Tag: climate

Suing to Save the World

the young activists of Juliana v. United States have grown ever more empowered, both within the courtroom and without. “I think that’s really important because something we harp on a lot is that it’s not just about us 21 plaintiffs, or even just about these last 4 years. What we’re doing is indicative of a wider movement and a wider change that’s happening with just young people stepping up to governments and stepping up to people in power.”

Falling Emissions

On average, the 30 cities identified by C40 have curbed emissions by 22%. Some of the most significant reductions came from London, Berlin, and Madrid, with 30% reductions, while Copenhagen lowered emissions by a dramatic 61%. Granted, when Copenhagen hit its highest emission levels to date in 1991, it was only releasing 4m tons of emissions, compared to, say, the 50m tons from London in 2000.

Calcifying Plankton

Then the calcifying plankton took over. Nowadays, you’d be hard-pressed to find ocean waters less than 100 meters deep that don’t contain calcifying plankton. Despite their teeny size, they may account for 12% of the total biomass in the oceans. And they’ve completely altered the way carbon moves around the planet. 80% of the carbon-containing rocks on Earth are derived from the remains of these plankton and other marine calcifiers — even though by mass, these plankton may account for less than 0.2% of Earth’s carbon-containing life. Making the oceans more stable didn’t just benefit the calcifying critters. With so many species less likely to become extinct at the planet’s whim, all marine species were able to relax and take the time to evolve complex relationships with others. That’s why life became bigger, faster and more aggressive: What had been a struggle against the planet became a struggle between organisms.

Agribusiness Climate Sabotage

But if we want to have a meaningful impact on climate change we will have to confront agribusiness, which spends more on lobbying in the United States than even defense lobbyists. A good first step in the United States would be to break up agribusiness giants that have virtual monopolies in regional seed, chemical, and meat markets. Several Democratic Party presidential candidates have called for such anti-trust action, such as rolling back the recent takeover of Monsanto by Bayer. Internationally, we need governments to sanction the kind of arson going on in the Amazon with punitive measures commensurate with the global threat it poses to humanity.

Air Conditioning heating

The warmer it gets, the more we use air conditioning. The more we use air conditioning, the warmer it gets. Is there any way out of this trap? In the mid-1980s, Geneva, which has a warmer climate than much of the US, the local government banned the installation of air conditioning except by special permission. This approach is relatively common across Switzerland and, as a result, air conditioning accounts for less than 2% of all electricity used. The Swiss don’t appear to miss air conditioning too much – its absence is rarely discussed, and they have largely learned to do without.

The Greening Earth

The earth is getting greener, in large part due to increased CO2 in the atmosphere. Surprisingly, however, another driver is programs in China to increase and conserve forests and more intensive use of cropland in India.

2022-07-21: While Amazon deforestation continues, in other places it is reforestation.

England has 2x the amount of forestland in the past 150 years, and now has as much land dedicated to forests as the year 1350.

Non-animal whey protein

The US is the single largest exporter of whey products, with estimated sales of $10B last year. The category will grow by 6% annually through 2023. But for all its popularity, all that whey still comes from cows, a fact increasingly seen as a liability for climate- and health-conscious dairy and protein lovers.

Sargassum belt

Sargassum is a rust-colored seaweed that floats. In the Atlantic Ocean, the 2 dominant species have now expanded so much, likely due to agricultural runoff from the Amazon or Mississippi, that blooms practically stretch from the Gulf of Mexico to West Africa. The seaweed provides a habitat for 100s of species of fish and hatchling sea turtles, seahorses, crabs, shrimps, snails, and nudibranchs. But excessive amounts of it are washing ashore and blanketing beaches, with significant environmental and economic consequences.

Speed Breeding

Combining speed breeding with gene editing and other technologies is the best way to improve crops. We already have test fields with 3x yield. Getting another 2x would feed more than 20B people. They trick the crops into flowering early by using blue and red LED lights for 22 hours a day and keeping temperatures between 16 and 22 degrees Celsius. They can grow up to 6 generations of wheat, barley, chickpeas and canola in a year instead of only 1-2 crops each year using old farming methods.