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The UN saved the ozone layer – now it’s the climate’s turn Updated for 2026

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It sometimes feels as if environmental news is never good news, but that certainly isn’t true when it comes to the ozone layer. The UN has announced that the ozone layer is showing “signs of recovery“.

Evidence has pointed to recovery for some time, but researchers have waited until they were confident that the hole in the ozone layer was beginning to heal. It’s not yet restored to perfect health – that will take a few more decades – but a significant corner has been turned.

That good news comes 30 years after governments around the world began to sign up to the Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer.

Solving global environmental problems takes time, but the success of the Vienna convention, and the Montreal Protocol that puts the convention in to action, is proof that when the world works together, and keeps working together even when the going gets tough, it can deliver the solutions that we all need.

Of course, having written “that we all need” begs an important question. Why does the ozone hole matter to me?

We have all seen those NASA images of the ozone hole over the Antarctic, but that’s a long way from where most of the planet’s population lives. It’s a little like that scene at the end of ‘Happy Feet’ where the politicians challenged to respond to the plight of the penguins ask why they should “worry about a load of flightless birds”.

So why should we worry whether or not there is a little more or less ozone, a tiny fraction of the gases in the atmosphere, than there might have been if we hadn’t all changed our fridges and under-arm deodorants?

What’s the ozone layer ever done for us?

The most obvious answer is that the ozone layer protects us from ultraviolet (UV) light, and that being exposed to too much UV can eventually cause skin cancers. OK, but just how many skin cancers have been prevented by protecting the ozone layer?

Until recently, it has been hard to answer that with any sort of numbers, but research has begun to model what the world would have been like if we had not protected the Earth’s ozone layer.

These ‘world avoided’ models are indicating that without the Montreal Protocol people around the world would already be exposed to increases in UV. Those increases would be enough to be causing skin damage that, over time, would mean more people developing skin cancers.

In fact, the most recent estimate of what would have happened without ozone protection suggests that by 2030 there would have been around 2 million more cases of skin cancer a year worldwide.

That can’t be a precise figure, but even if we take as a ‘ball-park’ estimate, that’s 2 million people every year being saved from skin cancer because governments acted to protect the ozone layer.

Looking over a longer timescale, do the maths. Two million fewer skin cancers a year, year on year on year soon generates some very large numbers. And those figures don’t take in to account the massive ozone depletion that would have occurred worldwide by the middle of this century.

Can we do it again, with climate?

That collapse in global ozone is a consistent outcome of ‘world-avoided’ research and would have increased UV levels around the world beyond anything that has ever been experienced since humans evolved.

Maybe we could have coped with that, but it would have been difficult. Yes, we can all reduce our exposure to UV by how we choose to behave, that’s probably the biggest factor affecting our risk of skin cancer in the world we actually live in. But what about in the world avoided?

How much sun-cream would you have needed if without protection you would begin to sunburn in just a few minutes? What clothes would you send your children to school in? Health-warning signs on the beaches?

And even if you could cope, what about the damage to crops, to forests and to the oceans that would have resulted from run-away increases in UV, the scale of which we can’t yet really quantify.

So yes, the news that the ozone layer is beginning to recover is a good reason to be cheerful. Be cheerful because we have protected the planet. Be cheerful because we have protected human health.

Above all, perhaps, be cheerful because the success of the Vienna Convention and the Montreal Protocol shows that global governments can work together to solve major environmental problems.

When the Vienna Convention was signed no one could be really sure exactly how ozone depletion might develop, but governments were brave enough to make tough decisions based on the best estimates of future risks. 30 years later, research allows us to confirm just how right those decisions were.

Surely that’s good news not just for ozone, but also as we look ahead to the even tougher challenges of responding to climate change.

 

 

Nigel Paul is co-chair of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) panel on ozone depletion and Professor of Plant Science at Lancaster University, but he writes here in his personal capacity. During the 1990s he received funding for research in to the effects of ozone depletion from UK research councils and the EU.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

The Conversation

 

 




384441

The UN saved the ozone layer – now it’s the climate’s turn Updated for 2026

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It sometimes feels as if environmental news is never good news, but that certainly isn’t true when it comes to the ozone layer. The UN has announced that the ozone layer is showing “signs of recovery“.

