[TheClimate.Vote] March 25, 2020 - Daily Global Warming News Digest..

[Richard Pauli]

/*March 25, 2020*/

[TIME Magazine opinion]*
* *5 Lessons From Coronavirus That Will Help Us Tackle Climate Change*
CHRISTIANA FIGUERES March 24, 2020
Could the devastating impact of the new coronavirus pandemic destroy the 
momentum that the climate movement has built up over the last year? Some 
say so, fearing that the economic fallout will push climate down the 
list of priorities for governments, and that travel restrictions will 
force a delay to the U.N. climate conference.

That can't happen. What brought us to this point of unprecedented 
interest in taking climate action is climate change itself. We have 
witnessed huge, record-breaking fires and floods, from California to 
Siberia, all in the space of one year. Sadly those negative impacts will 
continue, both in frequency and intensity. If we thought we could forget 
about it, I'm sad to say, nature will remind us.

In fact, I believe the last few weeks, as terrible as they have been for 
so many people, have taught us crucial lessons that we needed to learn 
in order to enter a new era of radical, collaborative action to cut 
emissions and slow climate change. Like everyone else, I can't believe 
we've learned these five lessons in a matter of days.

Global challenges have no national borders. Some people used to think 
that they would be immune to global crises like climate change unfolding 
"on the other side of the world." I think that bubble has burst. No one 
is geographically immune to the coronavirus and the same is true for 
climate change.

As a society, we're only as safe as our most vulnerable people. During 
the COVID-19 outbreak, the elderly and those with health conditions are 
more vulnerable to the coronavirus and the poor are more vulnerable to 
its economic impact. That makes us all more vulnerable too. That lesson 
has taken us into a space of solidarity that we've never seen before. We 
are taking care of each other both out of altruism and because we want 
to make sure that we're safe. That's exactly the thinking we need to 
deal with climate change.

Global challenges require systemic changes -- changes that can only be 
activated by government or companies. But they also require individual 
behavioral changes. We need both. We have seen over the past few weeks 
that governments can take radical action and we can change our behaviour 
quite quickly.

Prevention is better than cure. It's cheaper and safer to prevent people 
from catching and spreading the virus than to attempt to treat huge 
numbers of cases at once. That's always been the case in the health 
sector. And in climate change it is much better to prevent runaway 
temperature rises than to figure out how to deal with the enormous 
consequences.

All our response measures need to be based on science. There are a lot 
of myths around coronavirus, just as there are a lot of myths around 
climate change. But the countries and individuals basing their responses 
on what the health professionals are saying are doing better. Likewise 
on climate change we must take action in line with what the science 
tells us, rather than following myths or misinformation.

Of course, there are also key differences with COVID-19 that make 
responding to climate change a more positive experience. The coronavirus 
needs to be addressed through personal isolation, while the climate 
needs to be tackled through coming together and collaborating. Social 
distancing measures have caused economic paralysis, while our response 
to climate change should actually strengthen and improve the economy.

Governments and financial leaders are already considering recovery 
packages for an economy so badly hit by the virus. Surprisingly, these 
decisions will be the most important decision on climate change. If 
investments to kick start the paralyzed economy are directed into high 
carbon assets and industries, we will lock out our current potential to 
bend the curve of emissions this decade. On the other hand, with 
interest rates at an all time low, political and financial leaders now 
have an unprecedented historical opportunity to accelerate the energy 
transition putting us onto a safe path toward a 50% reduction of 
emissions by 2030.

I hope that the shock of this pandemic will jolt people out of their 
desire to ignore global issues like climate change. I hope our growing 
sense of urgency, of solidarity, of stubborn optimism and empowerment to 
take action, can be one thing that rises out of this terrible situation. 
Because while we will, eventually, return to normal after this pandemic, 
the climate that we know as normal is never coming back.
Contact us at editors at time.com.
https://time.com/5808809/coronavirus-climate-action/?amp=true



[curious]
*Here's what a coronavirus-like response to the climate crisis would 
look like *
By Sammy RothStaff Writer
March 24, 2020
Both the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change are global crises with the 
power to derail economies and kill millions of people.
Society has moved far more aggressively to address the coronavirus than 
it has the climate crisis. But some experts wonder if the unprecedented 
global mobilization to slow the pandemic might help pave the way for 
more dramatic climate action.
Leah Stokes, a political scientist at UC Santa Barbara, pointed out that 
aggressive steps to reduce planet-warming emissions -- such as investing 
in solar and wind power, switching to electric cars and requiring more 
efficient buildings -- wouldn't be nearly as disruptive to everyday life 
as the stay-at-home orders that have defined the novel coronavirus response.
"Dealing with the climate crisis is a decades-long transformation of our 
energy system," Stokes said.

