1 | Greta Thunberg & Kevin Anderson | In search of REAL climate leadership | 2022 Interview
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- čas přidán 25. 06. 2024
- Part one of two: In search of REAL climate leadership.
Greta Thunberg and Kevin Anderson are among the world's most direct communicators and rigorous thinkers on the climate emergency. Here is part one of a fantastic, rare conversation between them, hosted by regular Climate Uncensored collaborator, Ingrid Rieser.
Recorded in Sweden in March 2022, Kevin and Greta's informal yet candid discussion ranged over many key topics in climate mitigation, with honesty, leadership and agency being recurring themes.
Part two of the interview will follow next week.
Chapters:
00:00 Why was the school strike so effective?
04:24 When did your engagement with climate change begin?
08:02 Honest science communication vs. alarmism and hope
13:41 Objective climate science vs. the politics of mitigation
17:32 Top-down and bottom-up democratic responses to climate change
26:51 Equity & extractivism; regulation & voluntary change
👉 For more information about the topics in this interview:
climateuncensored.com
👉Follow us on social media:
/ clim8uncensored
/ climateuncensored
/ climateuncensored
CREDITS:
🔹 Interviewer: Ingrid M. Rieser, podcaster and filmmaker.
🌐 Find out about Ingrid's visual work at www.ingridmrieser.com.
🎧 Check out her podcast at forestofthought.com/
Discussants:
🔹 Professor Kevin Anderson, professor of energy and climate change.
Kevin holds joint positions at: Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at University of Manchester, UK; Centre for Environment and Development Studies / CEMUS at University of Uppsala, Sweden; and the Centre for Climate & Energy Transformation at University of Bergen, Norway.
🐦 / kevinclimate
🌐 climateuncensored.com for more bio.
🔹 Greta Thunberg, activist and advocate for climate action, initiator of Skolstrejk för klimatet and Fridays for Future, three-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee.
Follow Greta on social media:
🐦 / gretathunberg
📷 / gretathunberg
🌐 fridaysforfuture.org/
🔹 Video editing and post-production: Oscar Betancourt, picturelle.com
🔹 Camera operator: Joel Lindberg
🔹 Producer: Dan Calverley, / dancalverley
🙏 For caption translations, we are grateful to:
Nil Sarrafoğlu
#climatechange #democracy #gretathunberg
Comments on this video are being pre-moderated to ensure that discussion stays on topic and remains civil and respectful.
Thanks that's great.
@@tonymartinis2956 not censoring, just not using our channel to give a platform to baseless conspiracy theories or waste our time debating whether climate change is real or dangerous. Anybody who's into that stuff can look elsewhere on the internet, or start their own CZcams channel - yay for freedom of expression!
Also, sadly, many comments are just vile personal insults. Publishing those does nothing to foster healthy discussion, it just encourages more anonymous internet trolls to spread their hate. They're not welcome here and won't be given a platform by us.
Comments that meet our two basic criteria (on topic and respectful) will be approved, whether or not we agree with them.
@adoremus, please see our previous reply. But to explain once more, this video deals with mitigation. If comments are about that (on topic) and do not contain puerile ad hominem attacks (respectful), then they will be published. Anyone is welcome to participate that has something to contribute on mitigation or the other issues raised in the video, but we're not going back to debating whether climate change is a problem. This is what it means 'to moderate' (or chair, if you like) a discussion.
A further, final elaboration on this - abusive comments will earn you a block, no exceptions. The climate emergency is deadly serious. We don't have to time to waste on engaging with malicious, or vexatious (and almost always anonymous) accounts. BE RESPECTFUL AND ENGAGE WITH THE ISSUES IN THE VIDEO - PLEASE!!
