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https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/oct/14/net-zero-fossil-freedom-day-2047-industrial-revolution>
"The one thing that tends to get lost is the bigger picture – actually solving
the climate emergency. It’s on the agenda, of course, because it’s what the
meeting is meant to be about, but at the same time it’s not actually on the
agenda. We might get an agreement on financing, on loss and damage, on carbon
markets, on “nationally determined contributions” – the Paris pledges that are
meant to deliver on the 1.5C goal – which would all be great. I’ll be the first
to celebrate, and to dance on the Cop tables at five in the morning on the
final weekend.
But even 1.5C is a slippery target: it is not something anyone can actually
deliver, even collectively. Whether the planet’s temperature will cross the
threshold of 1.5C above pre-industrial temperatures is a product of the Earth
system’s response to cumulative emissions of greenhouse gases, which cannot be
known precisely except in hindsight. That’s why it is framed probabilistically
by scientists; for example there is a one-in-six chance that we have already
exceeded the 1.5C budget as I write today.
So what might be a Glasgow climate emergency target that we actually could
meet? My suggestion is extremely simple: we set a date for the worldwide exit
from fossil fuels, a sort of independence day from carbon. Like all ideas that
eventually become mainstream, at first sight this looks preposterous. You mean,
we actually have to stop burning oil? No more petrol? No more LNG tankers
plying the world’s oceans? No more giant coal machines scraping up
carboniferous forests from underneath medieval villages in eastern Germany?
Yes, that’s exactly what I mean. A fossil fuels exit date forces us to confront
what net zero doesn’t – that we have to actually entirely stop combusting
carbon. (We also have to figure out ways to remove the excess carbon already in
the atmosphere and to get everyone on largely plant-based diets, but one thing
at a time.) It means there must be no more exploration for fossil fuels well
before that date, because all that would be doing would be creating unwanted
hydrocarbon reservoirs. It means there must be no more building of fossil
infrastructure – coal-burning power stations, LNG terminals, oil refineries and
so on – at least 30 years before that date, because doing so would merely be
creating stranded assets."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
