Event in Ilminster on 27 April
Our last chance to prevent climate catastrophe?
The Warehouse Theatre was packed to capacity for a meeting arranged by South Somerset Climate Action. Rosie Boycott, the journalist, was joined on stage by Mayer Hillman the UK’s premier researcher into environmental matters and author of How We Can Save the Planet (Penguin)
Mayer Hillman delivered a devastating attack on governments and their advisors. Speaking lucidly and without notes, he outlined the causes of global warming. He castigated the excesses of our consumer society and our apparent lack of concern for the future of our children and grandchildren. He stressed that our lack of action is having dire consequences. We are hurtling towards climate catastrophe.
He insisted that the Contraction and Convergence framework devised by the Global Commons Institute is the only answer. The goal is that, a few years from now, everyone on the planet should have almost the same carbon allowance. By this time nations like ours will have contracted their carbon use by about 90%. The poorest nations will have increased theirs to converge at the same allowance per person. We can only hope that the planet will be able to cope with the carbon dioxide produced but there can be no guarantee. Within this system, people who use less than their allowance of carbon will be able to sell their surplus to those who use more. This will have the benefit of reducing the gap between the richest and poorest which is often considered to be a major source of tensions between and within communities.
Mayer particularly criticised the air transport industry. A flight to New York would take ten years of an individual’s carbon allowance - it was that bad. In the same breath he condemned the Olympics and other international sporting events because of the air travel they would encourage.
The Government has set a target of a 60% reduction of UK carbon emissions by 2050 which sounds impressive until examined. First, it is set well into the future so there is no electoral risk. Second, the government’s short-term target will be missed - indeed emissions are currently increasing. It gets much worse. Before the Industrial Revolution, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was 270 ppmv (parts per million by volume). It is now 380 ppmv - a 40% increase. Even if the Government’s target is met, the carbon dioxide concentration will still reach 550ppmv - double the natural level.
To put this another way, the fossil fuels we have burned so far have caused temperatures to rise enough to cause the Greenland ice sheet to start breaking up. As a result the sea will flood low-lying areas like London and the Somerset levels this century. If fossil fuels continue to be burned, sea levels could rise by a staggering 11 metres! (Yes, metres not centimetres.) Sir David King, the Government’s Chief Scientist has said that temperatures will rise by 3ºC. This will cause problems beyond our imaginings yet the Government tells us that concentrations more than twice the pre-industrial levels will be safe!
Nor can technology be relied on to deliver the necessary energy savings - major behavioural change is also required and this cannot be achieved by a voluntary approach. Only governments can negotiate on the adoption of Contraction and Convergence and only governments can legislate for Tradable Carbon Allowances.
The political parties must develop a common approach.
Further details of Mayer Hillman’s book How we can save the planet. A new publication How to save the planet with the sub-title - Our last chance to prevent catastrophic climate change is being printed by St. Martin’s Press
Rosie Boycott
Rosie Boycott stressed that climate change demands action by governments and by us individually - we must identify personal actions and take them. Globalisation has brought us cheap goods and generated a throwaway society. Meat production puts an unsustainable pressure on agriculture; we must develop an almost wartime attitude to waste and recycling.
She challenged the Christian Church to re-examine its notion that man was given ‘dominion’ over the planet and felt we should better understand the meaning of Gaia - that the world and all its species are interdependent and that we are not the world¹s masters. We need to develop sustainable lifestyles.
After a vigorous question time, Joe Burlington, founder of South Somerset Climate Action, thanked the audience for their attentiveness. He urged them to spread the word, press for political change and take personal action.
2 May 2006
“The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.” Albert Einstein