The pains of acceptance: climate change and the distraction of responsibility

Over the weekend I stumbled upon an article with the headline: ‘Craters on the seabed in the Arctic spew out methane gas’ (own translation from Swedish).

Although I did not exactly understand what this meant, the title was alarming. Yet, there was some hope. I continued reading, thinking that maybe, just maybe, this is a phenomenon that occurs naturally. For some reason, this thought provided me with some comfort.

Nonetheless, as I kept reading, I quickly found out that rising sea temperatures are contributing to the methane’s transitioning to gas form, releasing it from its underground slumber. Eventually, these gases end up in the atmosphere, adding to the abundance of greenhouse gases (which trap heat in the atmosphere) which in turn leads to continued global warming.

But why was my initial though that this occurrence was ‘natural’ and not manufactured though human industries and lifestyle choices a comforting one? The consequences of both are the same.

The answer is perhaps simple. The difference between ‘natural’ and humanly caused climate change is that the latter is of our own making, making us accountable. It makes us responsible not only for the scale of its occurrence but also responsible to, if possible, find a solution. Would it not be easier to assume that the problem was outside our control?

I often hear climate change deniers refer to the fact that climate change occurs naturally, and that the global temperature have always fluctuated. References have consciously been excluded here…

I can understand how that belief would be comforting; if we did not cause climate change, there is less reason for us to worry about solving the crisis, with the discomforts and sacrifices this entails. And then, would it even be considered a crisis at all?

Nonetheless, the climate change we are currently experiencing is different, most of all seen to its rapid speed. The acceleration of global temperatures is faster than at any point in the last 2000 years, fast enough for us to be able to witness the collapse of our ecosystem up close. As many people say: ‘Let’s make sure we go see the Great Barrier Reef before it’s too late.’ That is, before water temperatures have led to the devastation (bleaching) of the coral reefs.

Anthropocene, or humanly cause, climate change is caused by us. We are contributing to the coral reefs bleaching, to methane gas being released into the atmosphere and much more. Accepting our role in climate change is painful. It would be much easier to keep on as if this was all outside of our control. But a crushing majority of climate change scientists agree climate change is our own doing.

For me, that means that we are responsible to, if not prevent climate change, to at least slow it down. However, squabbles about responsibility can easily be circumvented. Does it matter what I do if large corporations and the majority of the global north continue in the same way?

In the end, it does not matter whether climate change is due to natural, human causes or a combination of both. When we see something that is wrong, it is our duty to intervene if we can. Responsibility can be a distraction from our obligations to this planet that we love and depend on so much.

Death by air

Australia is a car dependent country. A majority of people travel to work by car in all Australian states and capital cities. And poor or no access to public transport is quoted as the main reason for people to drive to work or study. The recent finding that the death of Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, a nine-year-old girl in the UK, is attributed to air pollution draws attention to an often-ignored fact; air pollution kills. In fact, air pollution is a serious threat to our health and wellbeing, and we need to reconsider the way we are living in and designing our cities.

Last week’s landmark decision from the Coroner’s Court in London found that air pollution substantially contributed to the death of nine-year-old Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah’s seven years ago. Ella suffered from serious asthma and died after almost three years of serious illness. Living close to South Circular Road, a major road on the outskirts of London, exposed Ella and her family to high levels of nitrogen dioxide. Dangerous levels that contributed to her ill health and the asthma-attack that led to her death.

Ella’s reoccurring incidents of poor health coincided with episodes of high air pollution in the area where she lived. The coroner concluded that the levels of nitrogen dioxide in the air where Ella lived exceeded the World Health Organization’s guidelines. The dangerous levels of air pollution persisted for a prolonged period of time despite efforts to reduce them. Following Ella’s death, the government has promised to oversee transport in the area and to reduce the pollution.

The harms of ambient air pollution are well-known, although, perhaps more associated with smoke from nearby bushfires, rubbish burning, and to particular locations such as near coal-fired power plants and in countries such as China, India and Bangladesh, than to transport in capital cities in the UK or Australia. The London Coroner’s decision contradicts this assumption. Instead, air pollution in heavily trafficked areas is harmful and even lethal. And what is worse, it affects those struggling economically more since they cannot always choose where to live. The World Health Organization estimate that nine out of ten people breathe air that exceeds their pollution guidelines and that annually about seven million people die as a result.

