do we maintain are current lifestyle or do we change to positively impact are planet. How will peoples lifestyles change? This is a huge question that is going to need to be answered as well because people act in their own interest, and with climate change taking over the world, how are humans going to change their actions? People inherently act in their own self-interest, so are people going to decide to balance the Fossil Fuel Balance Sheet, or The Healthy Climate? This is something that is up for debate in Economics and something we discussed previously in Econ courses. If there are no incentives for people to change, why would they? I would also like to touch on the idea that we have 5x the amount of Fossil Fuels it would take to destroy the environment on standby. Like the article discussed, How are people going to give up 20 Trillion dollars in assets. This change seems inevitable, but how must we as a whole change the world?

[a-bosko]

movie

When first watching WALL-E, I remember thinking about how crazy and unrealistic the plot was. After rewatching WALL-E under the context of environmental devastation, I realized that a world full of trash and uninhabitable land isn’t an unrealistic future, but rather an inevitable one.

At the beginning, we are presented with a world cluttered with trash. WALL-E (Waste Allocation Load-Lifter: Earth-class) is a robot tasked with collecting and compressing trash that humans have left behind. The only friend WALL-E is left with is a cockroach, which is funny because of the theory that cockroaches can survive anything. While WALL-E cleans Earth, humans live on a mothership, where everything is provided. Over the years, the passengers succumb to laziness and avoid doing anything due to complete robotic automation. Another robot named EVE (Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator) arrives on Earth to look for any signs of life. When WALL-E meets EVE, he shows her a boot containing a plant. Throughout the rest of the movie, WALL-E and EVE fight to bring humanity back to Earth.

The film highlights the existential threat we face with climate change, carbon dioxide emissions, and increased waste production. In 2018, the U.S. produced 292.4 million tons of waste, which averages to around 4.9 pound per person a day. With an increase in plastic use and fast fashion, this number grows exponentially. Not only are we producing an excess of waste on land, but we are also increasing the amount of junk in space. Some of this waste stems from the overproduction of items, especially single-use items or low-quality items. With an increase in production comes an increase of carbon dioxide emission into the atmosphere. The cycle of creation and waste adds to the problem of climate change and global warming, which will eventually cause the two-degree increase that will be fatal.

This movie exemplifies what the world will be like if we don’t take care of it. If consumers and corporations do not take action to lower the use of fossil fuels, we will end up producing too many carbon dioxide emissions and it will be too late to go back. As mentioned in the article “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math”, corporations are already planning on using five times as much fossil fuel as is considered to be safe by scientists. This means that 80% of the fossil fuel already set up to be used needs to be kept in the soil. The trickier situation is to convince big companies, such as Shell and Exxon, to not use these resources. These fossil fuels are worth over $20 trillion, and major companies are most likely unwilling to take gigantic losses such as these. The film WALL-E visually highlights how important it for all generations to take initiative in order to make sure we have an Earth to live for more than just another hundred years. In order to live on Earth, we must live sustainably and be conscious of what we are both consuming and creating on Earth.

Works Cited: Jonathan O’Callaghan, What is space junk and why is it a problem? https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/what-is-space-junk-and-why-is-it-a-problem.html

United States Environmental Protection Agency, National Overview: Facts and Figures on Materials, Wastes and Recycling. https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-and-recycling/national-overview-facts-and-figures-materials#:~:text=The%20total%20generation%20of%20municipal,25%20million%20tons%20were%20composted.

Wikipedia, WALL-E. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WALL-E

[janet-clare]

In thinking over this week’s selections, I recalled recently reading the obituary of Paul J. Crutzen, Nobel prize winning chemist who championed study, awareness, and legislation around the science of climate change. He is also credited with “...coin(ing) the term Anthropocene”1. And so, I ponder this relatively new, unofficial nomenclature for the times that we are living in. Humans have always necessarily exploited our natural resources for survival, we can look to our earliest engagement with agriculture around ten thousand years ago2, as a point in time of a relationship to our resources with “no turning back” that ushered in slow steady progress. Fast forward to the Anthropocene epoch, pegged to have “begun” sometime mid 20th century “as the exploitation of the planet’s resources accelerated”3. Geologic and atmospheric evidences of these exploitations include increasing fossil and trace elements such as “radioactive elements from nuclear bomb tests”, increased plastics, pollutants (carbon, methane, chlorine, mercury, to name but a few), and “even..bones left by the global proliferation of the domestic chicken”,4along with effects of deforestation, development and drainage, not to mention one of the most threatening, the soaring concentrations of CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere. And now we continue at this fast forward pace, as this is all occurring at a rate that heralds potential global catastrophe in the very near term.

As agrarians, humanity plodded along, and in a historical context, our transition from agriculture to industry is when the Pandora’s Box was opened and the pace picked up. On a global scale, the first, and then the second industrial revolution, while cultivating and embracing the development of technology and exploitation of resources, also nearsightedly cosseted the progression, continuation, and most markedly, amplification of unacknowledged adverse consequences and resultant damages. While technologies no doubt were improving lives there were also many aspects that, left unchecked, as they have been, were, hopefully not irreversibly, destructive. Enter the Anthropocene, where humans are engaged in an Industrial Age on steroids. Let it be a lesson that our industries, that is, we, must be reeled in. The consequences, already dire, may be devastating without the willful innovation to put on the brakes. The Anthropocene is moving, viewed in geologic terms, at breakneck speed. Let us not be the catastrophic cause of the end of the epoch.

And, since I haven’t used up all of my 500 words yet, noteworthy as well in these readings is the simultaneous quantitative and qualitative approach that is taken on all three. The data itself, or the issues explored, take your pick, pack a powerful punch. I found the texts in the IPCC reports to be particularly refreshing, elegant in their straightforwardness (not how I might usually assess an annual report). And there’s a glossary!

Anthropocene, #climate, #crisis, #acceleration, #origin, #framing, #balance, #words

Inserting image... www.smh.com.au/environment/humanitys-impact-on-earth-opens-anthropocene-epoch-scientists-say-20160108-gm1nwt.html

Lelieveld, Jos, Obituary Paul J. Crutzen (1933-2021), Nature magazine, 4 March 2021, Vol. 591, No.7848, 1-170,

Zimmer, Carl (17 October 2016), How the First Farmers Changed History, retrieved from //newyorktimes.com

OK, (2017, March), What is Anthropocene?, Retrieved from //geologylearn.blogspot.com

[smshiffrin]

climate #origin #solutions

The current state of climate on Earth is something none of us have ever seen before—nor anyone who has ever lived on Earth. The rapid increase in global temperatures, melting glaciers, rising sea levels, increase in natural disasters, and more, are all a result of human activity (1). Since the start of the industrial revolution in the eighteenth century, greenhouse gas emissions from human activity have drastically increased. This in turn has increased the concentration of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide in the atmosphere, leading to the many changes to natural systems of the Earth we have seen so far, and the many more that will inevitably come (1). These human-caused environmental changes, and many others, define the new geological time period dubbed the Anthropocene.

