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Durban May Be Last Chance to Stabilize Climate Under Two Degrees
CHANGWON, South Korea - The window to limit global warming to less than two degrees C is closing so fast it can be measured in months, a new scientific analysis revealed Sunday.
The International Energy Agency estimates that 80 percent of projected emissions from the power sector in 2020 are already locked in. (Credit:U.S. EPA/creative commons) Without putting the brakes on carbon emissions very soon, large parts of Africa, most of Russia and northern China will be two degrees C warmer in less than 10 years. Canada and Alaska will soon follow, the regional study shows.
"If one is sincerely committed to limit global temperature increase to below two degrees C... (governments) committing to a global peak emission level and peak year makes sense from a science perspective," said Joeri Rogelj of the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science in Zurich, who headed the analysis published Sunday in the journal Nature Climate Change.
Governments will be meeting in Durban, South Africa starting Nov. 28 to launch the next round of climate treaty negotiations, which so far have failed to ensure their goal of less than a two-degree C increase will be achieved.
IPS asked Rogelj if government delegates in Durban ought to set a specific year by which global emissions will peak and then decline to ensure the two-degree C target will be met.
"Committing to such targets would ensure that we embark globally on a technologically and economically feasible low-emission path," Rogelj said.
Rogelj and a group of leading experts show in this state-of-the-art analysis that to have a 66-percent or better probability of staying below two degrees C this century, global carbon emissions must peak before 2020. Global emissions ought to be around 44 billion tonnes of CO2 in 2020. That is four billion tonnes (also called gigatonnes, Gt) less than the estimated emissions for 2010.
After 2020 emissions must decline rapidly, about two to three percent less each year until they fall to 20 Gt by 2050, according to the computer models. This is an emissions "pathway that will be very challenging to achieve", Rogelj and colleagues conclude in their study.
"Very challenging" is scientist-talk for something that will be extremely difficult to do. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimated that 80 percent of projected emissions from the power sector in 2020 are already locked in, as they will come from power plants that are currently in place or under construction today.
"This significant increase in CO2 emissions and the locking in of future emissions due to infrastructure investments represent a serious setback to our hopes of limiting the global rise in temperature to no more than two degrees C," said Dr. Fatih Birol, chief economist of the IEA, last May.
The heating of the planet from burning fossil fuels is uneven since 70 percent of the planet is water, and most of that is cold water. For various reasons, the Arctic, Canada, Eurasia and parts of Africa are warming faster and will be substantially warmer now and in the coming decades. It also important to understand that returning the planet to pre-global warming temperatures is very unlikely.
Another new re-analysis also published in Nature Climate Change Sunday puts some dates on when much of the Northern Hemisphere and parts of Africa will cross the two degrees of warming threshold. Without major emission reductions, the African Sahel, including the Horn of Africa, along with northern Eurasia and the Arctic will cross that threshold very soon - between 2020 and 2030 - according to a study led by Manoj Joshi of the University of Reading in the United Kingdom.
They also found that by the time a child born today reaches 50 years old, it will be at least two degrees warmer everywhere except the oceans.
Even if carbon emissions cannot be cut fast enough to avoid two degrees C of warming in some parts of the world, urgent action will buy those regions valuable time - a decade or two - so they will have time to adapt, assuming they can.
Although two degrees C seems like a small amount, it is akin to a person running a high fever, with all kinds of consequences for the human body. On planet Earth, that amount of warming has serious consequences for food, water and biodiversity. It will guarantee more and stronger extreme weather events, including droughts and flooding.
Two degrees C puts humanity on a new hotter, stormier planet that is less compatible with human survival.
As for staying below 1.5 degrees C, as African nations, Pacific Island states and others believe is essential for survival, it may already be too late. In all the 193 scenarios examined by Rogelj et al, there were only two that suggest is it possible to stay below 1.5 C during this century. And that includes heavy use of bioenergy with carbon capture and sequestration.
More extreme measures, such as a technical study called The Energy Report by Ecofys, a leading energy consultancy in the Netherlands that developed a plan to shift the world to 100-percent renewable energy by 2050, were not included, said Rogelj.
