Climate Summit COP28...the Name and Shame Conference

Expectations were very low going into the just-adjourned climate conference called COP28. If ever there was a ‘home field advantage’ for the fossil fuel industry, this year’s COP served as a poster child. It was held in the United Arab Emirates; the conference president Sultan al-Jaber heads the state-held oil company and had publicly dismissed the link between burning fossil fuels and climate change; more than two thousand coal, oil and gas lobbyists were awarded credentials to attend. Yet as the gavel fell on the closing session December 13th,  even skeptical observers say the results defy belief..

Closing session of COP28 in Dubai

A Sea Change

COP28 is now being called ‘the Name and Shame’ conference.  It is the first such gathering to explicitly ‘name’ the use of fossil fuels as the cause of climate change and to ‘shame’ that use for the growing damage documented yearly on this planet. Analysts say the phase out of fossil fuels is no longer a matter of ‘if,’ but ‘when’-that fossil fuels now effectively have an expiration date. It is recognition of and response to what scientists have increasingly documented in peer-reviewed research for the past half century. This conference follows the hottest twelve months in this planet’s recorded history; a history that extends far beyond written observations to 125,000 years into the past, emerging through scientifically documented analysis of ice cores, deep ocean sediments and fossilized tree rings.. Scientists point out that the warm temperatures during that age developed slowly over a millennium or more, not over the short space of a few decades.

Researchers at the policy-neutral group Climate Central recently published a study of this record heat using the accepted statistical method called attribution science. (Disclosure: I served on the Climate Central advisory council roughly a decade ago). Their research indicated this heat was at least three times more likely now than before the Industrial Revolution because of human caused climate change. The Climate Central scientists calculated that nine of ten people on this planet, more than seven billion humans, endured at least ten days of such extreme heat, and that nearly three of every four people, roughly six billion, experienced it for at least thirty days.

Moving the COP delegates to recognize and reflect that reality in their conference-closing consensus agreement required several ‘all-nighter’ negotiating sessions; necessary to move past obstruction tactics of the oil cartel OPEC, particularly Saudi Arabia and Russia. Each had attempted to steer discussions and document language away from sources of emissions and their impacts, and toward adaptations.

Key Advances

An early surprise that suggested COP28 might provide recognizable action was the global methane pledge. 150 nations committed to a thirty percent reduction in methane emissions from human activities by the end of this decade. The agreement includes international monitoring and enforcement efforts. Although methane lacks the persistence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, it is up to eighty times more potent. Reductions in industrial methane release could reduce methane heating of the atmosphere by twenty five percent.

The 198 participating nations also agreed to ‘transition away’ from fossil fuels to reach net-zero emissions by 2050. This language marks the first explicit mention of fossil fuels since COP meetings were first held in Berlin in 1995. At this point, the call isn’t binding and there are loopholes large enough in which to fit a supertanker. But the agreement reached is likely to increasingly steer investment and development dollars away from fossil fuels toward renewables.

Representatives agreed to triple renewable energy capacity and double energy efficiency globally by 2030. There was also the stated recognition that wealthier nations with the greatest responsibility for global warming will be expected to pay more than poorer nations.

Wealthy countries also pledged specific contributions to what’s called a loss and damage fund designed to help more vulnerable nations. The creation of this fund represents the culmination of a thirty year effort by low and middle income countries who have done little to contribute to climate change but are suffering from its effects. One example is Bangladesh, which has seen up to a quarter of the country covered by flood waters.

Disappointments

Although the global methane pledge was an undeniable step forward with perceptible benefits, it was not signed by three major emitters of the gas-China, Russia or Venezuela. It is worth noting the US and China recently signed a separate pact to sufficiently increase their renewable energy capacity to potentially replace fossil fuels. China also agreed to set reduction targets for all greenhouse gases, including methane.

The Methane Pledge notably does not include the biggest contributor-the food we eat. One component, animals raised for food, account for thirty two percent of human-driven methane. And any reductions  of industrial methane are at least partially offset by the increasing natural release of the gase in a warming climate-thawing permafrost is just one example of such ‘planetary indigestion’.

Third world nations, especially island nations facing obliteration by rising sea levels, wanted a stronger call to phase out fossil fuels, not merely a transition, with a speedier commitment to reaching net zero.

Both China and India are left free to continue coal extraction. Saudi Arabia, just hours after COP28 was adjourned, stated the agreement would not affect their production of crude oil, a move criticized as effectively ‘thumbing its nose’ at the rest of the participating nations.

Although wealthy nations attending COP28 did commit specific funding to the loss and damage fund for poorer nations, analysts called it ‘a drop in the bucket’. The projected need is four trillion dollars; the amount committed, just $700 million. That’s less than one percent of the target. The United Arab Emirates and Germany both committed one hundred million dollars, but the United States pledged just  seventeen million. To place that in context, that contribution is approximately half of the annual compensation of ExxonMobil’s CEO, DW Woods. Participants called the U.S. contribution a ‘slap in the face’, considering it is both the world’s largest economy and the biggest oil producer.

