COP 20: Lima, Peru – Page 9 – Global Climate Change Mosaic: COP 20

October 22, 2014October 27, 2014

Dickinson in DC: Climate Change Symposium

By Elizabeth Plascencia

Dickinson's Global Climate Change Mosaic 2014. Pictured left to right: Professor Leary, Joe Riley '17, Jessica Poteet '15, Elizabeth Plascencia '16, Heather Morrison '15, Maeve Hogel '15, Brady Hummel '17, Cora Swanson '17, William Kochtitzky '16, Professor Niemitz, Rehana Rohman '16, Briana Zagami '15, Jackie Geisier '17, Keziah Groth-Tuft '17, Justin McCarty '15, Jack Marcus '17 — Dickinson’s Global Climate Change Mosaic 2014. Pictured left to right: Professor Leary, Joe Riley ’17, Jessica Poteet ’15, Elizabeth Plascencia ’16, Heather Morrison ’15, Maeve Hogel ’15, Brady Hummel ’17, Cora Swanson ’17, William Kochtitzky ’16, Professor Niemitz, Rehana Rohman ’16, Briana Zagami ’15, Jackie Geisier ’17, Keziah Groth-Tuft ’17, Justin McCarty ’15, Jack Marcus ’17

Dickinson’s Global Climate Change delegation spent the past couple of days in Washington, DC. Spanning from Monday, October 20^th – Tuesday, October 21^st we indulged in engaging dialogues with representatives from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Sierra Club, and more. Our meetings were held in a conference room within the National Council for Science and the Environment (NCSE), as Dickinson College is an affiliate. It was an incredible opportunity and experience to hear the range of perspectives alternating from climate scientists, economists, policy makers, and grass-roots movement leaders. It is safe to say that our delegation of students felt an extreme mixture of exhaustion and excitement by the end of our last meeting today. On Monday we met with Tom Lovejoy (United Nations Foundation and George Mason University), Daniel Reifsnyder (US Department of State), Jacob Scherr (National Resources Defense Council), Laura Petes (White House Office of Science and Technology Policy), and Jon Padgham (START). Today, we met with Mike MacCraken (Climate Institute), Dallas Burtraw (Resources for the Future), Liz Perera (Sierra Club), Joel Scheraga (US Environmental Protection Agency), and Keya Chatterjee (World Wildlife Fund).

Personally, these conversations have enhanced and further informed my understanding of global climate change.

It is especially clear that climate action is NOW.

I am so thankful for these individuals that found time in their busy schedules to meet with our delegation for these past couple of days in Washington, DC. This magnitude of engagement and conversation really sets the tone for our travels to the 20^th Conference of the Parties in Lima, Peru under the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change). I can hardly wait. Cheers.

Here is a video of Brady Hummel and I speaking about our experiences this weekend:

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7Ha1CdhAMo&feature=youtu.be” title=”Climate%20Change%20Governance%20in%20Washington%20D.C.”]

The main objective of NCSE found on the walls of their office

Half of the Dickinson delegation visiting the White House in between meetings. Pictured left to right: Cora Swanson '17, Brady Hummel '17, Elizabeth Plascencia '16, Rehana Rohman '16, Jackie Geisier '17, Jessica Poteet '15 — Half of the Dickinson delegation visiting the White House in between meetings. Pictured left to right: Cora Swanson ’17, Brady Hummel ’17, Elizabeth Plascencia ’16, Rehana Rohman ’16, Jackie Geisier ’17, Jessica Poteet ’15

October 20, 2014October 19, 2014

Andean Civilization and the US Food System

This semester I am taking South American Archaeology as one of my four classes. Right now, we are discussing pre-Incan Andean civilizations, some of which inhabited the area of Peru that we will be visiting on our upcoming trip. While developments in pre-Incan cultures might not be directly related to climate change, the topic of climate comes up often in the study of pre-Incan cultures, as it plays an important role in societies that are so connected to the Earth and the environment. There was, of course, no anthropogenic climate change during the pre-Incan period, but climate affects civilizations nonetheless. In fact, the collapse of the Tiwanaku was caused in part by a changing climate.
The Tiwanaku, a civilization present during the Middle Horizon period of Peruvian history, from about AD 500-1000, was already seeing fragmentation in their society near the late 11^th century, as evidenced by the defacing of ritualistic monoliths– representing a ritual “killing” of the monolith’s ritual and power. But, beginning in the late 11^th century and continuing for a few hundred years, a drought hit the altiplano region of the Andes, the location of the Tiwanaku capital. At the time, the Tiwanaku had a centralized food economy, and the drought put stress on this, exacerbating fragmentations in an already disjointed culture. Local production systems came under the control of local corporate groups exercising local autonomy over their region, taking power away from the elites of the society (Janusek). Tiwanaku civilization was really an alliance of many different ethnic groups, which probably made it easier for it to break apart.