"The [two] scenarios we analyse indicate it would be technologically and economically possible to follow such a future path (1.5 degrees C). They do not take into account the fact that there could be political and societal barriers," he said.
The two-degree C window, not to mention the 1.5 C window, is closing faster than most realise. There are less than 100 months left for governments, industry and the public to reduce global emissions by at least four Gt. It will be very difficult but it can be done, Rogelj et al note in their study.
Starting sooner is far easier than later. The Durban climate talks may be the last chance for governments to do what is necessary to keep their promise of less than two degrees.
The Rogelj study concludes with an uncharacteristically blunt warning to governments and the public.
"Without a firm commitment to put in place mechanisms to enable an early global emissions peak followed by steep reductions thereafter, there are significant risks that the two degrees C target, endorsed by so many nations, is already slipping out of reach."
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166 Comments so far
Show AllIMO, the window is already closed and the goal is now to prevent a 3C rise by 2200. Accomplishing that will require overthrowing the entire Neoliberal Complex existing in the USA and EU by 2020 at the latest. If the Complex and its Business as Usual behavior continues beyond 2020, we'll be hard pressed to avoid a 4C rise by 2200.
Even if we shut down ALL carbon producing industry on the planet (and let's face it, what industry ISN'T carbon producing?), the latest data tells us we are COMMITTED to a six degree Celsius increase in temperature worldwide by 2050.
If we do nothing (and that seems to be the Government and industry plan), we are committed to a SIXTEEN degree increase in temperature by 2100. At those levels, large mammals (anything larger than say, oh, a RAT) can't thermo self-regulate.
We are in serious trouble.
Galenwainwright - can you provide your source for these statements?
Please excuse me for taking the liberty of replying, in case Galenwainwright does not have the opportunity to return.
New research from some of our top scientists has determined that methane gas in our atmosphere has caused (*one third*) of the planet's temperature rise,,, not just(*one sixth*), as all climate models have been relied upon.
Based upon those recent scientific studies, the old time "Arctic methane threat" is no longer an issue to be put on the back burner, and it never shlould have been... Even this new study stated in this article does not address that most important issue and therefore the report is very, very conservative.
We will be very fortunate if the window of (no return) doesn't slam shut on us anytime within the next three to five years..
Most who are concerned about GW have likely read recent articles about the rapidly melting Arctic perennial sea ice. Along wth the sea ice melt is the sub-sea's permafrost floor or bed, which hold a trillion tons of methane, which is safely locked in ice.
That is (safely locked in ice),,, until the permafrost melts... Top scientists have stated if only 2 % of the Arctic's methane quickly escapes into the atmosphere, ("quickly" in their term is within a three to five year time frame), it will cause (runaway) global warming with no "do-overs", no turning back and that could happen any time within the next three to five more years, or by 2018... It is going to happen, when is not as yet known... Be assured that when it happens, we will know it.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/3340633/Arctic-ice-melting-faster-than-predicted.html
From that article...("This is extremely dangerous, as some of these changes have the potential to substantially increase the warming of the Earth,,, (beyond what models currently forecast.)...... The pace at which both the Arctic sea ice and the Greenland ice sheet is melting has "severely accelerated" and could bring about rapid and unstoppable change in natural systems across the world.
Those scientists have also statd the manner in whch the current atmmospheric methane level is determined is not accurate,,, it is far worse than has been stated..
We must reduce our carbon output by 50% very soon and scientists must find a safe method to stop more releases of the Arcticl's methane. and they don't have a lot of time left to find a safe way. .. When any scientists talk about 50 to a 100 or more years it is actually non-productive.... We are in serious trouble as Galenwainwright very honestly stated.
Wayne wrote:
"New research from some of our top scientists has determined that methane gas in our atmosphere has caused (*one third*) of the planet's temperature rise,,, not just(*one sixth*), as all climate models have been relied upon."
This is not true. There has been no such "new research." Wayne is making stuff up again.
"Those scientists have also statd the manner in whch the current atmmospheric methane level is determined is not accurate."
