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How to Prevent Global Climate Catastrophe
by Mayer Hillman
Book Reviewed by:From the book jacket: Climate change is the single biggest problem that humankind has ever had to face, as we continue with lifestyles that are way beyond the planet's limits. Mayer Hillman explains the real issues: what role technology can play, how you and your community can make changes, and what governments must do now to protect our planet for future generations. In The Suicidal Planet, he proposes:
Featuring the very latest information on global warming completely revised to
include U.S. facts and figures, The Suicidal Planet takes us out of the problem
and into the solution to our international crisis.
Comment: The Suicidal Planet is not an enjoyable read, but it is, arguably, a necessary one. In the first section, the authors lay
out the problem as they see it - our planet is warming at an alarming rate, and
two-thirds of the effect is due to the burning of fossil fuels, which have
released unprecedented levels of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. There
has been a one-third increase in CO2 levels since 1750, and half of
that increase has been in the past 40 years. Even if we stopped all carbon
emissions tomorrow, we could not eliminate the increased carbon levels in the
atmosphere and therefore we cannot stop global warming, but by drastically
reducing our carbon emissions on a global basis we could stabilize carbon levels
and, therefore, in theory, prevent further rises in temperature.
If we continue on our current course, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC) estimates that average world temperatures will rise between 2.5°F
and 10.4°F between 1990 and 2100. Temperature rises in currently colder
areas would be more extreme, with Alaska, Canada and Northern Asia rising by
18°F (see the sidebar for how such an increase could effect the USA).
To put things in perspective, the global temperature shift between the last Ice
Age and now is believed to be 10°F; and an estimated 11°F increase in world
temperatures was sufficient to wipe out 95% of species at the end of the Permian
Period 250 million years ago.
The authors predict much gloom for the world if temperatures increase, not least
of which is that just a couple of degrees of temperature increase will lead to substantial
increases in the number of environmental refugees, for example, a 3 foot
increase in sea levels would submerge low lying areas of Bangladesh and China,
occupied by about 200 million people. This fact, just one of many in this
fact filled little book, brings me on to my main criticism
of The Suicidal Planet and, for that matter, every other book that I have
read over the past few years that offers a solution to an immediate or impending
environmental catastrophe. Each book addresses the symptoms of their
particular focus but never the underlying cause that links all of our problems.
Books about the water crisis facing much of the world offer solutions for
smarter irrigation or dividing resources more fairly; books about the loss of
species talk about creating more preserves or whatever. The Suicidal
Planet is no different. Higher carbon emissions are a symptom of two
key factors. Firstly, over the past two centuries the world has learned how to
utilize fossil fuels in any number of inventive ways; secondly, the world's
population has increased six-fold, from about 1 billion 200 years ago, to about
6 billion today; and rising!
However, other than a few passing references to population, The Suicidal
Planet entirely ignores the population issue; and population control is no
part of their solution. In fact, if I am understanding their proposal
correctly (as explained in detail in Part 3 of Suicidal Planet), it could actually be beneficial for poorer
countries to increase their populations, because under the proposed system of
Contraction and Convergence (C&C), carbon usage levels by country would be based
on the country's population, with the ability for countries to trade between
each other at a national level. Initially, developed countries would
have higher allowances than non-developed, but over a decade or two, per capita
allowances would be equalized across nations.
In practice this would mean that the carbon allowance for a country such as
Afghanistan (the lowest per capita emitter of carbon in the world) would be in excess of its current usage, while the USA's would be
substantially below its current usage. The USA could buy Afghanistans' excess
usage at whatever rate the market demanded. However, if the percentage
allowance by country was adjusted regularly based on its population some
developing countries could see it as advantageous to increase their population
in order to increase their percentage of the overall allowance!
The second half of the C&C plan is that within each country carbon rationing cards
would be issued; and this is where the developed world, and particularly
America, would feel the pain. For example, the authors' carbon budgeting tables
illustrate that by the year 2030 carbon usage would have to be at 1/8th of the
level of today's average USA usage to stabilize the effects of global warming! Long distance travel by carbon
producing means would be effectively impossible - for example a return flight
from New York to Miami would use up the entire annual carbon allowance for an
individual!
Rationing cards could save our planet's environment, but it's difficult to see
the world's governments ever agreeing to such drastic levels of rationing in
time to make a difference. However, perhaps the threat of rationing cards
will be enough to drive new technologies and encourage sensible cutbacks in
consumption. However, unless the world manages to stabilize and then
gently reduce its population back to manageable levels, it's difficult to see a
long term solution to any of our environmental problems, with or without
rationing cards!
How big is the problem? According to the IPCC,
a 60% reduction in global emissions is needed by 2050 to stabilize temperatures.
Would governments ever endorse rationing? Apparently, a system of
Contraction and Convergence has already been endorsed by most European environment
ministers, key spokesmen in China, India and Africa, the World Council of
Churches and The World Bank. Of course, endorsing a concept is quite
different to agreeing the details, but the amount of discussion on the concept of
C&C is substantial at both government and individual level in much of the
world.
Can new technologies save us? According to the authors,
emphatically no. The second half of the book is spent in an
exhaustive and humorless review of all alternative energy sources, and the
authors' view is that even if we harness every renewable resource we cannot meet
the world's growing demand for energy - so we must ration the supply.
Energy efficient means of land or sea based transport might come along
(especially if minds were concentrated by the specter of rationing
cards) but, according to the authors, air travel is doomed as not only is there no known
alternative to jet fuel but the damage airplanes do by releasing their carbon
emissions into the high atmosphere is substantially worse than a similar amount
of emissions at ground level. Having said that, the authors claim that air
travel is doomed because there is no clean alternative to jet fuel reminds me of
the entry about
powered flight in our 1889 set of Chambers Encyclopedia, which states with great
authority that powered flight is impossible because the steam engine is too
heavy. Fourteen years later, the Wright brothers took to the air!
What are other countries doing? No other developed or developing
country comes close to the USA's consumption of fossil fuels; and the majority
of, if not all, developed countries are further down the road to recognizing and
managing the problem of carbon emissions. For example, I read The Suicidal Planet
while flying from California to England on a carbon-spewing, ozone destroying
jumbo jet; on arrival I shared some of the facts from the book with the first
half dozen or so friends I saw; without exception they were all familiar with
the concepts outlined in the book and had consciously made changes to their
lifestyle - nothing particularly dramatic, but changes nonetheless. The
European media are constantly exhorting individuals and businesses to shrink
their carbon footprint, and suggesting practical ways to do so; and European
venture capital companies and governments are busy investing in new forms of renewable energy
(such as the newly opened
solar power
farm in Spain, sufficient to provide energy to 600,000 residents of
Seville). The overall result is that tangible improvements in carbon
emissions are being made across the board. On the flight back I chatted
with a couple of Americans, both of whom had become much more aware of the issues
during their short stay in England; one had even cut out articles to bring home
to his daughter.
This review
first ran in the May 10, 2007
issue of BookBrowse Recommends.
If you liked The Suicidal Planet, try these:
by Stephan Faris
Published 2009
A vivid and illuminating portrayal of the surprising ways that climate change will affect the world in the near future—politically, economically, and culturally
by Barbara Kingsolver
Published 2008
Bestselling author Barbara Kingsolver returns with her first nonfiction narrative that will open your eyes in a hundred new ways to an old truth: You are what you eat.
by Jeff Goodell
Published 2007
As oil prices increase, Coal has effectively become the default fuel for electricity generation in the twenty-first century. Goodell debunks the faulty assumptions underlying coal's revival and shatters the myth of cheap coal energy.
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