Evidence has pointed to recovery for some time, but researchers have waited until they were confident that the hole in the ozone layer was beginning to heal. It’s not yet restored to perfect health – that will take a few more decades – but a significant corner has been turned.

That good news comes 30 years after governments around the world began to sign up to the Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer.

Solving global environmental problems takes time, but the success of the Vienna convention, and the Montreal Protocol that puts the convention in to action, is proof that when the world works together, and keeps working together even when the going gets tough, it can deliver the solutions that we all need.

Of course, having written “that we all need” begs an important question. Why does the ozone hole matter to me?

We have all seen those NASA images of the ozone hole over the Antarctic, but that’s a long way from where most of the planet’s population lives. It’s a little like that scene at the end of ‘Happy Feet’ where the politicians challenged to respond to the plight of the penguins ask why they should “worry about a load of flightless birds”.

So why should we worry whether or not there is a little more or less ozone, a tiny fraction of the gases in the atmosphere, than there might have been if we hadn’t all changed our fridges and under-arm deodorants?

What’s the ozone layer ever done for us?

The most obvious answer is that the ozone layer protects us from ultraviolet (UV) light, and that being exposed to too much UV can eventually cause skin cancers. OK, but just how many skin cancers have been prevented by protecting the ozone layer?

Until recently, it has been hard to answer that with any sort of numbers, but research has begun to model what the world would have been like if we had not protected the Earth’s ozone layer.

These ‘world avoided’ models are indicating that without the Montreal Protocol people around the world would already be exposed to increases in UV. Those increases would be enough to be causing skin damage that, over time, would mean more people developing skin cancers.

In fact, the most recent estimate of what would have happened without ozone protection suggests that by 2030 there would have been around 2 million more cases of skin cancer a year worldwide.

That can’t be a precise figure, but even if we take as a ‘ball-park’ estimate, that’s 2 million people every year being saved from skin cancer because governments acted to protect the ozone layer.

Looking over a longer timescale, do the maths. Two million fewer skin cancers a year, year on year on year soon generates some very large numbers. And those figures don’t take in to account the massive ozone depletion that would have occurred worldwide by the middle of this century.

Can we do it again, with climate?

That collapse in global ozone is a consistent outcome of ‘world-avoided’ research and would have increased UV levels around the world beyond anything that has ever been experienced since humans evolved.

Maybe we could have coped with that, but it would have been difficult. Yes, we can all reduce our exposure to UV by how we choose to behave, that’s probably the biggest factor affecting our risk of skin cancer in the world we actually live in. But what about in the world avoided?

How much sun-cream would you have needed if without protection you would begin to sunburn in just a few minutes? What clothes would you send your children to school in? Health-warning signs on the beaches?

And even if you could cope, what about the damage to crops, to forests and to the oceans that would have resulted from run-away increases in UV, the scale of which we can’t yet really quantify.

So yes, the news that the ozone layer is beginning to recover is a good reason to be cheerful. Be cheerful because we have protected the planet. Be cheerful because we have protected human health.

Above all, perhaps, be cheerful because the success of the Vienna Convention and the Montreal Protocol shows that global governments can work together to solve major environmental problems.

When the Vienna Convention was signed no one could be really sure exactly how ozone depletion might develop, but governments were brave enough to make tough decisions based on the best estimates of future risks. 30 years later, research allows us to confirm just how right those decisions were.

Surely that’s good news not just for ozone, but also as we look ahead to the even tougher challenges of responding to climate change.

 

 

Nigel Paul is co-chair of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) panel on ozone depletion and Professor of Plant Science at Lancaster University, but he writes here in his personal capacity. During the 1990s he received funding for research in to the effects of ozone depletion from UK research councils and the EU.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

The Conversation

 

 




384441

Investor heavyweights call for climate action Updated for 2026

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Many of the biggest hitters in the global financial community, together managing an eye-watering $24 trillion of investment funds, have issued a powerful warning to political leaders about the risks of failing to establish clear policy on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

More than 340 investment concerns – ranging from Scandinavian pensions funds to institutional investors in Asia, Australia, South Africa and the US – have put their signatures to what they describe as global investors’ most comprehensive statement yet on climate change.

In particular, the investors call on government leaders to provide a “stable, reliable and economically meaningful carbon policy”, and to develop plans to phase out subsidies on fossil fuels.