This is a conscious lie. Wayne refuses to provide a source for the allegation that top scientists are screwing up their methane measurements. He has no source. This is nothing but an anti-science smear, in the style of Wayne's mentor, arch-denialist Anthony Watts.
Knock it off MR. NULL.. I do not make things up nor do I lie. Read the articles I have posted here and previously about the subject and argue with those top scientists until your brains run out of your ears,,, not with me... Thank you!
Mr. Null is angry wilth me because I very strongly disagree with him on the proposal of Dr, Jame Hansen, who says if we have a (carbon tax) big business will be enticed to reduce carbon output and if we reduce our carbon output by (just 6%) over the next 88 years, or by 2100, we can have our atmospheric Co2 level back down to 350 ppm.
Well that is not near good enough and will do zip to prevent the Arctic's methane from releasing soon by far more than just 2%.... 2% is the point of no return for global warming.
Can we please just have the reference to the new report on methane? Prove me wrong and provide the reference, or else stop lying. You have not, cannot and will not substantiate your absurd anti-science smear with any reference.
Where a scientific claim is concerned, you are ethically obligated to reveal your sources or to withdraw it. In this case, your claim alleges incompetence on the part of scientists in the business of measuring methane. You shamefully defame honest scientific workers.
Were you telling the truth, you could simply provide the reference right here, right now.
I'll reply and post the links below where there is more url room for your obnoxious replies and rants.. I have previously posted them for you Null and you ignore them.
If I'm a lying troll, then the others here who say about the same as I, that we have a very serious porblem wlth GW and little time to act, must also be lying trolls in your deranged thinking... Some here believe we have already passed the tipping point and they may be correct,, we'll see.
I once posted a link for an article written by a pro GW denier, where he had pasted the exact words of climate scientists word for word from a Washington Post article. The scinetists words were important.
From that ~~Aleph Null~~ started saying I was a "troll" for Anthony Watts, the primo professional GW denier.. Which is a rotten lie, and Null knows it is a lie and therfore it is ~~Aleph Null~~ who is a liar and a dunce who insists that the ONLY chance we have, is to impliment Dr. James Hansen's proposals, which clearly are far from adequate. Now does that sound like I'm a GW denyer troll to anyone else here? .
In the meantime ~Null~, how about you explaining to everyone how (CAP AND TRADE) carbon tax works and how in hell a reduction of (only 6%) of our carbon output world wide over an 88 year time frame is going to prevent the Arctic methane from releasing more than 2% within the next three to five years, causing runaway global warming... Answer that ~Null~, you have refused so far to do so. .
And if any others may be readng the comments, please do keep in mind it was ~Aleph Null~ here who started this unnecessary detrating shitfight.
Do not let Aleph Null stroke you.. He's smart and he has an agenda. That agenda is to ONLY do as Dr, James Hansen proposes,,, which will insure the Arctic will be ice fee all summer long by 2015 and likely almost totally ice free most of the year within a few more years,,,, and the ones who wish to see that happen are (big oil and shipping)... So who is actually trolling for who and why?
Wayne habitually defames climate scientists, as he has here. In another thread, he attempted to portray denialist slanders by Anthony Watts and Mark Morano as "very credible" news.
I've shilled for James Hansen.
If saying scientists climate models are flawed and none have entered the methane threat, as scientists now admit,, then I'm defameng them,,, according to ~Aleph Null~. Of course the climate scientists admit their climt models do not include the methane releases past or present and they are doing backflips to correct that very serious error.
That is precicely why things are happening with GW 10 times faster than were ever predicted by any scientists climate models, as ~BeForKids ~ so well spoke of here.
Even the top climate scientist in the Obama administration says the errors in climate models are embarrassing... However; that does not detract from the (fact) that AGW is a fact. And that is something Anthony Watts denies,,, I do not,,, never have.
We're still waiting for that link, Wayne. Remember? The lie you've been telling about some methane discrepancy?
Well as soon as you stop your detracting BS replies to me, which I have been answering, I'll go get them from my files and post them. Right now I'm gong to walk the dog and then have my supper... I'll be back Null.
