ATMOSPHERIC POLITICS

Earth Hour is almost upon us again. The critics and supporters are contesting the value of symbolic action, a fundamental political issue.

What really will work to fully address the atmospheric, and by implication, climate crisis that now confronts humanity? The critics say that symbolic actions, such as using low power light globes, are feel good measures with no effect on the big picture. Supporters suggest that mobilization around a common cause can overcome inertia and create the energy and momentum for technological and cultural changes that are necessary to confront the problem. Time, after all, is short, and the changes implied are profound. We may simply be overwhelmed by the train of events, chain reactions that are in play in the global climatic system.

Do we continue to ignore the consensus of opinion of climate scientists, or do we listen to “the deniers”, who while scientists, are in the palms of the special interests, for example the coal lobby, and their public relations gurus? Plainly put the question comes down to enlightenment or stupidity, and as ever in the face of existential threat, courage. Might we find insight, sufficient to inform the policy actions of the governments of the world, by going into the dark for one hour?

Ben Chubby, from The Sydney Morning Herald reflects on the situation. He does two things, both of which are important. Firstly, we can learn from a case study in atmopheric science, which the scientists got right and governments successfully followed the correct public policy prescription as a result. The Montreal Protocol on chrofluocarbons was a triumph for effective global cooperation. It worked a treat, but we got home by a whisker. Ben Chubby reports:

 The world would be a very different place this century if political leaders had not listened to scientists and taken decisive action 22 years ago. The study, released this month, suggests that by 2065 two-thirds of the ozone layer would have disappeared. Just five minutes in the sun at temperate latitudes would have burnt your skin, according to the lead author, the atmospheric scientist Paul Newman. There would have been so much UV, just stepping outside would have become a risky proposition.

But it may well be that the problems faced by the greenhouse gases changes in the atmosphere and in the climate, and by implications patterns of rainfall, solar reflection, snowfall, glaciation, ocean acidity and the other effects are of more significant order of magnitude. We might now like the generals fighting again old battles without understanding the changes that have taken place on the battlefield. 

Ben Chubby is right to be optimistic:

With Earth Hour being held tomorrow night, the story of the ozone layer is a reminder that when the world decides to act, it can solve problems that seem too big and bizarre to get to grips with, and solve them quickly.

Earth Hour is a brave initiative, because it brings the conflict between materialism and sustainability into people’s homes, where we are used to doing what we like and not feeling guilty about it. Our energy-hungry fridges and TVs are literally part of the furniture, and it is uncomfortable to think that they are also part of the problem.

Earth Hour risks turning people off along with their lights, especially when the act of flicking a switch is so trivial and the problems are so decidedly not.

But it is a problem that we might as well start to face at 8.30pm tomorrow, because it is only going to get harder the longer we wait.

The message from two scientific conferences this month is clear. They brought together state-of-the-art global climate change research to confirm: the world is heating up faster than we can handle; humans are making it happen; we have the tools to stop it happening, but not yet the political will.

At this week’s Greenhouse 09 conference in Perth, Australia’s top climate scientists had never sounded so pessimistic. Privately they spoke with genuine despair about the growing gap between the decisions being taken by political leaders and the research showing that parts of Australia would be hit ferociously hard by climate change.

In Copenhagen a fortnight ago a varied group of 2000 scientists – liberal, conservative and apolitical – told politicians there was “no excuse for inaction”. Unusually direct, it shows many scientists consider this year the fork in the road; observable science points in one direction but government action blindly chuggs off down the other.

There are a few years left to stop increasing carbon emissions doing irreversible damage to the planet, to begin plugging in renewable power, to slow the warming enough to leave our children – and theirs – a decent place to live. But we do have enough time, just, to do the job in a sensible way, one that does not require us to radically change the way we live.

 As needed and essential as it might be, practical optimism in the face of potential global catastrophe.

Perhaps we should not be sanguine about the problems for which we need solutions, which may mean shaking down the fames of our being in the world so we can discover new ways of seeing the world. Ben Chubby observes:

Because Earth Hour means switching off the lights, it has led some people to say it harks back to pre-industrial times. This is wrong.

This assumes electricity is the problem, rather than our sources of electricity. Right now most of our power comes from burning coal, so using less energy is important.

But if we make a decisive switch to solar, wind, geothermal, biomass and wave power, we can run all the plasma TVs we like.

Then again we might discover that we do not really need plasma TV’s, and the alternative technology might lead to a way of living and a form of real democratic politics on a human scale? In change there is always something to be discovered, and if, a very big if, we come out the other side, we might find we have grown, and gone beyond the symbolic to the sustaining of human life by reason and common purpose. There might yet be a silver lining in this dark cloud.

ELSEWHERE:

At Truthdig, Scott Ritter reports on the Obama program to save the world. The problem is that “overarching plans” conceived in Washington are not likely to be inclusive of the interests of others, and so the disagreement about means and ends is likely. We begin to see, for example, sharp disagreement between America and Europe on the remedies for the global financial crisis. However, intelligent American engagement on the climate crisis, even leadership, is much to be desired over the previous reign of denial and arrogance.

At Common Dreams,Robert Costanza, envisages a “new sustainable economy”.

UPDATE:

The Guardian reported on the effect of Earth Hour. It was said that “Melbourne has not been this dark in a century”.

Daniel Dale for The Toronto Star (via Common Dreams) argues that the success could be measuredby the increase  in the number of  participating cities, the people involved and the electricity saved. Earth Hour seems to have caught on like an epidemic. It shows the appreciation is widespread of the energy and climate crisis with the world is faced.,

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