Responding to Climate Change: Making Tree Planting
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Responding to Climate Change: Making Tree Planting Pay Permaculture Convergence IPEC, Pirenopolis Brazil 22 May 07 Albert Bates Global Village Institute for Appropriate Technology This slide show is a free download at thegreatchange.com Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License 1 What we will talk about Problem Statement Climate Change Peak Oil Toxic Timebombs Ecological Overshoot Solution Statement Making Money by Doing Good This slide show is a free download at thegreatchange.com Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License 2 Gore’s budget advice for presentations Time Complexity Hope 3 TheThe FaFarmrm Planting Trees The Farm was settled in 1971, on 415 ha. (4 km2), replacing a farmer and 75 cows with 320 hippies 4 The Farm Planting Trees chip mills The Farm was settled at a time when the Southeastern forests were undergoing their third major removal, this time for pulp and paper. 5 TheThe FaFarmrm Planting Trees 1971 The Farm has gradually been acquiring forest land 6 TheThe FaFarmrm Planting Trees 1972 The Farm has gradually been acquiring forest land 7 TheThe FaFarmrm 1997 Planting Trees 1991 The Farm has gradually been acquiring forest land 8 TheThe FaFarmrm Planting Trees 2002 The Farm has gradually been acquiring forest land 9 Planting Trees Our near- term goal: ecological restoration 10 TheThe FaFarmrm Planting Trees The Farm in 2007 with 200 hippies (as yet no cows) is 2025 ha. (20 km2) and still growing ... 11 TheThe FaFarmrm Planting Trees Our holistic goal: biodiversity 12 Climate Change TheThe FaFarmrm Unanticipated: isotherm creep 13 Climate Change • At the end of the last Ice Age, Spruce retreated from the Central U.S. to near its modern position in N.E. Canada. Oak expanded its range to cover all the U.S. east of the Mississippi. • If they cannot make a migration to Northern Canada one hundred times faster now, the Eastern forests will simply vanish. Text 14 Climate Change 15 Climate Change 16 Climate Change 17 Climate Change 18 Climate Change 19 Climate Change 20 Climate Change 21 Climate Change 22 Climate Change ClimateClimate ChangeChange Source: Bates, Climate in Crisis (1990) 23 Climate Change 20°C 18°C You are here 17°C 16°C 1900 2000 2100 Source: Bates, Post-Petroleum Survival Guide (2006) 24 Climate Change Arctic Sea Ice Greenland Ice Sheet Saharan Vegetation Amazon Rainforest Dieback ENSO El Niño West Antarctic Ice Sheet Deep Antarctic Current Atlantic Thermohaline Permafrost and Tundra Melt Indian Monsoon West African Monsoon Oceanic Acidity Methane Upwelling Source: Bates, Post-Petroleum Survival Guide (2006) 25 Climate Change Key Findings IPCC-4 - Holdren Group - Pentagon - Lynas - Lovelock IPCC-3 (2001) understated the risk It is possible we could see a 6.4°C increase by 2100 Exceeding 2 - 2.5°C above 1750 levels would entail intolerable impacts (ie: risk of human extinction) due to tipping points We are already 1°C above 1750 levels The observed rate of warming is accelerating There is no guarantee that stopping all carbon emissions now would halt the rise of temperature 26 What is wrong with these statements? “We have 20 years to turn this around.” “Sustaining life on Earth is an imperative of Nature.” 27 28 1°C Increase - Right Now Ice-free sea absorbs more heat and accelerates global warming; fresh water lost from a third of the world's surface; low-lying coastlines flooded; hurricanes increase; droughts 2°C Increase - the Age of Loneliness South Europe dies of heatstroke; Amazon ravaged by fire; stressed plants beginning to emit carbon rather than absorbing it; a third of all species go extinct 29 3°C Increase Carbon release from vegetation and soils speeds global warming; death of the Amazon rainforest; super-hurricanes hit coastal cities; starvation in Africa 4°C Increase Runaway thaw of permafrost makes global warming unstoppable; much of Britain made uninhabitable by severe flooding; Mediterranean region abandoned 30 5°C Increase Methane from ocean floor accelerates global warming; ice gone from both poles; humans migrate in search of food and try vainly to live like animals off the land 6°C Increase Life on Earth ends with apocalyptic storms, flash floods, hydrogen sulphide gas and methane fireballs racing across the globe with the power of atomic bombs; only fungi survive ... possibly. 31 Climate Change ThisThis isis notnot MarsMars 32 World Population 9 billion 6 billion 3 billion 1 billion 33 Cows 3.2 billion 2 billion 1 billion .0.5 billion 34 Bacteria in bottle double every minute The bottle is full in one day www.globalpublicmedia.com/transcripts/645 www.hubbertpeak.com/bartlett/ 35 36 37 Global Ecological Balance Sheet (in global hectares/person, 2003 data) 38 Lifeboat Strategy 39 Peak Oil We stand at an unique historical moment. 