Edit:..: I'm back Null, my reply to you is currently number 68. And the article states methne may have caused a third of the plantet's rise in temperature as their new research indictes that is a so. .
Wayne wrote:
"That is precicely why things are happening with GW 10 times faster than were ever predicted by any scientists climate models"
Another gross distortion. The very worst embarrassment for the models is the rate of sea ice loss, happening about twice as fast as the models projected (a far cry from ten times as fast). Scientists have acknowledged all along that ice dynamics are very difficult to model. This report has a graphic which crisply illustrates how badly the models missed on sea ice projections.
"Even the top climate scientist in the Obama administration says the errors in climate models are embarrassing."
Pure WattsUpWithThat crap. Smears like this have been repeated by denialists and refuted by the exceptional performance of climate models for years. Wayne's job here is to retail denialist talking points like this one. He won't reveal his source, because it would turn out to be a known climate denialist website.
I had no idea the ("Independent") had anything to do with Anthony Watts. Because it doen't.. .You lied.
Is this the article you say has been (de-bunked)? Cite the de-bunking reference Null!
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/scientist-admits-climate-errors-were-embarrassing-1906478.html
Wayne misrepresents the Independent story. Jane Lubchenko did not say "errors in the climate models are embarrassing," as Wayne falsely asserts.
The errors Lubchenko refers to are in a section of the IPCC AR4 report, nothing to do with any climate model.
Another denialist distortion, intended to discredit climate science. Wayne's anti-science agenda just keeps showing its ugly head.
Lubchenko is embarrassing, if you ask me -- particulalry to the National Academy of Sciences of which she is a member.
During the BP oil volcano, she behaved more like an Obama PR hack than the scientist in change of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The way that she tried to discount the oil plumes that scientists like Mandy Joye and others had found was simply disgusting.
And the "oil pie" chart that NOAA released within days after the well was capped that indicated that the oil was all "accounted for" was simply a joke.
Lubchenko is a joke.
Hansen et al provide thorough answers to your questions regarding fee and dividend (distinctly not cap and trade) and the 6% per-year scenario in the 2011 paper I have referenced several times in this thread already: The Case for Young People.
This is what honest people do. They provide their sources. Where is the source of this methane crap you keep repeating? There is no source. It's a lie, isn't it?
Is you reference somthing we can open and read,,, or is it something we have to buy?
And what is the exact difference between (fee and divide) and (cap and trade)? ... How will a 6% carbon reduction prevent an ice free Arctic and a runaway global warming within at very least the next five years,,, or the next three more likely? __ It is impossible.
So why are you shilling for something the oil and shipping corporations will love to see? __An ice free Arctic.
I'm willing to mostly believe Galen Wainwright. Historical geological data points consistently to small natural perturbations upward turning into big perturbations upward. This happens both on small-scale warming and on massive-scale warming. A complementary effect in the cold direction has not been observed.
Two plausible causes of this effect might be massive runaway carbon releases at the poles, from permafrost and continental shelf melting, and massive worldwide tree dieoff due to micropests adapting and spreading north 1000 times faster than trees can adapt to them. The trees may adapt nicely after 100 generations of trees breeds the right characteristics, but that evolutionary process takes millenia. In the meantime the world's forests die and then superfires like the recent one near Austin, Texas put plenty of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
At least as bad, scientists reported higher methane emissions in the tropics independent of polar releases. Possibly a greater number of dead tropical trees are being eaten by bacteria or termites, which all give off methane.
Excellent points ~PaulK~, thank you.
PaulK,
You are right to be concerned about feedback loops which could lead to runaway climate change, such as forests turning from carbon sinks to carbon sources and Arctic methane. This is the key concern with global warming, which the article above largely ignores: the real risk from a dangerous level of temperature rise is that natural sources of greenhouse gases may become self-reinforcing, and keep growing even if human emissions are cut back. Once uncontrolled warming in initiated, nobody really knows when or if it will ever stop.