Sincerely, Dan and Kevin
So you're censoring people calling you out for censoring people to creat an ecochamber or lies and idiocy? Good to know
شكرا جزيلا للأشخاص الثلاثة على الفيديو المفيد هذا و على الحوار الجدي الذي دار بينهما حول موضوع قضايا التغيرات المناخية. لانه وضع في سياق أوسع و أشمل يربط بين ما هو محلي و ما هو عالمي، بين ما هو اقتصادي، اجتماعي، و ما هو تكنولوجي و ثقافي و سياسي. ما اعجبني كثيرا هو انه ضم شخصيتين حتى و ان كانا ينتميان إلى جيلين متباعدين في الزمن، إلا أن النظرة المستقبلية البعيدة تجمعهما، و كذا فلسفتهما للحياة.
تحياتي الصادقة إليكم أنتم الثلاثة. محمد علي برادة. مراكش
I’m interested that you think most/many people want to change our extractive consumerist systems. Outside my more environmentally minded friends most people seem to be oblivious to the destructiveness of our western lifestyles.
I think what Greta and Kevin were saying was that many or most people agree that we need to address the climate emergency - at least in principle, when asked to think about it. For those high emitting friends who are still somehow genuinely oblivious - let's engage with them! For those high emitters who are aware but ignore... as Greta says, they're not going to care.
It was great to hear Kevin talking about extracting, if possible, less, and using resources to replace business as usual with something sustainable. Where can I learn more about this?
I imagine I'm pretty typical in that I want to protest against proposed mining projects in my back yard but have the feeling of unease that goes with knowing that the non-recycled stuff is coming from mines _somewhere_ - likely somehere where environmental regulations are more lax. Worse than that, if The Machine doesn't give way to something better, people will use up our new-found efficiencies doing new, unnecessary things, many of which we haven't thought of yet.
Please know that many millions (billions?) around the world agree with you. And thank you for all you do.
Its frustrating that many of the solutions needed are available but I genuinely struggle to see how we can change the economic system we live in. Resource extraction, consumerism and the fantasy of infinite growth are so intrinsic to modern life, its difficult to see any path to an alternative. Maybe if we started chipping away decades ago at these ideas and systems, we would be better equipped to face climate change but we didn't and it seems now we no longer have the time for incrementalism. Dont know what it will take but what we're doing now is not working so sooner or later something will have to give. I just hope its for the better. (This is just a rant of frustration, Ill never stop trying, theres too much too lose).
Great conversation from two of the most honest voices out there. Looking forward to the next part(s)
yes Cinemad it is a seemingly intractable problem. But it can be done. Please don't give up. Midnight Oil wrote years ago "It's better to die on your feet, than live on your knees" yes a pop song but with deeper implications. Suggest you check out this discussion and look at the three C's - Citizens' Assemblies, Civil Resistance and Disobedience, and Cultural Wave (working with artists of all types from all countries) The latter are the spreaders the 'essential workers'... here's that youtube - czcams.com/video/puBB1fDZa5g/video.html ... good luck
Thanks for talking about this!
This discussion is brilliant and focused on the necessary questions of mitigation. It also is talking about the most fundamental aspects, the core economic model of economic growth. Climate science and the multidisciplinary science of studying the ecology all point the fundementally unsustainable nature of the economy relationship with the biosphere. And flowing on from this, realising the economy is a human construct, we make it, so we can change it, what is it that is soooo vexxing that makes it so hard to change? I believe it is the inner workings of the fractional reserve banking system and the way the vast majority of our money comes into existence as debt is the root mechanism that is resisting change. Essentially, our entire lives are being run by a equation, that has an embedded requirement of growth within it.... When you go to the bank to take out a loan to buy a house or start a business the bank does not go somewhere to access a pre -existing pool of money , that loan is literally created out of thin air by a few key strokes. It gets deposited into your account as a credit for you to spend and is a liability on the banks books. the destruction of the ecology comes from the act of charging interest! The act of charging interest is the embedded reason why the economy has to be bigger next year than this year... Because when you step back and think about it, you quickly realise that there is now more debt than money and to pay back the loan we all are in competition to get enough of a artificially scarce resource .... This is why the bank has to continue to loan money at an ever increasing rate because it is didn't the money supply shrinks and the economy destabilizes and we go into a recession or depression...
