Alun James says Wales has an opportunity to lead the way in the imperative to reduce carbon emissions
It’s a disheartening fact that on 9 May the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, as measured by an observatory in Hawaii, topped the symbolically important level of 400 parts per million.
So what’s the big deal with 400? Well, climate experts say it’s a CO2 level the planet hasn’t seen for over three million years. It’s also a warning that we’re heading for 450ppm within a few decades – this being the level which gives us a 50:50 chance of keeping average global warming to less than 2C, the internationally agreed limit.
It’s worth noting that before the industrial revolution the CO2 concentration was about 280ppm but since then we have released more than 375 billion tonnes of it, mainly from the burning of coal, oil and gas.
The Hawaii data is not the only item of sobering climate news. A few months ago, the World Bank issued a truly frightening report stating:
“Without further commitments and action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the world is likely to warm by more than 3°C above the preindustrial climate. Even with the current mitigation commitments and pledges fully implemented, there is roughly a 20 per cent likelihood of exceeding 4°C by 2100. If they are not met, a warming of 4°C could occur as early as the 2060s”.
They added that a further warming to levels over 6°C, with several metres of sea-level rise, would likely occur over the following centuries.
You may want to sit down for the next bit: A recent report by the Club of Rome claimed that an increase over 4C could mean an acceleration of global warming past tipping points, eventually diminishing the carrying capacity of the planet to fewer than a billion people, not the 7 billion-plus of us now living!
Now I’m worried I may have lost you with that last warning. Are such assertions by experts just unpalatable? Will people just glaze over, switch off, ignore the facts and hope the problem goes away?
Well, it won’t. Not unless we do something. So what can be done? First of all, let’s not give up on keeping global warming to less than 2C above pre-industrial times.
Even though this amount of warming would cause huge problems, with major impacts on agriculture in the tropics, ocean acidification, sea-level rise, droughts and loss of biodiversity, it’s incomparably better than the plus-4C scenario.
Staying below a 2C rise will be no mean feat. It requires us to leave at least two thirds of proven fossil fuel reserves in the ground, unless carbon capture and storage technology is widely deployed. So it was encouraging to see, in April, the International Monetary Fund call for an end to the $1.9 trillion in fossil fuel subsidies handed out worldwide each year.
Speaking as a Welsh resident, it means we also need to think hard before we start exploiting even more fossil fuels like shale and coal gas here in Wales.
Of course we need to keep the lights on, but this doesn’t mean we need a new dash for gas power stations. A recent study by Cambridge Econometrics has shown that a serious push for more offshore wind energy could create 70,000 UK jobs more than reliance on gas and could save £8 billion a year on gas imports by 2030. We can also do much more to harness other renewable sources to provide our heat and electricity and, of course, to improve energy efficiency.
Secondly, politicians can make a real difference by making the right choices, nationally and internationally:
- In Wales, there is a commitment, agreed by all Parties in the National Assembly, to reduce carbon emissions by 40 per cent by 2020. We should now push for a clear route-map on how this can be achieved. Welsh politicians needn’t fear they would be out of step in doing more to decarbonise energy; public opinion polls in Wales show a clear majority in favour of renewables.
- At the UK level there is still a chance that the Energy Bill going through Parliament can be amended to require a reduction in the carbon emitted by our power stations, and to do more to encourage energy efficiency.
- On the global scale, there’s a huge opportunity for real progress coming up in 2015, with a UN Convention in Paris intending to get all countries to agree to set legal limits on carbon emissions.
We need our politicians to do more than tip-toe their way along the decarbonisation path.
Bold leadership by the Welsh Government would show we are willing to play our part in dealing with the problem, and it could also have economic benefits by convincing low-carbon companies that Wales is the place to do business. The green economy is already growing in the UK at 4.7 per cent per year[viii], far faster than the economy in general. Further development of this sector fits in well with the Welsh Government’s broader vision for sustainable development, which must be the eventual goal if we care about future generations.
