Community voices – the climate needs you in COP26 countdown

The 14th community-based adaption event (CBA14) will call on local communities to use their collective power to hold climate decision makers to account.

Bangkok's low income communities are very vulnerable to climate change impacts (Photo: Siriwat Saisoonthorn, via Flickr, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

A run of international political events in 2019 marked key moments for influencing the climate action agenda, including this September’s UN Secretary-General’s climate summit and the UNFCCC conference in Spain (COP25). 

The sequence will continue to build in this “super year” – with a critical UN biodiversity conference (COP15), the maturing of 21 Sustainable Development Goal targets, global ocean treaty negotiations, finishing with climate COP26 in Glasgow when countries will be held accountable to the carbon emissions reduction and adaptation pledges made in 2015.

Nations will be called on to raise their ambition to avoid the escalating climate crisis, including committing enough finance for developing countries to build resilient economies that benefit everyone. 

These events must ensure that communities on the climate frontline get the support they need to build sustainable, successful livelihoods. 

Midway into this series of events, how do things stand? Are these communities getting their asks on the policy table? 

It’s been a mixed bag.

Local people and their representatives have pushed hard to get world leaders to listen to their priorities.

At last year’s annual community-based action event (CBA13), adaptation practitioners, researchers, grassroots representatives and local government planners gathered in Addis Ababa to exchange and develop tangible, locally tested solutions for dealing with the impacts of climate change. 

Debates covered practical ideas for getting finance to the local level, explored how social protection can help people prepare for climate disasters, and how the private sector can be mobilised for adaptation that benefits the most vulnerable. Delegates called for greater participation of women and young people in decisions about spending and resources. 

Many of these demands were reflected in the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) 2050 Vision – a bold and innovative plan for how the LDCs are going to achieve a climate-resilient future – endorsed by several developed and developing countries at COP25 in Madrid.

The vision calls for 70% of climate finance to be delivered to the local level and an ambitious "whole of society" approach to responding to the climate crisis. This approach recognises that all society institutions – public, private, customary and cultural – will need to work together to help people adapt to the new and escalating risks caused by a changing climate. 

Community voices also influenced the high-profile Global Commission for Adaptation’s (GCA) Local Action Track. Drawing on evidence of successful programmes from the past, the Local Action Track will seek to push adaptation led by local people up the political agenda. It was launched at last week’s Gobeshona conference. 

Top-down processes disappoint…

But these steps forward were often lost in the ’noise’ of a broader pessimism around major emitters’ wholly inadequate response to the crisis.

At September’s UN Climate Action Summit, developed countries did not raise commitments sufficiently to meet the urgency called for in the IPCC’s report on the impacts of 1.5°C warming. And COP25 in December saw slow progress with some countries, including the biggest polluters, undermining the talks.

Australia was among the nations frustrating progress at COP25 – while in the backdrop, deadly bushfires continued to rage across the country; the devastation still only meriting a half-hearted government response.

…but bottom-up momentum is building

Amid these setbacks, powerful social movements are building, letting governments know they will be held accountable for their inaction. As people have seen top-down decision making ignore their concerns, they have taken to the streets to demand change.

And this mounting discontent is proving to be a catalyst for change.

Fridays for Future and Extinction Rebellion can legitimately claim their part in many governments across the world declaring a climate emergency. Meanwhile, once marginal ideas such as the Green New Deal are going mainstream.  

The message is powerful: decision makers take note – you will be held accountable for your climate decision making. Without concerted action – and soon – movements of people directly affected by climate impacts will grow willingness to create greater disruption than ever before. 

The transition to carbon-free, resilient economies is a complex challenge. These kinds of problems can only be resolved by drawing on the knowledge, perspectives and will of the widest range of people and groups, and by building their capacity so they can fully engage.

We will need to consider how to reform our institutions so that greater decision-making power is put in the hands of those most affected by top-down decisions that aren’t working, to enable people to change course accordingly.

We must build climate responses that meet local needs and challenges, not just those of donors or senior ministers.

Communities: bring your voice to CBA14

This year's international community-based adaptation event (CBA14) will bring together climate adaptation practitioners to discuss what these solutions look like. We will explore how to take new adaptation technologies to scale, the role of social movements in working with governments, and how climate finance can flow to the local level – in the right ways and in the right amounts.