Fossil fuels powers this equation because the value needed to be created to pay the loans back can only come from fossil fuels due to the superior characteristics intrinsic to fossil fuel as a fuel source. Hence this is the root mechanism that drives ever growing burning of fossil fuels - it literally is powering our economic development and prosperity. Then flowing on from that we now have such immense concentration of wealth and power in so few hands that there are mad dreams of permanent global hegemony. We are seeing this battle play out over Taiwan and Ukraine and to actually be successful at mitigating climate change we would have to fundementally alter the power dynamics within our societies and the globe. Joseph Tainter wrote in his book, How society choose to fail or succeed that not one culture ever through all time has ever been successful at fundementally changing the core values that the society has been built upon.... To be successful we would have to get the vast majority of the people of the world to simultaneously walk off work and demand a fundamental redesign of society. And to counter this has been the purpose of the right wing propoganda and climate denial that has society pretty much evenly divided between blue and red... Labor or Liberal, progressive or conservative etc etc etc...
Thank you both for this insightful discussion!
Hope many people will listen and understand.
Great insightful discussion. Thanks
Thanks for this very interesting first part of the interview! I can't wait to see the rest!
As we say "in jest" with friends, "capitalism is the problem!". The sad thing about this is that it works as an answer to many of the problems we face today.
And the truth is, we already have many solutions, we already have many choices available, the problem is that we live in a society where the "so called leader" as Greta says so well, as well as any other pseudo decision maker or "important" person, have no advantage to try to change things. On the contrary, it wouldn't do them any good....
So I completely agree with the idea that "it has to come from below". But then I have a question, how do we get people to move, in a society where everyone idolizes the rich, only sees life through the prism of comfort and prefers to close their eyes on climate change rather than risk changing anything in their routine? Without, of course, destroying democracy...
I'd love to know your answer to this question.
Anyway, thanks again, It's motivating to see peoples thinking about the problems and consequences of things rather than burying their heads in the sand.
Thanks for this comment. Good question. One thing to consider is that for many people, a rapid decarbonisation programme would be a positive thing in terms of domestic comfort, employment in meaningful, skilled work, public service provision. So that aspect, that vision, has to be emphasised. On the aspirational celebrity / wealth worship (it's not really *everyone*), there are signs that profligate energy consumption is starting to attract negative publicity (see recent reactions to short trips in private jets; France moving to ban private jets). This should be encouraged! More on celebs in the second part of the interview.
Thank you very much. Great insights for an improved action. Understanding the climate crisis is the very basis of an effective action. So many, too many, are saying what should be done without even understanding what is going on. CEOs, Government representatives, NGOs, and so on. Understanding what is going on is the basis. I find I always evolve in my vision and understanding of the crisis when I watch interviews or presentations of Kevin Anderson. And Greta Thunberg, with Luisa Neubauer and Kevin Anderson are the 3 people whose tweets I read regularly. Great work, you two! Always impressive. Beyond thanks! is how I would say it. Best. - Shanti
The only way meaningful climate change can take place is a complete overall of the way we humans live and go about our everyday lives, it’s also going to take a couple powerful countries whom are willing to listen to that advice and implement it into reality. Right now we’re dancing to the “who wants to be a millionaire” tune and it rules our whole existence, imo this is the thing that needs to change, how about we find a way to work together (everyone) all walks of life, poor rich young old, high school educated, college educated) it’s time to end the class system and just let ppl live. We have the technology now where if a powerful society wanted to stop playing “who wants to be a millionaire” they could, just tell ppl in the country we all have to do our bit to make it happen, imo if we had a system where everyone pitched in and did work somewhere that’s needed we could have a system where a person only had to work 40 hrs a month to survive maybe even half that.
Bingo! I would love to chat with you sometime, you're right on the money, even if you are a robot.
Select a brand to destroy. That would make corporations take notice. Suppose everyone under the age of promised to not buy Coca-Cola for the rest of their lives. Totally legal.
