Between earth and eaarth

It is becoming much clearer to me that we are now living on a planet that is quite different from the one on which I was born. Let me elaborate.

First, I did the WWF environmental footprint calculator (again) the other day to discover that no matter what I do, I need at least 1.4 earths to provide enough resources for everyone on the planet to live like I do. And that is by going vegan, no car, walking or riding my bike, living on a farm (no food miles) and no grid connection. The life styles we enjoy are literally unsustainable by many metrics. This simply means we will run out of key resources and not have alternatives.

Second, the speed of change we need to make from an oil based economy and society is simply too slow to seriously limit changes to the global climate system. For example, the world's current investment in oil infrastructure is worth around 10 trillion dollars and needs between 10 and 50 years before the capital costs are paid off. Who is going to pay for this? There is tremendous inertia in the investment system and even on the best case scenario this asset investment will not be given up without a major fight.

Third, how long will it take to replace the transport fleet? We are seeing hybrids and electric vehicles enter the market place (hybrids are ahead of electrics in Australia), but it will probably take 20 years to replace the stock. In the meantime, we continue to pollute.

Fourth, the alterations in the climate system due to historically unprecedented levels of greenhouse gases will be very hard to pull back. But this is no longer a future scenario, as it was when concerns about climate change first emerge over 30 years ago. We have increasingly frequent extreme storm events from drought to forest fires. We have always had these but there is clear evidence that these events are increasing. This is not a future impact of climate change, it is a current impact.

I am not sure our political systems are up to the task. I simply cannot see a clear pathway through the complex policy, economic, and political landscapes. We will make some progress, and I do think there will be unprecedented innovation and technological development. We may be able to hold the climate system to a limited temperature increase overall. But we not only cannot stop change, change is here, now.

Bill McKibben states this most powerfully in his new book, 'Eaarth; Making a life on a tough new planet'. The old earth we grew up with has actually gone, and we now live on a new eaarth.

For more on McKibben

For another interesting take on this see The Dark Mountain Project