Earth and Climate

Well it‘s been in my head for a while, and since it seems that since the 1.5 degrees proposal by the IPCC, more people are talking about it, I finally got to bring myself to write down my thoughts about it.

First of all. I‘m pretty sure we won‘t be able to meet the requirements for the 1.5 degrees warming. Here is why I think so:

The main part probably is because we do too little too slow, all of us.

We also mostly don‘t think about Earth as something we should take care of together, but we think within boundaries. Starting with myself and my family, but on to cities, states and countries or continents.

Furthermore I think that these studies don’t grasp the complexity of the climate on Earth and are not emphasising the urgency to change enough. We need to act NOW, not in 10 years.

Also there are many other problems on Earth which most of us regard as more important. Then the climate and nature have once again lost the attention they deserve. E.g. Trumpi wakes up one day and thinks that he should be in the headlines once again. And he will, because most people will listen to what he says, because of the position he is currently in. And it is not only him. I’m not that sure, but I guess in Germany, during the last elections, environmental protection didn’t even make it to the top three or even five key topics of the different parties.

Politicians always talk a lot, but in the end not enough is done. Maybe because there are deals with the economy or because they just love babble with little result. Mostly the first part probably. E.g. Germany just recently managed to negotiate a deal, within the EU, that makes it once again easier for car makers and their engines. Instead of 40% they only have to produce 35% less emissions in the next years. Of course jobs are always a nice bargaining chip for the economy. The list goes on. German coal power is still very strong, because of course they needed something to replace the fission power plants. However much more could have been done in terms of wind energy. Then again who sits in the supervisory board of most energy companies? You guessed it, politicians that moved on.

But it is easy to blame it all on them. When something is finally planned that would help in that respect, there are initiatives against it, because it shouldn‘t happen in front of „my“ door. Well wake up people. Whatever is in front of your door will change. It can either be an ugly ass wind power plant now, or a changing landscape over time. You might not or only in part experience that, but your children will.

As long as we use and rely on things that use energy in some way to make our lives easier, but are not really necessary we will loose that battle.

Leaf blowers are just one ridiculous example… They make a lot of noise and produce emissions compared to a simple rake. And we use them just because it is easier and looks a bit “cleaner” afterwards. Many examples could be added here.

If we keep thinking like that I think we deserve nothing else than our big cities along the coast drowning in the sea.

Some people also think that fusion plants will save Earth. I admit they sound very nice. But I guess until they are working well enough, it is already too late. And even then there are enough companies wanting to make profit in any way. Possibly selling the older, dirty tech to “less advanced countries”. Now we are back to point one. This way the EU might be “clean” one day and maybe even in time. But what about other countries? We won’t save Earth by using clean stuff and thinking clean thoughts within our boundaries but selling the dirty stuff outside of them. Think globally.

On Youtube there are a lot of animations covering all sorts of aspects of the climate change on Earth. Rising sea levels, melting ice bodies, average temperatures. I like one of them, which I’d like to share. It is about temperature, but a few countries have been picked to show it based on those countries. I just discovered that very recently. Before that I was always looking at another one. The link to that is below the new one.

(first one I had was this one)

The change is too slow for many people to think of it as important. In summer, on hot days, more people will complain about the heat. But then they just buy an AC and use even more energy. Only once it is too late and the drowning of Hamburg can’t be stopped any more, once they are faced with the result of it all, will they be willing to do something on their own. But the wheel can’t be turned back as easily as it would have been to stop it in the first place.

I don’t really think it will be a big problem for Earth. Earth experienced quite some hot climates during its existence. Flora and Fauna will also change. It will be a problem for us Humans however. We will have to adapt to the change, and I’m not that sure if we will manage, with all our boundaries included in the game. But there are so many other things tied to this which can’t be imagined now I guess. Who knows, maybe the result will even be an united Earth population like in Star Trek. At the moment it looks like they will be standing on a barren Earth though.

All of that not only counts for emissions of course, but for many other things like plastic. Before the oil and plastic, it was fine to use paper bags. It was fine when other people touched your apples in the store. It’s not like they will be bad afterwards. After all you can always wash them when you get home. Possibly in a decade or two there is so much plastic waste on Earth that it is already part of our food chain like it is for fish already. Who knows if plastic is not the top notch disease then?

I guess it would help a lot to think TWICE.

Think twice before you order “that stuff” ONLINE instead of buying it in a local store. You might not get exactly what you wanted, but you helped the environment & sometimes even your local community.

Think twice before you use the car to drive to the fitness centre to work out. It would be even good for you to actually use your bike to get there.

Think twice before buying even more useless toys that use energy, from companies that want to sell all sorts of crap just to make profit.

The growth, growth, growth principle, above all else won’t work for much longer, if we want to preserve what we have.