Who would pay attention?
9:30 "can't talk... it takes away hope""
What I don't entirely understand, given that there is a window of opportunity, and the unions in W. Va for example do see retraining as opportunity, why there isn't a nationwide or international teacher enhancement core program being broadcast to vitalize the issues, backroom politic for good lyrics in mainstream could help, a UN Declaration of Eco-School Expectation structuring minimal topics adaptable culture to culture for a few examples. It's the vitalization trends that need cultivation.
Some fantastic insights from 2 of the best commentators on the climate and ecological crisis. There are too many points for me to cover, without writing an essay. However, I will highlight 2 key insights. First from Kevin, the excellent insight that the slogan must be listen to the science, not necessarily listening to the scientists, because unfortunately too many of the influential ones have feet of clay. Then in response Greta made an equally important observation about reading between the lines of the science. What I call big picture thinking, joined up thinking, of which Greta is one of the best exponents I know.
However, I would like to address one key point, because it is necessary to understand this. I don't know if Greta is just being over-modest when she says she doesn't really know why the movement she inspired took off. I know why it took off, because I had long explained the necessary parameters for creating a global movement, which wouldn't be a flash in the pan and fade away like many hopeful environmentalist movements I've seen in the 50+ years, I've been observing this situation. Much of this had to do with Greta's wisdom and that of other young people she inspired. To me the key issue that stopped this movement imploding is the wisdom of not coming up with plans or specific demands. To keep it general, and say we need action, we need change, and not to specify particular actions and demands. There is a huge unhelpful myth in our culture, that to change things we need to come up with a great big plan first. This is mistaken on so many levels. The big problem is it immediately creates friction and division as people compete with their own ideas. It is pointless, because until you create a consensus for change, none of these plans are ever going to get implemented, and coming up with these plans is the surest way to stop this consensus being achieved. Once we get something of a consensus, and get people working and thinking together, the plans will develop spontaneously as we work towards that common goal.
There was a bit of serendipity in how Greta's solitary protests, got picked up and reported. But there was no luck in that Greta became the most articulate person as to defining the problem in simple and easy to understand terms, when she got a platform. I know of no one else who could have done this, and Greta's insight and wisdom is massively underestimated. She inspired other young people to think for themselves, and to give them the confidence to express their fears. I could go on, but I will cut it short here. A huge thanks for putting together this interview.
Thanks for this comment, Stephen. You've provided a fascinating insight into how social change builds momentum.
At 16:02. Just a bit of clarification. When Prof Anderson says "How do we make sure we don't sell any more four-wheel drive cars?" does this mean new 4x4s, or even prevent sales of second-hand 4x4s? Or does it mean that we should take them off the roads now (because if even second-hand 4x4s aren't sufferable for the moment, people would mostly just keep their existing 4x4s and so the problem would remain).
Secondly, "Or that we phase out petrol and diesel cars by 2025". Again, does this mean the sales of new petrol and Diesel cars or take all the combustion (including all combustion cars up to PHEVs and REX's) off the road? Is that the scale of action you're talking about?
I ask, because when I first did some estimations in 2015, I assumed that the deadline for selling new combustion cars was 2025, as this would allow existing combustion cars to run out their normal lifetimes and essentially be entirely off the road by 2050, when (at the time) I understood that was the deadline for transport decarbonisation. 25 years is a little under 2x the average lifespan of a UK car.
And, at the time, plans by e.g. Amsterdam to ban the sales of new combustion cars by 2025 seemed very progressive, but it could easily be the case today that even that is utterly inadequate.
Ya, we're screwed. All I see in NYC are bright shiny brand new luxury infernal combustion engine cars. Total denial.
Human beings learn primarily through emulation. Resistance to change isn’t due to lack of information but lack of examples. Activism doesn’t help this, only successful demonstrations of another way of living does. There are individuals who do this, but they are largely voiceless because career celebrities control the discussion, but offer nothing to to imitate.
