George Monbiot’s article today says that climate scientists around the world are mostly in agreement that it’s too late. We’ve squandered any opportunity we might have had in the last decade to mitigate climate change by curbing our CO2 emissions. And last night on G’Day World Live I was *still* debating with Nick Beaugeard about whether or not climate change was caused by humans. The recording of that show, which also features Ian Kath and Kate Edwards discussing polyamory, will be up shortly this morning.
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Quietly in public, loudly in private, climate scientists everywhere
are saying the same thing: it’s over. The years in which more than 2C
of global warming could have been prevented have passed, the
opportunities squandered by denial and delay. On current trajectories
we’ll be lucky to get away with 4C. Mitigation (limiting greenhouse gas
pollution) has failed; now we must adapt to what nature sends our way.
If we can.
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Related
Isn’t the ultimate problem behind human-caused climate change that there are just too many of us on this planet demanding energy to support our society with our current fossil-fuel based methods of energy production? James Lovelock is ‘optimistic’ that Earth will still be able to support a population of 1 billion by the end of the century. Overpopulation seems to be the elephant in the room that isn’t being discussed in the context of addressing climate change. To play devil’s advocate for a moment, perhaps other countries should be looking to China’s example and consider one-child/two-child policies? What is the carbon footprint of having and raising a family? If we are blaming capitalism and the demand for economic growth for the climate change problem, it seems that the number of people participating in the economy is possibly driving the demand for economic growth?