That is the tipping point we need to concentrate on averting, the warning climate scientists are begging us to heed. Some have taken that warning too far, however, and interpreted it as a fait accompli. No authority in climate science has published the opinion that the Earth's climate system is now committed to runaway climate change. Some of those who spread scenarios of doom, contradicted by current scientific knowledge, have the same agenda as the climate denialists: to undermine sentiment supporting action to stabilize the Earth's climate.
Others seem to derive a ghoulish thrill from impending doom. Whatever their motivations, the doomsayers are wrong, according to the finest minds in climate science.
A scenario that stabilizes climate and preserves nature is technically possible and it is essential for the future of humanity.
The Case for Young People, Hansen et al (2011)
Yeah,, sure... ALL we have to do,,, according to ~Aleph Null~,,, is have a cap and trrade carbon tax and reduce our carbon output by 6 % over an 88 year time frame to reduce our atmospheric Co2 level to 350 ppm.
Global warming was already a serious problem when the atmoshperic Co2 level rose to 340 ppm... In 1950 it was 320ppm, which was pretty good.... And I'm an Anthony
Watts troll for saying such things for the past 20 years, trying to fool everyone,,, acording to Aleph Null. .
Intentionally or ignorantly, Wayne distorts Hansen's recommendation again. Hansen advocates fee and dividend, and strenuously objects to cap and trade.
People who have taken an interest in global warming solutions understand the difference.
I'm sorry I apologize for my error there... I thought they were both carbn taxes and about the same thing.... It is a carbon tax isn't it?
That said, much more importantly, which you did not reply to,,,, is how will a 6% reduction of carbon output over a 88 year time frame, stop the Arctic from being ice free all summer long by 2015? __ Or,, by 2030? or ever before we have runaway global warming and no turning back to ever fix it?
It is not possible, we must do much more than that,,, and you keep saying that is all we have to do.
Speaking of not replying, it is perfectly clear by now that the reason you do not provide a reference to the study finding a methane accounting discrepancy is because there is no such study.
Regarding your request for details of how Hansen's scenario is supposed to work, I've already referred you to (click on the hyperlink!) Hansen's paper (it's a free download!) on the subject. If you can articulate any problems with Hansen's explanation, I'll try to help you out.
Should you ever become interested in climate science and actually read Hansen's paper, you will discover that Hansen et al are not saying that mitigation and reforestation are all we should do. The paper sets out to prove there's a scenario in which mitigation and reforestation would be sufficient, but the authors also consider carbon capture.
I have posted the article you say I lied about NULL. It's currently the 68th post. So you may shut it off now.
I think Dr. James Hanso is selling a lot of his books, but his proposals won't do shit to prevent the Arctic methane from releasing within the next three to five years by far over 2%.
Null,,, you also said in a prior post here replying to me,,, that things have not been happening ten times faster than the climate models projected. However NULL, on another thread you wrote in a re[p;l to Richard Catz,,, that hings are happening with
GW ten times faster than had been projected. Want some more hits of your deciet?
This is standard denialist technique: pretend that your previous lies stand unchallenged, and just keep repeating them.
My comment was that global warming today is proceeding 10 times faster than the previous episode of warming, 55 million years ago. Not 10 times faster than models predicted. It tedious to correct Wayne over and over again on this point, but it also illustrates the whack-a-mole rhetorical games typical of denialism.
That is not true Null,.. I cut and pasted and posted (exactly) what wrote on Oct 1 concerning the (current) global warming,,, see my post here at 10.59 am Oct 25. And you have the gall to say I am a liar.
truenorth,
I recommend you check this out:
Why large-scale climate change (probably) cannot be stopped (& we must, thus, increase our adaptability)
http://alderstone3.com/?page_id=433
I believe it wll be a bit difficult to (adapt) to what is in store for us, with average summer temperatures above 130 to 140 degrees F in the shade and very high humidity at the same time.
But some may live through that early phase of dramatic GW, if they can find food and non polluted water... Maybe a cool deep salt mine to live in... It's coming.
WayneWR,
I agree it will be difficult to survive. I bring up that web site mostly so people can understand the enormity of this climate clusterfuck the industrial revolution has brought us. It's bad and it's going to get worse.
