I want to start this week’s news roundup with William Shatner’s moving account of traveling into outer space in the Blue Origins space craft, drawn from Variety’s exclusive preview of Shatner’s forthcoming book Boldly Go: Reflections on a Life of Awe and Wonder.
I had thought that going into space would be the ultimate catharsis of that connection I had been looking for between all living things—that being up there would be the next beautiful step to understanding the harmony of the universe. In the film “Contact,” when Jodie Foster’s character goes to space and looks out into the heavens, she lets out an astonished whisper, “They should’ve sent a poet.” I had a different experience, because I discovered that the beauty isn’t out there, it’s down here, with all of us. Leaving that behind made my connection to our tiny planet even more profound.
It was among the strongest feelings of grief I have ever encountered. The contrast between the vicious coldness of space and the warm nurturing of Earth below filled me with overwhelming sadness. Every day, we are confronted with the knowledge of further destruction of Earth at our hands: the extinction of animal species, of flora and fauna . . . things that took five billion years to evolve, and suddenly we will never see them again because of the interference of mankind. It filled me with dread. My trip to space was supposed to be a celebration; instead, it felt like a funeral.
Shatner goes on to say that similar experiences have been reported often enough that the phenomenon has a name - it’s called the “Overview Effect.” He continues:
It reinforced tenfold my own view on the power of our beautiful, mysterious collective human entanglement, and eventually, it returned a feeling of hope to my heart. In this insignificance we share, we have one gift that other species perhaps do not: we are aware—not only of our insignificance, but the grandeur around us that makes us insignificant. That allows us perhaps a chance to rededicate ourselves to our planet, to each other, to life and love all around us. If we seize that chance.
News roundup
Climate
Bad Times for the Amazon Rainforest
The Washington Post has launched a major investigation into the plight of the Amazon rainforest in Brazil, with their key results summarized here.
Last week we looked at the linkages between organized crime and deforestation. The Washington Post series also finds pervasive links between crime and rampant corruption in the very institutions that are supposed to protect this vital resource.
These issues may not have begun with President Jair Bolonsaro’s administration, says the Post, but they have worsened significantly during his tenure:
Brazil has long struggled to bring order to the Amazon, a vast territory with little state presence. Many law enforcement agencies have for years complained of insufficient resources and nettlesome bureaucracy. But the challenges have deepened significantly during Bolsonaro’s four years in office.
This agrees with Carbon Brief’s damning report, based on their own analysis, that if Bolsonaro loses the current presidential election that’s headed to a tight run-off, it could lead to an 89% decline in deforestation in Brazil over the next decade.
The Washington Post series finds that most deforestation in the region is to clear land for cattle pasture. This is reminder that one of the easiest things anyone can do to fight climate change is to reduce your intake of meat, especially beef.
WWF: Wildlife population index plunges by 69% since 1970
The World Wildlife Foundation reports plummeting wildlife populations globally. Losses are especially great “in tropical regions that are home to some of the most biodiverse landscapes in the world,” according to Marco Lambertini, director general of WWF International. He adds that conservation in Latin America in particular is “super important for regulating the climate. We estimate currently there's something like 150 to 200 billion tonnes of carbon wrapped up in the forests of the Amazon.”
Update: Catrin Einhorn wrote a useful explainer for this finding for the New York Times that does a great job explaining what the 69% figure refers to - it is essentially an aggregate index WWF uses to track the overall status of a large number of observed wildlife populations. This finding shouldn’t be taken as a 69% decline in the animal population as a whole.
Hotter and drier, longer and worse
The UK Health Security Agency released a report this week that linked more than 2,800 deaths of people 65 and older to the country’s record-smashing heatwaves this summer, including more than 1,400 deaths in mid-August alone.
The United Nations and Red Cross Red Crescent has also released a report warning that future heat waves could make large swaths of Africa and Asia “uninhabitable” and displace as many as 600 million people. The Washington Post coverage likens the severity of health dangers from climate change to that of “all cancers or all infectious diseases.”
And the Washington Post reports on the city of Coalinga, California, which is set to run out of water in coming months, and may have to buy water to survive on the open market, where it comes at a very steep premium. I will admit a certain impatience with the cantankerous way some representatives of this Central Valley Republican enclave appear to blame the whole issue on partisan politics.