Apart from contributing to global warming, private vehicles cause harmful and deadly air pollution in our cities. We need to reconsider our options and prioritise extending the public transport network across Australia. Moreover, locating job opportunities across the city will reduce the need to travel. Finally, we need to closely monitor air quality around residential areas to minimise the risk of exposing people to hazardous levels of pollution.

How to get through this summer’s bushfires: Lessons from California

As we approach the Australian summer, we are also getting closer to another potentially devastating bushfire season. The upcoming fire season will be unlike any before as it takes place during a global pandemic. Australia has a lot to learn from the problems facing California, as they battle serious bushfires while still heavily accosted by the Coronavirus. Hundreds of fires are raging across California. The fires have destroyed more than a thousand homes and non-residential buildings and at least seven people have lost their lives. California, with a similarly flammable landscape to Australia, helps us foresee what is to come. It demonstrates how the threat of fires is intensified by the pandemic and vice versa. As the Australian summer approaches, in a country still recovering the losses from last summer’s fires, there is a lot to learn from the situation currently facing California.

In California, incarcerated labourers with an hourly rate of $2 USD and promises of reduced sentences, are an important firefighting resource. However, this year many convicts are unavailable following various severe Coronavirus outbreaks in prisons. Other, non-incarcerated firefighters are exposed to the added risk of contracting the virus as they work and often live in close proximity of each other. This in turn could lead them to unintentionally bringing the virus back home to close family and friends. Moreover, the exposure to the smoke from bushfires put firefighter at risk of worsening the COVID-symptoms and its consequences. These are concerns to be taken seriously in relation to the Australian firefighting response. During last summer’s fires, the Australia government was heavily critiqued for their lack of financial compensation for the large volume of volunteer firefighters making up Australia’s bushfire response. In the coming weeks, the Australian Fire and Emergency Services need to reflect on its bushfire response to minimising the adverse impact of the virus.

Also, the virus brings with it some added difficulties surrounding evacuation. Over a hundred thousand people have had to evacuate around California, leaving their homes to escape the deadly fires. It is crucial that Australia review their evacuation procedures. How will people be evacuated and where will they be given emergency shelter to prevent the virus to spread? This, I argue, requires particular attention in view of the recent hotel quarantine failure in Victoria, which caused the state’s deadly ‘second wave’ of infections. The Australian government should carefully consider the most appropriate evacuation procedures and how to support people that lose their homes temporarily or more long-term.

Finally, prisoners are vulnerable in a pandemic, due to the large number of people forced together in small spaces. Due to their restricted movements, they are also vulnerable to disasters such as bushfires. In California, incarcerated people were suffering as the fires approached. Although the areas around the prison had been evacuated, the prisoners were left in-place. They lack the authority to evacuate and were left breading the toxic smoke. For a prison system challenged by a pandemic that feeds off the proximity of bodies in confined spaces, bushfires represent an added threat. The Australian Corrections still have some time to prepare and should consider when and how a necessary evacuation should take place in order to avoid unnecessary harm to people in their care.

Although parts of Australia are currently in the midst of their bushfire season, the most flammable landscapes still have theirs to come. Judging from the early start to last year’s fire season, larger bushfires could be expected within the month and this year will be unlike any before. Among the added concerns are the exposure to toxic smoke from the fires, the risk of firefighters getting infected by the virus, mass evacuation and prisons. Thus far, we have been asked to stay home in order to remain safe from the pandemic. Leaving home is to expose ourselves and those we love to the virus. Severe fires will threaten some people’s access to that safe haven. Consequently, the Australian government needs to think through the implications of such loss and how to best get through the summer.

Waste: Out of sight, out of mind

Today I am writing about something that often occupies my mind: waste. Waste is a word that encompasses so many things. A beloved item, clothing out of style or a mouth-watering meal from the week before can with the passing of time turn to waste in our minds. I say in our minds because waste, more than anything, is a state of mind and a highly individual framing. Waste, in all its forms, could therefore be understood as that which we no longer desire to be in the presence of. This goes for broken items and spoiled foods, but it also encompasses a lot of fully functional but for some reason undesirable items. When no longer desired, such items become unwanted, an eyesore and are classified as waste, followed by attempts to do away with it. Rubbish is therefore often hidden away under kitchen counters, the sights and smells restricted by bin lids, and as soon as possible we seek to remove it from our living quarters to the large bins at the back of the house. After it has been picked up and taken away, it is out of sight and out of mind. When possible, we like to send it to a country far, far, away, cram it into stockpiles or dig it down in landfills. Waste out of sight allows us to forget about it and it permits us to continue to produce and consume more items.