Is the problem to much consumer followership?
How much CO2 in atmosphere is the result of unnecessary manufacturing due to planned obsolescence? Our nitwit economists have ignored the depreciation of durable consumer goods since Sputnik.
What is NDP? Only the depreciation of capital goods is measured via tax returns. There were 200,000,000 cars in the US in 1994. Where are those cars now?
A huge portion of emissions results from manufacturing goods. With technology especially, consumer items like PCs and smartphones use many times more energy to manufacture than the device could ever consume through usage. There's a link to the environmental reports at the bottom of Apple's website, which lists the footprint of each device they make. On pretty much all MacBooks, iPads, and iPhones, the emissions from manufacturings dwarfs those of transportation and consumer usage, and that's with Apple's efforts to clean up their supply chain. As an overall company, even without the renewable energy generation, manufacturing also dwarfs emissions from corporate offices, datacenters, and their stores.
When it comes to the old adage of reduce, reuse, recycle, we ought to update it to reduce, reduce, reduce.
Reduce (1) material consumption by buying less overall, find used/refurbished options when you need to buy something (outside of food or life supplies), and making what you have last longer.
Reduce (2) energy consumption dramatically. Minimalism and sufficiency can really help with this. Vampire loads are sneaky and can use surprising amounts of energy even though they are low power. My tube amplifier and floor standing speakers use less energy than a HomePod over the course of a month. My usage during a busy month is 96 hours (12 hours per day during the weekends/8 days per month). While powered up and playing music, the amplifier draws 40 VA (VoltAmps = Watts but with power factor ignored). When off, it draws 0.5 VA. Over the course of a month, the amp consumes 4,104 Wh. An Apple HomePod (not the mini, the original), simply plugged in and not used for a month, draws a steady 8 VA the entire time it's plugged in, leading to a monthly energy consumption of 5,760 Wh. Factoring in the same usage as the amplifier, monthly energy consumption of the HomePod increases to 6,912 Wh (HomePod uses 20 VA to play music at a nominal volume). So while the HomePod is a physically smaller device, it consumes more energy than a hybrid tube-type amplifier over the longer term simply due to idle consumption. Granted, at a certain usage rate, the amplifier would end up consuming more, but it would require heavier usage than what I have time for. While the amplifier and floor standing speakers have a considerably higher manufacturing footprint (from all the extra material), I have no doubt that the amp and speakers will far outlive the HomePod (Plus, to match the audio quality, it takes two HomePods in a stereo pair). I would estimate that the amplifier will last at least the lifespan of 3 consecutive HomePods (whether the original or the current Mini).
Reduce (3) our building. For decades, environmentalists have been concerned about urban sprawl. In the area where I live, I'm far more concerned with suburban sprawl. We have housing plans popping up like crazy all over the place, using, on average, 30 acres of former forest to house approximately 400-500 people (assuming a couple with 2 kids per house). These are all cheaply built, standalone houses with gas heat and air conditioning, probably the least efficient way to house people. After the events over the last several years, we have a surplus of commercial space (high-rise buildings, malls) that would be prime candidates for conversion into apartments or condos. A single enclosed shopping mall can house anywhere from 50-200 families while maintaining some businesses inside (drug store, maybe a small grocery market, and a food court for instance). Using a larger 2-story mall as apartments, big enough to house 4 people each, could easily prevent at least 2 of these 30-acre plans from being developed, saving natural habitat from development while re-using an existing building. The large, mostly flat roof is a prime candidate for a massive solar installation and, if the parking lots are covered in solar as well, could make the building a net exporter of energy.
But I NEED that plastic stair stepper under my bed! I just never seem to be motivated to use it, because it's upstairs.
@@MrTsolar I upend people's beliefs quite often when I explain that the Pollution in China is from U.S. manufactures making products for U.S. consumers. It puts an end to the, "I'm not going to do anything until China does something" argument.