Obviously, a development such as the one seen with the Tiwanaku can inform our current situation with global warming. For instance, the US, similar to the Tiwanaku, has a centralized food economy that could be damaged by the effects of current climate change. Because all areas of the country depend on a centralized production center, the whole country will feel the effects of climate change, as a decrease in crop yield in one part of the country will affect the quantity and quality of food shipped to the whole of the country. We are not only facing at long-term drought, as the Tiwanaku did, but also rising oceans, more extreme weather, and hotter global temperatures. While we might have a better infrastructure than the Tiwanaku did, if we don’t do anything, at some point we will not be able to deal with the fallout from current climate change. Further, even if the US can deal some of these effects, the same cannot be said for less developed countries. These changes will not only have damaging effects on human populations, but might even modify economic and government systems. Already, and as Michael Pollan hints at in his book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, we are seeing, in some areas of the US, movement towards supporting locally sourced food (Pollan). Could this represent regions of the US starting to exhibit more local autonomy, due to the stresses put on the world’s economic and political systems by climate change? Furthermore, private corporations and subnational governments are working together to form transnational governance networks, for the purpose of working to mitigate and adapt to climate change below the realm of international negotiations, as they realized some of the failures of the UNFCCC and Kyoto Protocol. I’m not saying our whole civilization is going to collapse due to climate change, but climate change will definitely affect more than just our daily everyday life. It will affect the whole of human civilization.

Works Cited:

Janusek, J.W. 2004 Household and City in Tiwanaku. In Andean Archaeology, edited by H. Silverman, pp. 183-208. Blackwell Publishing, Oxford.

Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. New York: Penguin, 2006. Print.

October 19, 2014

What Actually Is Nature?

In addition to our mosaic courses, Global Climate Change and Global Environmental Challenges and Governance, I am taking an elective course, History of the Environment. This course takes us way back to the original hominids and the beginning of human interactions with the environment.

Contrary to popular belief, humans have been altering the Earth’s natural landscapes from centuries before the industrial revolution. If you feel bad about your environmental footprint, your ancestors are to blame. Our ancestors have been exploiting Earth’s resources since their existence, and yes that includes Native Americans. Even when humans aren’t transforming the land, natural occurrences and other organisms do. One of the debated topics in class is questioning What is nature? Is there such thing as “pristine” wilderness? Well, I hate to break it to you but there is no such thing as pristine wilderness, there are no places that remain untouched. Some people identify nature as a getaway from urban centers to the country or forests. However these “natural” places were created by humans. Most of the species that exist now did not exist before our time. Do you have a dog? Well, dogs did not always exist until humans selectively domesticated wolves. And that is just one example. The primitive hunter and gatherer societies caused the megafaunal extinction, and we will never get to meet any of the large species once served on a dinner plate…or rock. Since the discovery of fire, one of human’s greatest accomplishments, Earth’s landscapes have been forever transformed. Slash-and-burn methods, or fire-stick farming, have been a major part of human interaction with the land. The aboriginals in present day Australia were complete pyromaniacs and actually burned the land so intensely that today’s existing landscapes are a product of it. Some primitive civilizations exploited their land so badly it resulted in their own self-destruction.

So, the history of the environment has made me aware that the transformation of Earth’s landscapes is not at all a new phenomenon. Will history repeat itself? Is our present day society on its way to self-destruction?

As I now know nature is not defined as “pristine wilderness” I am still looking for a new definition. How would you define nature?

October 17, 2014October 17, 2014

Proud of my Green State

Anyone who has interacted with me enough to discover where I am from, knows I am proud to be from the Golden State. I love the landscapes, the access to the outdoors, the food, the people.. in short I love my state. Part of this love comes from the role California has as a leader of environmental sustainability. It is currently the nations top producer of solar energy (in 2013, 18% of our power came from solar), and is rated number one in clean technology (Bennett). None of this is to say that don’t have annoyance and anger towards the egregious environmental short comings of my state (don’t get me started on fracking, or almond production) but AB 32 reminds me of the environmental promise in California.

