Climate & Society – Page 9 – COP 20: Lima, Peru

August 31, 2014September 21, 2014

The Impact of Human’s Hamartia on Climate Change: Procrastination at it’s Finest

In a discussion about climate change with my father, I mentioned the dire circumstance of Earth’s future and the necessity for change on a global scale. He smiled at me and said with a shrug “Heather, they were saying that stuff when I was at school. And look, nothing happened, we are still fine and we will continue to be fine”. I hate to admit it, but my father is a climate-change-denier.

Denial is a trait that we all share and exhibit to varying degrees, which can ultimately lead to procrastination. When a hard-to-grasp or difficult situation arises, it’s easy to ignore the major issue and focus on the smaller ones. In regard’s to climate change, human’s hamartia (fatal flaw) is denying that climate change is an issue, leading to the worldwide procrastination of changing our high-energy consuming lifestyles. Fencer R. Weart discusses this dilemma through the historical analysis of scientist’s climate change discoveries in his book “The Discovery of Global Warming”.

Surprisingly enough, as far back at 1896, scientists already understood that global warming was occurring and human activities were responsible for contributing to atmosphere’s imbalance. Meaning that the academic world has been aware of climate change for 118 years and there has only been an increase in fossil fuel emissions. It seems that as a race we are in severe denial about what is going on with our planet and the implications we are causing for ourselves for two major reasons. One reason is that climate change is a long-term issue that so far has not required immediate attention. At least in American society, it seems that people would rather concentrate on the internal issues, such as gun laws and health care. These issues are important, but are more short term rather than long term. Even though, the effects of global warming have not drastically affected our daily lives, there will be consequence for future generations around the world due to longevity of the feedback cycle.

The other reason is due to the orchestration of science is based on theory and uncertainties. People value certainty for when something is unsure it allows for people to believe there is another possible outcome or that action is not required because it COULD not happen. For example, if the weather report predicts 100% chance of rain, then one will most likely wear a rain jacket; but if the report predicts for 50% chance of rain, one will most likely ignore the report. A problem that requires immediate attention will often receive action because it’s easier to act upon something that is more concrete. Throughout human history, the uncertainties have affected the credibility of climate change. Even though, that’s how science works, people were able to foster in the unknown and say that even the professionals don’t know what is occurring.

When an issue is not set in stone and is at a global scale that requires an immense change in lifestyle, it is understandable why dealing with climate change has been pushed to the back- burner for over a hundred years. However, if we continue this extensive error in judgment about global warming, it could lead to our ultimate downfall.

August 30, 2014September 21, 2014

How to Distort Truth and Neglect Facts

There is always a choice. Right now it is an incredibly important choice; the shift away from a the self-destructive habits that have been formed over the years of our development in order to preserve our global society. The petroleum-based ways of life we have come to know so well has reached a precipice. The planet’s atmosphere is filling with greenhouse gasses at an alarming rate; gasses that the industrialized world are mostly responsible for. That means me,, that means President Obama, that means Aunt Alice in Ithaca. We need to change the way we as a global society operate. For too long have we dumped our waste into the atmosphere. Part of this was due to ignorance. However, as of late, it has been due to inaction.

Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway’s Merchants of Doubt explains how several scientists in combination with several think tanks have been able to warp truth and distort facts since the mid-20th century. From tobacco smoke and its link to cancer to the denial of global warming, no chance has been missed by these “merchants” to benefit from regulatory inaction and the misdirection of the public. The authors explain that the merchandising of scientific doubt was seen around the 1970s when scientists began to find links between tobacco smoke and higher rates of cancer. Sensing a possible hit to their revenue, the large tobacco firms began to work together, looking for a way to ensure that no such link was ever seen by the public. They found their answer in a few willing scientists who, through some questionable decisions, were able to temporarily keep the public from completing understanding the dangers of tobacco smokes. It is obvious now that what they did was in vain, as the Surgeon General’s warning is very obviously placed on all tobacco products.

Now these groups are turning to climate change denial. The George C. Marshall Institute, an essential part of keeping alive the possibility of Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative, found a fresh voice in the climate change discussion. Scientists working within the institute wrote a report that essentially pointed to the sun’s increased solar output as the culprit of a warming Earth. It is also now known that they were wrong. There is now a consensus within the scientific community that anthropogenic greenhouse gases are causing the enhanced greenhouse effect that is currently being experienced. This consensus may not have existed years ago when the denial began, but scientists knew that the chance of an anthropogenic climatic shift was possible. The Marshall Institute was criticized heavily for the report, but they made their way through and the denial still exists today.