For the past 11,700 years, humans have lived in the geological time period known as the Holocene, a period marked by relatively stable climate. Then around twenty years ago, atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen and lake ecologist Eugene Stoermer realized that with the deterioration of the ozone layer and the acidification of bodies of water due to greenhouse gases, environmental conditions had changed enough to say that we were no longer living in the Holocene (2). Together, they introduced the world to the Anthropocene, the current geological time period in which human activity is the dominant influence on climate and the environment.

There have been many debates as to when the Anthropocene began—originally, it was thought to have begun at the start of the Industrial Revolution around 1750, when the use of fossil fuels and the ensuing emissions began (2). However recent studies have indicated that perhaps the Anthropocene began around 1950, when the world started to see major changes in the environment, and energy use increased to a level higher than ever before (2).

This collection of charts shows the numerous drastic environmental changes that occurred starting around 1950, the beginning of the Anthropocene.

From reading the IPCC’s report (1) and Elizabeth Kolbert’s discussion on climate change and the future of the environment (3), it is clear that if we don’t make any drastic changes in the way we live and consume energy, we will face more and more harmful environmental changes—not only affecting humans, but all organisms on Earth. While it is easy to lose hope in humanity to make these necessary improvements, one optimistic statement in Kolbert’s article stood out to me. Kolbert noted that “according to a report by the International Energy Agency, using technologies now available, offshore wind turbines could provide the country with twice as much electricity as it currently uses, and, according to some estimates, weaning the U.S. off fossil fuels would create tens of millions of jobs,” (1). A solution such as this seems to be a hopeful possibility for the US, and among other potential solutions to our global crisis, might be a way for humanity to extend its time on Earth.

Sources: 1 Synthesis report from IPCC5 - Summary for Policymakers https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/AR5_SYR_FINAL_SPM.pdf 2 Zalasiewicz et al. The Anthropocene. 2018. Geology Today. 3 Elizabeth Kolbert, “Three scenarios for the future of climate change” https://www.newyorker.com/news/annals-of-a-warming-planet/three-scenarios-for-the-future-of-climate-change Image: https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007%2F978-3-319-71063-1_26-1

[louisjlevin]

Upon reading Colbert's article, I was struck by the international and generational inequity that climate change is set to heighten. Internationally, what does it look like to tell developing nations that they too need to set ambitious climate targets? The answer to that can, sadly, be found in a statement from Raj Kumar Singh, India's minister for power. Mr Singh last week told a meeting organised by the International Energy Agency (IEA): "The developed world has occupied almost 80% of the carbon space already. You have 800 million people who don't have access to electricity. You can't say that they have to go to net zero, they have the right to develop, they want to build skyscrapers and have a higher standard of living, you can't stop it." Mr Singh is, of course, right. But how do we proceed? There are ways for developing nations to develop sustainably, but for now they still are more expensive and require more infrastructure than their less sustainable counterparts.

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm just fascinated how we go about having these conversations. There's so much history wrapped up in the dialogue -- so much exploitation and inequity. It seems to me that in tackling climate change, we will also have to reckon with our global past, and the ways that the development of developed nations has come at the cost of their less developed peers. A tall order!

And on a different but related note, the generational divide flagged by Colbert is similarly challenging to overcome. Our parents' and grandparents' wealth and happiness has come at our own expense (just looking at Hansen's final quote). Basically, in all this, I guess want to point out that it feels like developed nations and older generations have a real responsibility to step up and do their part right now. And too that we as a global community are going to be forced to reckon with the shocking levels of inequity we're facing right now.

[omarh4]

Climate #Movie #Solution #Origin

Wall-E might at first glance seem like a kids movie, and it is, but it does carry some foreboding messages that instill a sense of urgency even in adults. With the looming threat of climate change threatening our blue skies, Elizabeth Kolbert of the New Yorker states that no idea is too unrealistic or unpleasant so long as it enacts drastic change. While sending humanity to live on a giant spaceship while we leave a team of robots to clean up our mess might seem unrealistic at this moment, this kind of drastic change might be the last option in a couple decades. If Wall-E is any sort of premonition of what is to come, we should perhaps consider learning from it. While we may not be able to learn the technology that makes this world a reality, we can learn what not to do. For instance, in the remnants of earth, there are billboards of a company called Buy n Large. While not much is said specifically about the company in the movie, many Pixar theorists concluded that this corporation is in fact largely responsible for the state of how we see earth in the movie. Capitalism at its best results in extreme purchasing, packaging and pollution, evident in the literal mountains of garbage piled around the globe. While we are drawing parallels between our world and that of Wall-E it is fair to say that our own path to destruction might be identical to the fate of those in the movie. Individual acts to help the environment are not performative because they do contribute towards change, but it should not fall on the individuals to repair the climate problem created by large corporations and governments. Where individuals can make worthwhile change is in holding the companies responsible for the damage they have done to our climate. In the movie, the general populace is unaware of the reality that is earth and how it came to be like that. In a way, this also rings true for society today. We cannot hope for the same large organizations that are driving us off this planet to simply build a spaceship and leave earth for forgotten, we have to enforce that they are using their vast resources to reverse the damage done to the planet and ensure that the events in Wall-E never come true.

[scicerom]

Solution

On a personal level, there are not many options as to how one might do what they can in the avoidance of further climate change. Most cars run on gasoline and those that don’t frequently have their energy coming from more efficient but still carbon-based energy sources. The same goes for the lights in one’s house or workplace. The majority of products one buys do not offer significant choice-to-choice differences in carbon release apparent to the consumer. One place where this choice does blatantly exist on a day-to-day basis, however, is in food choice.

According to the EPA, United States greenhouse gas emissions originate from virtually all sectors of the economy, with approximately 10% coming directly from agricultural sources.1 Almost half of these emissions come specifically from livestock and manure. It must be noted that the remainder is largely due to certain practices in soil fertilization and crop choice, but these effects are more detached from the consumer, and so more difficult to avoid. The crop choice issue is more complex than it would appear as well, as the crops in question are nitrogen-fixing crops, often a significantly more climate-friendly method of soil fertilization than the alternative. As for the livestock, though the percentage contribution of total emissions appears small, this is a meaningful contribution to climate change which is easy to at least partially avoid in one’s own life.

I won’t lie; I’m not a vegetarian. I don’t fully buy any of the ethical, economic, or even climate change arguments for the lifestyle. However, the partial solution offered through food choice is not a boolean one. Just as one is told not to leave the sink running as they brush their teeth, one can meaningfully decrease their personal carbon contribution to climate change by, with some regularity, intentionally bypassing meats, especially beef, in their meals.