Why 2030 matters?

Scientists have emphasized the need to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) compared to the beginning of the industrial age to avoid the most severe, persistent and damaging climate impacts. That’s generally considered to be the period beginning in 1850. The average global increase is already at 1.2 degrees Celsius and rising. To avoid blowing past that threshold, evidence points to the need to reduce fossil fuel emissions immediately, definitely before the end of this decade. Yet a United Nations survey of the twenty top fossil fuel producing nations shows little or no evidence of restraint; nineteen plan to increase their production of oil, gas and goal at a level consistent not only with exceeding the 1.5 degree limit, but also a higher 2.0 degree limit. Projected to lead to widespread extinctions. Investigations by the Stockholm Environmental Institute supports those conclusions, adding there’s strong evidence there will be record drilling and extraction through the year 2030.

Of course the production and use of fossil fuels at lower, current levels have already resulted in both historically unprecedented warming and economic impacts. The congressionally-mandated National Climate Assessment estimates the national economic impact of increasing weather disasters has risen to a yearly average of $150 billion dollars. The analysis of nine hundred climate, environmental, health and economic researchers tracked a massive increase in the number of individual billion-dollar weather disasters in the United States; from about three times a year in the 1980’s to an average of twenty five per years now. That’s-about one every two weeks.

Challenges Ahead

COP29, the next conference, will once more provide ‘home field advantage’ to a petro-state-Azerbaijan. Fossil fuels account for ninety percent of its exports. Azerbaijan’s selection as the 2024 host country resulted from Russia repeatedly blocking every nomination of a European Union country, or a member state already suffering from climate change.

The outsized influence of multi-national corporations and the very rich also remains a concern to climate scientists and policy makers. Thirty four billionaires registered to participate in COP28, collectively worth 495 billion dollars. That’s just slightly below the gross domestic product of the COP28 host country, the United Arab Emirates. One in every four of those billionaires made their fortune in polluting industries that contribute to climate change. That’s leading to growing pressure to end the effective veto power given to each participating nation, allowing action based on an agreement of 75% of the participating countries.

A Vision Beyond COP28

Costa Rican climate negotiator Christiana Figueres clearly critiqued the shortcomings of the negotiated agreements, referring to fossil fuels as the modern equivalent of whale oil; poised for extinction as a viable industry. But Figueres emphasizes her sense of continued hope (what she calls ‘a verb with its sleeves rolled up) given the successes of the conference and the growth of renewables. She offers a vision of climate change as the gym in which we as human beings have the opportunity to strengthen our intellectual and ethical muscle to be able to evolve to a much higher level of awareness and action, to make life more equitable and qualitatively better for our children and their children.

Young People are our Future-what if they disappear? The cost of Climate Anxiety.

Among the greatest compliments I received from viewers during my television news career was 'although I've never met you, I consider you a friend, almost a part of my family. You're a nightly guest in our homes on good days and bad-we feel you understand our needs; we trust you'. When I retired, I was moved by viewers who wrote me personal notes describing a sense of loss, some even driving to our studio to stand outside our observation window and wave goodbye. I was very thankful, but also emphasized there'd be new and talented colleagues who would be working very hard to gain their trust.

We continually face the need to build new relationships; it can be uncomfortable adjusting to a new and younger physician; financial advisor, teacher, faith leader, co-worker or neighbor. But the transformation of the girl or boy next door or down the street into a productive adult is what maintains the viability of our businesses, industries or professions; our community, state and country; the flow of money, energy and imagination.

Careful research suggests the assumption that process will continue is a shaky one. Demographers refer to what they call the coming gray tsunami; the aging of the US work force and the diminishing growth of women entering the job market. I was struck by the insightful if worrisome conclusions of research conducted by Mark Watson of Princeton and James Stock of Harvard. They predict those changes, if not reversed, will lead to slower growth, deeper recessions and weaker recoveries. But I was also struck by a point they didn't cite-one explored by Matthew Schneider-Mayerson of Yale/NUS College in Singapore. I was glad I was sitting down when I read it his paper; the potential impact of climate change on decisions to have children.

The study bears the rather dry title of 'Eco-reproductive Concerns in the Age of Climate Change'. It only hints at the powerful implications of the survey of young American adults, ages 27 to 45. Almost all, 96.5%, stated they were very or extremely concerned about the well-being of their children-either existing or expected, due to climate change. A sizable majority, 59.8% cited that worry as reason to reconsider having children. And six percent expressed regret that they'd brought children into this world; not because they were unhappy with their children or being a parent, but because of the world those children face, now and in the future. The younger the study participants, the greater their concern; male and female respondents expressed equal anxiety due to ongoing climate change and environmental degradation.