I am not necessarily leading up to a solution here but instead I am emphasising what I see as a major issue: that we are out of touch with our rubbish. As we place it in the bin, we could think about whether we could give it another life, whether it could be repurposed or anyone else would find value in it. Yet, even this is to undershoot. Instead, that thought should better come to us in the moment that we purchase something. Buying an item, or even accepting it for free, do we consider the lifespan of it and could we consider getting a second-hand item instead? I reckon that it is way too easy to wink at the fact that a now so desirable item, one day will seem redundant to us and will end up as waste.

Last week we could read about Liz and Brian, a Melbourne couple who put their rubbish bin out for the first time in a year. To clarify, this consisted of only one bin of landfill waste that they had collected over 12 months. So, how was this achieved? By reusing, recycling and repurposing as much as possible. They also try to reduce waste by avoiding purchasing items such as vegetable in plastic packages. In other words, they have managed to reduce their contribution to landfill through conscious buying, reusing and disposal. When possible, they give items a second life. As the couple themselves recognise, this is a time-consuming task and not achievable for everyone. Yet, we could all reduce our landfill by applying these same principles.

Although not an anticipated alternative per se, if we were forced to look at the waste we generate, perhaps to sleep next to it at night, to display it openly in the front yard or as a mountain in the centre of town, would that change our relation to consumption and waste? What if the council ceased all waste collection for a year? Would visual and other sensory confrontation with waste change our relationship to it? And could it also shift our relationship to our accumulation of possessions and the objects of our desire? As it is now, it is way too easy to drop something in the bin and forget that it ever existed. I know, because forgetting is often what I try to do.

What do or could you do to reduce your landfill contribution?

Advancing to normalcy

Many countries around the world are starting to lift the COVID-19 emergency measures and to slowly return back to normalcy. The reason, more than anything, seems to be to slow the effects of the anticipated recession as state funds are dwindling and money printing presses are running warm. The dos and don’ts of managing this health crisis, I leave to others to discuss. Instead, I want to think through travelling and transport choices in the COVID and post-COVID world. Clearly, many communities are put under enormous economic pressure, especially those that are dependent on tourism, and unemployment numbers are climbing. However, I argue that we should not be so quick to rush back to previous travelling behaviours and in this blog post I want to think through ways to advance to a new normalcy, rather than moving back to what was before.

Firstly, how will the pandemic affect the way we move in the city? The question of public transport is caught up in the issue of contamination as the system is currently built around a high density of bodies in shared spaces. During the last two months, a few times I have had to utilise public transport for essential travel, and the change in travelling behaviour is striking. The empty trams have an eerie feel to them with only a handful of passengers in the otherwise so packed spaces. Naturally, this is due to less people moving around in the city but during the last two months more people have also been selecting cycling over public transport. As we transition out of in-house lockdowns and people once again have a reason to move around the city, will people continue to avoid public transport in favour of cycling, or will there be an increase in the use of cars? Resorting to the private spaces of the individual vehicle is not an option for everyone and it is certainly not a sustainable one. Instead I suggest that other options should be explored. In Melbourne, following the examples of major cities around Europe, there is a proposal for footpaths and bike lanes to be expanded in order to provide alternatives to public transport and to allow for more distancing between people. This will be at the expense of on-street parking. These are great examples of the ways transitioning out of isolation can be combined with more sustainable patterns of life.

At the same time, the European Union is urging European countries to reopen the boarders. “This is not going to be a normal summer… but when we all do our part we don’t have to face a summer stuck at home or completely lost for tourism industry,” Margrethe Vestager, the EU Commission Executive Vice-President announced at a press conference last Wednesday. Although I strongly sympathise with the tourist industry and European countries dependent on wealthy tourists from abroad, let us consider alternative to air travel with less adverse effects on the environment.

Luxuries become habits and habits becomes taken for granted. Before the pandemic, travelling to faraway destinations was no longer a luxury but rather the bare minimum requirement for many. For the last two months, here in Melbourne, we haven’t been allowed to travel anywhere really. As someone who works from home, my life has consisted of a five-kilometre radius around my house, which is about as far as I get on my runs. To travel anywhere right now seems like a luxury to me. I long for the Victorian countryside outside of Melbourne, the beaches and the valleys. I long to meet up with my friends in the city, to see my colleagues at work and to travel to visit my friends in different suburbs. Let us not resort to old habits of treating international flights as the norm. Let us instead treat it as something special, a luxury or the last resort.