[LucLampietti]

framing

In the New Yorker article, "Three Scenarios for the Future of Climate Change", Kolbert opens up with pointing out the absurdity of the Times publishing the headline, "Global Warming Has Begun, Expert Tells Senate”, in the summer of 1988, decades after reports of climate change's deleterious effects had already started circulating. Understanding the consequences of climate change seems like basic arithmetic at this point–afterall, the notion of greenhouse gases and rising temperatures is being taught alongside arithmetic at the lowerschool level in many schools. Perhaps I am just fortunate enough to have had that education, but regardless, even amongst the privileged who are instructed in the mechanisms and outcomes of climate change, there seems to be very little impulse to act. This notion–that of the past 30 years of warnings were a waste–made me think: have we approached it all wrong? How can one get others to care about the devastating consequences of losing something if they don’t have an intrinsic respect for that something to begin with? In “A Sand County Almanac” by Aldo Leopold, he puts forth the following idea: “All ethics so far evolved rest upon a single premise: that the individual is a member of a community of interdependent parts.The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants and animals, or collectively the land.” In other words, instead of viewing the community as being composed of the humans and human settlements within, Leopold suggests expanding this notion of community to the surrounding natural world. By extension of Leopold’s view, it is easier to demonstrate care for something when that something is loved, than it is to avoid hurting something and fearing the consequences. Therefore, I posit that there are three possible scenarios for addressing climate change from a behavioral standpoint. First, continue with the status quo of imparting fear of the consequences until their presence is felt firsthand. Second, guide eco friendly human behavior subliminal through “nudges” à la behavioral economics. Third, impart a land ethic so that detrimental actions are more immediately and intrinsically recognized by the individual.

[seankoons]

origin #climate #risks

Complementary to the question I asked, I wanted to do a little more research on BECCS and their origin, function, and the opinions that professionals in the field have on them. Again, just as a refresher of what BECCS are, BECCS work by growing crops and trees which take in CO2 and release O2 into the atmosphere. Then, these plants are burnt, and their CO2 is trapped and stored. More about BECCS is that they depend on two technologies: biomass being converted into heat, electricity, or fuels and the carbon emissions storage technology that allows the CO2 to be stored in “geological formations or embedded in long-lasting products.” This essentially means that BECCS are producing negative emissions because they are putting more O2 into the atmosphere and drawing out preexisting CO2. In 2001, Swedish PhD student Kenneth Möllersten and Michael Obersteiner wrote a paper called “Managing Climate Risks” where the idea of BECCS was first introduced: in the paper it was actually called BCRD – Biomass-energy with Carbon Removal and Disposal. The idea came to Möllersten when he was writing his PhD thesis about Swedish paper mills and the new carbon capturing technology. When looking at flaws in the BECCS technology, the actual availability of land, water, fertilizer, and storage space are its major constraints, but out of all technology that has been proposed to produce negative emissions, BECCS have been proven to be the best and most efficient. According to the Global CCS Institute, their emissions target for BECCS by 2100 is 3.3 gigatons stored per year, they want to have 5 BECCS facilities, use 300-700 million hectares of land, and their cost target is $15-$400 per ton of CO2 avoided. The thing is, BECCS technology today is mature and able to be put into practice, and after researching, I couldn’t really find any negative opinions and perspective on it. I am very excited for our guest speaker to answer my question and see how this technology eventually will be put into practice.

Sources: https://www.carbonbrief.org/beccs-the-story-of-climate-changes-saviour-technology https://www.american.edu/sis/centers/carbon-removal/fact-sheet-bioenergy-with-carbon-capture-and-storage-beccs.cfm https://www.globalccsinstitute.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/BECCS-Perspective_FINAL_18-March.pdf

[chasedenholm]

climate #solutions #policy

In the synthesis report, many potential solutions were put forward to address the global threat of climate change as well as noting the difficulty of implementation to completely correct the damage that has already been done. What is fascinating to me solution-wise is what lies in the energy sector. The future of Earth is heavily dependent on the continued advancement of the renewable energy sector. I think we are in the 1st inning of the game with regards to renewables impact on our planet, and there is still a lot of game to be played. The various renewable energy sources we have developed thus far are experiencing a continual decrease in cost and increases in global adoption and awareness for the necessity of them. Specifically, with solar, there are massive farms being developed across the globe. The reason for building supersized solar farms goes beyond increasing energy output, the scaling also cuts the relative cost tremendously. Since solar power is becoming cheaper, it's now becoming a possible solution for developing countries as well. The issue with solar in my eyes is getting the energy from the source of the farm to our homes and businesses. With independent solar on property, that is obviously not an issue to worry about. That, however, is still quite expensive to install. If our electricity transmission grids can improve constant electrical distribution, then why would solar not be our top choice of energy. The infrastructure problem surrounding solar is what needs to be fixed and the only way I can see this being fixed reasonably is to consolidate farms in creating more super grids and decreasing the number of smaller farms. The issue, however, is the sheer amount of Government regulation and red tape we would need to get through. If we want to build a gigantic solar farm in New Mexico, we could theoretically power most, if not all, of the United States. So why don't we do it? If governments are to accelerate their efforts in limiting climate change so that humanity doesn’t meet its end, it starts with realizing the power and potential for renewable energy and giving that industry appropriate subsidies and land to fuel its growth. 

References:

https://www.nbcnews.com/mach/science/supersized-solar-farms-are-sprouting-around-world-maybe-space-too-ncna901666c)      ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/SYR_AR5_FINAL_full.pdf

Pictures:

https://www.google.com/search?q=graph+for+solar+projections&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwiHudbh1ufvAhWQVKwKHbZSD90Q2-cCegQIABAA&oq=graph+for+solar+projections&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzoECCMQJzoFCAAQsQM6AggAOgcIABCxAxBDOgQIABBDOgYIABAFEB46BggAEAgQHjoECAAQGFDxvwFY7-wBYJruAWgAcAB4AIABhQGIAZIRkgEEMjQuM5gBAKABAaoBC2d3cy13aXotaW1nwAEB&sclient=img&ei=ZE9rYIf3N5CpsQW2pb3oDQ&bih=718&biw=644#imgrc=k57IZ0Q5QopcSM https://www.google.com/search?q=solar+farm+new+mexico&sxsrf=ALeKk01DY_fCwwENQc-kFZnvm0iYO2PDgQ:1617645393353&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjO86vY1ufvAhVXCM0KHQVwCxIQ_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=644&bih=718&dpr=2#imgrc=hYpIomGgU2H-6M

[benindeglia]

framing #solutions #climate

Can there be compromise on climate change? That's the question I ask myself after looking at all the numbers within this week's readings. Specifically, looking at the inevitably of climate and taking into consideration the marker of 1.5 C and 2.0 C. This number of 2.0 C is a concession made for politicians and large corporations, a number that is stated to be “simply too much” (James Hansen) but also the only number they agreed on to be inevitable. It is an unacceptable upper limit to temperature rise, and is agreed upon to be where extinction would be guaranteed. This number is agreed upon by all individuals who are outside the scientific community (but still believe in climate change) as the goal to hit, the absolute maximum of what the earth can handle. This believable goal is, at least now, pushing public policy and politicians to try and find ways to hit that margin. All plans with regards to climate change have become much more persuasive once there has been a target, a goal that individuals feel as though they can actually work towards, with 167 countries trying to at least endorse this target.