This is probably the most empirically rigorous study performed to date, but it essentially confirms the conclusions of other scholarship on the issue of environmental psychology, sociology, demographics and climate mitigation. The results amplify the potential damage of 'the gray tsunami' on our lives and the lives of generations to come, and our need to address the building wave of climate change and it's companion, often called climate or eco-anxiety.

Jeff Renner leverages four decades of experience as a practicing and award-winning Atmospheric Scientist and Science Journalist to provide knowledge and perspective of trends in climate change and climate anxiety.

COVID, Earth Day and the Abyss

The impact of continued COVID infections and deaths, together with ‘social isolation’, leaves many of us feeling as though we’re staring into an abyss. A deep abyss. Even without knowing the formal definition or without having encountered such ‘a deep and seemingly bottomless chasm” we feel foreboding; a sense of awe at best and paralyzing despair at worst. I learned the power of an encounter with an abyss some years ago when my wife and I visited Grand Cayman Island in the Caribbean. Not only the psychological power of such an encounter, but also an effective response. I find that useful today when confronted by the COVID pandemic and, on this 50th Earth Day, the U-turn in efforts to preserve a sustainable environment for our children and grandchildren.

I was on a scuba diving tour of one of the nearby reefs, gradually descending to about sixty feet, enjoying the brightly colored corals, fish and other forms of life. Our guide motioned us to the edge of the reef. We descended slightly, to about 80’. What I saw literally took my breath away. The reef plunged almost vertically into what’s called the Cayman trench, eventually reaching a depth of 26,000’. I was transfixed by the change in water color…from the aquamarine of the shallows, to azure, to cobalt, to midnight blue. I felt very small, and also a bit of fear. For at least a moment, I was chilled by the thought that a giant sea creature might rise from the invisible depths sensing easy prey, or possibly that I was going to be drawn downward, never to return. As the German philosopher Nietzsche warned, ‘if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you’. Nietszche never encountered the Cayman Trench, but his description of the impact of such an encounter was unerring. I felt as though I was physically being drawn downward.

Seeking reassurance, I checked my depth gauge. Still 80 feet. Half-rolling, I saw the reef almost within touching distance. There were the same colorful corals, the same rainbow-hued fish. The abyss, the Cayman Trench, hadn’t vanished, but neither had the beauty that drew me underwater. I recognized that my state of mind depended upon my focus. It wasn’t a matter of ignoring the reality of the abyss, but remembering the reality of the reef’s beauty and health too; my inspiration for visiting this reef. I believe also applies to our environmental challenge on this Earth Day. We need to be clear about the challenges, but we also need to be clear about why we want to confront those challenges-and to spend time in such places to refresh that clarity and inspiration. Hard science shows time spent in nature-generating a sense of awe-improves our mental and physical health…and that there is no substitute for it.

As I ascended over the reef, I noticed the small bubbles exiting my regulator, the device that allows a diver to breathe air from his/her scuba tank. As my bubbles rose, they combined with those from my dive partners, forming one large, luminous bubble ascending to the surface. I saw in that process more than a simple fact of dive mechanics, but rather an insight into our deceptive belief of separateness. We are community. Recognition of that reality will determine our success or failure in overcoming the COVID threat, and the threats to our home, Planet Earth.

An Anti-dote to Anxiety Going 'Viral'

This pandemic is forcing us to confront our mortality, our assumptions, what we value in life. The diminished availability of the typical diversions of sports, shopping and entertainment is making it more challenging to avoid that shift in focus. But that recalibration of our life isn't, by itself, a negative...especially if it leads us to better appreciate our friendships, the gifts of unexpected encounters, the magic of life-both what we see, and what we rarely see. Stay informed, but also take time daily to search out the beauty and wonder of our existence. Just because you can't see something right now, like the Hubble image, doesn't mean it's not there. Such encounters sustain and elevate us. Search them out…whether on an ‘exercise walk’ outdoors…or through on-line videos-make it a daily practice.

Gifts that are never 'unwelcome'...gifts that truly connect

Gift lists dominate our thoughts this time of the year, whether it’s for ideas we supply to others, or those we need to purchase. I’ve found my ‘gifting philosophy’ has changed over the years; that the best gifts anyone can receive are those that carry a part of us, and the best gifts given are those that better connect the recipient and the giver. Such presents don’t have to be ‘stuff’, and the opportunity for such sharing can come not just on special occasions, but on any day of the year. A recent trip to Paris with my wife Sue supported that belief.

