The science that explains the need to reduce carbon emissions on an individual, community and global basis is irrefutable. Since the industrial revolution, the world has begun to warm to the point where the bedrock eco-systems that maintain life on earth are being pushed out of balance. In the past 200 years, carbon dioxide produced by fossil fuels has risen from 280 ppm to 400 ppm.
This is primarily caused by the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere via several rapidly destabilising mechanisms. The rate is increasing to such an extent that the earth is becoming wrapped in a thickening thermal blanket. Consequently, heat that would normally be vented into space to maintain climate equilibrium is now trapped in the atmosphere.
The resulting increase in heat has generated a 1-degree uplift in global temperatures. Twenty of the hottest years on record have happened in the past 22 years and the frequency of extreme events is increasing. Sea levels that have remained constant for several thousand years, have risen 20cm in the last few years
We are witnessing and experiencing a manmade ecological disaster. In her book, The Sixth Extinction, Author, Elizabeth Kolbert, sees humanity as the contemporary equivalent of the asteroid that triggered the mass extinction of the dinosaurs.
The release of gases such as Carbon Dioxide, Methane, Nitrous Oxide and F Gases into the atmosphere is causing climate change, storms, floods, heatwaves, and rising sea levels.
In my lifetime, greenhouse gases have torn holes in the ozone and depleted the polar icecaps. Rising sea levels are already creating climate refugees around the world. (Even the US is not immune.) Millions of people now need humanitarian help due to climate change and this number is set to increase exponentially.
According to NASA’s Global Climate Change research, 90% of global warming is happening in the ocean. As the oceans get hotter, they expand. This alone accounts for a third of current uplift in sea levels. The year 2021 was the ocean’s warmest on record. Additionally, Antarctica is losing three times as much ice as 20 years ago and, as the ice melts, the surface of the world becomes darker. A darker surface means increases in atmospheric temperatures.
Forests that provide much of the air we breathe are vanishing. They are used for logging or being burned to make way for cash crops such as soybean and palm oil. The carbon stored in these forests for millions of years is being released into the atmosphere where it adds to the climate change problem.
All over the world, increased temperatures are contributing to forest fires, causing loss of life, financial ruin, and homelessness. Entire species that are critical to the delicate balance of biodiversity of life on earth are being driven to extinction.
The temperature is currently predicted to rise by 1.5% at some point between 2040-50. If it reaches 2% during that time, the situation could reach an irreversible tipping point as Methane, which is currently trapped in the permafrost is released into our atmosphere in significant volumes. Methane, already produced in damaging levels by ruminant animals, is even more detrimental to the environment than carbon dioxide. Climate change problems are stacking up to the point where we may reach an irreversible tipping point in the next 20-30 years.
As a society, as businesses owners, as educators and as individuals, we need to embrace the tangible truth about carbon emissions and their effect on the world we live in. We need to avoid making things worse, mitigate the effects of existing issues and plant the seeds of a sustainable green economy.
As individuals, we also need to explore and deliver practical solutions and actions that will enable us to play our part in protecting all life on earth.
As an academic practitioner that has worked in advertising and marketing for the past 40 years, I have come to understand the part I have played in developing the age of conspicuous consumption, self-interest, and short-termism.
THERE’S NO PLANET B
Average individual carbon footprint, globally 5 tonnes. Average in the UK, 13 tonnes. Mine 13.5 tonnes. Target 5 tonnes.
The Carbon Literacy Trust training has encouraged me to look past these negative and unproductive feelings and consider how my work as an educator and consultant presents opportunities to help reduce carbon emissions. As Mike Berners Lee’s book states, “There is no Planet B.” You can find out about upcoming CLT events here.
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