What is fascinating however, is that the IPCC special report being specifically about the dangers of 1.5 C. Each pathway they focus on is how devastating 1.5 C can really be, how many ecosystems are dying, lives lost or ruined. This number seems semi apocalyptic in its catastrophic nature, and no action needs to be taken to acquire it. It can and will literally be our doom if we do nothing but watch the number on the global thermostat go up and up. This point of 2.0 C becomes much more of an interesting question. Undeniably, it is doing good as our upper limit of what countries can strive for, and it is widely accepted already. But it isn’t enough. As James Hansen said, “The target that has been talked about in international negotiations for two degrees of warming is actually a prescription for long-term disaster.” The 2.0 C marker doesn't do enough. It won’t prevent disaster. However, the concern becomes more if a higher goal is more achievable. Can the human species waste more time and effort to try and fight against propaganda and denial funded by billions of dollars from massive corporations, or should we strive to accept this marker because it's pushing for change in the here and now? It’s a terrible choice to make, that can force early burn out in people working for change. At least some movement to save the planet is better than none, but there is only so much acceptance and working within the system that those of my generation can take and still survive until 80.

[gracecwagner]

salience #framing #origin (?)

While I was doing the readings for this week, I found myself thinking about how I originally learned about climate change, the energy crisis, and the very different frame it was posed in.  Just by reading these articles, you can see how urgent a crisis this is.  It would make sense that as it is taught to children, there is a sense of urgency, no matter how simplified it is.   But in 5th grade, the main concern that was communicated to us students, was that we would soon “run out” of oil and natural gas, so we needed to slow our (as humans, not our’s as 5th graders) consumption of resources.  I will mention that I went to school in Fort Worth, Texas, an area well known for fracking that sits on top of the Barnett Shale.  There’s a museum in the city that has a large, permanent exhibit explaining the process by which the Barnett Shale was formed and how the fracking process is carried out, specifically geared towards children.   
It is not difficult to guess why the school and museum in Fort Worth want to convince the children and future generations that oil is a resource to be preserved and fracking is possibly a solution to elongate our use of oil, but this presentation is problematic, for obvious reasons.  
How can we hope to slow the rising temperatures when the problem is not presented as such to children? It’s an example of misinformation, starting before kids reach middle school.  Obviously, this is not the case everywhere, and we’re seeing more and more media concerning climate change that hopes to explain it too kids, but we need the severity of the problem needs to be communicated everywhere, one could argue especially in the heart of where oil and natural gas are so prominent.  
While I haven’t been to this museum in a hot minute, my aunt, who takes my cousins often, has told me that there is now information about alternative energy sources in the exhibit that also houses a miniature oil rig and interactive games allowing kids to try their own hand at fracking the Barnett Shale (pictured), so maybe there’s some hope.

[LanceJohnson1]

[ZeyangPan]

movie

The film "The Day After Tomorrow" was screened in 2004. The film starts with climatologist Jack as the main character suggesting that global warming would cause the global average temperature to rise. Then, a large number of icebergs in the Arctic Ocean would melt into the Atlantic Ocean, and, therefore, destroy the water-salt balance in the oceans. As a result, human civilization is going to enter a new ice age. However, when Jack states his ideas to government officials, politicians did not listen. They think those wild imaginations are not enough to distract them from generating the national economy and improving national strength. After the refusal of Jack’s repeated reminders, the future he expected became true, except the disaster came much faster than the time he expected. When the disaster happened, the tornado formed on the land covered the sky, and bricks were flying all over the place by the wind. Tropical countries were covered by blizzards, and huge hails fell from the sky. Entire North America has been shrouded by tsunamis, and thousands of lives have been ruthlessly annihilated. "The Day After Tomorrow" is the first natural disaster film I have watched. It shows that as early as the beginning of the 21st century, people’s bold imagination and understanding of the potential climate change on Earth have been developed to a new level. The film impressed me not only with the shocking special effects of natural disasters but also the desire of human beings to protect civilization and the harmony between people when facing the end of a race. All of these show that nature is the ruler of the Earth, we will pay back everything we have done eventually. Director Roland Emmerich brought this natural disaster film to us with a special perspective, novel themes, and superb technology. Excessive emissions of heavy industrial gases, excessive emission of vehicle exhaust, and deforestation... These small damages accumulate together, and when the damage passes a certain threshold, the final consequences return to humans. The ancients once said: "Do not commit an evil act just because it is small in scale". In recent years, responsible countries have jointly launched a series of preventive and remedial activities in response to the increasingly severe climate situations. The improvement of the ecology is the premise of economic development, such as the issuances of new energy automobiles, upgrading of the industrial structure, encouraging shared bicycles, reducing production capacity to build an efficient green society... One human being might be

small, but the power of all human beings is huge.

[bbroner]

origins #solutions

The key problem that the world has when it comes to climate change in my opinion is that individuals will always want the luxuries and technological advancements that make life easier and more enjoyable. While at this point the vast majority of Americans believe in climate change and a majority believes we are currently mishandling the crisis, I'm not convinced that individuals would make the sacrifices necessary to curb our emissions to under the 565 gigatons of CO2 that would keep us under a 2 degree increase in worldwide temp. Technology has been advancing at an exponential rate for human history so there is no reason to expect individuals to curb their use of technology "for the greater good" until they do not have the means to keep up their lifestyles.

One issue I had with the "Three Scenarios for the Future of Climate Change" piece we read for today was where it tried to make the argument that a world that cut emissions would cause the world to be more just. In my opinion the most likely scenario would be for countries like China and the US to create renewable energy technologies that they would then sell for an extremely high price or use developing countries to help manufacture the power. Neither scenario would cause a more just world, and I'm just not sure how outlawing CO2 emissions would do anything other than make the most technologically advanced countries better off and everyone else worse off.

Lastly I believe the future should be to invest in environment altering technology and more specifically carbon capture technology. Like I said earlier, with the exponential growth in technology we definitely have the tools to prevent a doomsday scenario, but our game plan needs to expect individuals to keep emitting carbon, as any other projection just doesn't seem likely to me.

[fdioum]

[#movie] The movie The Day After Tomorrow represented the existential challenge of climate change well in many ways. They successfully represented to the people’s dismay that climate change is real and its effects are punishing and vicious. The main character who was a climatologist tried to share his findings with political leaders in order to take the proper course of action that will save the most people, however, they were always reluctant to even look at these findings. The movie also illustrated the unnecessary misfortunates that come from misinformation and people’s egos and fear, specifically believing that they know more about climate than actual climatologists. In this case, it led to the death of hundreds from going outside in below freezing weather. Contrary to my belief of what will happen with climate change, the film represented it as an ice age that will happen after a series of events such as hard ice falling from the sky, consistent heavy rainfall, hurricanes and tsunamis. All of the events highlighted the disastrous effects of climate change which were very realistic. However, from my meager knowledge about climate change, I think they ignored the fact that the planet is warming and not getting cooler. It may be that the cooling effect is a result of the extreme warming which they should have explained thoroughly to avoid any sort of confusion or misinformation even among viewers.