Galenwainwright's claim that the Earth's climate system is committed to 6°C of warming substantially disagrees with scientific opinions I've encountered. For instance, Hansen's current calculations* indicate:
The Earth's current energy imbalance is 0.75 W/m2.
This means that the 0.8°C global warming so far is about half of the response to human-made climate forcing.
The conventional meaning of committed warming is the amount of warming to result from current forcings, minus the amount the Earth has already warmed. Hansen says the Earth is committed to about 0.8°C of warming from carbon emissions which have already occured.
* See page 8 of The Case for Young People, Hansen et al (2011)
Ending the war and a Free Palestine would be the first sign that humanity and our government is serious about the environment.
We can have a War Economy or a Safe Planet, but we can't have both.
The scientific community is aware of the danger, the world is aware of the danger, but as long as the 1% can put some mega-buck$ in their pocket by producing those Gigatons of CO2 in the atmosphere, there will be no relief.
As always, it is "follow the money."
This has nothing to do with warming as this article demonstrates. I would prefer a cleaner environment but I will be damned If these opportunists (1%) get even a nickel out of me. They have lied to the point on no return, all for the sake of money. The climate will be fine when they are gone. They are just worried about their carbon investments.
http://cleantechnica.com/2011/10/24/20-trillion-for-urgent-climate-change-action/
The 2C target was already a political compromise, not a scientifically-determined safe maximum for global warming. Hansen has emphasized that 2C is already quite dangerous:
Global warming of this amount would be putting Earth on a path toward Pliocene-like conditions, i.e., a very different world marked by massive and continual disruptions to both society and ecosystems. It would be a world in which the world's species and ecosystems will have had no recent evolutionary experience, surely with consequences and disruptions to the ecosystem services that maintain human communities today. There are no credible arguments that such rapid change would not have catastrophic circumstances for human well-being.
Paleoclimate studies, theoretical modeling, and current observations firmly establish that the maximum safe level of global warming is below 0.75C. The catastrophic circumstances which entail from exceeding that level do not stop at 3C or 4C. At some point it's around she goes, where she stops nobody knows.
For the final climate model, try Venus.
America's elderly don't seem to care much about global warming. It could be up to today's youth to stop it.
Direct democracy
That is why we are so fucking glad that you are awake and moving now.
We are gettin too old for this shit... but we love ya for takin it on.
.
Jim Glover (in reply to ezeflyer) wrote:
That is why we are so fucking glad that you are awake and moving now. We are gettin too old for this shit... but we love ya for takin it on.
* * * * *
My Reply:
Jim Glover,
But you are posting here and you still care about global warming and climate change.
Of course I care, and folks older than I do care, but it is our youth who have the energy and incentive to do more than we do to fix it... we won't be around to see it much longer but you will.
If you get my meaning fine, if you don't life goes on. I was just letting young folks and ezeflyer know in plain street language that it is their world now more than ever... this is your time to do it before you too get too old to act boldly... caring is great but action is better.
I do not agree that the elderly don't care, we wouldn't love you for taking it on if we didn't care.
.
ezeflyer wrote:
America's elderly don't seem to care much about global warming. It could be up to today's youth to stop it.
Direct democracy
* * * * *
My Reply:
ezeflyer,
I disagree. You don't seem to know what you are talking about.
Doris "Granny D" Haddock (January 24, 1910 – March 9, 2010) is just one, sort of famous, example. I know of others who are not so well known.
Over eleven years ago, at the age of 90, "Granny D" Haddock was arrested in the Capitol Rotunda on behalf of democracy and the environment.
- -
Excerpt from Granny D And Author Bill McKibben Arrested In Capitol During Protest Against Campaign Corruption And Global Warming, Progressive Newswire, April 25, 2000:
WASHINGTON - April 25 - Led by Doris Haddock ("Granny D") and the revered environmental writer Bill McKibben, the 32-member John Muir Democracy Brigade, a merger of campaign-finance and environmental activists, sallied forth in the Rotunda of the national Capitol on Friday, April 21, with banners and speeches for an end to the endangerment of the earth by oil, coal, and nuclear industries. All 32, including Granny D, McKibben, and leaders of various organizations, were arrested by the Capitol police for "demonstrating" in the Capitol contrary to a federal law which carries a maximum six-month jail term.