Participants will be able to set the standard for what effective participation looks like while building capacity on how to advocate for it. It will be an opportunity to use the strength of the CBA community voice to reflect on how well countries are embracing the transition to fairer economies.

CBA14 will allow community representatives who can’t attend COP26 to be part of a global festival of action, creatively spotlighting what is working on the ground and pushing for greater global ambition. CBA will link up with other key events, including Gobeshona and Development & Climate Days, to feed messages into policy dialogues leading up to the crunch COP in Glasgow.

2020 is set to be an intense year. Five years on from signing of the landmark Paris Agreement there is no assurance that any new policies will meet the needs of marginalised and vulnerable people most heavily impacted by climate change.

Collectively, the CBA community of practice has a voice and influence greater than the sum of its parts, speaking to internationally recognised processes and influential programmes such as LDC Initiative for Effective Adaptation and Resilience or the GCA’s 'Year of Action'.

Join us at CBA14 to add to the momentum that is building for a just transition to climate-resilient future.

Feeling the Green Guilt? You’re Not the Only One

We’ve all done it. You forgot your water bottle at home, so you buy a plastic water bottle at the supermarket. Or you were too tired to rinse out your plastic salad container, so you throw it in the trash bin instead of the recycling bin. Your long-awaited Amazon package arrives in the mail and as the gas-guzzling truck turns down the block you unwrap layers upon layers of plastic packaging for the tiniest item. We’ve all thought to ourselves, “I’m a fake environmentalist” or a friend has joked about us being the sole killer of the environment, or we have consoled ourselves that this one plastic bottle won’t make a difference.
As new emotions and problems arise that we have never had to think about before, our language adjusts to voice our newly discussed fears. So along with the new social media lingo and normie twitter jokes, we can add eco-guilt to the list of words younger generations are handling today.
Ecoguilt is “the feeling you get when you could have done something for the environment, but consciously made the decision not to”. It accompanies the knowledge that there are easily accessible alternatives and the burden that human-caused pollution and industry is affecting our environment in preventable ways. It affects those most often in affluent countries where there are affordable alternatives and where residents have the time, opportunity, and choice to make more environmentally friendly decisions. According to a survey conducted by Vivint.Solar in the United States, it is affecting the younger generations more than the other generations.
The Guilt Report: 2019 Edition has discovered that, of the 2,500 people of varying age and gender surveyed, 79 percent of 18 to 34-year-olds feel guilty about wasting energy. The percentage of feeling guilty decreases the older the participant, shown in the figure below. And the guilt is arising from different sources. Although one of the biggest fears of the climate crisis is access to freshwater, people feel the least guilty about wasting water, with wasting energy and recycling issues climbing above it in the poll.

Obviously, some of the questions proved to be more divisive than others. For instance, 70.8 percent of people felt guilty about throwing recyclables in the trash but when it came to using heating and cooling during different seasons, the percentage of those who felt guilty hovered between 47 and 49 percent. The report also highlighted the performative aspects of being seen by others as eco-friendly, suggesting that it does not play as big a part as some might think. Only half of the people surveyed stated that the knowledge that others were watching affected their eco-friendly behavior. Also, 70.9 percent of people answered that they do not feel the need to compare their carbon footprint to their friends.
So where do we draw our eco-inspiration from and perhaps the most pressure to be environmentally conscious? As shown by the image below, the largest influence comes from our spouses and partners, and the least from our co-workers.

The majority (54 percent) become increasingly stressed and feel guiltier because of news headlines and recent environmental reports. The youngest surveyed were the most affected.
But what can we do to handle our ecoguilt and eco-anxiety? While the headlines and the pressure to do right by future generations can lead to a healthier planet, the most important thing to do is to not feel helpless. We need to encourage one another to do what we can and learn from the experiences of others. What each of us can do will look different. It could mean setting up a community garden using only organic fertilizers and pesticides to provide food deserts with more organic and healthier options. It could mean researching more effective ways to use water in your community and investigating the personal impact of lowering federal environmental standards. It could mean teaching your child’s elementary class about saving water when they are brushing their teeth or packing their lunch in reusable, recycled containers. It could mean voting in as many elections as you can and encouraging your neighbors to do the same through carpooling and volunteering. Whatever it looks like for you, do not forget to communicate your experiences to others, because you never know when you could become the inspiration to change someone else’s habits.