The movie made the challenge more salient for me. It really helped me understand the gravity of the situation and how disastrous and out of hands the situation can get. And sadly, it might reach a point where a large portion of the world won’t be able to be saved and will be left to die and fend for themselves, which sends chills down my spine. For some critics, the movie failed to really show the magnitude of the effects by omitting images of the plethora of dead bodies. They also did not have an example or scenario that showed true desperation in a grand scheme as everything mostly worked out for the main characters.

(https://github.com/jamesallenevans/AreWeDoomed/files/6275330/memos.2.pictures.docx)

[ishaanpatel22]

climate #risk #framing

In the article, Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math, the author talks about the number, 2° Celsius, that was mentioned by the world leaders that drafted the Copenhagen Accord. This number represents the scientific view that “the increase in global temperature should be below 2° Celsius”, so as to limit the effects of climate change as much as possible. However, is limiting the temperature rise to 2° Celsius truly enough?

Since 1906, the earth has warmed by more than 0.9 degrees Celsius (this is a more updated number than McKibben’s article). Moreover, as was noted by McKibben, even this rise in temperature has caused more damage than scientists could have fathomed. Therefore, quite a few discussions surrounding this 2° figure and its true accuracy have been raised. One such piece is the IPCC Special Report. Throughout this report, the authors make numerous comparisons as to why limiting the global rise in temperature to 1.5° Celsius versus 2° is so important, and why looking at global temperature rise as a cardinal figure is misleading.

The primary reason for the latter part of the aforementioned argument is that temperatures rise heterogeneously across the globe, with warming higher over land than the oceans and the strongest warming happening in the Artic during its coolest seasons. Therefore, purely looking at average global temperature rise is misleading, as more than 20% of humans reside in regions with warming that is already greater than the 1.5 degrees Celsius increase in at least one season. Therefore, it is key that statistics for areas of high warming be considered (like areas of lower latitude), rather than just considering a global temperature increase figure in a vacuum. This would ensure that high-risk areas and communities receive the attention and solutions they need, rather than having them fall under the umbrella of the rest of the world.

As was mentioned, the IPCC special report implored readers to keep the global temperature rise to 1.5° Celsius versus 2°, because heterogeneity in temperature rise means certain areas would suffer greatly from a 2° increase vs. 1.5°, and certain symptoms of temperature rise would be exacerbated. For example, limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius would reduce the number of people exposed to extreme heatwaves by 420 million. To put this idea in a more concrete context, the deadly heatwaves seen in India and Pakistan in 2015 could occur annually with 2 degrees of warming. Another stark piece of evidence in support of making the 1.5 degree increase the limit can be found through drought and water data. The report mentions how up to 50% fewer people would experience climate-induced water stress by limiting warming to 1.5 degrees, which would undoubtedly save lives in some of earth’s poorest areas.

All in all, the mountain of evidence provided by the IPCC vastly favors limiting global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees and could lead one to question the quality of knowledge many world leaders have regarding climate change.

Image Source: https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2865/a-degree-of-concern-why-global-temperatures-matter/

Sources: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/global-warming-effects https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2865/a-degree-of-concern-why-global-temperatures-matter/

[stellaslorer]

solutions #framing

How can we effectively combat climate change? Numerous solutions have been proposed with regards to governments, industry, innovation, and individuals. However, the colossal issue persists as we continue to destroy our planet without any clear path towards reversal and restoration. As the readings for class highlight, we cannot merely rely on politicians to set and enforce emissions targets that are aligned with science. The inherently self-interested and present-focused nature of politics means that, ultimately, when considering such standards for CO2, the final decision is not a result of what is right for the planet but, in fact, a more pragmatic blend of what can be passed and what will not be perceived as too “extreme”. So, where does our path to a green future lie? Lots of emphasis is placed onto the impact that each of our own actions can have on the climate. We can decrease the size of our carbon footprints by eating less meat, using public transportation, turning off the heating, and boycotting different companies––just to name a few. However, I’ve never found these arguments for individual change convincing. Of course I believe that individual accountability matters, but can it save us? It often feels like the onus is placed on us in order to avert our attention from the larger culprits––big industry. We cannot continue factory farming, fracking, and traveling in the same ways that we are currently. Carbon offset plans are a measure that companies like Delta have proposed. Yet, these plans are often tenuous, drafted to claim the title of “Carbon Neutral” but rarely followed through in tangible ways. Thus, it seems like the only way that we might be able to save our planet is through innovation and adoption. We might be eating lab-grown meats and powering engines on biofuels and batteries. Will these actions be enough to avert doom, especially as developing nations currently require resources and energy to power their growth?

[jcrary711]

movie #origins #solutions

The Disney Pixar movie WALL-E follows a seemingly sentient robot in the near distant future (roughly 800 years in the future) who has been tasked with cleaning up a flood of human trash left behind by a human race that has abandoned Earth. This movie displays the devastation pollution and climate change has had on all life on Earth as well as the Earth itself. While a majority of the movie takes place in space, the glimpses of Earth shown display a desolate place with mountains of garbage, both on Earth’s surface and in orbit around Earth in the form of abandoned space satellites/stations, and immense clouds of smog and dust. During the course of the movie, it is made clear that humans have abandoned Earth for two main reasons: The Earth’s resources have been largely depleted, the air has presumably become toxic. While this may seem unrealistic in the near future, it is perhaps not too far off. As of today, approximately 91% of the human population is exposed to an unhealthy level of pollution (1). This shocking percentage is just the tip of the iceberg. Overpopulation within the last few decades has led to depleting of natural resources. Once nonrenewable resources are depleted entirely humans will be forced to turn to a different source. It appears that the movie WALL-E also presents indirect solutions to the impending climate crisis. In the movie, the entire human race, which has dwindled from billions to seemingly thousands or even hundreds, leaves Earth on a spaceship in search of a new home. While this solution may seem ridiculous, I argue it is not and entirely absurd idea. If portions of the human population were able to travel through space in search of a new hospitable planet, it could greatly reduce the population, which would in turn both lower emission, and require a lower number of resource production.

(1) WDI - The global distribution of air pollution (worldbank.org) - https://datatopics.worldbank.org/world-development-indicators/stories/the-global-distribution-of-air-pollution.html

[aj-wu]

climate #movie #framing

I'd actually never seen "An Inconvenient Truth" or "An Inconvenient Sequel" until yesterday, despite a long-standing interest in climate change. First, it was fascinating to watch a movie from early in the Trump era through a present lens—having gone through the Trump presidency and transitioned to a new administration, with all the crises and victories in between. I find it difficult sometimes to remember, after all this time, that sense of incredulousness and impending doom that was so pervasive then. Now some of the uncertainty that the subjects of the documentary faced is resolved, and we've collectively been through some tragedies most of us couldn't predict.