"We no longer have proper representation," Ms. Haddock, the 90-year-old woman who walked across the continent for campaign finance reform, told a press conference on the Senate lawn before she led the group into the Rotunda. "Our elected leaders are consumed by the need to raise election funds from special interests, and they no longer are able to represent the needs of the people or of our ravaged earth.
"We must declare our independence from the corrupting bonds of big money," she continued. "Our right to alter our government must be used to sweep these halls clean of greedy interests so that people may use this government in service to each other's needs and the protect the condition of our earth."
This was the fourth Democracy Brigade action, and the largest, since last Oct. 26th. The demonstrators carried enormous banners proclaiming that "Campaign Finance Corruption Leads to Environmental Destruction," "When Democracy Is For Sale So Is the Environment," and "Clean Elections Equal Clean Environment," and demanding: "Stop Global Warming--Ban Campaign Contributions from Global Warmers." The Brigades, a project of the Alliance for Democracy, are demonstrating on behalf of full public funding for public elections. They aim to obtain official congressional hearings on that proposal by the spring of next year.
McKibben, the author of THE END OF NATURE, said that there is now a "strong consensus" in the scientific community that global warming is dangerous and that even some large companies, such as British Petroleum and Shell, have joined in the concern. "The only people that seem not to get it work in that building behind us," which "may have something to do with the millions and millions of dollars that flow in to that building from the interests that do not want to change the status quo," McKibben said.
Referring to Granny D's walk, McKibben said, "When I'm 90 I plan to walk across the country, and hopefully it will still be as sweet and lovely a country as it is now."
John Passacantando, executive director of Ozone Action, declared that "this type of peaceful civil disobedience is the new face of democracy. It's not just about voting any more because in some way that has been stolen from us by what's going on in this building behind us....It has ceased to be the people's house."
At some point, said Randy Hayes, president of the Rainforest Action Network, democracy "becomes a democracy theme park," in which the two major parties represent "a distinction without a difference" and jeopardize "the earth itself." Wenonah Hauter, director of Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy Project, told the press conference: "The Democracy Brigade is here today to demonstrate that people will not stand for this type of legalized bribery any longer."
Representing the principal sponsor of the event, the Alliance for Democracy, Ronnie Dugger said, "We are a part of a general nonviolent uprising of the people against the sale of our government to the highest bidder." Congress and the White House, by "risking the killing of this green and pleasant earth and all that lives on it" to rake in campaign contributions, are committing "a crime so vast it has no name," Dugger also said.
The speakers and allied activists then followed Granny D into the Capitol Rotunda and spoke out in six separate groups, which the Capitol police arrested one at a time. McKibben was arrested with the first group and Ms. Haddock with the third. Ms. Haddock was reading a passage from the Declaration of Independence when she was arrested and handcuffed. The demonstrators, including all the speakers at the press conference, were photographed and their thumbprints taken, and they were ordered to appear in District of Columbia court on May 24th to answer the charges against them.
The press conference and Rotunda speak-out were carried at length on C-Span and were featured news on NPR's "All Things Considered." Ms. Haddock's arrest was the subject of an AP story and a feature article in Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper.
The Rotunda actions will continue throughout the year 2000. Those who wish to participate in the next action may contact Randy Kehler at telephone 413-624-3836, or by email at randyk@javanet.com. Further information may be obtained from the Alliance national office at 781-894-1179. http://afd-online.org
Article URL: http://www.commondreams.org/news2000/0425-11.htm
.
ezeflyer wrote:
America's elderly don't seem to care much about global warming. It could be up to today's youth to stop it.
Direct democracy
- - - -
WayneWR wrote:
Those are the only options I know of, to prevent the next mass extintion of lfe on Earth... Do or die.. . I personlly have had a good life, I'm almost 78 and have maybe three years or maybe less.... My children and grandchildren like ALL of the world's children deserve a fair shot... We are not giving them a fair shot at life.