Time to get more ambitious!

They warn: “Gaps, weaknesses and delays in climate change and clean energy policies will increase the risks to our investments as a result of the physical impacts of climate change, and will increase the likelihood that more radical policy measures will be required to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

“Stronger political leadership and more ambitious policies are needed in order for us to scale up our investments.”

So far, attempts to establish carbon pricing systems capable of making an impact on climate change have ended in failure, notably in the EU’s Emissions Trading System, which has suffered from the over-allocation of emissions permits and low carbon prices.

Likewise fossil fuel companies in the oil, gas and coal sectors have successfully fought off moves to reduce or abolish widespread subsidies and tax breaks for fossil fuels.

The US alone is spending $4 billion per year subsidising fossil fuel production. Total subsidies worldwide may be as high as $600 billion.

This is the signal the world needs

The investors’ move has been welcomed by the United Nations. Achim Steiner, head of the UN Environment Programme, said:

“Investors are owners of large segments of the global economy, as well as custodians of citizens’ savings around the world. Having such a critical mass of them demand a transition to the low-carbon and green economy is exactly the signal governments need in order to move to ambitious action quickly.

“What is needed is an unprecedented re-channelling of investment from today´s economy into the low-carbon economy of tomorrow.”

The investors’ statement comes amid growing concern in the finance sector about the economic consequences of a warming world.

Last week, a commission composed of leading economists and senior political figures said the transition to a low-carbon economy was vital in order to ensure continued global economic growth.

The danger of ‘stranded assets’

Other groups say investors who continue to put their money into fossil fuels are taking considerable risks. As governments and regulators face up to the enormity of climate change and place more restrictions on fossil fuels, such investments could become what are termed ‘stranded assets‘.

There are also signs of a surge in low-carbon technologies, particularly in the renewable energy sector. Last week, Lazard, the asset management firm, reported that a decline in cost and increased efficiency means large wind and solar installations in the US can now, without subsidies, be cost competitive with gas-fired power.

There is also increased activity on the carbon pricing front. China, the world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, recently announced it would establish a countrywide emissions trading system by 2016.

If implemented, the China carbon trading system will be the world’s biggest. The country already runs seven regional carbon trading schemes. – 

 

 

Kieran Cooke writes for Climate News Network.

 

 




384420

Climate March and Summit: world leaders’ ‘flimsy pledges’ denounced Updated for 2026

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This Sunday 21st September hundreds of thousands of people have pledged to march in New York, London, Amsterdam and many other cities around the world to demand climate justice, standing with climate and dirty energy-affected communities worldwide.

They are hoping to influence world leaders gathering in New York for their one-day Climate Summit taking place on 23rd September to exceed the poor expectations vested in them.

“Our demand is for action, not words”, the organizers explain. “We must take the action necessary to create a world with an economy that works for people and the planet – now. In short, we want a world safe from the ravages of climate change.”

Friends of the Earth International (FOEI) is among those warning that little progress is likely. “A parade of leaders trying to make themselves look good does not bring us any closer to the real action we need to address the climate crisis”, said Dipti Bhatnagar, FOEI’s Climate Justice and Energy coordinator.

“World leaders are falling far short of delivering what we need to truly tackle climate change in a just way. Their flimsy non-binding pledges in New York will do little to improve their track record.

“What we urgently need are equitable and binding carbon reductions, not flimsy voluntary ones. This one-day Summit will not deliver any substantial action in the fight against climate change.”

Record levels, record increases, of greenhouse gases

Last week the World Meteorological Organization warned that atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases hit a record in 2013 as carbon dioxide concentrations grew at the fastest rate since global records began.

The impact of increasingly common extreme weather events, such as flooding, droughts and hurricanes, are devastating the lives and livelihoods of many millions of people.

Climate change is directly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people per year, most of whom live in poorer countries. Without immediate and decisive action, climate change will certainly get worse and could pass a dangerous tipping point where it becomes both catastrophic and irreversible.

The 195 States that signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) recognise that rich, industrialised countries have done the most to cause climate change and must take the lead in solving it, and provide funds to poorer countries.

Both rich and poor countries are failing their people

But developed countries’ leaders are neglecting their responsibilities to prevent climate catastrophe, as their positions are increasingly driven by the financial interests of fossil fuel industries and multinational corporations.

