FtF News #118 – 8th September 2021
The end of leaded petrol, solarpunk, and balancing optimism against despair
Hello, and welcome to Forge the Future, your weekly rundown of the latest climate news.
I often return to the theme of balancing positives and negatives in this newsletter, and this week I came across a perfect piece on this theme. It can often seem like we live in dark times, but there’s a huge amount of positive change also going on, although that side gets told more rarely. It’s also hard to hold both in hand simultaneously, but the real world is messy, and it’s up to us what narrative we weave from this mix of good and bad. Ultimately, all we can control is our own story – how we feel about the world, and what we do to shape it.
State of the world
Climate research and findings, extreme weather events and studies
Hurricane Ida, after destroying New Orleans’ power grid, has wreaked havoc across the northeastern US, bringing heavy rain and flooding to New Jersey and New York. At least 47 people were killed, many in basement apartments that flooded in the chaos. New York City’s Central Park saw 3.5 inches of rain in an hour, nearly doubling the previous record, set barely two weeks before with the impact of Hurricane Henri.
Scotland has recorded its fourth hottest summer on record, seeing the highest temperatures in August for the entire UK. Drought is also a pressing concern, with some areas experiencing their second driest summer in 160 years as reservoirs drop to extremely low levels.
North Atlantic Right Whales may be in decline once again, after beginning a slow recovery. The species was hunted almost to extinction for its meat and oil, but protections were helping numbers to recover. Unfortunately, warming seas have decimated populations of the crustaceans on which they often feed, causing them to move north in search of food. Their new domains are not subject to the same protections, meaning whales are being killed by collisions with ships or through entanglement in fishing gear.
The EPA has released a new report on the impacts of climate change on minorities, hailed as a ‘first of its kind’, and a federal acknowledgement of the effect of climate change on more vulnerable groups. The findings are dire, but align with previous studies – indigenous peoples are more likely than others to live in areas that will be inundated by sea rise, and many racial minorities face outsize impacts from heat and air pollution, leading to increased mortality. Hopefully the report will inform policies to address at least some of the systemic issues it raises.
A new paper looks at the energy requirements needed to give universal global access to decent living standards. All together, it would increase energy demand by around a quarter, but it is still well within scope of climate targets – a concern for some who’ve thought the two might be mutually exclusive.
Planet positives
Moving towards a greener and more equitable world
Lead-free at last
The UN has declared the era of leaded petrol ‘officially over’ as Algeria, the last country to use it, ends pump sales. This is the result of a decades-long campaign to eliminate the fuel, and it’s estimated that the move could prevent more than 1.2m premature deaths per year. However, the effects of sustained use of the fuel will linger for decades to come, particularly in urban environments. A study in London found that lead is still present in the air 20 years after the fuel was banned in the UK, due to lead pollution coating buildings and soaking into soil, where it continues to impact health.
A change of heart
News Corp Australia is to end its hostility to emissions reduction policies, and is embarking on a major campaign to promote a carbon neutral economy in the country. The News Corp media empire has been behind a huge amount of climate denial and delay, with its platforms across the world wielding an outsize influence on public opinion. This move is definitely a welcome change, particularly in Australia, which is distinctly behind the curve on climate action and policy. However, it is not clear whether this will be part of a wider shift across the News Corp empire or limited to Australian shores.
Adverse circumstances
Events that move the needle in the wrong direction
Fossil fuels are (not) facing up to the future
This week saw the Biden administration announce the resumption of auctions for oil and gas permits, including nearly 90m acres of rights in the Gulf of Mexico. This action follows a ruling in June by a federal judge in Louisiana that the original pause in auctions was unlawful. Rather than fight, the administration has backed down and is restarting the auction process. Despite this, the industry group Western Energy Alliance is suing the government to bring auctions forward to this year.
Nigeria has also announced plans to triple crude oil production, cutting taxes on energy companies to boost production. Many of the major international oil firms have been offloading their assets in the country to local companies, who now see an opportunity to increase extraction while they still can.
On a more positive note, the finance minister of Iraq (a founding member of OPEC) has called for fellow oil producing nations to move away from fossil fuel dependency and towards renewable energy. A key argument was that nations that rely overly on fossil fuels could become stranded as the world moves beyond oil and gas if their economies are overly focused on a single resource. So far, OPEC members are split, with some countries such as Saudi Arabia decrying calls for climate action, whilst others are pushing ahead with moves towards green hydrogen and renewable energy.
Long Reads
Interesting deep-dives into climate-related topics
Solarpunk is a movement gaining ever more attention in recent years. Whilst it may seem focused on aesthetics, the real core of the movement is political – a collective reimagining of the world around us, casting humans as stewards of the planet. To put it more snappily, it’s about prioritising people and planet over individuals and profit. With its focus on the creative, there’s an opportunity to reshape the narrative of climate doom into an opportunity for a better, more equitable, more sustainable world – something I hope we can all get behind.
Many cities, particularly in Europe, have made significant moves towards de-prioritising cars in the last few years. However, such changes are rarely simple, and often prompt significant backlash, with right-wing politicians often using the measures as a wedge issue to gain support. Ultimately, everywhere is different, and what works in one city may not work in another, so leaders are faced with a delicate balancing act – making enough changes for people to see the positives, whilst not alienating people by suddenly penalising car ownership or use.
Quick Headlines
Some quick climate news nuggets to sate your appetite
The UK government has updated its carbon price to a sizeable £241/tonne, rising to £378 by 2050, hopefully strengthening the influence of climate impacts on policy.
More than 200 health journals have called for urgent action on the climate crisis, calling it the ‘greatest threat to public health’.
A major Trump era loosening of US water pollution rules has been struck down by a federal judge, paving the way for a replacement rule expected next year.