It was a trip rich with experiences and encounters-but one random encounter summarized not only that gift philosophy, but also the rich opportunities available if you’re willing to step beyond the familiar and the comfortable. One evening, we were  crossing Rue de Rivoli, a very busy street that runs parallel to the Seine river. We were just blocks away from Notre Dame Cathedral, barricaded as repair work was underway after the recent fire. I had stopped to take a few photos; after all, what city presents better night-time vistas than Paris?  I was two-thirds of the way across the street when I noticed an elderly man using a walker behind me. There were many cars waiting at the light, which I knew would quickly change. On impulse, I walked back to him and asked in very rudimentary French, ‘je peut marcher avec vous?-may I walk with you?’. He looked at me, smiled, and responded in excellent French-accented English, ‘I’d like it very much if you’d walk with me’. So we continued together slowly, now against the light, but not a single motorist sounded their horn, shouted or showed the slightest outward impatience. By the time we reached the curb, I had learned a little about his life, and shared some elements of mine. Safely on the sidewalk, we shook hands and exchanged ‘au revoirs’.

Who received the bigger gift? I believe I did. It was the gift of an opportunity to expand my heart, to connect with a Parisian beyond the formal interactions at tourist sites and shopping venues, and to possibly counteract stereotypes of travelers from our country. It cost absolutely nothing, beyond the risk of bearing the irritation of annoyed drivers (which never materialized). It’s the kind of gift we can give and receive any day. And the memory of that gift will likely endure.

A Lesson from THE 'Dog Day' of Summer

There were few hot dogs in Bend, Oregon on the Fourth of July. And that was unusual! Know that I’m not speaking of the ‘hot dogs’ served on a bun, but the four-legged variety; the canine companions who so enrich our lives. That’s because dogs, along with cats, snakes, lizards, ponies and pigs were, after all, the focus of Bend’s traditional Fourth of July Pet Parade. And there were many of them!

Thousands-yes thousands-lined the streets of this high desert town in central Oregon. There were so many that some spectators climbed onto rooftops of local businesses for a better view. I enjoyed waving to them as I walked one of our friends’ two dogs. My Siberian Husky Roger had just succumbed to cancer five weeks earlier. It was good to get some ‘dog time’.

Not only were temperatures comfortably moderate in this high desert town in central Oregon...so too were the moods of the diverse crowd of people and animals gathered on the Fourth. Bend encompasses an area marked by political and cultural diversity; yet on this day, there was little in the way of slogans or posturing. Perhaps the humans were inspired by the ‘other’ participants. Pets of different sizes, shapes, colors and even biological families walked, trotted, slithered or were carried shoulder to shoulder, nose to nose, scale to scale, with a notable lack of confrontation.

Were there cautious or curious looks directed by one participant toward another? Of course there were! But there was no refusal to share the parade or even the treats offered, no assertion that those who looked different didn’t ‘belong’; that the retrievers should return to Labrador, the huskies to Siberia, the poodles to France (actually Germany) or the Chihuahuas to Mexico. And that led me to consider the nature of two words often associated with the Fourth of July holiday. Freedom. Independence.

Freedom can be viewed in line with the popular advertising slogan to ‘just do it’, though it extends well beyond the focus on athletic performance intended by the originator of that slogan. Independence? The removal of constraints or obligations. Of course the exact interpretation of these words will vary from one person to another. A parent will interpret these words differently than a child. So will someone responding to the need of a neighbor, or perhaps moved by the plight of another through a chance encounter. Beyond that, are there deeper meanings that would be useful to consider? Could such meanings offer a more enduring sense of fulfillment, a better means of coping with the flood of changes and stress in 21st century America?

Perhaps the words ‘freedom’ and ‘independence’ are most constructively understood when linked with another word-‘wholeness’; wholeness that isn’t defined by a sense of separateness or simple ego gratification, but of identifying what contributes to our becoming all that we’re capable of being. Of freedom and independence from habits and impulses that reduce our dignity, of reaching our potential. So perhaps with this celebration of the Fourth still in memory, we can ask ourselves a few questions-what could ‘wholeness’ mean for me? What  would it look or feel like? What habits or attitudes hold me back?

When we’re moving toward such wholeness, our sense of stress decreases. As my friend Carl Arico says, ‘the issues are in the tissues’; that is, our bodies sense when we’re living and moving toward our highest purpose…toward wholeness…and when we’re not. They also sense when we’re holding others back from being whole.  When we reduce the dignity and limit the potential of others to become whole, we reduce our own. Our bodies recognize what our minds won’t consciously admit.

After all, the Preamble of the Constitution, the document that was the culmination of the dreams, the events  and sacrifices we celebrate on the Fourth of July, began by stating…”We the People of the United States”, not “Me the People” and “in order to form a more perfect Union”. The framers recognized that community and connection lead to wholeness, “a more perfect Union”. Working to bring wholeness into our lives, and in others…will do just that. The participants in the Bend pet parade lived that. We can too.

When things head up…this pup looked for a way to cool down…