The same interests are also opposing renewable energy and have succeeded in undermining support regimes in the UK and elsewhere, limiting the funds available and getting the bulk of the ‘low carbon’ finance available in the UK diverted to nuclear power – an expensive and ineffective way to tackle climate change.

Bill McKibben and the 350.org campaign he founded have highlighted the need to return to 350 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide (CO2) – and then lower still – to preserve the planet and its people.

The sharing of this burden, they say, must be based on historical responsibility, capacity to act and access to sustainable development in order to enable a just global transition.

A Peoples’ March to end carbon emissions

A total phase out of carbon emissions by 2050 is necessary, says FOEI, in order to reverse current warming trends and minimize the chance of irreversible damage and possible runaway climate change, with reductions agreed through a legally-binding agreement at the UNFCCC.

“Funds are urgently needed for clean, sustainable community energy and adaptation to climate change in developing countries”, the group adds, explaining its support for a ‘Financial Transactions Tax‘ as a source of climate finance.

The People’s Climate March has been endorsed by over 1,200 organizations representing 100 million people worldwide.

“We know that no single meeting or summit will ‘solve climate change’ and in many ways this moment will not even really be about the summit”, say organizers.

“We want this moment to be about us – the people who are standing up in our communities, to organise, to build power, to confront the power of fossil fuels, and to shift power to a just, safe, peaceful world. To do that, we need to act – together.”

 

 




384196

Tory MPs: ‘climate change is not man made’ Updated for 2026

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Only 30% of Conservative MPs accept that climate change has been proven to be caused by human activity, according to a new poll by PR Week.

The survey of 119 MPs from all parties was commissioned by the magazine from Populus to establish the attitudes of parliamentarians to climate change and environmental issues as part of a special report on the subject. 
 
Only 51% of MPs agree that it is an established fact that global warming is largely man made, though there are substantial differences between parties. 

Nearly three-quarters (73%) of Labour MPs agree that man-made global warming is now an established scientific fact compared with 30% of Tory MPs.

Over half (53%) of Conservative MPs agree with the statement that “it has not yet been conclusively proved that climate change is man made.” A further 18% agree that “man-made climate change is environmentalist propaganda.”

Falling off the political agenda

Climate change has fallen down the political agenda in the past five years, said half of all MPs, compared with 23% who believe the opposite. 

However, 68% of all MPs believe more should be done to raise aware of environmental issues. 

Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven described the findings as a “huge embarrassment” for David Cameron in the run-up to the UN climate change summit in New York later this month.

“There’s virtually no scientific argument left about whether manmade climate change exists, yet two-thirds of Tory MPs are ready to ignore the science in the name of ideology”, he said. 

“There’s no reason for the laws of physics to stop at the right of centre of British politics. Climate change is real and is happening – we’re all going to pay a price for our politicians’ failure to take it seriously.”

What happened to Thatcher’s legacy?

The minister for energy and climate change, Amber Rudd, sought to dispel the impression that the Conservatives are the party of climate change denial. 

“Man-made climate change is one of the most serious threats that we face”, she said.

“In 1988 Margaret Thatcher, a scientist herself, put climate change firmly on the political agenda in her speech to the Royal Society when she said: ‘It’s we Conservatives who are not merely friends of the earth – we are its guardians and trustees for generations to come…

“‘No generation has a freehold on this earth. All we have is a life tenancy – with a full repairing lease. This Government intends to meet the terms of that lease in full.'”

PRWeek’s examination of the state of the climate change message includes the results of a separate poll of 2,000 members of the public by YouGov. 

This found that 80% agree that the climate is changing and 60% think it is the result of human activity. 

A third of voters believe concerns about climate change are exaggerated.

 

 

 

This article was originally published by PR Week.

 

 




384119

Tory MPs: ‘climate change is not man made’ Updated for 2026

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Only 30% of Conservative MPs accept that climate change has been proven to be caused by human activity, according to a new poll by PR Week.

The survey of 119 MPs from all parties was commissioned by the magazine from Populus to establish the attitudes of parliamentarians to climate change and environmental issues as part of a special report on the subject. 
 
Only 51% of MPs agree that it is an established fact that global warming is largely man made, though there are substantial differences between parties. 