Better to live in a uncomfortable truth than a beautiful lie keep fighting the good fight Greta
I'm afraid most people really don't think we need to adress the climate emergency at least according to oppinion polls. Climate change stands out as an especially strong concern among citizens here in the EU but this is not true in global context. If you look at polls among GOP voters in the US for example, very few are convinced that we face climate emergency. The situation is even worse in Asia, Africa, South America and Eastern Europe. The data shows that the climate emergency still lacks media coverage. Furthermore, there are active media campaigns in conservative and far-right media to undermine the credibility of scientific studies proving the overwhelming influence of man on climate change.
Thank you for this very interesting inerview. I learned something new. Keep up the good work!
I don't think there is hope. The problem isn't burning oil, it's that we as a species are totally unevolved. We're mired in selfishness, greed, materialism, bigotry, racism, ignorance, paranoia, hate, and particularly our competitive mindset, which is death. Telling humanity that we need to abandon capitalism and competition for resources is like telling a fish to grow legs because the ocean isn't habitable anymore.
This, my dear, is one of the most basic perspective that real climate leaders must master before they can actually effectively timely lead. Celebrity climate leaders are ill-prepared for their aspiring roles.
We see so many changes happening so fast, sometimes weekly and sometimes daily, with the two Nordstream pipelines being shut down and destroyed, the Russia Ukraine actions evolving quickly, the rise of electric car sales. Hopefully the rise of cycling cities will happen faster as well. But we could use climate advocates' support to help make that happen. Jason Slaughter is influencing a lot of people with his video channel Not Just Bikes.
The scope of action we must undertake, and the insanely short timeline we have to do it, is frightening, bordering on hopeless. Even with the US achieving net-zero tomorrow, global emissions would continue driving us in the wrong direction. All the action to date has only slightly slowed the growth in human impact. Even the economic pauses experienced during the last two years barely made a dent, and the minimal impact they had were short-lived. We are still feeling the economic effects of those brief pauses with very little environmental benefit, if any. A 40% cut in emissions across the board would be just that, a 40% reduction in global emissions. We need at least a 90% reduction globally, at the least, to stop making the problem worse. We'll need zero emissions and carbon removal to start reversing accelerated climate change. The necessary resources to switch our current lifestyles to fossil-free power will wreck what's left of the Earth's surface. We need to outright abandon the most energy intensive aspects of our lives, make radical sufficiency the norm, and grow, not make, the remaining resources we need. Forget systemic change, we're talking full-blown paradigm shift. Odds of being successful? Better if we quit complaining about industries only responsible for 6% of emissions, for example.
Also, just a small tip. Fridays for Future would likely gain more support if they would remove the racist and sexist wording from their webpage for the September 23 events, included below. This does nothing to aid the movement and is completely irrelevant to the topic at hand. Also, under FAQ, stating that you don't have the capacity or competence to evaluate solutions, doesn't that detract from the legitimacy of Fridays for Future?
"Global North dominated by affluent, white, heterosexual cis-males, "
Listed under "The Problem" at fridaysforfuture org/september23
Fantastic video - thank you.
great to see Kevin & Greta in conversation. Will make a great training resource for Carbon Literacy training. More please
Thanks, Phil. Part two should be out next week. Also for Carbon Literacy training, have a look at our short animated films on carbon budgets (czcams.com/video/i0IufZFN3_w/video.html) and equity (czcams.com/video/3SPVIUV2_uY/video.html).
@@ClimateUncensored just watched - fantastic teaching resource & really complementary to the interview too!😃
If you are putting the cart before the horse by obsessions about the criminals exploiting institutionally induced ignorance instead of doing the scientific observations required to denounce their criminality, you get what you pay for unwillingly. Business as usual.
Thank you for this well-structured interview with a clear message: as stated by Kevin, many of us watching and reading this are the privileged consumers with the luxury of spare time and good technology. Kevin correctly articulates - in my opinion - how many of us want meaningful change 'imposed' upon us top-down, hopefully soon to be triggered by the bottom-up approach of activists such as Greta, Fridays for Future, Extinction Rebellion, Scientists Rebellion...
