Global Climate Change Mosaic: COP 20
Earlier this week Oreskes appeared in an interview in the New York Times. She spoke about her new book about the future in a world that has warmed. It would be an interesting read and builds on what she wrote about in Merchants of Doubt. If you are interested, you can check out her interview here.
Lets face it, Halloween is all about the candy! Every October, Americans spend at least $2 Billion dollars on Halloween candy. However, what most people don’t realize is that the environmental impact of these sweet treats is actually a trick. Here is the low down on Halloween candy, and how you can avoid the tricks and enjoy more treats.
Palm oil, a type of edible vegetable oil grown specifically in tropical climates, is an extremely versatile cooking oil that, among many other household items, is also found in candies. Palm oil is inexpensive and can be found in “50 percent of items found in supermarkets” (Donlon, 2014). This global commodity is extremely popular and production rates are doubling. So what is the problem with palm oil? Palm oil is a driving force of deforestation, loss of biodiversity, and greenhouse gas emissions, which are all contributing factors to climate change. Large areas of tropical forests have been destroyed throughout Latin America, Asia, and Africa in order to clear land for palm plantations. This process of deforestation has several impacts on the environment. The process of clearing the land involves slash and burn agriculture, which is the deliberate burning down of forests. This burning results in habitat loss and species disruption, which in some cases is leading to extinction. The clearing of the land also makes it easier for poachers to capture and sell wildlife. Orangoutangs are often targeted by poachers. Not only does this impact wildlife, but also it releases stored carbon into the atmosphere, thus altering the concentrations of greenhouse gasses. This is just one aspect that shows the unsustainable side of Halloween.
Read further on sustainable chocolate!
This Halloween be “HalloGREEN” and refrain from consuming candies containing palm oil!
See how to enjoy Halloween treats without destroying the planet here!
Find more information about Palm Oil and how to get involved!!
Happy HalloGREEN !!
Donlon, Diana. “Trick or Treat? The Frightening Climate Costs of Halloween Candy.” The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 24 Oct. 2014. Web. 28 Oct. 2014.
A comprehensive international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is derived from the need to halt human-induced shifts in the climate system as soon as possible. These shifts are dependent “on cumulative emissions rather than on emissions at any particular point in time” or place for that matter.[1] There may be some nations, such as China or the United States, that need to reduce their emissions significantly more than others, but they cannot be the only reductions. Every other nation that is party to the UNFCCC must make reduction efforts if there is to be a holistic commitment by the entire international community. This means that nothing can fall through the cracks, which has been seen in past “top down” and “bottom up” approaches. A less rigid and more all-inclusive agreement needs to be reached. This agreement will have to come in the form of a “mixed track” initiative in order to allow for the flexibility needed by the broad range of interests displayed in the Parties.
This new agreement will come out of the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action (ADP), whose directive is to “develop a protocol, another legal instrument, or an agreed outcome with legal force under the Convention applicable to all Parties.”[2] The ADP is also charged with having this agreement ready for the 2015 negotiations. This would allow for it to be adopted and for implementation to begin in 2020, at the end of the extended Kyoto Protocol.
This new instrument will need to address the issue from a new perspective, as old agreements have not been comprehensive enough. A “mixed track” initiative would allow for flexibility and what is termed as “variable geometry” within the negotiations.[3] What this means is that certain parties would be able to take up different pledges in order to meet requirements set out for their particular region. This approach is not the one-size fit all that has been seen in the past. It avoids some of the pitfalls experienced by the stricter “bottom up” and “top down” approaches. An example of improvements to be made on the “top down” approach can be seen in the Kyoto Protocol’s lack of flexibility in developing emissions reductions targets. A more flexible approach would allow for non-absolute targets and allow for more participants, while promoting equity through nationally appropriate targets. This level of flexibility can be seen in the “bottom up” approach style, however the dependence on domestic governments in the development of national protocols has held some nations back from developing plans. The “mixed track” approach would offer the “variable geometry” that Bodansky mentioned. Nations would be able to develop a plan for emissions reductions, while still acting under the international regime target of emissions reductions, and have a higher likelihood of meeting that plan- seeing it was developed with domestic interests in mind. An issue of complexity does come to my mind when I think about this approach. Developing a system that could capture the many interests and needs of the international community without duplicating processes could prove to be difficult. But, no system is going to be a simple design. If this “mixed approach” could be agreed upon and developed it could get the job done.