Nearly three-quarters (73%) of Labour MPs agree that man-made global warming is now an established scientific fact compared with 30% of Tory MPs.

Over half (53%) of Conservative MPs agree with the statement that “it has not yet been conclusively proved that climate change is man made.” A further 18% agree that “man-made climate change is environmentalist propaganda.”

Falling off the political agenda

Climate change has fallen down the political agenda in the past five years, said half of all MPs, compared with 23% who believe the opposite. 

However, 68% of all MPs believe more should be done to raise aware of environmental issues. 

Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven described the findings as a “huge embarrassment” for David Cameron in the run-up to the UN climate change summit in New York later this month.

“There’s virtually no scientific argument left about whether manmade climate change exists, yet two-thirds of Tory MPs are ready to ignore the science in the name of ideology”, he said. 

“There’s no reason for the laws of physics to stop at the right of centre of British politics. Climate change is real and is happening – we’re all going to pay a price for our politicians’ failure to take it seriously.”

What happened to Thatcher’s legacy?

The minister for energy and climate change, Amber Rudd, sought to dispel the impression that the Conservatives are the party of climate change denial. 

“Man-made climate change is one of the most serious threats that we face”, she said.

“In 1988 Margaret Thatcher, a scientist herself, put climate change firmly on the political agenda in her speech to the Royal Society when she said: ‘It’s we Conservatives who are not merely friends of the earth – we are its guardians and trustees for generations to come…

“‘No generation has a freehold on this earth. All we have is a life tenancy – with a full repairing lease. This Government intends to meet the terms of that lease in full.'”

PRWeek’s examination of the state of the climate change message includes the results of a separate poll of 2,000 members of the public by YouGov. 

This found that 80% agree that the climate is changing and 60% think it is the result of human activity. 

A third of voters believe concerns about climate change are exaggerated.

 

 

 

This article was originally published by PR Week.

 

 




384119

Tory MPs: ‘climate change is not man made’ Updated for 2026

Leave a reply




Only 30% of Conservative MPs accept that climate change has been proven to be caused by human activity, according to a new poll by PR Week.

The survey of 119 MPs from all parties was commissioned by the magazine from Populus to establish the attitudes of parliamentarians to climate change and environmental issues as part of a special report on the subject. 
 
Only 51% of MPs agree that it is an established fact that global warming is largely man made, though there are substantial differences between parties. 

Nearly three-quarters (73%) of Labour MPs agree that man-made global warming is now an established scientific fact compared with 30% of Tory MPs.

Over half (53%) of Conservative MPs agree with the statement that “it has not yet been conclusively proved that climate change is man made.” A further 18% agree that “man-made climate change is environmentalist propaganda.”

Falling off the political agenda

Climate change has fallen down the political agenda in the past five years, said half of all MPs, compared with 23% who believe the opposite. 

However, 68% of all MPs believe more should be done to raise aware of environmental issues. 

Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven described the findings as a “huge embarrassment” for David Cameron in the run-up to the UN climate change summit in New York later this month.

“There’s virtually no scientific argument left about whether manmade climate change exists, yet two-thirds of Tory MPs are ready to ignore the science in the name of ideology”, he said. 

“There’s no reason for the laws of physics to stop at the right of centre of British politics. Climate change is real and is happening – we’re all going to pay a price for our politicians’ failure to take it seriously.”

What happened to Thatcher’s legacy?

The minister for energy and climate change, Amber Rudd, sought to dispel the impression that the Conservatives are the party of climate change denial. 

“Man-made climate change is one of the most serious threats that we face”, she said.

“In 1988 Margaret Thatcher, a scientist herself, put climate change firmly on the political agenda in her speech to the Royal Society when she said: ‘It’s we Conservatives who are not merely friends of the earth – we are its guardians and trustees for generations to come…

“‘No generation has a freehold on this earth. All we have is a life tenancy – with a full repairing lease. This Government intends to meet the terms of that lease in full.'”

PRWeek’s examination of the state of the climate change message includes the results of a separate poll of 2,000 members of the public by YouGov. 

This found that 80% agree that the climate is changing and 60% think it is the result of human activity. 

A third of voters believe concerns about climate change are exaggerated.

 

 

 

This article was originally published by PR Week.