Why do this though? Why deny facts and push doubt unto the public? Personal agendas are partly to blame. The scientists at the heart of the doubt-mongering reports- Fred Seitz, Fred Singer, Bill Nierenberg, and Robert Jastrow- were anti-communist and therefore willing to do anything to keep government powers to a minimum, as well as destroy environmentalist who were seen as potential “cousins” to the communists. The think tanks that funded the research received their funding from massive corporations in the concerned industries. These agendas have led policy astray and lended a hand to the inaction experienced today on climate issues. While the debate may still rage on in some corners and inaction still runs rampant, the planet is warming rapidly and everything and everyone is implicated. We have a problem. We know about it. We need to work together to solve it. That starts by agreeing on reality.

August 30, 2014September 21, 2014

A Change at Home

Over winter break last year I was on a hike in the hills around my home in San Rafael, California with my two siblings. It was in that space of time between Christmas and New Years and it was an incredible day; not a cloud in the sky and perfectly warm sunshine was hitting us. I have spent long mornings and afternoons throughout my life running and hiking in them, surrounded on either side by tall grasses and oak trees. When you get to the top you are guaranteed a particularly beautiful view of the Bay Area. You can see the Golden Gate Bridge and all the way to the financial district of San Francisco, the East Bay, the Headlands, and the beginnings of Napa.

We were taking a break near the top, gazing at our stunning surroundings. But instead of being comforted by the familiar sights I was on edge looking around. The grass should have be green this time of year but it was the color of straw, we hadn’t needed to jump the creek as we normally did in December; this was the landscape I knew as summertime not winter.

California is in the middle of the worst drought it has ever had on record. In parts of the state the ground has raised up to half an inch because water is no longer weighing it down. Just in the last few years the landscape of my home is being completely altered because of climate change.

I do not consider my self a scientist or even a scientist in the making. Nor have I ever really attempted to delve into the world of science aside from the mandatory classes in elementary through high school. However, in The Discovery of Global Warming, Spencer Weart lead his audience not just through the scientific milestones behind our current understanding of climate change but how other major historical events interacted and informed the blunt science. From the 1896 calculation that asserted global warming was possible through human emissions to the media coverage informing the public in the 80s. The fact is the weather has been changing since the beginning of the industrial revolution and it has been swift. However, we are reaching a point where the consequences are dire if action is not taken just as rapidly.

While reading this book I thought back to that moment with my siblings when I fully understood for the first time that climate change is not in the future, it is here. I also thought back to a poem by Donald Marquis entitled “What the Ants are Saying.” For me, one stanza sums up all the science I know and the personal experiences I have with climate change:

what man calls civilization

always results in deserts

man is never on the square

he uses up the fat and greenery of the earth

each generation wastes a little more

of the future with greed and lust for riches

August 30, 2014September 21, 2014

Infrastructure: The Road to Survival

It’s not sexy. It doesn’t work well on a bumper sticker easily. It doesn’t bring in big donations to charities or get people energized. But infrastructure is the key to our future survival and prosperity. A continually changing climate and environment necessitates advancing infrastructure renewal to keep pace. In Bill McKibben’s Eaarth, a new world is described that is radically different than the one we currently enjoy, and one that we may even begin to experience within our lifetimes. The effects of global warming on this new world, Eaarth, will have serious economic repercussions; for example, Hurricane Katrina caused about $108 billion of damage in the United States. The infrastructure that was in place before the storm was severely insufficient to match the storm, even though predictions had been made before the storm hit in 2005 that the infrastructure needed to be beefed up in case of a direct hit by a hurricane. Had the city’s infrastructure been attended to before the storm, the economic and personal costs to the people of New Orleans would have been far less severe.

A well-maintained infrastructure is pivotal to whether or not we can maintain the lifestyles we have grown accustomed to. If any more delay persists, the global economy will be dangerously unprepared for the looming fate that awaits us just over the horizon. Shocks on the scale of Hurricane Katrina are not going away; they’ll be a fact of life, and we need to be proactive with precautionary measures and fundamental changes to our economic and physical landscape in order to weather the impending storm (pun intended).

However, McKibben is not suggesting just throwing money randomly on infrastructure renewal projects; he implores a smarter, long-term planning perspective that takes into consideration the changes that will happen not only in the next decade or two, but over the next century. Rising sea levels will submerge coastal roads and bridges around the world; rather than repairing those that most likely will be inaccessible in a few years, it’s more effective to repair infrastructure that is out of the danger zone and that will be available for use further into the future. If we’re smart about what and how we overhaul our infrastructure systems, we’ll be far better prepared to withstand what lies ahead.