Tourism can be undertaken in various ways and local attractions have a lot to offer. Nonetheless, the allures of the different, the far-away and the unknown remain. So, perhaps it is time to properly invest in more sustainable modes of travel. Holidays by train is the new black in Europe, but it is expensive and as many other ‘green’ alternatives therefore not available to or desirable for everyone. I am not sure whether the cost of train travel is representative of the cost of building and managing the infrastructure or, which I suspect, the discrepancy in flight and train prices is the result of allowing the ‘market’ to rule. Nonetheless, before we rush back into normalcy and previous travel behaviours, let us think about what travelling is necessary, what is sustainable and whether this is a good time to readjust some of those itinerant expectations.

After pandemic

The coronavirus pandemic has transformed human behaviours around the world with some positive effects on the environment. In Australia, everyone whose work allows it is now working from home which means that less people are commuting to and from work each day. There is very little international travel and much less national travel taking place as state borders are closing and we are encouraged not to undertaking any unnecessary travelling. In addition, some industries have temporarily reduced their activities. I am, for example, now working from my home and I only leave my house to buy groceries, go for a run, a walk or to sit down at the creek close to my house. I have had to cancel my planned international trips to conferences and to see my family back in Sweden. These changes in mine and in millions of people’s lives have led to a slashing of air pollution globally as observed by the European Space Agency via satellite images. Although from a personal perspective the pandemic and the isolation are both tragedies, from a purely environmental perspective, these are all important behavioural changes and vital pollution reduction that we have been waiting for.

This is a time when we all worry about the future, wondering whether after the pandemic, life will return to something resembling normality. The Chinese city Wuhan, where the virus was first detected in December last year is now slowly lessening their strict mass quarantine rules. This, I think, is providing us all with some sanguinity. I hope that soon we can go back to living without the anxiety of death and disease being all around us. I also hope that we once again will seek closeness and social inclusion rather than fearing the person beside us and practicing social distancing. But will we also go back to travelling as much as we did before? I certainly hope not.

As someone who has been working from home for two weeks now, I do not believe it to be a good solution for everyone, or at least not every day. Nonetheless, perhaps those who can should work from home two days a week or find alternatives to the car. Moreover, there are a lot of national and international meetings that quite successfully can be undertaken via conference calls which has the potential to lessen the degree of business trips. If you drive to the grocery store, perhaps try to make less trips in a week and consider what consumption practices are absolutely necessary. In rough times it is natural to wish for something positive to arise as a result, for all the suffering to have led to something good. I would hope that this experience in all its tragedy could open up our minds towards alternative ways of life. I also hope that it has shown us how able we are to act and adapt in order to save lives. In what is hopefully not more than a few months, as we once again rebuild our societies after this frightening disruption, let us think about what world we want to live in and what we want Earth to look like in 20, 50 and 200 years. And then let us consider the best possible way forward and work together to get there.

Enter: Fire

The Anthropocene is a name given to the geological epoch during which human beings have come to fundamentally change the geology and ecosystem of the Earth. Increasingly we are controlling the world around us, removing unwanted vegetation and habitats, turning pastures into cities, paths into paved roads. We have drilled the Earth’s core, built towns in the desert, domesticated animals and introduced non-native species. The list goes on and on. I find it important to take a step back and remind ourselves that this is a self-proclaimed right. Other animal species utilise the gifts from Earth to keep themselves and their gene pool alive. In contrast, we, the rich and wealthy, take from the Earth in order to achieve increased luxury, status, enjoyment and wealth while others suffer devastating famine, injury and death. We want to move faster and reach higher than anyone else, we want to conquer the land, the water, the atmosphere and the outer space. We are indeed ruling Earth with an iron fist. The realisation that the effects of unrestrained human activity is reverberating over the planet and attempts to ameliorate the damage is making this abundantly clear; such as our efforts of keeping species at the edge of extinction alive and to prevent others from proliferating. We might seem to be in complete control of the planet. But then there is fire reminding us of our limitations.

Last year we witnessed another devastating bushfire season in California, largescale fires in the Amazonas – that along with deforestation is considered especially destructive for the ecosystem – and hundreds of bushfires in Siberia and Indonesia affecting the air quality in nearby cities. In Australia the fire season started early and is considered to be one of the worst ever recorded. These fires followed extreme heat and below average rainfall. The harm and damage from these fires are due to their location, many burning along the eastern part of the country, close to many human settlements. Many people have lost their lives, many more their homes, millions of acers of land have burnt, animals are dead or dying and the fire season is far from over.