 

 




384119

Tory MPs: ‘climate change is not man made’ Updated for 2026

Leave a reply




Only 30% of Conservative MPs accept that climate change has been proven to be caused by human activity, according to a new poll by PR Week.

The survey of 119 MPs from all parties was commissioned by the magazine from Populus to establish the attitudes of parliamentarians to climate change and environmental issues as part of a special report on the subject. 
 
Only 51% of MPs agree that it is an established fact that global warming is largely man made, though there are substantial differences between parties. 

Nearly three-quarters (73%) of Labour MPs agree that man-made global warming is now an established scientific fact compared with 30% of Tory MPs.

Over half (53%) of Conservative MPs agree with the statement that “it has not yet been conclusively proved that climate change is man made.” A further 18% agree that “man-made climate change is environmentalist propaganda.”

Falling off the political agenda

Climate change has fallen down the political agenda in the past five years, said half of all MPs, compared with 23% who believe the opposite. 

However, 68% of all MPs believe more should be done to raise aware of environmental issues. 

Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven described the findings as a “huge embarrassment” for David Cameron in the run-up to the UN climate change summit in New York later this month.

“There’s virtually no scientific argument left about whether manmade climate change exists, yet two-thirds of Tory MPs are ready to ignore the science in the name of ideology”, he said. 

“There’s no reason for the laws of physics to stop at the right of centre of British politics. Climate change is real and is happening – we’re all going to pay a price for our politicians’ failure to take it seriously.”

What happened to Thatcher’s legacy?

The minister for energy and climate change, Amber Rudd, sought to dispel the impression that the Conservatives are the party of climate change denial. 

“Man-made climate change is one of the most serious threats that we face”, she said.

“In 1988 Margaret Thatcher, a scientist herself, put climate change firmly on the political agenda in her speech to the Royal Society when she said: ‘It’s we Conservatives who are not merely friends of the earth – we are its guardians and trustees for generations to come…

“‘No generation has a freehold on this earth. All we have is a life tenancy – with a full repairing lease. This Government intends to meet the terms of that lease in full.'”

PRWeek’s examination of the state of the climate change message includes the results of a separate poll of 2,000 members of the public by YouGov. 

This found that 80% agree that the climate is changing and 60% think it is the result of human activity. 

A third of voters believe concerns about climate change are exaggerated.

 

 

 

This article was originally published by PR Week.

 

 




384119

Ocean acidification and greenhouse gases hit new records Updated for 2026

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The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) has reported that the amounts of atmospheric greenhouse gases reached a new high in 2013, driven by rapidly rising levels of carbon dioxide.

The news is consistent with trends in fossil fuel consumption. But what comes as more of a surprise is the WMO’s revelation that the current rate of ocean acidification, which greenhouse gases (GHGs) help to cause, appears unprecedented in at least the last 300 million years.

“We know without any doubt that our climate is changing and our weather is becoming more extreme due to human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels”, said the WMO’s secretary-general, Michel Jarraud.

“The Greenhouse Gas Bulletin shows that, far from falling, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere actually increased last year at the fastest rate for nearly 30 years. We are running out of time. The laws of physics are non-negotiable.

A 34% increase in radiative forcing from 1990 – 2013

The details of growing GHG levels are in the annual Greenhouse Gas Bulletin, published by the WMO – the United Nations specialist agency that plays a leading role in international efforts to monitor and protect the environment.

The Bulletin reports on atmospheric concentrations – not emissions – of greenhouse gases. Emissions are what go into the atmosphere, while concentrations are what stay there after the complex system of interactions between the atmosphere, biosphere (the entire global ecological system) and the oceans.

The Bulletin shows that between 1990 and 2013 there was a 34% increase in radiative forcing – the warming effect on our climate – because of long-lived greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO2), methane and nitrous oxide.

About a quarter of total emissions are taken up by the oceans and another quarter by the biosphere, cutting levels of atmospheric CO2.

In 2013, the atmospheric concentration of CO2 was 142% higher than before the Industrial Revolution started, in about 1750. Concentrations of methane and nitrous oxide had risen by 253% and 121% respectively.

Reduced CO2 absorption by the biosphere?