McKibben said “we’ve got to harden our communities so they can withstand the couple of degrees of global warming that are now inescapable.” Investment in infrastructure is not only to ensure our long-term prosperity, although it is that; it is also to guarantee and protect our ability to adapt and function in the ever-changing world and to survive. Everything is at stake, and it won’t be easy to defend it. But, when you weigh the options, the course of action is clear.

August 29, 2014September 21, 2014

A New Narrative of Change

I come from an incredibly liberal household in a very progressive area of the country. So, growing up I was always very aware of climate change and what it might mean for my future. I was raised to care about environmental issues and taught to make the connections between them and other issues in society, politics and the economy from an early age. Coming from this background I was always shocked and put off to hear how the issue of climate change challenged by unbelieving Americans. Until reading Merchants of Doubt, my first reaction was to blame their own ignorance and be angry with what I perceived as their apathy. However, I have come to see a different side of the story, one in which they were instead misguided by people they trusted to have the facts. I am still stunned and outraged by the people who spread misinformation as a tool for their own personal agenda but it is unfair to always accuse the listener.

Earlier this summer I read a booklet entitled Organizing Cools the Planet: Tools and Reflections to Navigate the Climate Crisis, and in it I found a quote that resonated. It said that too often, “Activists assume that because something is true, it will be meaningful to the people [they are] trying to reach. But In fact, the opposite is often the case: if something is meaningful, people believe it to be true” (26). The merchants of doubt in otherwise settled scientific matters were successful because they could tell a story that was easy to listen to and believe. However, going forward it is important for us, who know the facts, to give meaning to them in an accessible way. Climate change clearly cannot be tackled with only a handful of people and a few simple cures. The importance of giving the crisis a face and a narrative is crucial to create positive change, especially going forward into COP20.

August 29, 2014September 21, 2014

Seeds of Change: Sustainable Agriculture

Often when we hear the phrases “eat your greens” or “eating healthy” we do not make the connection with creating a “greener” planet or a healthy climate. Yet, in Diet for a Hot Planet, Anna Lappe makes it clear that our food is inextricably linked with climate change. So often in hearing and learning about the climate crisis on our doorstep (although perhaps now the metaphor should be in our kitchen) I am left with a poignant feeling of despair. I get the sense that the forces perpetuating climate change are too great, and the opposition too meager. However, this book illuminated the incredible potential of sustainable agriculture locked within an otherwise bleak portrait of the future. According to her the current food system is responsible for roughly one third of all greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. It is to blame for most of the nitrous oxide and methane emissions (two of the most damaging greenhouse gasses). Yet, through changing the way we farm, eat, and dispose of our food, agriculture could sequester roughly forty percent of all current emissions. Rarely, if ever, have I discovered such an obvious change that could make a significant impact on our future.

Personally, these are some of the most hopeful facts I have heard. Not only that, but it is a solution that I, and others within the Dickinson community, are already taking part in directly at the College Farm. Though the farm I have attended the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture conference where I saw the backstage of a movement that has been growing throughout America and abroad. It has been popping up in the form of local farmers markets, cooking in popular restaurants, and taking seed in the grocery aisles now dedicated to “organics.” There are websites devoted to grassroots fundraising for “green” farms, and organizations created to cultivate a herd of young farmers. Just in the past year at Dickinson I have had a direct relationship with sustainable farming, learning its possibilities, successes and promise.

Personally, what is most exciting about sustainable agriculture are it’s many intersections with so many other crucial issues in our society, offering solutions to them as well. What we eat and where it comes from crosses the field to impact many of the systemic health problems and issues of social justice we as a society face. Industrial agriculture relies on petroleum-based, toxic chemicals, synthetic fertilizers and is generally heavily processed (think corn syrup). Two of the leading causes of death in America, heart disease and diabetes, are directly correlated with eating poorly. The process of industrial agriculture also requires farm workers. These workers are habitually some of the most marginalized Americans, often immigrants, at incredibly high risk for cancers and other serious health threats because of the toxins they encounter daily.

Sustainability is not always accessible to Americans, but we have to eat food everyday. For many people it is hard to see the benefits of turning off the lights, taking shorter showers or riding public transportation but our relationship with food is crucial on a primal level, it literally comprises what we are. Sustainable agriculture is one of several key solutions necessary to slow and prevent climate change and it is one we can feel good about doing.