Fire moves in and removes everything in its path. It is the Earth rising up against its emperor – not overthrowing it but weakening it substantially. As long as people have lived on this planet, fire has been by their side. Fire on Earth is indeed like the mythological Phoenix, causing death only for life to rise again from its ashes. After vegetation burns, new life returns. With fire by our side we have been able to conquer the world, remoulding the land encountered, making it habitable for us. But at times fire also keeps us in place. It comes in, it destroys, and it shows us that what we have built, the security induced oasis in its path, is in fact instable and fleeting. Reports of increased and more severe fires around the world following Anthropocene climate change, makes me wonder if fire is entering as the new dictator on Earth. Can we regain control over it, will we be forced to follow its orders, or can we learn to live side by side, respecting each other’s territories?

But how come the Australian government is denying the fact that fire has entered the political arena? While acknowledging the victims of fire, many Members of Parliament are still denying the fact that fires are exceptional and that they are induced by climate change. Now, I suppose it is a political game, part of its grandstanding, not to look the challenger in the eye and not to acknowledge their sway. Pretending that your adversary is lesser than you and indeed wishing for it to be so. But Scott Morrison, the next election is impending, fire is gathering its forces and the people, the people that you represent, are calling for a meeting between fire and you. We want to witness your confrontation, listen as you acknowledge fire’s existence and follow along as you prepare for the most important showdown of your life.

Attuning to air and atmosphere

Over the Christmas holidays, I left Melbourne to spend a few weeks in Sweden with my family. A few days before my return to Melbourne I was reached by the news that Melbourne was experiencing reduced air-quality due to drifting smoke from the large bushfires along the Victorian coast. As I landed in Melbourne a few days later, the air quality was very bad. It was the morning on the 15^th of January, the air was glimmering yellow in the morning light and it tasted off. Although air is necessary for survival, breathing is an unconscious reflex which is often forgotten about. However, Choy reminds us that in places where air quality is bad, it becomes a topic of medical, political and social importance. Decreased air quality forces us to think about the atmosphere in more concrete ways. I know that for me, to check the air quality in my neighbourhood has now become a regular part of my morning routine. I have also downloaded an app which gives me daily updates, similar to weather notifications. Apart from employing such technological means of control, I am increasingly aware of the sight, taste and smell of the air. Preferably, air should not be seen or tasted but during bad days it is like you can see the dust and the chemical particles moving in the air, smell dirt in the wind and sense the minute particles through your taste buds. Twice so far, I have run around my house at night whiffing, after having detected an unusual smell, only to draw the conclusion that it must be coming from the air outside.

So, at least for me, the fact that air quality has become an issue in the city where I live is making me aware of air in ways that I previously was not. In addition, the fact that the air quality is not constant but rather erratic and changing intensifies this experience. A few years back I spent some months in Mexico City. At the time I would sometimes hear reports of the damage of breathing the air there being equivalent to smoking a packet of cigarettes a day or something to that effect. That is not a pleasant thing to hear but something that I quietly accepted and mostly avoided thinking about. The bad air was constant and largely due to the compact and laxly regulated traffic in the city. Nonetheless, the consistency of the air allowed me, for the most part, to forget about it. Similarly, recently I was complaining to my partner about the bad air in Melbourne and he, who had just returned from a trip to his hometown Dhaka, Bangladesh, answered by telling me about the air quality in Dhaka which often reaches hazardous levels. This of course does not stop people from going about their daily activities and I highly doubt they check the air-quality index each morning. Since, I believe, once again, the air quality is always pretty bad. In contrast, recent bad air in Melbourne has been a temporary and varying condition. ‘Hazardous’ air in the morning might be ‘moderate’ in the afternoon and ‘good’ the next day. Although the air quality has been good for a while, before going for a run I check the air to make sure that it hasn’t decreased.

Whether this acute attention to air would last even if the air quality continued to fluctuate, I do not know. Perhaps even that we would get used to. But for now, many people around Melbourne are on hyperalert for bad air and hazardous conditions as bushfires around the state are expected to burn all summer. This puts us in touch with air and the atmosphere within which air circulates in new, terrifying and exciting ways. Whether this attunement to air will lead to a change in behaviour or stricter carbon emission targets, is yet too early to say. What is clear is that we now exist in an atmosphere of increased climate urgency, which is making many people realise that climate change is affecting us here and now, not only there and then.