The observations from WMO’s Global Atmosphere Watch network showed that CO2 levels increased more from 2012 to 2013 than during any other year since 1984. Scientists think this may be related to reduced CO2 absorption by the Earth’s biosphere, as well as by the steady increase in emissions.

Although the oceans lessen the increase in CO2 that would otherwise happen in the atmosphere, they do so at a price to marine life and to fishing communities – and also to tourism. The Bulletin says the oceans appear to be acidifying faster than at any time in at least the last 300 million years.

Wendy Watson-Wright, executive secretary of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO, said: “It is high time the ocean, as the primary driver of the planet’s climate and attenuator of climate change, becomes a central part of climate change discussions.

“If global warming is not a strong enough reason to cut CO2 emissions, ocean acidification should be, since its effects are already being felt and will increase for many decades to come.”

The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere reached 396.0 parts per million (ppm) in 2013. At the current rate of increase, the global annual average concentration is set to cross the symbolic 400 ppm threshold within the next two years.

Other potent greenouse gases

Methane, in the short term, is a far more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2 – 34 times more potent over a century, but 84 times more over 20 years.

Atmospheric methane reached a new high of about 1,824 parts per billion (ppb) in 2013, because of increased emissions from human sources. Since 2007, it has started increasing again, after a temporary period of levelling-off.

Nitrous oxide’s atmospheric concentration in 2013 was about 325.9 ppb. Its impact on climate, over a century, is 298 times greater than equal emissions of CO2. It also plays an important role in the destruction of the ozone layer that protects the Earth from harmful ultraviolet solar radiation.

The oceans currently absorb a quarter of anthropogenic CO2 emissions – about 4kg of CO2per day per person. Acidification will continue to accelerate at least until mid-century, according to projections from Earth system models.

“The Bulletin provides a scientific base for decision-making”, concluded Jarraud. “We have the knowledge and we have the tools for action to try to keep temperature increases within 2°C to give our planet a chance and to give our children and grandchildren a future. Pleading ignorance can no longer be an excuse for not acting.”

 

 

Alex Kirby writes for Climate News Network.

 

 




383906

The liberal climate agenda is doomed to failure Updated for 2026

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“You can’t hate the roots of a tree and not hate the tree.” – Malcolm X

Somewhere between the Bay Area’s environmental non-profit bubble and multi-million climate march planning in New York City, 21 people in the Utah desert took action to shut down the first tar sands mine in the United States.

They’d been part of a larger encampment on the eastern plateau, where local organizers educated over 80 student climate activists about the Utah tar sands as well as trainings on organizing, direct action and anti-oppression.

Utah tar sands fighters have spent the summer living in the area as a constant protest against Canadian-based company US Oil Sands’ extraction efforts on the plateau.

Every night, black bears raided the camp looking for food and every day local and state police agencies harassed the camp with veiled threats and innuendo derived through Facebook stalking.

On the earth, for the Earth

Despite the harassment and surveillance by the state, actions happen. This particular arrest action gained lots of national media attention and a number of larger environmental organizations put out statements of support of the activists. It also included a number of escalated felony charges on some of the activists.

Utah tar sands fighters living on the ground on the plateau, in Moab and in Salt Lake City live and breathe the campaign against the Utah Tar Sands. They strategize and organize it the same way that Appalachian mountain defenders organize the struggle against mountaintop removal coal mining.

They live it the same way that the Tar Sands Blockade lived the campaign against the southern leg of the Keystone XL pipeline in east Texas and Oklahoma.

In all of these campaigns, it’s been an alliance of unpaid radical organizers working with local landowners and community members fighting to save homes, forests, water supplies and more. Furthermore, these campaigns have defined risk and sacrifice.

All ignored by the green establishment

In Appalachia, after numerous actions on strip mine sites, coal companies filed lawsuits against those participating in civil disobedience actions. West Virginia law enforcement imposed huge bails to further deter actions on mine sites.

In Texas, TransCanada sued numerous individuals and three grassroots organizations for over $20 million after the same sort of action. The Canadian oil giant also compiled dossiers on noted organizers and briefed local and federal law enforcement agencies with possible crimes and charges for stopping work on its work sites.

Texas law enforcement obliged TransCanada’s hard work with felony charges and violent brutalization of peaceful protestors.

