Trump, Trade-wars and Electric air-taxis
Forge the Future #1
Hello, and welcome to the inaugural edition of Forge the Future.
I'll be playing around with formats a bit over the coming weeks, seeing what works and what doesn't. On that note, if there's a section you particularly like (or dislike!), let me know, via email or Twitter.
State of the Climate
The latest recorded CO2 level in the atmosphere is 414.96ppm. It's worth noting that the CO2 levels in the atmosphere follow a yearly cycle, with a peak in May, and a trough in September, so this is probably one of the highest numbers we'll see this year.
However, looking at the long term trends we can see that we're still increasing year on year at a steady rate, with no signs of slowing thus far. There's a lot of work to be done!
Visualisation of the week
This week's climate visualisation is 'Warming Stripes' by Ed Hawkins. It reduces temperature changes to a single colour per year, ordered chronologically. The stripes above show global temperature from 1850 to 2017. For more information on this visualisation, see this explanation.
News
Let's take a quick look at what's been going on around the world this week.
Dep't of Political Affairs
USA
🛢️ The Trump administration's push to open up offshore oil and gas drilling around the USA, including in the Arctic, has been found unlawful. This immediately reinstates the drilling ban, which if lifted, would allow drilling all along the Arctic coast of Alaska, as well as coastal waters in the mainland US. The administration is likely to immediately appeal the ban, but at this point, it seems best to hope for delaying tactics until 2020, when there's hope for a leader with at least some willingness to acknowledge and tackle environmental issues.
🐘 US republicans are starting to acknowledge climate change. This is a major step forward for the US, which often seems split across party lines as far as environmental issues go. Jerry Taylor, formerly of libertarian think tank CATO, and previously a strong climate change skeptic, wrote an excellent piece this week on why he changed his mind on environmental issues.
EU
🗳️ This week has been dominated by the EU elections. Whilst pundits are still trying to figure out what the results mean, with both right-wing/nationalist and centrist/moderate groups claiming success, it's perhaps more interesting to look at the results from an environmental perspective. CAN Europe recently published a guide to every party in each country, rating them as either climate defenders, delayers or dinosaurs, depending upon how progressive their environmental stance is. Check it out here.
I haven't had a chance to check out the individual results, but running through the provisional results by political group, the number of MEPs rated as 'climate defenders' and 'climate dinosaurs' both dropped significantly, with most shifting to a moderate position. As to what this means in terms of policy, we'll have to see in the coming months.
USA/China
📈 The trade war between China and the US continues to evolve. Whilst not directly climate focused, it's worth keeping an eye on as it involves the world's two biggest polluters, and the result is likely to impact in some way on how their industry, and potentially their environmental policy evolves. I feel that climate change is such a global problem that two world superpowers facing off across the Pacific is only likely to distract from concerted action on environmental issues.
Serious Business
💸 The New York Times wrote recently about how hard it is to raise VC funding as an eco startup. VCs either don't grasp the technology, or don't see a business case for it. Some argue that without government policy changes to make a better economic case, there's no incentive to invest in long term gambles on climate change with minimal chance of payoffs. VCs are missing a chance to get ahead of the curve. Government policies change too slowly, and need an incentive to shift. There are too few VCs willing to chance anything beyond software, let alone eco-tech.
Startups offer an excellent way of trying out many risky ideas for minimal cash outlay, and those that succeed are likely to find themselves at the start of huge markets that they've created. As much as I'd like to hope that charity and donation-based models will save the day, given the dominance of market-based approaches today, a similarly market-based solution is the only thing that will scale fast enough to make the enormous changes we need. Silicon Valley prides itself on being a disruptor and an innovator, but feels distinctly behind the curve here.
🍔 Engadget did an interesting profile of Impossible Foods, the company behind the now famous vegan bleeding 'Impossible Burger' that is taking the US by storm. They're hoping to expand out to the mass market, as well as move into other types of meat. Anything that reduces meat consumption, particularly beef, will help in reducing agricultural CO2 emissions significantly.
To give you a sense of the scale of beef and dairy emissions, in the EU, emissions from cattle (either manure or from enteric fermentation - basically cow burps and farts) make up ~46% of total agricultural emissions (data from official EU reported emissions).
✈️🚕 Lilium have recently performed the first test flight of their all-electric air taxi. This is pretty awesome news, although I'm still unconvinced that taxis are what we should be targeting with electric air vehicles. I suspect this may be a Tesla-style play, targeting high-end customers first, then rolling out to mass market. As cool as this is, I'd like to see more mass transit options along the lines of Eviation or Zunum Aero rather than more entries into the already-crowded taxi market.
For those working a sustainability project, Bethnal Green Ventures have opened up applications for their Autumn 2019 programme. BGV are a VC with a difference - they're a B-corp, and are really focused on building projects and companies that do good in the world. I've not worked with them myself, but have heard a lot of good things.
Projects of the week
Interesting projects that deserve more attention.
ElectricityMap - a really cool interactive map of how carbon-intensive electricity is by region, incorporating wind and solar data, and modeling electricity flows between countries.
Global Forest Change - an interactive tool visualising changes in forest coverage between 2000 and 2018. This shows not only things like logging, but also damage from storms and wildfires.
Impact Tech Makers - A community for Tech Entrepreneurs and makers who want to help with climate change. The community has grown to over 150 people in only a few weeks, and has already launched projects, including Climate Choice - a website of guides on how to reduce your impact on the environment.
Forge the Future
You may or may not be aware, but there's also a site for Forge the Future. It's designed to showcase interesting companies, groups, activists and more working on climate change. It's still at a very early stage, and I'm still figuring out how best to present the data. If you get a chance, I'd love if you could take a look and let me know what you think. Thanks!
Endgame
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Until next week,
Oli
Notes from the community
If there's anything going on that you'd like to tell the community about, let me know. This could be a new project, a blog post, an event - anything goes!