Russ Vernon-Jones

love, justice, and climate change … I know you can make a difference.

Hope

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Worth Remembering from 2021

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If you are reading this, you are one of the people who has survived another challenging year. Congratulations! Thank you for your continued caring about climate change and climate justice.

What a year it has been! The coronavirus pandemic is hard on all of us and seems endless. Our democracy in the United States is in peril. The climate crisis continues to worsen–some good actions have been taken, but they are still woefully in adequate.

President Biden has been far bolder on climate than anyone would have guessed when he first announced that he would run for President, but he’s also failed to take essential climate action steps that are within his power.

There’s been plenty of bad climate news this year and some good news too. I’m going to trust that you have some picture of how dire the situation is and not trouble you with reviewing the bad news in this post. Here are three bits of good news that are helping me stay hopeful–and committed to climate action in the coming year.

Also here are the five posts of this blog in 2021 that contain perspectives and information most likely to be important in 2022.

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News Items – Troubling and Encouraging

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Some recent climate news items seem particularly noteworthy. I’ll start with some bad news, but I promise some encouraging items in the remainder of this post.

For thousands of years prior to the Industrial Revolution, the atmosphere held about 280 parts per million of carbon dioxide. (From studying air bubbles in ancient ice scientists have determined that for most of the last 800,000 years carbon dioxide levels were even lower than that.) Once humans started burning fossil fuels at the beginning of the industrial age, the carbon dioxide level started rising. The news item is that in May the global level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere reached a new dangerous high–50% higher than the pre-industrial level.

This undesirable benchmark is particularly problematic because carbon dioxide stays in the atmosphere for 1,000 years or more. Worse yet, the average rate of increase is faster than ever. Carbon dioxide (and other greenhouse gases) in the atmosphere are the primary cause of climate change and all its harmful effects.

Also in May, the International Energy Agency (IEA) issued a landmark report. The IEA has traditionally ….

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Nurturing Hope

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Hope is essential for climate action. Some activists may be motivated by fear, anger, or even grief, but without hope it is virtually impossible to sustain an effective, active commitment to stopping climate change. What does it mean to be hopeful when people around the world are already suffering and dying from the catastrophic effects of climate change? What does it mean to be hopeful when despite all the marches, speeches, scientific reports, and goal setting, damaging global greenhouse gas emissions are still rising at an accelerating rate and deadly feedback loops are being triggered?

What is hope? Hope is not a conviction or prediction that things will turn out well. It is possible to be hopeful even when the odds are not in your favor.

Hope is a decision. Hope is a decision to hold open the possibility of success regardless of the odds. Hope is a choice. Hope is deciding that you would rather join with others and go for what you want, than give up and resign yourself to failure or inevitable doom. When it comes to tackling climate change, hope is a decision that you will have a better life and experience greater integrity and sense of purpose if you work together with others to try to solve the crisis than if you turn away from the issue or declare the battle lost.

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5 Reasons We Might Succeed

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Joe Biden and his new Administration have been taking excellent steps on climate very quickly. It’s very hopeful. At the same time, the magnitude of what must be done to prevent the worst effects of climate change is still staggering. It cannot be accomplished without major legislation, both federal and state. Massive public support demanding bold action on all fronts is needed to give us even a chance of success. We aren’t there yet.

In December I wrote a post about the need to raise our climate targets to meet our international responsibilities. One of my readers, agreeing with my view, but despairing of getting sufficient support for needed actions, summed up her feelings with, “Aaargghhh!” She led me to write today’s post — some reasons to believe we can succeed.

The views of the public continue to move more and more in support of climate action.

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Can Joy and Realism About the Future Co-exist in Our Minds?

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The day before Joe Biden was inaugurated President, a friend of mine said to me in passing, “I’m so happy and excited that he’s going to get us back into the Paris Climate Accords right away!”

I have another friend who worked hard to get Biden elected. The day Biden was declared the winner, she shifted to bemoaning the fact that he isn’t more radical than he is, and focusing all her energy on where we need to push him to take bolder action on both climate and race.

Both?
I could identify with both of my friends — feel both the joy of first one and the upset of the other. But I don’t want to choose between being happy about what a difference Biden’s election will make, and being upset about the fact that his policies are still not adequate to meet the crises we face. Can’t I have both happiness in the moment and a sense of purpose and determination about the challenges ahead?

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Hope and Action — Georgia, Climate, and Us

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As soon as Biden and Harris take office there are some positive steps they can take right away with regard to climate change, even while we are dealing with COVID, racism, and the economy. The President- and Vice-President-elect have made some good plans and commitments, and we can build public support/pressure for them to go even further. Winning the two U.S. Senate seats in the run-off election on January 5th in Georgia will make so much more possible, but we can also take heart from what presidential action alone can achieve. Executive orders can be issued by the President in many areas without Congressional approval and can have far-reaching effects.

Georgia now
Many of us are writing letters and postcards, making phone calls, making donations to help the Democratic candidates, Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, win the U.S. Senate run-off elections in Georgia. I hope you will find a way to join us. Every little bit helps. These elections will have more impact on what is possible with regard to climate, racial justice, economic recovery, health care and more, in the U.S. than anything else on the horizon right now.

Biden and climate
Meanwhile, now that Biden has been elected, what does that mean for climate action?

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Celebration, Vigilance, and a New Burst of Energy

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We have a President-elect! We have a President-elect who has named four major priorities for his incoming administration: climate change, racial justice, jobs and economic recovery, and COVID-19. We have a Vice President-elect who is a woman of color — a Vice President-elect who co-sponsored the Green New Deal resolution in the U.S. Senate. It’s time to celebrate!

I’m well aware that Trump is refusing to concede, fighting to stay in office, and making moves that are damaging to both our democracy and the incoming Biden-Harris administration. I know not having taken the Senate (yet?) is a major obstacle to progress on all key issues. I’m as upset as you likely are that over 70 million people voted for the lying, climate-destroying, abuser of women, pandemic-exacerbating, white supremacist Donald Trump. I’m clear that Joe Biden’s proposals are not as bold as we need.

Nevertheless, we get to celebrate. We can’t know how messy things will get, and we must remain vigilant, but I think it is most likely that we will get Joe Biden and Kamala Harris into office.

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Is There Still Time?

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When I was a very young child I loved books and I loved being read to. My mother, or my father when he was available, would read to me at bedtime. It was a brief, happy time each day. It always ended with the announcement that it was time to turn out the light and go to sleep. I couldn’t tell time yet, but each night I knew that time for books was running out. My constant question was, “Is there time? Is there time for one more book?”

Many of us have that question about climate change. Is there still time? Is there still time to reduce emissions, sequester more carbon, and avoid the most catastrophic effects of global warming?

There are some bright spots, some big challenges, and some hard realities in the current answer to this question, as I see it.

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Piano Man

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A nurse who is a friend of my partner had an amazing experience recently (and is amazing herself). She described it this way:

I woke up this morning singing “Piano Man.” At work I cared for a patient named Ted – a 60 year old guy who was really sick with COVID pneumonia. They were trying not to intubate him and he was on that edge….

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