Works Cited
Bodansky, Daniel & Elliot Diringer. 2010. The Evolution of Multilateral Regimes: Implications for Climate Change. Pew Center on Global Climate Change, Arlington, VA.
Bodansky, Daniel. 2012. THE DURBAN PLATFORM: ISSUES AND OPTIONS FOR A 2015 AGREEMENT. Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, Arizona State University.
UNFCCC/CP/2011/9/Add.1
[1] Bodansky and Diringer, 2010
[2] UNFCCC/CP/2011/9/Add.1
[3] Bodansky, 2012
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As was brought up countless times on our trip to D.C. last week, a main concern with U.S. climate policies is the possibility of a changing political leader every four or eight years. Furthermore, by including congressional elections to this equation, every two years the U.S. national political climate (no pun intended) changes. Thanks to the U.S. system of checks and balances, no matter whether it is the presidency or congressional majorities which change, both positions have the powerful ability to change policies through tools such as limiting funding and executive orders. There is hope that because Obama’s initiative for energy emissions reduction through the Clean Power Plan is implemented through the Clean Air Act, there will be few attempts to disassemble it as the Clean Air Act has met little opposition thus far.
This attention on national climate policy is no longer such a fringe topic, as is exemplified by the use of climate change as a debate topic for the upcoming Senate mid-term elections reported on by Coral Davenport and Ashley Parker in the NYTimes. Both Republicans and Democrats are focusing on climate, energy, and the environment in their ad campaigns and in some unpredictable ways. For example, both Republicans and Democrats in coal-producing states such as West Virginia are careful to support the industry and workers. However, in Colorado, Republican Senator Cory Gardner preaches clean energy in front of a wind turbine backdrop in one of his ads. The bottom line is no matter the stance, climate change will be a more central topic in this year’s midterm elections and even in the 2016 presidential elections. Already, senate debates in Arkansas, West Virginia, Louisiana, Kentucky, Colorado, and Iowa have included climate and environmental topics, compared to the 2012 presidential debates where climate change did not come up once.
The greater centrality of climate and energy policies in upcoming domestic elections makes me hopeful that something could be done regarding climate change in the future, and even better, possibly independent of a candidate’s party affiliation. Additionally, this rise in domestic political focus speaks to and provides hope for the idea that domestic action is the only way climate action will take place, even if determined on the international regime level. The need for nation-states’, and non-state actors for that matter, is vital for any possibility of international regime goals such as the 2°C warming limit, to be achieved.
Just a bit ago, James Balog came to Dickinson to receive his Rose-Walters Prize for Global Environmental Activism. He came to check out all sectors of environmentalism at our college. I was able to spend lots of quality time with Balog– he ate breakfast at my home, the Center for Sustainable Living, came to my work at the Alliance for Aquatic Resource Monitoring, and he stopped by our mosaic class.
During our interactions, I was struck by how eloquent Balog was when talking about nature. When asked about how he felt connected with nature, he talked about how the night connected him with the universe. The sky is deceiving, he said, when the light stops hitting the particles in the atmosphere, you see where we really are. You see that we are actually on a rock, speeding though outer space. You see that we have a small home in a vast universe and we have to protect it. We can’t allow our little space ship to be uninhabitable.
He said several times that there is no one thing that each person should do to combat climate change, we each have our own talents and should use those talents for the cause. Balog is using his artistic skills to raise awareness about increased glacial melting due to climate change. Sometimes, visual evidence can persuade people of the danger in ways charts and figures cannot.
You don’t need to be an economist or environmental expert to make a difference- if everyone used their own talents in slowing climate change, the force would be unstoppable.