‘It is our collective and individual responsibility … to preserve and tend to the world in which we all live.”
Dalai Lama

To see the full survey conducted by Vivint.Solar, check out the results here and their analysis here.

Arctic Sea Ice on Track for Record Low Levels This Year

Earlier this year, atmospheric carbon dioxide levels in the Arctic reached the unhappy milestone of 400 parts-per-million. Now, information coming from the National Snow & Ice Data Center indicates that this year’s Arctic sea ice is on pace to shrink to its smallest levels ever.
One of the clearest examples of the effects of global warming and climate change is the receding of the Arctic ice cap. The NSIDC indicates that this year’s sea ice is already slightly smaller than it was in 2010, which was the previous record for this time of year. It is also smaller than it was in 2007, which was the year that had the ice cap shrink to its smallest size in September of that year.
Starting the summer with the smallest Arctic cap on record is not an auspicious sign, for the Arctic or for the planet.
image: NSIDC

Satellite Data Shows Enormous Greenland Ice Melt

In mid-July, an astonishing, estimated 97 percent of the ice sheet covering Greenland was melting due to a high temperature dome of warm air. Scientists at NASA noticed this late in July, and were shocked at what they found.
Most of Greenland is a big ice sheet. In the summer, large areas of its surface melt, though much of the water quickly re-freezes. Under more normal conditions, 40 or 50 percent of the area can have melting, but virtually the entire ice sheet melting was unprecedented. The 97% area was so extraordinary that the scientists who first discovered this initially thought that there was a problem with the satellites providing the data, and they didn’t release the information until they had checked their findings with two other instruments.
The melting took place exceptionally rapidly, as well. “The melting spread quickly. Melt maps derived from the three satellites showed that on July 8, about 40 percent of the ice sheet’s surface had melted. By July 12, 97 percent had melted.”
Scientists are not yet sure how much of an impact this event will have on sea level rise or how the ice sheet will be affected long term. But it is another unusual event that further shows evidence that the climate is not behaving in the ways it has in the past.
via: NASA

Japan Drops Nukes then Reverses Policy

A few days ago, the Japanese government announced its plans to begin to phase out nuclear power with the country aiming to end all nuclear power by 2040. But less than a week later, the announced policy policy was already backing away from that commitment.
Of course, Japan suffered an enormous environmental crisis in the wake of the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami when the Fukushima nuclear reactor complex suffered a series of explosions and meltdowns of some of the reactors, contaminating the region with radioactive material. There has been strong public sentiment in Japan favoring an end to the use of nuclear power in the aftermath of the crisis.
The government had initially announced plans to end all nuclear power by 2040. But only a few days later, this decision was evidently reversed in an announcement of the new energy policy that leaves more room for continuing use of nuclear power. Business interests had lobbied hard for changes in the policy.
Other countries have taken steps to phase out nuclear power, but they generally have stronger programs of renewable power already in place. Japan is particularly poor in fossil fuel resources, but could be well situated for renewable sources including wind, wave, and tidal, as well as solar.
image: CC BY-SA 3.0 by Digital Globe/Wikimedia

Temperature Extremes In Both Hemispheres

Recently, there have been a couple of extreme climate effects noted. Record high temperatures have made the news on two continents in the northern and southern hemispheres.
In the United States, to the surprise of no one who experienced it, 2012 was the hottest year on record by more than a degree, with hundreds of new temperature records set throughout the year. The average national temperature was a full degree higher than the previous record. A degree of temperature may not seem like much, but when talking about an average over a year, that’s a huge spike. “Normally, records are broken by a tenth of a degree or so.”
And, in Australia, recent temperatures have gotten so hot that the Bureau of Meteorology has had to add new colors to those it uses on its interactive weather forecasting chart. Until now, the temperature maps have gone up to 50 degrees C (122 F), but that hasn’t been enough for recent high temperatures. Now, the new scale extends to 54 C (129 F).