Renewable Energy and Technology
Carbon capture boost leaves conservationists skeptical
Carbon capture is a controversial approach to fighting climate change. Most proposed models for reaching net-zero emissions include some degree of carbon capture to handle processes that don’t have any viable carbon-free alternative, such as fueling airplanes or container ships. A fully-loaded Boeing 777 on a long-distance flight uses 175 tons of fuel - it is highly unlikely that batteries will ever power anything beyond short-haul flights.
Some fossil fuel companies are getting behind the push to develop carbon capture, representing it as a technology that will allow us to keep on burning fossil fuels without making any real changes - we’ll just capture all that carbon dioxide and stick it underground. Such arguments stretch credulity - see, for example, this extensive IEEFA study that found that most sequestered carbon dioxide to date has been used to drive more oil to the surface for exploitation.
The always-excellent Inside Climate News has an article analyzing the billions of dollars coming out of Congress for carbon capture and its embrace by companies like ExxonMobil - check it out.
Politics and Policy
UK’s Truss government declares war on climate
After a spectacular failure pushing tax cuts for top earners during an economic crisis, Liz Truss has set her sights on renewable energy and conservation. When thinking about how to characterize her philosophical approach to environmental stewardship, I kept coming back to the title of an early Werner Herzog film, “Every Man for Himself and God Against All.”
Here’s some of the relevant news from the last week:
Having rejected calls for a windfall tax on gigantic energy profits (the EU agreed to such a tax a few weeks ago), the UK has instead decided on a de facto windfall tax on low carbon energy providers. Britain’s Department of Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy tells us that the measure is intended to “to help sever the link between high global gas prices and the cost of low-carbon electricity.”
In news that is totally not related, the Right Honorable Kwasi Kwarteng, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Truss’s thought partner in her recent tax cuts debacle, had undisclosed meetings with senior executives of Saudi Arabian firms while he was business secretary. Such meetings are supposed to be reported, but this one was undisclosed due to an “administrative oversight.”
Update: Hours after this newsletter went out, the Right Honorable Kwasi Kwarteng was fired.
Ranil Jayawardena, the UK’s new environment secretary, is seeking to ban the deployment of solar panels on “prime agricultural land.” The move is nominally intended to preserve land for agriculture, but as Greenpeace UK has pointed out, more than five times as much land is currently used for golf courses than for solar farms in the UK.
After Truss ignored recommendations from her own climate advisors to launch a public awareness campaign calling for a reduction in energy use, the UK public regulator Ofgem stepped up on its own initiative to help meet the need.
Graham Stewart, the new climate minister, publicly declared that fracking is “good for the environment.” Truss’s government recently lifted a ban on fracking and has already issued 151 licenses that Guardian analysts warn threaten sensitive or protected lands.
Hilary McGrady, head of the National Trust, has accused Truss of “demonising” conservationists and is sounding a well-deserved alarm.
The breathtaking pace of these actions is startling. Could it be that I will actually start to feel nostalgia for the Johnson administration?
Green farming is at stake in US election
Along with many other pressing issues, a massive spending bill for farming is on the table, and the shape it takes will be largely determined by the outcome of the next election. If the GOP takes control of the Senate, they’ve already signaled their intent to block any climate spending provisions in the package. Grist reports on the bill and what’s at stake.
Kenya’s president calls for African leadership in clean energy
William Ruto, president of Kenya, wrote an opinion piece for The Guardian calling for Africa to be a leader in clean energy.
The call comes ahead of next month’s COP27 climate change talks, which is widely expected to focus heavily on the pressing issue of climate justice. One issue that will probably receive a lot of attention is compensation by major greenhouse gas polluters to countries like Pakistan, which has been devastated by massive floods that were exacerbated by the climate change that the country has done little to cause.
“Milestone” agreement on aviation emissions
The International Civil Aviation Organization has agreed to drastically lower emissions from air travel by 2050 in a long-sought but largely-symbolic achievement. The agreement, which took nearly ten years to hammer out, does include buy-in from all major polluters, but lacks any authority to set or enforce actual policy.
Join the conversation!
Any thoughts about this week’s newsletter? Something you’d like to add, or that you disagreed with? Something you’d like to see more or less of, going forward? Please let us all know in the comments below! Managing climate change is first and foremost a conversation.