So my message is this: despite the grim figures, let’s not bury our heads in the sand. Let’s heed the warnings. Let’s show decision makers in Wales and around the world that we are truly concerned and let’s urge them to act on climate change while there is still be time to avoid the worst consequences.
Some climate scientists, most notably Prof James Hansen, believe that the figure of 450 ppm has been accepted as the danger level we should not exceed primarily because it enables politicians to delay the need for action. He believes that the maximum safe level of atmospheric CO2 for the planet is 350 ppm.
But new research http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo1836.html , suggests that the Earth will warm a little more slowly over this century than was previously thought. This might give us a little more time – around five or 10 years – to tackle the problem.
In a review of the study in this week’s New Scientist, one of its lead authors, Prof Myles Allen of the University of Oxford, says:
“Prior to this, a lot of us were feeling quite gloomy that whatever we did, we would go over two degrees C. It’s not a foregone conclusion anymore.”
This will, no doubt, be seized upon by climate change deniers, and their supporters in some of the tabloid press, to claim that there is little to worry about, and it might also simply increase complacency amongst politicians. They should realise, but will almost certainly not, that this simply provides a glimmer of hope in an otherwise increasingly hopeless situation and, as Prof Allen warns, “we still have to reduce emissions drastically”. And that is something we are still failing to do despite years of warnings of the consequences.
As Alun says, the UN Convention in Paris in 2015 provides an opportunity for real progress at the international level. Let’s hope this new study will encourage action before it’s too late. We can all, as individuals, improve the chances of success by making sure our political representatives know that we expect them to give climate change top priority.
On Friday, a delegation from Pembrokeshire Friends of the Earth, comprising of a company director, lawyer, doctor and environmentalist, went to see their local MP, Simon Hart, to urge him to take the issue seriously and, more specifically, to ensure that the Energy Bill going through Parliament will be as robust as possible. We hope this will influence his voting intentions on this important issue.
Once upon a time, a long time ago, Wales was the centre of the industrial and developing world. The whole world came to Wales. Sadly, those glory days are long gone and it is now merely a small and relatively poor region of the UK. The idea that we can in some way influence the likes of China, India, Africa and the rest of the world is both fanciful and perhaps a little arrogant. Unfortunately articles like these and quite a number of others that have appeared in the IWA in recent months pander to this notion. And their ‘greenness’ would be seen by many to be rather extreme. Indeed, they bring to mind the hell-fire and damnation sermons of yesteryear – and perhaps that is what is happening and what we now have are Green Apostolics.
I realise that the IWA tends to store articles, so maybe this one has been in the locker for a while as it seems to predate the latest, some would say rather reluctant downward revisions by the Met and others as to the likely temperature rise due to rising CO2 emissions. And it obviously completely discounts the recent Russian prognostications of a Little Ice Age starting around 2030. The fact that the Solar TSI is decreasing, despite the current double header SunSpot maximum, which is itself rather weak by recent standards and the forecasts that the Solar cycle 25 may not happen at all does lend a bit of credence to these possibilities. The next few years will certainly help scientists to better understand the relative influence of the Sun and CO2 and perhaps lend a bit more sanity to the debate about real as opposed to computer-modelled theoretical climate change.
Severn barrage? Wylfa B? Both projects opposed by many “environmentalists”.
Here here Alun – well said. It’s good to see some figures on the global as well as national implications of CO2 increases as this helps remind us that this remains a local as well as an international issue. Also, it’s important that there is a general awareness of options (ie. reduction in carbon emissions and expansion of green economy) as we need to focus our attention on action rather than discussion now…
“It’s a disheartening fact that on 9 May the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, as measured by an observatory in Hawaii, topped the symbolically important level of 400 parts per million.”
Actually it’s a disheartening fact that NOAA quality-controlled the May 9th Mauna Loa CO2 reading down to 399.89 ppm but I never expect WWF to let scientific facts get in the way of a good red-green rant spreading the anti-scientific FUD orchestrated by the likes of the Club of Rome and the rest of the red-green eco-fascists…
It’s beginning to look as if the only people who believe this drivel are all on the payroll…