It's also possible COVID-19 will change nothing for the climate fight, 
precisely because the calamitous effects of rising temperatures -- such 
as worsening wildfires, deadlier heat waves and rising seas -- are 
building over time rather than all at once.
We asked eight scientists, activists and other experts what a 
coronavirus-like response to climate change would look like, and what we 
can learn from the pandemic. Here's what they said.

In other words, narrowly addressing root causes isn't enough. Public 
officials in various parts of the country haven't just tried to slow the 
spread of COVID-19; they've suspended evictions, guaranteed paid sick 
leave and proposed sending cash to Americans.
Similarly, Grubert said, climate policies can't just focus on reducing 
emissions. They must provide relief for those who are most vulnerable, 
such as coal workers who lose their jobs and low-income communities 
suffering the worst effects of pollution.
"We can't really solve the climate crisis without having support for 
people's healthcare, and support for people being able to survive 
wage-wise and job-wise," she said. "And I think with the coronavirus 
response, we're starting to see a lot of those same types of arguments 
being applied."
  - -
In an interview, Orford explained that international law has long been 
shaped by the "rational choice" paradigm that dominates U.S. legal 
thinking. She described that way of thinking as follows: "You can't ask 
people to make any sacrifice of liberty or property for the collective 
-- and even if you did ask them, they wouldn't do it." Nations, too, 
will act only in their own self-interest, "even when faced with 
destruction of the planet."
Now the COVID-19 pandemic is putting those ideas to the test. And Orford 
suspects there's no going back.
"We can't un-live this," she said. "We now know you can ask people to 
radically do something we wouldn't have thought possible, and we can do 
that with good humor. So why can't we do that for the environment?"
https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2020-03-24/what-coronavirus-like-response-to-climate-crisis-would-look-like



[another trait]
*The key ingredient to surviving both coronavirus and climate change: 
our shared sense of humanity*
By Yvette Cabrera on Mar 22, 2020

It's not easy to look out for each other these days, or so I thought as 
I rushed to the store to buy a roasted chicken for my mom last weekend. 
It was a seemingly innocent task that in the time of coronavirus had 
suddenly turned macabre. Would I inadvertently bring the virus straight 
to her doorstep? I was determined not to, since she falls into the age 
range most vulnerable to complications from COVID-19. So I stepped up my 
typical sanitizing protocol as I shopped for groceries, using a 
sanitizing wipe on everything my hands touched, from the grocery cart 
handlebars to my steering wheel, and squeezing hand sanitizer onto my 
hands after paying.

It was my sister's birthday -- her "coronavirus birthday," as she took 
to describing it while the news of the outbreak, market crash, and 
massive nationwide shutdowns took over our lives. How do you celebrate 
in a time like this? We'd debated that question, eventually rejecting 
all of our usual dining haunts -- it's not easy to practice social 
distancing in a restaurant -- and settling on what we had done growing 
up: cooking sopes, a favorite dish of my dad's when he was alive, at our 
mom's house.

If you've ever made sopes by hand, you know it's a true labor of love . 
Mixing the corn masa (dough), shaping the masa disks on the tortilla 
press, cooking them first on the comal and then frying them in oil -- 
it's a family affair that requires all hands on deck. In our case my dad 
always headed that assembly line. Tortillas were his business in Mexico 
City, where my parents were born, so he knew how to measure exactly the 
amount of water the ready-made masa harina needed to achieve the perfect 
masa texture -- not sticky and never cracked dry -- for our Sunday 
sopes, which we'd top with mashed beans, cabbage, salsa, sour cream, and 
different types of meat.

At my mom's house, I wasn't worried about cleanliness. Anyone who enters 
my mom's kitchen knows the drill: Wash your hands! And trust me, she 
watches to make sure it's done properly. What kept me up later that 
night was whether any of us -- my sisters, my nieces, or nephew -- could 
already be carrying the virus. Would it have been safer just to stay away?