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WayneWR's comment was posted under the article "Canadian Arctic Loses Nearly Entire Ice Shelf", Associated Press, September 30, 2011.
Article URL: www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/09/30-5
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My Reply:
ezeflyer,
Then, of course, there is WayneWR, who has already posted a number of comments in this thread. He claims to be almost 78 years old, and I have no reason to think otherwise.
What is ezeflyer talking about? Many of us who post here are long-time environmental and social activists who preach, write, plead, etc., etc. about global warming almost non-stop, plus the other ills of the world today. <
We organized a climate change symposium in Downeast Maine in April and the speakers were all what is considered 'elderly," as am I, if I were to allow that word to be used on myself. I consider myself an Elder, not elderly, which sounds old, and those of us who post here are definitely not "old," no matter how old we are.
What is ezeflyer basing this out-of-the-blue insulting observation that elderly don't care about GW on?
In any case, one major thing we can do as a species is re-form agrarian societies, growing our own food locally without chemical pesticides or fertilizers, and without machines.
For us Elders, and for everyone else as well, raised-bed gardens - preferably 2 feet high, 4 or so feet wide, and however long you want - work best so there's little stoop labor and diversified crops can be planted together so there's no wasted space. No tillers ever needed.
Climate scientists keep saying this would help slow down the warming because this would eliminate much transport of food which now travels thousands of miles to your dinner plate. Also, the use of oil to create pesticides and fertilizers would cease if our food were all grown organically.
Since we all have to eat, this would be a major step to take, and you, each of you, can do it this next spring.
Good, non-GMO food suppliers are http://www.fedcoseeds.com and http://www.johnnysseeds,com (both Maine-based). You can order their catalogs now online and get them in another month or so in the mail.
Build yourself some raised beds or just use bottomless wooden boxes (no treated wood) , fill them with good soil - be careful and ask whether it's sewer sludge, often sold as "compost" - and get growing. Lots of help out there for organic growers.
I'd suggest Rodale's "Encyclopedia of Organic Gardening" as a start, but it's just not that complicated.
Also, you can go to www.mofga.org (Maine Organic Farmers & Gardeners Association) and check out everything that's going on in the organic arena. Also, Organic Consumers Association (google url) and get on their mailing list - really good stuff comes out of that group.
Lots of land and water in Maine - come on up and join the rest of us former city people who left the turmoil behind and are now organic farmers (over 3 decades for me - used to be think tank computer programmer). Great way to live!
It would seem that climate change, as a result of global warming induced by industrial societies, should also be an issue for OWS.
For, apparently, only the dismantling of the corporate stranglehold on the planet, will enable us to start implementing the necessary changes.
To really dismantle a corporate stranglehold, it would help mightily if we could assemble something else, something that we have already tried on a small scale and it worked.
I'd accept something that we tried on a small scale, it half-worked, and next time we can fix half of the remaining problems. Forward!
I started following this issue 20 years ago when Jim Hanson first brought it up. From what I have witnessed, the only thing I am sure of is that scientists keep finding that changes are happening faster and more than they predicted and that unexpected positive feedback loops keep occurring.
We haven't yet learned that Mother Nature bats last. The human race, in it's terminal stupidity, has not yet learned to deal with anything until it's too late.
Oikos has it right. Of all the stuff we keep leaving our young to deal with, now it's saving humanity. But first they have to take ownership back from the corporations, which we have and continue to allow to get totally out of control.[I just spoke with Valerie at CD and they are aware of the paragraph problem and working on it]
In 1985 my boss was a climatologist, and he was lecturing about climate change then. The answers are often out there, but only a few people heard the answers and they are kind of slow to spread the word.
Everyone, do your own friends really understand what's going on?
No Paul, they don't understan it, they watch re-runs of I love Lucy and Jeapordy... And no one wants to hear bad news and the professional GW deners have done their work very well for the Koch Brothers and Exxon, etc.