In my lifetime, population has gone from
Doing something about it and connecting with others who are is the only helpful response that I know.
If people are upset by the polite words they read on placards or the scientific climate reports, are they really doing the right thing? Insrtead of writing placards demanding change, ask for change with please and thank you. Instead STOP ROSEBANK, have PLEASE STOP ROSEBANK, THANK YOU!!
Great discussion. Can we talk about negative population growth? I can envision a world capped with a billion people, zero pollution, solar power, closed loop resources with no more extraction. Millions of square miles restored to its former natural beauty with materials extracted from abandoned cities and landfills. No more war or crime.
Zero extraction would require hydro exclusively, according to Jack Alpert. He says max global population would be 50M.
Interesting but it neglected the obvious solution of people making do with less:- both industrially with less non-functional consumer "stuff", & in everyday human activities to use less energy (typically self-indulgent transport & leisure activities). Growing more of our own food locally or at home also helps in reducing demands upon energy intensive supply chains.
However, as an example the UK during WW2 needed to import huge quantities of food for a population around 25% smaller than that today. So there are clearly enormous challenges ahead just in attempting to produce our own food with a minimal carbon footprint
Thanks for commenting, but perhaps you missed the final section of this video (from 26:51 on) in which Greta and Kevin discuss equity & extractivism, regulation & voluntary change? Kevin notes that the labour and resources that are currently being used for 'non-functional consumer stuff' for the wealthy few would need to be re-purposed for building a zero-carbon society.
@@ClimateUncensored OK but IMHO that comment by Kevin is so wide ranging as to be almost superfluous, & idealism ain't cutting it. It has to be structured in detail like, as many have suggested, the Marshall Plan for such to have any chance of diversifying & repurposing labor & resources effectively to create a renewable energy & reduced energy consumption scenario.
THE QUESTION OF BICYCLES
We have the debate of whether or not to use nuclear power to reduce dependence on fossil fuels. But I never hear Greta or her allies talk about encouraging use of bicycles. These are compelling reasons for bicycles as a way to go green:
Anyone can afford a bicycle so it fits into discussions on equity.
It's by far cheaper than buses and subways to build and to maintain. (Bike lanes, for instance)
It's action that can be done right now.
The switch to battery electric cars involves massive expansion of mining for these materials that will take a minimum of a decade to ramp up.
The switch FROM ice, internal combustion engine cars can be dramatically speeded up when it does not just depend on going with e cars.
It thumbs our noses at big oil one trip at a time. (It can also instantly help defang Russia's action in Ukraine.)
It's completely zero carbon emissions travel. AND it's zero cancer causing particulates. Many cities have massive rates of illnesses which we know are directly linked to local air pollution, including Deli, London, NYC.
It's grass roots action that every age and demographic can participate in.
It's a healthy daily dose of mild exercise. That's a good side benefit, besides saving the climate.
Riding a bicycle is most often done by people of Greta's age now and especially her age when she started her protests as a school girl. That large demographic is her audience. It would take very little effort on her part to encourage youth to ride bicycles and ride more often. All she has to do is meet other youth and leaders on bicycles. She rode a bicycle to school before she started her rallies but to my knowledge rarely does it now.
I spoke with Fridays for Future leaders and they said bicycles are great but Greta's mission is to talk about the problems and highlight inaction. So this is not something they will actively promote. That's fair at face value. But she's gone at length talking about going vegan, which is a personal lifestyle choice the same as riding a bicycle is. She rode a bicycle in the past. All that would be needed is to occasionally do it again or encourage FFF members to show up at rallies with bicycles.
Riding a bicycle is something which is very public, while going vegan is something people can't see us doing nearly as easily. So it would be much easier to show others this is an action more of their friends are doing.
