Saving
the Earth
At the Social Good
Summit, a day after the climate
march in Manhttan, the Greenpeace Executive Director noted the planet will be
fine without people—oceans won’t acidify, forests will flourish, groundwater
will recharge—it’s the people who are at risk.
The vast majority of the global community supports the Paris Accord. Bill Mc Gibben, 350.org,
cited agreement that a 1.5 degrees centigrade increase would keep the global
community safe. Yet agreed actions lead to a 3 degrees centigrade increase. The
Clean Power Plan, a key US action, now not supported by US leadership.
Forecasts from complicated mathematical models aside, the Great Acceleration shows why global
action is needed. Major increases in both environmental and socio-economic indicators
from 1950 to present bring us out of the Holocene,
the last 10,000 years with temperature variations limited to about one degree
centigrade. This favorable climate for human development now gives way to the
to the Anthropocene. Now human
activity can take us into uncharted territory including the ability of
acidifying oceans to supply fish, deforestation changing rainfall patterns, and
water scarcity.
The Great Acceleration continues in the Age of Sustainability. The Earth Institute’s Jeff Sachs points out
that global product will triple by 2050 while carbon load must be cut in
half—change by a factor if 6 in carbon intensity to keep us safe. We will add
many more mega-cities and global increases in purchasing power will put
pressure on supplies of food, energy, and water.
Our global challenge is well summarized in Doughnut Economics. Raworth combines
the Planetary Boundaries of Johan Rockstrom’s Stockholm Resilience Institutes
Planetary Boundaries with the aspirations of the Sustainable Development Goals
to demonstrate a safe space for humanity.
Moon Shot
Mentality Vandana Shiva argues for a massive effort to restore the
functionality of soils versus geo-engineering schemes such as filling the
atmosphere with pieces of aluminum. Partnership with the microbial universe is
indeed the way forward with energy from biomass, food and energy savings from green
roofs, vertical farms which need much less water, and composting of animal
manures to restore the carbon capture and ground water recharge capabilities of
soils as the goals of a sensible latter day Moon Shot.