What spoke to me most about the movie was the negotiations with India leading up to and during the Paris Conference. When Gore addressed Modi about committing to emissions reductions, he responded, with evident resentment, that his people could worry about the climate after they've had the chance to develop their economy at the expense of the environment like the West has. It’s totally justified for developing countries to want the same opportunities that the west got to pollute in the name of economic development, or else ask for support from richer countries to make those sacrifices. But developed countries have all the leverage. The poorest countries are also the most vulnerable to rising sea levels, unlivable temperatures, food insecurity, conflict. I think this shows in the way Gore speaks to Modi: I hear you, but I also see the haze in your sky. I found it reductive, and emblematic of the sustainable development movement's larger environmental justice problem.

Ultimately, India did ratify the Paris Accords, asking for access to credit in exchange. Interestingly, the NRDC reported last year that India is one of the few countries on track to meet its Paris target, which is to reduce the emissions intensity of its GDP by 33–35 percent by 2030.

One theme that seems to be recurring in this class so far is what it takes to foster genuine international cooperation. Surely bullying developing countries into sustainable development and continually holding developed countries to a different standard can't cut it. India is correct in its stance that India did not cause climate change and that developed countries should do more. And it's no excuse that those countries tend to have lower emissions now; given what we know about cumulative emissions, there's a clear space for technologically advanced countries to take the lead on, for example, carbon sequestration.

[nobro011235]

movie

The movie Wall-E follows the anthropomorphic robot and his friend Eve as they team up to bring humans back to the Earth that they had abandonded due to climate change. The film represents the existential change by introducing the movie in a trash wasteland that is later described as Earth in the future. The incredible use of imagery in the movie between the terrifying storms, the mounds of trash, and the views of a polluted Earth from space do an incredible job of giving viewers a warning sign of a realistic future to come. In addition to the imagery, the film does an incredible job of combining multiple of the problems we will talk about in this class to create a gripping storyline and a multifaceted warning to take care of the future. With constant references to BnL, a corporation that seems to have an incredible amount of power in past Earth, the movie warns of centralization of power in the hands of people who don't necessarily care for the greater good. With the failed mutiny of the autopilot program, the movie warns against the indiscriminate use of artificial intelligence, another topic that will be covered in this class. However, I believe the movie misses a little bit by its lack of coverage of how we got to the setting of the movie. The movie completely takes place in the far future, and skips over exactly how the planet became an empty wasteland, throwing that plot point to a couple of cutaway scenes by the former president. This makes Wall-E seem more otherworldly, and pushes the problem of climate change to a time and place that seems unfamiliar to the modern viewer. As a movie viewer, I am convinced that a dangerous scenario exists, but not that this situation is eminent. In this way the movie did minimize the problem of climate change (although the fact that Pixar put out a movie that focuses on climate change at all is pretty incredible). Surprisingly, the director Wall-E, Andrew Stanton, agrees - "I don’t have a political bent or ecological message to push". So, even the director did not see a direct connection between Wall-E and impending climate change. As the McKibben piece shows, we don't have much time to waste in responding to impending environmental disaster, and the fact that the movie did not take advantage of their platform to make it clear that there is no time to waste is a missed opportunity at best.

[ktavangar]

policy #solutions #framing #climate

"Developed nations would have constructed storm-surge barriers to keep out the sea and erected border walls to keep out refugees. They would also have started to air-condition the outdoors. Developing nations, meanwhile, would have been left to fend for themselves." Three Scenarios for the Future of Climate Change by Elizabeth Kolbert in the New Yorker

These sentences touch on an aspect of climate change that is not as prominently discussed, at least among everyday people: environmental justice. The focus at the moment is on solving the pressing issue at hand, but the manner in which we solve it also deserves consideration. Although the main goal is to stop the destruction of the planet, I do not believe we could be proud of our success if it comes at the cost of creating massive global inequality and threatening billions of people's livelihoods in other ways. The quote above comes from the discussion of the middle scenario in Kolbert's article. I believe that of the three paths she lays out, this is the most likely one to actually occur. I think it is unlikely that as the circumstances get even more dire than they already are, politicians in wealthy countries won't put all their weight behind finding temporary technological solutions such as outdoor AC and storm-surge barriers. This would create a situation where through innovation, members of certain countries would find their livelihoods intact, albeit changed. This would allow some to proclaim victory while ignoring the worldwide nature of the threat as developing countries face the true devastation our recklessness will cause. That is why this must truly be regarded and treated as a global crisis. Any "solution" which only affects certain areas of the world is an incomplete one and we need to put pressure on leaders to regard it as such. However, in this age of increased nationalism, I have little hope that leaders and policymakers in developed countries will act in the best interest of the world as a whole.

[BuffDawg]

salience

I watched Wall-E this week as part of my learnings on how climate change can negatively impact the habitability of the Earth. In a post-apocalyptic world where "survival of the fittest" is the motto, will the rich people of today be the only sect of humanity that could afford survival? Or, in seeing the decay and destruction of the planet and the loss of resources, would the working class refuse to seal their own fate working for people with more material wealth? My game theory class I took here at UChicago addressed issues not unlike this one and has changed my perspective on preparation. I believe discussing the survival of humanity on a "hot Earth" in the face of overwhelming odds that we simply consume too many fossil fuels and cannot develop technology to revert climate change is a necessary bad sad truth. After taking the Global Warming class here at Chicago, I learned that there are many positive feedback loops that we are already subject to such as the increasing water vapor in the atmosphere and the permafrost melt which will release a significant amount of trapped methane. These fears were confirmed by the Rolling Stone article which discussed the new math implying our impending climate catastrophe. Further, with the receding ice caps, we will no longer benefit from ice/snow's high albedo, which reflected significant sunlight and energy away from the Earth's surface, keeping temperatures cooler. In response to all of these impending threats, instead we are trying to develop new more experimental methods of fossil fuel extraction, which all come with high risks and known rewards. Though the shale revolution has increased our mastery of extraction, we are still not on track as a worldwide society to defeat our own pollution of the atmosphere.

Circling back to my earlier point, is there any use in studying how the Earth's civilization will re-organize when the planet can no longer support billions of humans? Will we face a nuclear holocaust before that point is reached? These are all pressing questions that need to be discussed if we are to truly confront the thought of experiencing significant global heating. The known methods of climate change reversal make that conversation significantly more derivative and unimaginative. Of course we need to adopt renewable energy and decrease single use plastics... But these are antidotes we have discussed many times before. Will the world be a version of Mad Max? More harsh? More peaceful?