August 29, 2014September 21, 2014

Where the free market fails

Current political conservative rhetoric typically bashes the government’s regulatory role and promotes a completely free market economy. This view, which became very popular with Ronald Reagan, fails from the perspective of negative externalities and a lack of full cost consideration. If the US had a completely free market, business would be able to rape and pillage land to access mineral reserves, such as fossil fuels to feed our growing population and economy. Fortunately, for the environment, the US government has put in place a series of laws, which protect people, air, land and water. However, these laws and regulations are the very reason why we have climate deniers. Any group (governmental, non-profit, or business) which has a cost presented to it, through legislation or possible action, has a vested interested (benefit) from not having that action completed, this is why corporations have hired people like Seitz, Singer, Nierenberg and others to spread doubt.

These people such as Fred Seitz and Fred Singer (as described in Merchants of Doubt) are essentially climate hit-men, old reputable scientists working to promote the interest of corporations looking to profit from resource extraction or products that damage personal/environmental health (ie. Cigarettes or DDT). These corporations have a vested interest in avoiding the added externalities of their products, and thus are willing to spend millions of dollars to prevent any kind of environmental or health governmental action. This is where the media begins to unfairly represent climate change. Journalists are used to presenting two sides of any argument from neighborhood parks to health care, journalists attempt to cover both sides of the story. They are mistaken then when they attempt to do the same with climate change or scientific issues in general. Seeing as the public does not read scientific journals, Seitz, Singer, and others are able to insert their propaganda into the mass media. This leads to bias in the media in how climate change deniers are presented to the public. Deniers are typically given equal time and reputation for a factually incorrect viewpoint. This is the first step that must change in order to help the public understand the degree of certainty that we have (as scientists) in the current research on climate. (See John Oliver’s show here for a more accurate, and comic, representation of a debate)

In the end, it is the responsibility of those of us who have contributed most to the pollution to take action now to prevent future devastation. Climate change is like second-hand smoke. Those of us in the developed world (the smokers) have been polluting for decades and have raised levels of greenhouse gases to unsafe atmospheric levels. In this analogy the citizens of the developing world are the ones who are now faced with a problem in which they did not contribute (received all the costs without any benefits). The developed world still faces these issues, if not more so, because we must find an alternative way to run our economy.

August 28, 2014September 19, 2014

Steve Schneider: “We are not in the business of equal time for all claims”

Stephen Schneider (1945-2010) placed great importance on scientists engaging with the public and policy makers to raise awareness and understanding about climate change, and he was one of the most audible scientific voices on this issue in the public sphere. You’ll find a number of references to Steve in two of the books that we read over the summer for the Mosaic — Weart’s Discovery of Global Warming and Oreskes & Conway’s Merchants of Doubt.

I’m reading Steve’s book Science as a Contact Sport in which he recounts in detail some of the events described by Oreskes and Conway in which Steve was a principal participant or observer. In his book, Steve addresses the “doctrine of balance” as applied by media in news coverage of climate change. He writes that the doctrine

“is pernicious when applied to science, because science is rarely just two-sided like two-party politics, where balance is appropriate. Scientists winnow out the relative likelihoods of all of the various potential outcomes. We are not in the business of equal time for all claims; we are in the business of quality of evidence assessment. Therefore, what we need to do is report the relative strength of the arguments, not give equal time to all claimants of truth.” (pp 119-120).

I had the privilege of working with Steve on the IPCC’s 2001 report. This photo was taken of us at a meeting in Geneva near the end of our work on the Synthesis Report.

You can watch Steve talk about Science and Distortion in this video produced by Stephen Thomson of Plomomedia:

Stephen Schneider: Science and Distortion

August 28, 2014September 21, 2014

We want real green, not camouflage!

As a recent vegetarian of about two months ago, reading Diet for a Hot Planet by Anna Lappé has helped to solidify my decision in becoming a vegetarian and has all around helped me to dig deeper in thought about the food I consume. Anna Lappé touches upon several aspects of the food industry as a whole with the intent that the reader may not know that the food industry in its entirety has a larger effect on global warming than the entire transportation industry combined. She brings to the attention of the reader everything that goes into producing food; manufacturing of pesticides, fertilizers, and other chemicals, distribution of these chemicals, equipment and machinery used in on the farms, the multitude of feed crops for industrial scale farming that is needed to feed cattle and poultry, the transportation of feed crops, the transportation of meat and produce from country to country, etc.. Within her book, she also discusses several other issues with the food industry.