40 Peak Oil We stand at an unique historical moment. Hairless Apes in Gasoline Crack of History? —Wm. H. Burroughs 41 Climax Peak Oil Industrial Compost-Modernism Modernism (Permaculture) Pre-industrial sustainable Future low energy culture sustainable culture 1000 1500 2000 2500 Yrs AD after D. Holmgren, Permaculture (2002) 42 Peak Oil HubbertHubbert:: • Since the tenets of our exponential-growth culture (such as a nonzero interest rate) are incompatible with a state of nongrowth, it is understandable that extraordinary efforts will be made to avoid a cessation of growth. • Inexorable, however, physical and biological constraints must eventually prevail and appropriate cultural adjustments will have to be made. M. King Hubbert June 4, 1974, to the Subcommittee on Environment, Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs 43 Civilizations collapse. PopulationPopulation wellwell aboveabove historicallyhistorically stablestable levelslevels PoliticalPolitical corruptioncorruption andand mindlessmindless intriguesintrigues TooToo manymany farmers,farmers, tootoo manymany crops,crops, tootoo muchmuch ofof thethe landscapelandscape employedemployed inin productionproduction——soilsoil fertilityfertility crashcrash DeforestationDeforestation andand desertificationdesertification ClimateClimate changechange oror extremeextreme ofof regionalregional climateclimate pendulumpendulum DiminishedDiminished resilienceresilience toto naturalnatural disasterdisaster IncreasedIncreased migration/fightingmigration/fighting inin searchsearch ofof resourcesresources DiseaseDisease andand pestilencepestilence PopulationPopulation crashcrash 44 Ticking Time Bombs Chemical plants & refineries in a reduced-regulation environment Nuclear wastes, reactors, and components Bioweaponry, and accidental runaway genes Super-viruses and bacteria Financial derivatives and currency collapse Cowboys in government 45 Climate Change + Peak Oil + Toxic Timebombs + Population Explosion = Planetary Life Disaster We do not have 20 years 46 Solutions 47 Carbon Sequestration Carbon Sequestration by Biome Type tons per acre/yr Source: Bates, Climate in Crisis (1990) Solutions 48 Scale of forest loss Step 1. reverse deforestation of the Amazon Solutions 49 Making Tree-Planting Pay Private Donations / Websites Government / UN / Kyoto Carbon Trading Partnering with Major Organizations Agroforestry / Mycoforestry Solutions 50 Private Donations / Websites Solutions 51 www.fiohnetwork.org/patia Solutions 5 2 www.fiohnetwork.org/patia Solutions 5 3 www.dell.com/content/topics/global.aspx/corp/environment/ Solutions 5 4 www.dell.com/content/topics/global.aspx/corp/environment/ Solutions 5 5 Solutions 56 Solutions 57 Government / UN / Kyoto Carbon Trading In 2005, the European Union introduced a Europe-wide market in carbon dioxide emissions for major greenhouse gas emitting industries. This is the forerunner to a similar system that will operate under the Kyoto Protocol among its signatories after 2008. The EU ETS is designed to prepare European nations for Kyoto. Solutions 58 www.undp.org/energy/cdm.htm Government / UN / Kyoto Carbon Trading Solutions 5 9 Government / UN / Kyoto Carbon Trading The scheme is based on the allocation of greenhouse gas emission allowances, called EU Allowances (EUAs), to specific industrial sectors through national allocation plans (NAPs) with oversight by the European Commission (EC). These allowances can be traded. The first phase of the EU ETS covers the period 2005-2007, while the second phase coincides with the Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period, from 2008 to 2012. The first phase of the EU ETS applies to 7,300 companies and 12,000 installations in heavy industrial sectors in the EU. These include: energy utilities, oil refineries, iron and steel producers, the pulp and paper industry as well as producers of cement, glass, lime, brick and ceramics. Solutions 60 Government / UN / Kyoto Carbon Trading Carbon markets traded $30 billion worth of greenhouse gas emission reductions around the world in 2006, an almost three- fold increase on the previous year’s $11 billion Another $5 billion was traded in carbon offset credits under the Kyoto Protocol’s schemes, in return for clean technology transfer to the developing world and former Soviet bloc. Most of this was under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), where companies and countries in the industrialised world pay for emission reducing projects in the developing world, so far mainly China and India. CDM trade in 2006 was double that of 2005. A large proportion of these carbon credits, CERs and ERUs, flow back to European investors where they can be substituted for EUAs under EU ETS. Japan is the other major source of demand for CERs. Solutions 61 Government / UN / Kyoto Carbon Trading