By Maeve Hogel
A week ago today, we had the opportunity to spend two days in Washington D.C., listening to and learning from many incredible people working in the climate change field. By the end of the second day, I was exhausted and my attention span had been shot. However, our last speaker, Keya Chatterjee from the WWF, said something that caught my attention and has kept me thinking since then. She said that information doesn’t change people. She explained that those people out there who still don’t believe in climate change have already seen the graphs and the statistics and presenting them with more information won’t make them a believer. So then what can we do to get people to care about climate change? According to Keya, the answer lies in music, movies and T.V.
Music, historically, has been a powerful medium to represent cultures and time periods. Recently it has been used to make much more obvious political statements. Macklemore and Ryan Lewis played their hit Same Love at the 2014 Grammys, showing their support for equal marriage to an audience 28.5 million viewers. Similarly, Puerto Rican band Calle 13 has spread the word about the struggles in Latin America through many of their songs, including their recent release of El Aguante. Meaning ‘Endurance’ in English, the song discusses all of the things humans have endured through, from Pompeii to Hitler to Hiroshima. However, despite a comment about severe weather events and a jab at Monsanto, environmental issues are left out of Calle 13’s new song. Which leads to me ask, is the issue of climate change not conducive to songs and movies or do people just not care enough to talk about it in those mediums yet?
My guess is the second. I still think information is important; I firmly believe that education is a key component of solutions to most problems. However, when it comes to climate change, there seems to be a whole lot of people who know the information, but just don’t really care. People do, however, care a lot about music, movies and T.V.
By Elizabeth Plascencia
Last semester I was enrolled in ERSC 202: Energy Resources with Professor of Natural Philosophy, Marcus Key. Our primary learning objectives revolved around understanding the physics, chemistry, and geology of energy resources. We also reviewed some of the major economic, political, and environmental implications within the exploration and exploitation of certain energy resources. I felt extremely well informed once I had a better grasp on the physical earth systems that created the natural resources. The common jargon of “fossil fuel” suddenly made all the sense in the world. This course sparked my interest in alternative or “green” energy resources ever since.
Our course final project was to present an oral PowerPoint presentation to inform our peers on an energy resource of choice. My colleagues presented on a vast range of alternative energies including solar, wind, hydrothermal, geothermal, biomass, etc. I decided to explore geothermal energy in Iceland, because I spent the beginning of my first summer after freshmen year in Iceland with Professor of Earth Sciences, Benjamin Edwards, conducting pillow-lava research. Nearly two years later, I am still obsessed with Iceland. As an active climate change activist, it was incredibly moving to see alternative energy as a major resource in a nation. For more information on geothermal energy in Iceland, check out this link: http://www.nea.is/geothermal/
Now with that background in mind, I was so excited to find this article on the first airborne wind turbine in the world. It is projected to harness renewable wind energy and Wi-Fi to Fairbanks, Alaska. It is so great to see an initiative like this take off because a colleague in my ERSC 202: Energy Resources course actually did her final presentation on this MIT startup, Altaeros Energies. At the time there were only prototypes but now this airborne wind turbine is expected to launch sometime next year!
Progress is key.
Click here to check out the article: http://inhabitat.com/worlds-first-airborne-wind-turbine-to-bring-renewable-energy-and-wifi-to-alaska/
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After this weeks discussions in Germany, negotiations has stalled leading up to Lima. Developed countries were not able to agree to a deal on financing the developing nations in exchange for their commitment to reduce emissions. This will continue to play out all the way through Lime. How are developed nations going to meet their $100 Billion pledge by 2020? With financing pieces from the US falling through, it looks challenging, but to get developing nations on board to reduce GHG emissions, it must be done. Read more here about the developments.
The City Commission and Mayor of South Miami recently passed a resolution calling for South Florida to split away from North Florida over climate change. They cite inaction from a more conservative North Florida as a key reason for splitting. Sea level rise will have drastic effects on Southern Florida as much of the coast line is very close to sea level with much topographic change over great distances. A good calculator for sea level rise can be found here.
It will be interesting to see how this develops and if South Florida is actually able to split or if the politics will be sorted out and they can do more on climate change adaptation.
Read more about the new South Florida here.