There are several strands to the Global Warming situation. To address all in detail would take too long so I'm going to ask that you accept the evidence on some points.
The First Point I ask you to accept is that the planet is warming and that it is down primarily to CO2 which in turn is down to our burning of fossil fuels. The scientific evidence on this is pretty solid. There is plenty of readily accessible evidence showing the link between CO2 and temperature rise so I won't reproduce it here. To see the inexorable increase in CO2 just take a look at the latest measurements on the following web site:-
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/graph.html
CO2 levels only move in one direction - upwards. And at an ever quickening pace. They need to move in totally the opposite direction!
(Note that this site a US research facility and the Trump administration is making noises about cutting funding in this area. Visit it while you can, an excellent source of real data. )
The point is that whatever we put up there each year is just added to what is there already. Even to meet the modest Paris 2016 CO2 reduction committments we need to half the emissions every 10 years until they get to near zero. Is that really going to happen?
The Second Point to consider is whether it matters.
And there are various ways to look at it.
1. If we care about what we are leaving for future generation - it matters.
2. If we care about the very survival of the human species (see my other blog called Cosmic Concerns for a cosmic view on things) - it matters
3. If we care about the immediate survival of thousands of other species - it matters
4. If you are a politician only looking at how to get elected next time round - it doesn't matter
5. If you are having a fairly comfortable life and don't want to worry yourself thinking about the future too much - it doesn't matter
The Third Point relates to what anyone can do about it.
Some countries, notably Sweden, Germany and France, are making excellent progress in moving away from fossil fuels but as wonderful as this may be we have to bear in mind that this is a global problem. Even if the UK were to reduce its emission to zero tomorrow it would only have around a 1% impact on the global CO2 level. It would still keep rising. So what real differnce will the action of an individual in the UK make to this global problem?
The big success for the 2016 Paris agreement was not in what it actually achieved in terms of controlling CO2 levels, it was in getting the whole world to agree to accept that there is a serious problem and to work together to do something about it. The key word is together. It only takes one large global emitter to go back on the agreement and the whole process is futile. Think Trump. It all comes down to politics in terms of achieving anything significant. We will certainly see some strong political action when we get to the point at which GW is wreaking havoc with food supplies bringing mass migrations and resource conflicts. But it may well be too late by then. We may have passed an irreversible tipping point.
So what can an individual do? Obviously everything any one individual does will help. But by how much? Is it worth the sacrifice? To make a significant difference would required the majority of the population to make really significant lifestyle changes. How do you go about making that happen?
There will always be a small number of individuals who will act in a responsible manner simply because they feel a moral obligation to do so. They have a conscience we could say. But I suspect the majority don't concern themselves with issues outside their daily bubble. And a perfectly valid opt-out would be that it's the job of politicians to sort out these matters - it's what we pay them for.
But if we don't think politicians are doing a good enough job over GW how do we address that?
Unlike many other problems that have confronted the human race, as individuals we can't escape this particular problem, by shutting ourselves away from it, or by moving to a more enlightened country. It should be a challenge that unites us. Yet today the world is regressing back to its primitive tribal instincts with short-sighted nationalism on the rise again. It is not at all obvious that our species has the maturity to resolve this one.
The First Point I ask you to accept is that the planet is warming and that it is down primarily to CO2 which in turn is down to our burning of fossil fuels. The scientific evidence on this is pretty solid. There is plenty of readily accessible evidence showing the link between CO2 and temperature rise so I won't reproduce it here. To see the inexorable increase in CO2 just take a look at the latest measurements on the following web site:-
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/graph.html
CO2 levels only move in one direction - upwards. And at an ever quickening pace. They need to move in totally the opposite direction!
(Note that this site a US research facility and the Trump administration is making noises about cutting funding in this area. Visit it while you can, an excellent source of real data. )
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| CO2 just keeps rising - it needs to come down ! |
The point is that whatever we put up there each year is just added to what is there already. Even to meet the modest Paris 2016 CO2 reduction committments we need to half the emissions every 10 years until they get to near zero. Is that really going to happen?
The Second Point to consider is whether it matters.
And there are various ways to look at it.
1. If we care about what we are leaving for future generation - it matters.
2. If we care about the very survival of the human species (see my other blog called Cosmic Concerns for a cosmic view on things) - it matters
3. If we care about the immediate survival of thousands of other species - it matters
4. If you are a politician only looking at how to get elected next time round - it doesn't matter
5. If you are having a fairly comfortable life and don't want to worry yourself thinking about the future too much - it doesn't matter
The Third Point relates to what anyone can do about it.
Some countries, notably Sweden, Germany and France, are making excellent progress in moving away from fossil fuels but as wonderful as this may be we have to bear in mind that this is a global problem. Even if the UK were to reduce its emission to zero tomorrow it would only have around a 1% impact on the global CO2 level. It would still keep rising. So what real differnce will the action of an individual in the UK make to this global problem?
The big success for the 2016 Paris agreement was not in what it actually achieved in terms of controlling CO2 levels, it was in getting the whole world to agree to accept that there is a serious problem and to work together to do something about it. The key word is together. It only takes one large global emitter to go back on the agreement and the whole process is futile. Think Trump. It all comes down to politics in terms of achieving anything significant. We will certainly see some strong political action when we get to the point at which GW is wreaking havoc with food supplies bringing mass migrations and resource conflicts. But it may well be too late by then. We may have passed an irreversible tipping point.
So what can an individual do? Obviously everything any one individual does will help. But by how much? Is it worth the sacrifice? To make a significant difference would required the majority of the population to make really significant lifestyle changes. How do you go about making that happen?
There will always be a small number of individuals who will act in a responsible manner simply because they feel a moral obligation to do so. They have a conscience we could say. But I suspect the majority don't concern themselves with issues outside their daily bubble. And a perfectly valid opt-out would be that it's the job of politicians to sort out these matters - it's what we pay them for.
But if we don't think politicians are doing a good enough job over GW how do we address that?
Unlike many other problems that have confronted the human race, as individuals we can't escape this particular problem, by shutting ourselves away from it, or by moving to a more enlightened country. It should be a challenge that unites us. Yet today the world is regressing back to its primitive tribal instincts with short-sighted nationalism on the rise again. It is not at all obvious that our species has the maturity to resolve this one.