In each of these campaigns, bold and effective organizing against oil, gas and coal companies has created moments to stop egregious practices and projects at the points of destruction – only to be abandoned or ignored by the larger environmental establishment.

In the wake of that abandonment, hundreds of Appalachian Mountains have been leveled while oil flows through the Keystone XL pipeline from Cushing, OK to the Gulf Coast, and ground is now broken on the first tar sands mine in the United States.

Liberal reformism is hope over experience

The liberal reform agenda of the environmental establishment continues to dominate the climate movement. Organizations sitting on millions of dollars in resources and thousands of staff are now engaged in a massive ‘Get Out The Vote’ style operation to turn out tens of thousands to marches before the September 23rd United Nations’ Climate Summit in New York.

Their hope is to impact the summit framed as UN Secretary General Bai-Ki Moon’s dialogue with global politicians on climate change in the lead up to the 2015 climate talks. Civil society’s demands include passing meaningful climate legislation and signing binding agreements on carbon regulation.

History continues to repeat itself as the environmental establishment had similar demands in Copenhagen at the 2009 climate talks.

After spending millions of their donors’ dollars and thousands of hours of staff time, successes included an email campaign that got President Obama to travel to Denmark and personally witness the failure of those climate talks.

Almost simultaneously, legislation to regulate carbon emissions failed in the US Congress as well. After outspending the climate liberals 10 to 1, the political will of Big Oil and Big Coal remained unbreakable.

Meanwhile, these same companies continue to drill, mine, frack, pollute, poison, build pipelines and burn coal in neighborhoods and communities from coast to coast.

Justice cannot be compomised

However, there is recent precedent for movements to effectively confront power-holders that moves beyond traditional liberal solutions of compromise and polite advocacy with grassroots organizing, direct action and meaningful solidarity with communities seeking clean and just solutions to pollution and exploitation.

In 1999, the North American anti-corporate globalization movement partnered with peoples’ movements in the Global South to literally end business as usual at the World Trade Organization (WTO) talks in Seattle.

A grassroots spirit dedicated in solidarity with anti-austerity, human rights and environmental movements around the world spread like wildfire.

Rooted in direct action, direct democracy and anti-capitalism of movements both in the US and abroad, the global justice movement had been built over decades to stop the privatization of labor, environmental and human rights protections across the globe.

The Seattle shutdown happened in defiance of Democratic politicians, Big Labor and other large organizations dedicated to reaching agreements with Corporate America in the WTO talks.

In 2011, after decades of pickets and strikes, of budget cuts, layoffs and evictions, the movement for economic justice in the United States rose to a new level as Occupy Wall Street began to occupy parks and public spaces across the nation.

This happened after decades of politicians creating policies that benefited the rich and powerful while harming poor and working people. These occupations against the power of the ‘1%’ created such a dramatic tension that the Department of Homeland Security coordinated a massive crackdown that ended many Occupy camps.

Creating a toxic environment for fossil fuels

Throughout the Global South, they fight back against the polluters and the profiteers as well. In states across India, residents living near coal plants regularly engage in direct action and street fighting against authorities defending the right of corporations to poison their communities.

In China’s Hainan and Guandong provinces, tens of thousands have taken to the streets in resistance to coal polluting their air and water. In 2011, Bolivia passed the rights of mother earth into law in defiance of companies in western democracies profiting from destroying the planet for financial gains.

While the liberal climate agenda is rooted in compromise with policy-makers and playing nice with corporations, a radical climate agenda must take the small disparate pieces of the existing climate movement and grow them exponentially to become a fierce counterbalance to the fossil fuel industry.

It must include strategies that create an environment so toxic for the climate pollution industry, its executives, its politicians and the financial institutions that back them that business as usual becomes impossible.

Furthermore, this agenda must be rooted in principles of justice and ecological sanity as well. Lastly, it must be willing to take risks, do jail time and say what doesn’t want to be heard by friends and enemies alike.

People are hungry to do more than send emails to President Obama asking him, once again, to do the right thing or march in a permitted march.

Real change won’t come from professional activists rooted in the existing political and economic system; it’ll come from a mobilization of people willing to engage in risk and sacrifice.

 

 

Scott Parkin is a climate organizer working with Rising Tide North America.

Follow him on Twitter: @sparki1969

This article was originally published on CounterPunch.

 

 




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