Earth Day has passed, but the subject I began to discuss yesterday still needs answers to the many questions I posed, including:
- Can we ignore politics and side issues and stay focused on the existential threat that climate change presents?
- Can we collectively and willingly change the way we live to reduce our environmental footprint on the planet?
- Do we have the collective will to end our fossil fuel reliance and replace it with sustainable energy-producing alternatives?
- Do we have the technological know-how and will to spend the money and develop the solutions to help remove greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the atmosphere and ocean?
- Are we prepared to help communities and nations already impacted by our fossil fuel addiction and help with compensation and adaptation?
Let’s tackle a few of these in this posting.
Ignoring Side Issues to Concentrate on Climate Change
What’s it going to take?
Leadership
Whether leaders gather at G7, G20, BRICS, Davos, or the United Nations, climate change needs to be a priority topic. Why? Because without tackling global warming, food and freshwater security are imperilled. Without tackling global warming, more extreme weather events will destroy homes, infrastructure, farms, and more, adding an enormous financial burden. We need leaders to provide “fireside chats” made famous by Franklin Roosevelt during the Great Depression and World War II. And because the atmosphere knows no boundaries, we need alliances to address climate change, rather than fail with scattergun approaches led by parochial and ineffective leaders.
Messaging
Like many who go to bat to combat climate change, we tend to talk “gloom-and-doom.” This has to stop. What’s needed is the promotion of climate change success stories and the running of contests that monetize solutions, aimed at climate change mitigation and adaptation. We need government data transparency from all levels, from local to national.
Policies
Shying away from the hard decisions to transition from our carbon-intensive energy dependencies because of side issues and transient issues that arise has only stopped our progress in driving down GHG emissions. Those Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) that were asked for and agreed to following the signing of the Paris Climate Agreement in 2015 need to be updated annually, with transparent public reporting. The market vehicles created, such as carbon pricing and trading in carbon credits, should be enshrined in legislation, and the numbers generated should be publicly shared. Many governments have weakened zero-fossil-fuel and EV targets of late. This needs to stop.
Inclusion
I am 77, and I’m telling all of my readers to listen to the youth whose future we hold in our hands. We need, as well, to be listening to Indigenous cultures, who traditionally have been closer to the land and the environment and have practical knowledge to share. We need to teach the public about climate change, global warming, mitigation and adaptation. We need to engage the whole of society to become involved in the solution.
Achieving Net and Negative-Zero Emissions
This section addresses questions 2 and 3. I thought it made sense to tackle them under one heading.
Technically and economically, it would be a lie not to say there are challenges in transitioning from carbon-energy dependence to alternative energy in the short term.
Is it feasible? Yes!
Role of the Global North
The Global North is responsible for 92% of global GHG emissions. The Global North created the problem and, therefore, must act responsibly by sharing its scientific and engineering know-how to tackle it.
Through carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technologies and other climate change solutions being developed by Global North universities, laboratories and businesses, the means to stop the rise and reverse CO2 emissions is doable.
Role of the Global South
The Global South’s contribution is not to repeat the mistakes of the Global North. Just as Global South countries have leapt beyond land-based to wireless telecommunications, so too can they bypass energy generated by burning fossil fuels.
Global South demand for energy can be met by renewables like wind and rooftop solar, and by storage backup. Geothermal and new types of nuclear, like modular plants, can provide baseline power when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine. Distributed and localized energy can replace national and transnational grids, creating multiple redundancies and leaving no single points of failure.
Is there a business will to move from carbon energy to renewable and sustainable, low-polluting alternatives?
Role of Business and Government
A 2025 global poll involving 1,500 business executives from 15 countries from both the Global North and South, indicated 97% support for transitioning to renewables, with 80% committed to seeing it happen for their businesses by 2035. Of those surveyed, 50% indicated they would consider relocating business operations and supply chains within five years to access renewable electricity.
What businesses are looking to governments for:
- Programs and policies that address job change, education, retraining and reskilling,
- Timetables and milestones,
- Mapping the changes throughout a fast transition to renewables and 100% electrification,
- Serving as captain as the economy carries on through the storms caused by temporary disruptions,
- Guaranteeing energy security during and after the transition,
- Ensuring that businesses will not lose their competitiveness in the global marketplace.
What is it that businesses don’t want to hear?
How much sacrifice will be needed to make a net and negative-zero enegy transition work to help solve global warming?
While sacrifice is expected, what businesses don’t want to see happen is that they go under in support of a noble yet failed cause.