The the Global Warming Solutions Act (AB 32) is one of the most comprehensive actions to mitigate climate change while living up to its promises of co-benefits. It takes a multitrack approach with, “Reductions in GHG emissions [that] will come from virtually all sectors of the economy and will be accomplished from a combination of policies, planning, direct regulations, market approaches, incentives and voluntary efforts” (“Assembly Bill 32 Overview.”). It will improve energy efficiency, expand renewable energy, improve public transportation, reduce emissions, waste and increase technology all while saving consumers money, and improving community health (“Assembly Bill 32 Overview.” and Alvord). According to the Union of Conserned Scientists, “A recent study found that California’s low carbon fuel standard and cap-and-trade programs will save $8.3 billion in health costs between now and 2025 by reducing asthma attacks, hospitalizations, and other health impacts associated with poor air quality” (Alvord). AB 32’s ultimate aim is to return California’s net emissions by to 1990 levels by 2020 and the more ambitious aim of reducing emission 80% below 1990 levels by 2050 (“Assembly Bill 32 Overview.”).

Three cheers for my home state!

A picture of me and my sister backpacking in the Lost Coast in Northern California

Work Cited:

Alvord, Adrienne. “Big Oil, Climate Change, and California’s AB32.” The Equation: Union of Concerned Scientists . N.p., 30 Sept. 2014. Web. 16 Oct. 2014. <http://blog.ucsusa.org/big-oil-climate-change-and-californias-ab32-669>.

“Assembly Bill 32 Overview.” California Environmental Protection Agency. Ca.gov, n.d. Web. 16 Oct. 2014. <http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/ab32/ab32.htm

Bennett, Lisa. “Rays of Hope in California.”The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 2 Oct. 2014. Web. 16 Oct. 2014. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lisa-bennett/rays-of-hope-in-californi_b_5916096.html>.

October 16, 2014

Climate Physics 101

By Elizabeth Plascencia

As an Earth Sciences major at Dickinson College I am well aware of the seminars that we host as a department in order to foster an open platform to share student-faculty research, relevant geoscience news, geologic field excursions, and more. I have personally participated in two seminars in which I helped present student-faculty research in Iceland and a field excursion in Baffin Island, Canada.

Today, I attended a seminar of this sort but the Physics department hosted it. What attracted me most about this seminar was the topic of discussion in lieu of all of my studies so far within my courses, ERSC 204: Global Climate Change and ERSC 331: Chemistry of Earth Systems. Additionally, Professor of Meteorology at Pennsylvania State University, Kenneth J. Davis, presented his talk in a way that was readily accessible to the non-physicist.

This Physics Colloquium was officially called “The Breathing of the Earth and Fires of Industry: Measuring Greenhouse Gas Sources and Sinks at Regional Scales”. I found this talk compelling, because Davis spoke passionately about human activity increasing the greenhouse gas concentration in the earth’s atmosphere, resulting in an irreversible greenhouse effect. I especially appreciated his position on the matter because he was proving anthropogenic climate change with physics equations that I had never even heard of before! As a budding Earth scientist I found this talk to be extremely conducive to my climate change background as a whole, because I had never seen the information presented in that way and everyday I am realizing that this is truly an interdisciplinary field of study.

Example of tower-based turbulent flux measurements for eddy covariance

Davis spoke about the distinct methods for data collected like tower-based turbulent flux measurements, extrapolation of ecosystem fluxes across space using space-based remote sensing, and atmospheric budgets that utilize weather forecast systems combined with tower-, aircraft- and satellite-based greenhouse gas concentration measurements. Overall, I am happy to say that this talk has prompted me to look into reaching a stronger background in physics within my Earth Sciences major.

For more information please feel free to check out this awesome video describing the methods used in eddy covariance flux towers:

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ighAqUtUq3g”]

October 16, 2014October 23, 2014

Climate Change’s Link to Decreasing Honey Bee Populations

Honey bee populations have decreased from “5 million in the 1940s to only 2.5 million in 2014 in the United States” ( USDA) . Human-induced CO2 emissions could have affected the honey bee populations. Honey bees are major pollinators for plants, hence they are vital for our agricultural system. An example of this dependence is Californian farmers bringing in colonies of bees to keep crops alive through pollination. Plants and bees have co-evolved together, so bees know when to pollinate flowering plants. The major issue is that scientists do not know the environmental and genetic triggers that cue plant and pollinators to have synchronicity. Meaning temperatures have increased due to global warming, warmer temperatures have caused plants to flower earlier in the season than bees have been ready for.