The next Conference of Parties this October is in the Middle East, in a tourist town of Egypt. For the first time in the history of the COP meetings riding bicycles will be presented as a topic for mitigating climate change. That is NOT because Greta or climate scientists / activists pushed for it. It's because cycling advocates pushed for it in Glasgow last year. The climate advocates have a strong ally with cycling advocates but cycling advocates have NO SUPPORT from environment groups or leaders or individuals. If that was to change, if the simple act of riding a bicycle was seen as a powerful way for environmentalists to meet their goals for saving the environment AND to generate more awareness for environmental issues, that would work in their favour, even be pivotal.
THIS MACHINE FIGHTS CLIMATE CHANGE. Please embrace it.
Great point. I've ridden a bike all my life and I'm in my sixties.🙂
The thing is that an objective is not the same as a plan or a strategy.
Consider a message which deprecates EVs in favour of bicycles. The reality is that people who are interested in the environment are far more likely to get on board with this message than people who don't care, or actively support fossil fuel driving (and this is still the majority).
So, the upshot, would be to leave the fossil fuel industry virtual unaffected, but hugely depress the emerging EV market possibly to the point of non-viability; which would mean that when environmentalists want or have to travel in motorised transport, they have to choose fossil fuels; and all the motorised transport they rely on e.g. for food; or manufacturing etc would also remain fossil fuelled.
And this would happen, because we currently have almost no control over the structural changes that really matter: the fossil fuel industry, politics, industry, social systems, aviation etc.
The target always has to be fossil fuels per se, because that is something that can be effectively attacked. For example, I can attack the fossil fuel industry by driving my EV using renewable energy (which I do) and making sure I never share a fossil fuel car for a lift (I force people to share my EV instead). So, bikes are great, and personally I love them and have spent most of my working life travelling to work on them, but they need to be used as a weapon against the fossil fuel industry alone, IMO.
@@julianskidmore293 I appreciate your lengthy response. I got confused a bit on it and could use your help to clarify it a bit. I'm not interested in shutting down the electric car movement. I'm not so sure it can be at this point. Norway is about 80% e car in new car sales. Sweden, beside Norway, where Greta hails from, is also picking up in e car sales.
In this video, she says the mining for e car materials is also bad for the environment. But she never suggests bicycles as an alternative to all cars. It's a shame because cycling advocates strongly support the environmental movement, at least in so far as bicycles reduce co2 and pollution.
I just want Greta and others to share that bicycling is a very effective way to help the environment and can be done now, by people of any age or financial standing, in every country. There are some exceptions but by far most people can ride a bicycle but so far have not. More people encouraging bicycling helps a lot.
Regarding Greta's concern about mining, this also is something which can be fixed and needs to, by innovating how mining and refining are done. I don't see either of these ending any time soon so finding ways to mine that do less harm to environment is a worthwhile goal. In the meantime, let's get on our bikes and ride! :)
4 years later and Ms. Thunberg still shows telltale signs of stage fright even when she's merely talking about the moment she became the center of attention. Admirable young lady.
Nuclear electric generation?
Please listen to Kevin Anderson talk about this. I think you'll change your mind
What about the coal in Germany ??
And the trees. "Biomass"
"Individual scientists very seldom have the courage to tell it like it is." How is this not malpractice and why are they allowed to get away with it? If they were medical doctors withholding important information about your health, they'd be sued into another galaxy, however a free pass is granted here. Totally unethical as well. Absolutely disgusting!
The medical malpractice analogy doesn't work well here - individual scientists are typically working on one aspect of the climate problem, not the whole patient. But in any case, as Kevin says in the interview, mitigation is inherently political, and we have now left it so late that addressing the climate emergency means questioning our entire socio-political framework. It's in that sense that Greta & Kevin are talking about 'telling it as it is'.
in a military camp the guy who sounds an alarm has the total command (for a while)
#Scriptgirl (Margaret Klein Salomon, "Leading the public into emergency mode", a 2016 framing manual: phrase "house on fire" etc) #Astroturfing
If nuclear energy is not seriously considered, then this entire discussion is disingenuous