please empty your brain below
Clearly horrified at the thought, she dumped the clean glass in the sink and headed off to the nearest shop to buy a plastic bottle of water. Speechless!
Also many people arguing that climate change always happened, it’s just another cycle - not realising that it naturally happens in an incredibly slower pace than what’s going on now and human populations did get wiped out in various places throughout time, it could as well be some of us next. I’m sure many of us will still see some hell breaking loose before our deaths.
Many can be mindful about consumerism but many many more are not and are susceptible to advertising. The young couple next door produces 4 times as much weekly rubbish as I do with my two children and they are hopeless at recycling and composting (not that things get properly recycled and composted after leaving our houses) and I’m sure they have all the information they could ask for and still choose the easier way of life… not sure I have any hopes really.
Not eating meat would save carbon emissions. But farmers, especially hill farmers who produce food from otherwise unproductive land, are in trouble now, from many directions including Brexit and the supermarkets' pressure to keep prices down.
I wonder whether not driving to the supermarket would save as much or more than not buying meat when you are there. It would certainly do more good for our own health and fitness.
I'm child-free too, but that's by happenstance rather than a choice.
I've lived more or less my whole life on the ethos of not taking the car somewhere if there is a public transport alternative. So my years living in London, only took the car if I had to deliver or pickup a heavy load etc, and same when I lived in Dublin.
Now in living in a rural area, my nearest bus route (2km away) runs once a week. Nearest frequent service is 30km away. But I still use public transport when commuting to Dublin (pre Covid) - I just drive to the nearest bus/rail as appropriate.
I also have a classic car, which could be a bit more problematical, carbon wise. But I try to use it only to substitute for weekend journeys that I would otherwise be making in my modern diesel, rather than "just driving it for the fun of it".
But there are plenty of other ways that I could reduce emissions if I made more effort. As I said, a thought-provoking piece.
This is why some countries are trying to get the birthrate back up to at least replacement levels and/or increase immigration.
We would have more success lobbying to create greater accountability for these companies to ensure they contribute towards a greener future for the planet.
On the other hand, not having a child in the UK may actually *increase* net carbon emissions, statistically, for two reason:
- assuming the UK becomes 'net-zero' by 2050 or thereabouts and continues roughly on that trajectory, net emissions through a predicted lifetime of a child born now will be *negative* (positive for the next 30 years, negative for the following 50ish)
- globally, the UK is one of the countries trying hardest to get *other countries* as well as international companies to reduce carbon emissions - more people here means more power to the UK globally means more pressure to curb emissions
- research impacts - a child of DG (a middle-class university graduate in London) would be quite likely to attend a top-500-in-the-world research university, potentially contributing to global-warming-fixing innovations; while the chance of one particular person making a significant impact in this is low, the potential 'return' is so enormously high that it would probably balance out the comparatively very small emissions the child would produce
Whilst it may be true that 100 companies contribute 71% of all global emissions, I notice that they are pretty much all fossil fuel extraction companies. Now if we all were to take steps to reduce our CO2 emissions, the emissions caused by those companies will be reduced accordingly. Ultimatly, it is the combined actions of 7 billion humans (of which we are all a part) that is the problem, not simply "someone or something else".
I do though strongly support your point on lobbying, as well as supporting greater governmental action on them (Carbon tax?).
Interesting post!
If we want to continue buying our cucumbers wrapped in film or our pasta in a single use plastic wrapper, we'd better find a better way of recycling/disposing of it PDQ! And don't even get me started on bottled water!!
Also, the fashion industry is the one of the biggest polluters - needing almost as much water to produce as the beef industry, while second-hand shops are groaning under the weight of perfectly good clothing and the rags are shipped to Africa who don't want them either.
We are a parasite and we are killing our host, and instead of finding ways to save our own planet we're busy sending rockets into space to look for others to destroy.
This means that 4 pints would cost £1.25. This is only a fraction more than the price of semi-skimmed milk at the big 4 supermarkets.
I believe at present the soya milk from Lidl is always 59p but I would need to check.
So there are cheap alternatives, you just need to be willing to look.
It's frustrating to see how quickly and easily some innovations are adopted by society (like cars, mobile phones, bottled water) ... and how incapable society is, on the other hand, of taking action in matters that are far more vital.
I enjoyed the bits about "not doing" or "not buying" having an impact. Completely agree.
Replace Chinese with most other ethnic groups/nations and there would rightly be condemnation (actually the comment is unlikely to have been made).
All racism needs to be called out - being not-racist is not enough. We all need to be pro-actively anti-racist.
And talking of transport, which is more efficient and eco-friendly - six thousand miles of tarmac roads all needing construction and maintenance, or a mile of runway at each end of a long haul flight? Assume for the moment that emissions are similar for both means of transport.
Water? What Oxford drinks today, London will drink tomorrow. Some people are not happy with that - can you blame them? Not that it worries me. Being stingy has its own rewards.
Cameron and Blair both had 4 children, while Boris has had 7 (or is it 8?).
I also think focussing on 100 companies is not very helpful - if Esso stopped producing oil it would no longer be one of those 100. On the other hand, a few governments do have a huge amount of power. If China and the USA worked together on this they would be able to influence the rest of the world enough to solve the problem.
The impact of "one child less" on carbon dioxide emissions, per capita and overall, is strikingly high in many parts of the world. The ill-fated consumerism which causes these emissions is a fact we often like to ignore. If, on the other hand, the decision for or against having another child were ultimately down to its carbon footprint, other reasons must be pretty poor and random.
Now that's bolx.
Life expectancy is going up everywhere. We have plenty of (most) resources to go around, they are just distributed unevenly. It's about protecting the few scarce resources instead.
The "overpopulation" thing is a bit of a red herring.
The most important thing is the continued shift to renewables, and to less damaging, more productive ways of farming, and reducing our dependencies on scarce resources in a sustainable way.
Have all the kids you want, take all the flights you want, crank up the heating. These aren't the things killing the planet. (But you might want to eat less meat).
I do worry that climate change has become a thing for wealthy white westerners to hang their slightly alarming Malthusian tendencies on, or as some sort of smugness test akin to "I don't own a TV".
Wrapping cucumbers in plastic is a brilliant idea. It massively reduces food waste. It makes food more affordable and last considerably longer. James Wong is a good person to read on this.
Cats have no meaningful impact on biodiversity in the UK. They only kill very sick or weak birds (they don't target nests for example). The RSPB even says as much. It's a widely reported myth.
All these tiny things are just total rot that seem to take root as part of the wider narrative.
A much bigger issue with food is excessive water or fertiliser use, etc. Avocados take loads of water to grow, almond milk even more so!
The point I'm probably failing to make is that this is a series of complex decisions and instead everything gets lumped together into one amorphous lump of "good things to do" and "bad things to do" when these decisions are often context specific, person dependent etc. Which is why tackling this issue on an individual level is impossible and it can only be achieved through regulations and international agreements.
So I'm a prime polluter.
Thanks DG. You've cheered me up no end (NOT).
But never mind China, India has the largest cattle population in the world and is a significant rice producer. Who’s going to tell them to start culling their herds and to try planting spuds? It’s a thorny problem trying to get a global consensus.
"worry less about the bag, and more about the pointless crap inside it"
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