Another outcome from global warming’s increased temperatures is that it has changes in migration patterns, which results in native plant’s lacking pollination. Another issue is that bees have been laying their eggs earlier in the season because of increased temperatures from climate change. Bees lay their eggs when temperatures are warm enough outside and require a constant temperature of 93 degrees for their eggs to survive. However, since they are laying their eggs earlier in the season there is a greater chance for cold days. These cold snaps have resulted in all the eggs in a nest dying, causing the future populations of bees to be stunted. (Earth Observatory). For example, bee keepers have seen a 30-90% population decline in winter. These cold snaps have resulted in all the eggs in a nest dying, causing the future populations of bees to be stunted. The decline of bee populations can be observed in weighing the nests. The nests indicate the bee’s health and their health has declined seen from the decreased weight. Although the effect of climate change on honey bee populations is still relatively speculatively, these points have shown that changing climate could have negative consequences on bee populations. Fortunately the United States has set up an $8 million fund for the preservation of honey bees.

October 15, 2014October 15, 2014

Discounting the Future

Many of the possible effects that climate change poses have a temporal component to them: they will be realized and compounded over time. Thus, the actions and inactions of today’s generation will have significant effects on those that come afterwards. This compounding effect has a fair amount of consensus among environmental economists; however, there is not consensus on how much we should take those future effects into account during current decision-making processes for policies that might effect climate change. This disagreement revolves around the discount rate, defined by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) as the “rate at which society as a whole is willing to trade off present for future benefits.” Because investment is inherently productive (that is to say, money is interest-bearing), resources on hand today are more valuable than resources available later; the difference in the values placed upon money today and in the future is where the disagreement lies.

Take, for example, a future benefit of $1000 to be accrued in ten years: how much would I need to put in the bank now in order to have that $1000 at the end of the decade? At a discount rate of 5%, it would be $613.90; at a discount rate of 8%, it would be lower, at $463.20. Thus, the higher discount rate signals that society is more focused on present benefits than future benefits.

Let’s look at this in the context of climate change. As a society, how much are we willing to spend now in order to protect the climate system from further “dangerous anthropogenic interference,” as is the UNFCCC’s stated objective, and to avoid future costs and damages? At a lower discount rate, we place a higher value upon the maintenance of the climate system and pay a higher premium now in order to protect future generations. At a higher discount rate, we place a higher value upon the current energy consumption patterns and are not willing to pay as high of a premium.

In Environmental Economics, my “wild-card” elective course for the Mosaic this semester, we discussed the argument that a near-zero discount rate is the most appropriate response to the effects of climate change. We need to take aggressive action now and invest as much in climate mitigation and adaptation as possible in order to stay below the 2 degree Celsius threshold put forward by the UNFCCC. If we do not do so, the costs borne upon future generations will be greater, as will the damages and level of disruption to our lifestyle that will occur from climatic change. A discount that is higher than zero or near-zero could jeopardize the 2 degree threshold, undercut the international negotiations of the UNFCCC, and threaten the generations that will come after us.

October 15, 2014

Merchants of Doubt Stop Selling?

According to the Guardian’s article, “World’s to PR companies rule out working with climate deniers,” there has been a recent shift in the role PR companies have in creating climate change doubt. After reading Merchants of Doubt we all know the importance PR companies, along with several other actors, have had in making action on climate change difficult. The level of certainty within the scientific community has been high enough, in my opinion, to warrant wide-scale public fear and pressure to demand immediate and strong action to mitigate climate change for decades now. However, this level of certainty is still not reflected in the mainstream media or consciousness. This is in large part because of misinformation campaigns, driven by savvy PR firms, that slam real facts, and misinterpret reasonable amounts of uncertainty about the various aspects of climate change from the science to the economics of it.

Yet, we are perhaps witnessing a change in the willingness of these companies to partake in merchandizing doubt, even if marginal. The Guardian and the Climate Investigations Center (an organization that monitors and researches misinformation campaigns surrounding climate change) acquired data through surveys sent to these companies. According to the authors of the article, Suzanne Goldenberg and Nishad Karim, “Now a number of the top 25 global PR firms have told the Guardian they will not represent clients who deny man-made climate change, or take campaigns seeking to block regulations limiting carbon pollution. Companies include WPP, Waggener Edstrom (WE) Worldwide, Weber Shandwick, Text100, and Finn Partners” (Goldenberg). This moral and political switch is very exciting and hopeful to a certain extent.