I consider myself lucky. I live just a 20-minute drive from my mom. I 
flew the coop long ago when I went to college, but I always knew I'd 
return to my hometown to be closer to my family. Food has always been 
how we show our love. When I'd come home from my college, my dad would 
always ask, "Mi'ja, what dish should we make this weekend?" Enchiladas 
Suizas, I'd declare! And so it was.

Now, when I'm out shopping and spot delicacies like flores de calabaza 
(squash blossoms) or chirimoyas, I scoop them up for my mom, who never 
forgot the poverty of her childhood, when some days all she had to eat 
were tortillas and beans. She loves simmering the squash blossoms in 
tomatoes, onions, and chiles, then wrapping it all in a tortilla. What 
she loves most, though, is feeding us, and we happily oblige.

So even though a part of me worried about celebrating last weekend, it 
also felt right. I walked in, washed my hands, and stepped right into 
the assembly line, wrapping each sope in a thin towel and pinching the 
edges on the hot disk to create a rim. It's during these times of 
uncertainty that we lean on each other the most, and our cozy family 
meal was exactly that: a time to catch up, listen to the news, stress 
about COVID-19, and share tips on how to survive this global crisis.

That was before the governor of California ordered everyone in the state 
to stay home except for essential work or travel. The next few weeks 
will be isolating, but even as we maintain the recommended distance from 
friends, colleagues, and everyone else, there are ways to bridge that 
space. Last weekend, my neighbor who raises chickens left a dozen 
beautiful, fresh brown eggs at our door. Friends from across the country 
have sent texts checking in, sharing advice, and sending their love. On 
online forums, neighbors are offering to help those in need shop for 
groceries. We may not be able to break bread in public, but the loss of 
life to COVID-19 is a reminder that this isolation is a small price to 
pay to keep all of us safe.

We are faced with a deepening health crisis that scientists say may well 
be linked to environmental destruction. The question is: What will we 
do? In the short term, it's heartening to see generosity extended from 
one stranger to another, and by those willing to help others in this 
time of need. But as we fight this pandemic, we should remember that the 
greater battle against global warming is still ahead, and that the same 
environmental degradation that may have led us to this outbreak is 
poised to lead to a more extreme public health crisis as climate change 
accelerates.

That same spirit of sisterhood and brotherhood can help us find 
solutions that address both of these calamities. You can call it "love 
in the time of coronavirus," and indeed many are referencing Gabriel 
Garcia Marquez's masterpiece these days. But the themes of Love in the 
Time of Cholera resonate even more deeply than we realize. In the novel, 
Florentino Ariza waits patiently for decades to unite with Fermina Daza, 
and finally together, they essentially quarantine themselves aboard a 
steamboat forever sailing the waters of the Magdalena River.

But in his zeal, Florentino, president of the River Company of the 
Caribbean, fails to see the warning signs of environmental degradation 
along the Magdalena. The "father of waters" is no longer the great river 
of Florentino's youth. It's been ravaged by 50 years of "uncontrolled 
deforestation," toppling ancient, colossal trees whose wood feeds the 
steamboats' boilers. Without these giants, the shrieking parrots and 
screaming monkeys have vanished, as have the manatees with their siren 
songs from the river's sandy banks.

The message from Garcia Marquez is not so subtle: Florentino receives 
the alarming reports of the Magdalena's demise, but never acts, and by 
the time he realizes the truth, it's too late. "Love becomes greater and 
nobler in calamity," writes Garcia Marquez. Will we heed his words of 
wisdom for the sake of the generations that may never have the 
opportunity to sail down a river as magnificent as the Magdalena? As 
Florentino and Fermina discover in the winter of their lives, despite 
what everyone has told them, there is no barrier that love can't 
overcome because "love was always love, anytime and anyplace, but it was 
more solid the closer it came to death."

https://grist.org/climate/the-key-ingredient-to-surviving-both-coronavirus-and-climate-change-our-shared-sense-of-humanity/



[Digging back into the internet news archive]
*On this day in the history of global warming  - March 25, 2002 *
The Associated Press reports:

"Environmentalists say their requests for a meeting with Energy
Secretary Spencer Abraham in the months prior to the release of the
Bush administration's energy report were rebuffed by an aide who
cited Abraham's' busy schedule.

"John Adams, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council,
said Wednesday the refusal to meet with the environmentalists stands
in sharp contrast to the eight meetings Abraham had with energy and
business groups in early 2001 to discuss the energy plan."

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/green-groups-we-had-no-say/
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