One thing in particular that I found most attention-grabbing in Lappé’s work was her “How to” section on deciphering whether or not large scale corporations are advertising their recent “green” initiatives for publicity and popularity or out of a sincere effort to reduce their carbon emissions. The following is a brief overview of what she has to say on this matter and questions to consider.

Are claims relevant? It is easy to take credit for something that does not require any effort such as claiming to be “CFC free” when CFC’s have already been phased out or claiming to be “GMO free” when ingredients may not even be available in modified forms.
Are claims vague? Terms such as “all-natural”, “chemical-free”, “eco”, and “green” have no true official definition.
Are claims a decoy? Companies are filled with hidden trade-offs. Example: Processed foods companies claiming to contain only organic ingredients while they are produced in toxic plastics.
What tense are commitments made in? Many companies use forward-looking language such as “may”, “might”, “intend”, or “expect” that actually take them off the hook of having to follow through with their promises.
Is the commitment generous or a gimmick? Companies that say they donate percentages of their profits have “total giving limits” in the fine print. Consumers may think that some of their purchase is helping a cause elsewhere, when the total giving limit has already been met and none of your purchase goes to the cause.
Does the context trump the commitment? Coca-Cola uses about 2.5 liters of water to produce 1 liter of beverage but they state they are “working to get that number down”. Even with a 25% reduction, they are still wasting to produce. The bigger issue here, millions of people in our world lack access to safe drinking water.

See also www.stopgreenwash.org, www.greenerchoices.org, and www.futerra.co.uk for more information on corporate industry greenwashing.

Lappé, Anna. Diet for a Hot Planet: The Climate Crisis at the End of Your Fork and What You Can Do about It. New York: Bloomsbury USA, 2010. Print.

August 22, 2014September 21, 2014

Acid precipitation research at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest

In 1955 the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest (HBEF) in the White Mountains of New Hampshire was established to investigate the surrounding watershed ecosystem. In 1963 the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study (HBES) was started by a collaboration of colleagues, later that year they discovered acid rain. Although this area is far removed from urban areas, it’s rain recorded pH measurements that were less than 4, while ordinary rain in this setting is typically expected to be measured around a 5.6. (Oreskes)

Acidic substances such as lemon juice have low pH values and more basic substances have higher pH values; the scale ranges from 0 being the most acidic to 14 being the most basic and 7 being a neutral value. Prior to the 1963 HBES, acidic precipitation brought on by volcanoes and natural phenomena and in areas with high industrial pollution had already been discovered, but anthropogenicly induced acid rain in rural areas had not. In this case, acid rain can be defined as “precipitation that has a pH lower than 5.6 because of human influences such as the burning of fossil fuels.” (Welman)

In Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes, she addresses the uncertainties that arose in the debate over the researching and policy making process during President Ronald Reagan’s administration. She mentions the Acid Rain Peer Review Panel (ARPRP) that pushed for legislation on policy making that would set limits on nitrous oxide emissions and the opposing parties such as Bill Nierenberg, Fred Singer, and the Reagan Administration who significantly changed the panel’s final report without their knowing. (Oreskes) However, what I found most intriguing about the entire acid rain story is that it was discovered in New Hampshire, the state I grew up in. This persuaded me to look into what is currently going on at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest located just two hours North of where I live.

Once a week technicians carefully go out into the woods and collect precipitation samples that accumulate over a seven-day period. The samples are brought back to the lab, measured, and stored in a long-term database. Precipitation is collected though several funnel-shaped tools that open into a storage bottle with an overflow valve and an anti-precipitation design. Once in the lab, the samples are tested for nitrates, Carbon, Nitrogen, conductivity, and pH. Acid precipitation patterns and trends are then examined as well as its effects on animals, plants, trees, soils, streams, and the entire ecosystem as a whole. It has indeed proven to alter soils, cause stress on vegetation, and impair streams and lakes in the North East in recent decades. (Welman)

For more information on any aspects of the HBEF or the HBES, including acid precipitation research, please visit http://www.hubbardbrook.org

Works Cited:
Oreskes, Naomi, and Erik M. Conway. Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming. New York: Bloomsbury, 2010. Print.
Welman, Adam, and Marianne Krasny. “Acid Rain Research at the HBEF.” N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Aug. 2014. <http://www.hubbardbrook.org/6-12_education/Introduction/Intro13.htm>.