[jrgill-coder]

movie

Pixar’s Walle tells a heartwarming story about two robots’ adventure to get humanity returned to an earth that has been decimated by climate change but can potentially host life once again. The earth that is depicted in Walle is a wasteland of trash, which a series of “Walle” robots are tasked with converting to compact, vertical towers of trash. It is revealed that the corporation largely responsible for polluting earth’s atmosphere and forcing humanity to leave never expected the earth to be habitable again, and the ship’s automatic steering system named Auto tries to prevent the ship from returning to earth; however, our robot protagonists manage to get the ship back to earth. This film is dystopian in a light-hearted manner in its portrayal of the consequences of climate change. Humans have significantly maladapted to living in space and having robots serve their every need. While earth is certainly decimated, the conditions are fanciful enough so as to not feel like it is portraying a proximate threat to humanity. I am of the belief that overtly fanciful depictions of scary situations decrease a viewer’s suspension of disbelief and makes the situations depicted less frightening. As such, films like Walle are poor messengers for an imminent threat like climate change. To connect with audiences better, I believe filmmakers should tell stories about more realistic, proximate consequences of climate change. For example, the World Wildlife Fund estimates that by 2025, two-thirds of the world’s population may face water shortages. What will happen when major cities start routinely running out of access to water? What types of geopolitical conflicts would result from this? Could these geopolitical conflicts intersect with other threats we discussed/will discuss this quarter like nuclear war? I firmly believe that storytellers can do important work to increase the exigency with which people view the issue of climate change; however, they should choose to do stories of the proximate harm that climate change will cause, not stories almost a millennium in the future, an idea I think this political cartoon successfully communicates.

[dillanprasad]

One of the most interesting aspects of the climate conversation for me has always been the political dimension. The political attitude towards climate policy is perhaps the single most important determinant of humanity's long-term prognosis with respect to inequities and maladies arising from an environment in flux.

However, research and 100-page proposals aside, one of the most fundamental aspects of Western politics that is frequently overlooked is the game of incentives. Indeed, we are all incentivized to "fix" our climate by adapting our lifestyles and limiting our emissions. Why, then, do we not see widespread, international climate protectionism? Why do politicians in this country rarely run on slates of climate policy being the first, or even second most pressing issue?

The answer to this question is similar to the explanation for why we see very little effort on behalf of politicians in this country to pay down the national debt. The ascension to political office in the US is a frenzy, accompanied by lofty promises, lobbying, media appearances, and dependent on garnering the support of many, many people via the proposal of attractive value-adding ideas that your slate brings to the table. Climate reform, unless cleaning up a mess that already has been made, is rarely attractive enough to recruit this type of support. Simply put, this "early" in humanity's warming game (as in we do not yet see dramatic, human-displacing impacts of climate change) it is unlikely for politicians and policymakers to motivate--with the support of the people--to the point of implementing the extreme policy and adaptive changes needed to curtail our emissions. Politicians have no reason to run on slates discussing paying down the deficit, since the effects of the looming deficit are still nebulous and considered by the average American to be distant.

In this same vein, Presidential term limits contribute to the failure of powerful policymakers to address existential public challenges that are longitudinal in duration, massive in scope, and unappealing in the public eye. In just 4-8 years, does a President really want to push a hard line on climate, or the debt, when he can instead address social issues such as healthcare, wage, education, etc? To be clear, I am not advocating for the abolishments of term limits, but we can certainly see how temporally constrained policymakers are more incentivized by working on publicly "sexy" issues instead of the looming--and perhaps far more impactful--issues of the near to distant future.

In short, people are fickle. We are rarely motivated as strongly by a positive incentive than by a negative punishment, and at the collective social level, the political machine rarely takes action on anything before it becomes a catastrophe affecting many people. The tragedy of the commons, a famous notion that any public good will be used and abused until it is run into the ground, is perpetually at play as well as individuals seek to maximize their own personal interests. Thus, we stand in the midst of a quandary; though the issue at hands impacts each and every one of us, I believe it is unlikely that we will actually do anything about it until it's too late. And it's already too late.

framing

[ChivLiu]

origin #risk

Does climate change have a strong correlation with air pollutant discharge? Although they may seem to be two very different issues, climate change, and air pollution are closely interlinked, so by reducing air pollution we also protect the climate. Air pollutants include more than just greenhouse gases—principally carbon dioxide but also methane, nitrous oxide, and others—but there’s a big overlap: the two often interact with each other. For example, air pollution in the form of particulate matter produced by diesel engines spreads around the world, eventually spreading to the most remote places, including polar regions. When it lands on ice and snow, it will darken slightly, causing less sunlight to reflect back into space and leading to global warming. The slightly warmer temperature promotes the growth of plants in the sub-northern hemisphere. As they grow in the snow, they cast shadows. When multiplying with millions of small plants, it also has the effect of darkening the surface of the earth, leading to further warming.

Theoretically, it could be explained as so, but scientifically, we need some evidence. Tai et al. [2010] applied a multiple linear regression (MLR) model to study the correlations of total PM2.5 and its components with meteorological variables using an 11-year (1998–2008) observational record over the contiguous US. They find that daily variation in meteorology as described by the MLR can explain up to 50% of PM2.5 variability with temperature, relative humidity (RH), precipitation, and circulation all being important predictors. Temperature is positively correlated with sulfate, organic carbon (OC), and elemental carbon (EC) almost everywhere. The correlation of nitrate with temperature is negative in the Southeast but positive in California and the Great Plains. RH is positively correlated with sulfate and nitrate, but negatively with OC and EC. Precipitation is strongly negatively correlated with all PM2.5 components. Moreover, they observe that PM2.5 concentrations are on average 2.6 μg m−3 higher on stagnant vs. non-stagnant days. The observed correlations provide a test for chemical transport models used to simulate the sensitivity of PM2.5 to climate change. They point to the importance of adequately representing the temperature dependence of agricultural, biogenic, and wildfire emissions in these models.

Sources:

https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/story/air-pollution-and-climate-change-two-sides-same-coin

Tai, Amos PK, Loretta J. Mickley, and Daniel J. Jacob. "Correlations between fine particulate matter (PM2. 5) and meteorological variables in the United States: Implications for the sensitivity of PM2. 5 to climate change." Atmospheric environment 44, no. 32 (2010): 3976-3984.

Tagaris, Efthimios, Kuo-Jen Liao, Anthony J. DeLucia, Leland Deck, Praveen Amar, and Armistead G. Russell. "Potential impact of climate change on air pollution-related human health effects." Environmental science & technology 43, no. 13 (2009): 4979-4988.

[laszler]

salience #solutions

Collective action on climate change appears to be one of the biggest barriers and pathways to fighting the problem. I don’t believe this is an issue of awareness, but rather one of helplessness. That is, like many potentially devastating problems we face, the issue seems too great and our personal impact feels to small to make a difference. In the Rolling Stone article, McKibben writes, “Since all of us are in some way the beneficiaries of cheap fossil fuel, tackling climate change has been like trying to build a movement against yourself.” And, it appears, even when we are fully aware of the problem and its effects, we do not act.

In 2007, the artist Eve Mosher painted chalk lines around New York City boroughs demarcating areas 10 feet above sea level—the height to which water might increase after a storm. In a 2007 New York Times article, Randy Kennedy writes, “Ms. Mosher is trying to draw attention to projections that the chance of flooding up to or beyond her line could increase significantly as a result of global warming.” Sure enough, when Hurricane Sandy struck New York in the fall of 2012, many of the areas Mosher had painted over with chalk ended up getting flooded. This makes me wonder—imagine that the lines Mosher painted had been permanent instead of out of chalk. Would the potential effects of flooding have lingered for longer in the minds of New Yorkers? Would permanent lines end up affecting behavior if they served as a constant, unavoidable reminder of the effects of climate change? Nearly 15 years after Mosher painted the lines, I am also curious if art can serve as a catalyst for action and if Mosher’s work would have had a greater impact had it happened today.