However, the research collected should be taken with a fair amount of skepticism and a watchful eye of potential green washing by these companies. To begin the Guardian and Climate Investigations Center (CIC) did not appear to get the full picture of the “top PR Companies” as the title suggests; less than half responded to them including companies with a history of both environmental and climate change disinformation campaigns. Furthermore, it was a survey, not necessarily research into each individual firm’s internal policies, client list and current and past campaigns. This means the firms only offered what information they want the media and watchdogs to know. These are PR firms, they are experts in creating the appearance they want, while masking what they don’t want known or focused on. Kert Davies, the founder of CIC acknowledges this saying, “They pretend they are above the fray and they are not involved, and yet they are the ones designing ad campaigns, designing lobbying campaigns, and designing the messages their clients want to convey around climate change ” (Goldenberg).

So while this article can, and perhaps should, be taken with a healthy dose of cynicism it got me thinking about some hopeful outcomes. As we have learned in class one of the key roles of transnational networks is regulation. This is often taken in the form of an organization or network creating a certifiable standards, benchmarks or rules that encourage voluntary participation of companies. These certifications can be highly credible and a good way to motivate companies to take action and become accountable for their current actions. I think that if a transnational network of PR firms set a standard that committed them to only represent climate positive companies it has the potential to increase the momentum founding this article. While the CIC is a good start, from what I can tell, a more legitimate actor with similar goals, would be necessary for this type of regulation to succeed.

Work Cited:

Goldenberg, Suzanne , and Nishad Karim. “Environment Climate change World’s top PR companies rule out working with climate deniers.” The Guardian. N.p., 4 Aug. 2014. Web. 15 Oct. 2014. <http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/aug/04/worlds-top-pr-companies-rule-out-working-with-climate-deniers>.

October 15, 2014

Trash Talk in America

from U.S. EPA and http://www.wec.ufl.edu/extension/gc/harmony/waste.htm

Tonight at Sociology Professor Barnum’s Soup and Bread discussion in Dickinson’s Treehouse: The Center for Sustainable Living, we covered a variety of issues, one of them being trash. In a consumer society where items are created to last no more than three years, trash has become a much bigger part of American society than most Americans realize. According to Forbes, the U.S. is responsible for producing ¼ of the world’s waste, meanwhile making up only 5% of the world’s population. That’s way too much trash, and too much trash too responsibly remove from society.

How did Americans become so unaware of their waste habits? After all, according to Edward Humes, author of Garbology, per capita waste levels have doubled in the U.S. since 1960. Think of the phrase “out of sight, out of mind”. Once an American puts the garbage out on the side of the curb each week, the trash is no longer their problem and they can move on to collecting waste for the next week. The rest of the world, however, is not so ignorant toward the U.S.’s trash problem. Just take the floating trash island in the Pacific- an “island” made of plastic debris deposited into the ocean which will never fully decompose.

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKBWNVNzaPo”]

When there were no municipal waste programs (granted there were, however, major health problems), people were reminded constantly of their trash- by its smell and its appearance. With American’s desire for homes to look pristine and neat, trash could definitely get in the way of this. If American’s were forced to deal with their trash for more than seven days at a time, actions and attitudes might be different. Disposable toothbrushes, Brillo Pads, and excessive paper handouts would feel more threatening once they needed to be stored for more than a week, making them no longer out of sight and so hopefully no longer out of mine. With a more “in your face” approach to America’s trash, the disgusting and greedy extent of its waste products could possibly decrease.

A good link to check out: www.zerowasteamerica.org.

October 14, 2014

To Climate Change Deniers

By Maeve Hogel

In preparation for COP 20 in Lima, we’ve been learning about the difficulties that arise in climate change negotiations. For such a global problem, we need a global effort and it’s hard to get that many nations, cultures and peoples on the same page.

However, even within the United States, we still aren’t on the same page. Despite all of the data and statistics showing that the planet is warming, U.S. Representative Paul Ryan said today that we still don’t know if humans are causing climate change. When asked in a debate if humans were the cause of climate change, Ryan said “I don’t know the answer to that. I don’t think science does either.”

To all climate change deniers, our favorite science guy, Bill Nye, says perfectly, “that living things change through a process that Darwin and Wallace calls natural selection. Those are facts. Tectonic plates move and that’s a fact. And the world is getting warmer because of human activity. And thats a fact.”

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkR3TI6xyzU” ratio=”4:3″]