Reference:

https://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/16/arts/design/16chal.html

[isabelmw]

salience

This is not my memo on a #movie/#novel, but I will be discussing movies in my post.

This week I was very familiar with many of the movies on the syllabus (such as Wall-E, Nausicaä, the Day After Tomorrow, Soylent Green, Akira), and they were interesting to consider in conjunction with our assigned readings. What I really wanted to contemplate in this memo is the effectiveness of sci-fi/fictional films that pose warnings or forebodings themes on environmental destruction. Is their call to action effective? I want to engage with this idea and also give some push back as well.

Something that really struck me from this week’s readings is that they would certainly be difficult for someone to understand if they didn’t already have 1.) context around global warming 2.) particular knowledge of the jargon used and 3.) the time and energy to devote to reading the article. I think even the readings that are meant to be both clear-cut and accessible (such as the power point attached to the IPCC5 report and the New Yorker article by Elizabeth Kolbert) are still taxing for the regular person. In that sense, there is certainly something about documentaries that makes climate change and environmental issues more palatable for some people, particularly if the documentary really takes its time to give its viewers a steady and foundational introduction to the topic. They’re entertaining, and documentaries are an effective “gateway” to create awareness and initial engagement with a topic that is on paper either incredibly intimidating or too ostensibly exhausting to read.

Even more accessible are fictional and sci-fi films that contain calls to action or warnings about environmental issues. Blade Runner 2049 is one such example, where the total environmental decay of the urban’s surrounding hinterlands is on colorful and vivid display. However, I’m curious how effective these movies actually are at getting people to engage with environmental issues and further generate an actual response to climate change? And are there any ways that these fictional imaginaries of an environmentally desolate future are actually unhelpful? Perhaps they conversely generate complacency or inaction? In my mind, any film that helps to raise the public consciousness around the environment is positive. However, I can also imagine that the warnings fictional movies present are easy for audiences to brush off exactly because they are just that – fictional. And often the depiction the environmental or societal denigration on display is so extreme and purposefully provocative that it exists at a distance for the viewer. Environmental concern is contained within the film’s world. So I’m curious how effective fictional films actually are at promoting engagement with the environment. In my personal experience, movies like the ones on the syllabus have certainly encouraged me to contemplate on an issue more than I normally would or have made it more salient. At the same time, as I said, I think there’s the potentiality that some are not only ineffective but destructive – by indirectly encouraging complacency. Every movie aims for the reaction “I wouldn’t want to live in an environment like that, we should think about this more or do something”, but another person can walk out thinking “Well at least the world isn’t that bad” and feel they don’t need to do anything to help the environment.

Blade Runner 2049:

[smichel11]

The idea of a carbon tax is not revolutionary. Many countries are already familiar with the concept, implementing their own versions in an effort to lessen carbon emissions. Though a version of this policy has been proposed in the United States, it still has not been passed and upheld. Rather than having big polluters pay for their emissions that heavily influence the climate, the people have been led to believe that they themselves are at fault. People are pressured into spending more money and make sacrifices to lead an environmentally sustainable lifestyle and appease their moral conscience. With all this pressure placed on the individual in society, the “perception of fairness…has been entirely missing…as the biggest polluters have been allowed to expand their emissions without penalty” (Klein, 116). How can we expect the public to pay for their own livelihood, pay for sustainable products, and pay for the mistakes of corporations if they cannot afford it? Instead of placing pressure on the people to fund Climate Change prevention, we should shift our focus to that of “the top five oil companies pulling in $900 billion in profits from 2001 to 2010” (Klein, 111). Less than four percent of those earnings went to renewable energy. If rich men cannot bother to make any strides to significantly lessen the effects of Climate Change, why should the public bother? To make the situation fairer, the government should impose a carbon tax on corporations who are responsible for the emissions. Corporations might attempt to make up the losses by hiking up prices of their services, so in implementation, governments must provide a way for “a tax cut or income credit [to] compensate[e] poor and middle-class consumers” as well as establish “heritage trust funds…dedicated to building the post-fossil fuel future…helping communities adapt to these new realities” (Klein, 113). One of the largest problems is that polluting is free. It does not cost anything to release carbon emissions. Corporations would finally be paying for carbon emissions that are detrimental to the planet, so they would be less inclined to emit pollutants and try to find cheaper and greener sources of energy. Consumers would be protected from any sudden changes, and the often-forgotten communities that are most affected by Climate Change are remembered. These changes are by no means easy, but they are able to be implemented quickly. All it takes is a bill and a vote.

Source: Klein, Naomi. This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate. Vintage Canada, 2015.

[ghost]

risk #policy

As the IPCC makes clear, there are a plethora of potential consequences if we, as a society, continue to let climate change go unchecked. From droughts to extreme temperatures to rising sea levels, there will be no part of the planet that doesn’t feel the effects of climate change. However, instead of banding together to address this problem and take action to mitigate the effects of climate change, we all seem to think someone else is going to fix it for us. This is, in my opinion, why we are doomed. Humanity’s failure to seriously address the problem thus far does not inspire hope for the future, at least for me.

The risks of unmitigated climate change are not even as far off as they may seem when reading the IPCC summary. I live in Maine, and I have seen firsthand the effects of climate change already. The Gulf of Maine is the fastest warming body of water in the entire world, and this is already having a devastating impact on the local economies here. [1] Fishermen are struggling with dwindling populations in some species of fish, as well as lobster. [2] Their struggle then affects the local restaurants and the tourism industry. The effects of climate change are here – they are no longer something to be discussed in the abstract.

I am currently writing my thesis on how soft law has affected international environmental agreements such as the Paris Climate Accord. As I mentioned in my question for this week, the rise of soft law and an increasing number of non-binding agreements essentially allows governments to make “promises” that they have absolutely no intention of following through on. There must be a better policy approach going forward, in my opinion, because we seem to be getting nowhere with the current approaches. While I’m unsure binding agreements are the answer, as countries could then simply decide not to participate at all, perhaps incentives could be added to the non-binding agreements to encourage countries to actually make an effort to meet the targets set forward. There needs to be a balance struck, where countries are not so put off by potential punishments for not meeting the goals that they fail to take any action whatsoever. We are not going to get anything done by making empty promises.

I do not mean to sound overly critical of the Paris Climate Accord – my cousin was actually one of the delegates from the Marshall Islands for this particular agreement. It was an important symbolic action, if nothing else. What I hope to make clear is the fact that I do not believe it addresssed climate change to the extent that we needed it to.

1: https://tinyurl.com/w3xbbh3u 2: https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/gone-in-a-generation/fishing-climate-change.html