Russ Vernon-Jones

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

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Fossil Fuel Racism

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We now have a new report authored jointly by Greenpeace, the Movement for Black Lives, and the Gulf Coast Center for Law and Policy that brings climate and race issues together in a new way and coins the term, “Fossil Fuel Racism.” They found that coal, oil, and gas, at every stage of their lifecycles–extraction, processing, transport, and combustion–generate toxic air and water pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. At each stage they create public health hazards. At each stage they worsen the climate crisis. Both their public health effects and the effects of climate change fall disproportionately on Black, Latinx, Indigenous, Asian and poor communities.

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Feedback Loops: Greta Thunberg Asks Us to “Educate Ourselves”

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When Greta Thunberg addressed world leaders at the UN Climate Action Summit in 2019 she mentioned “feedback loops” as something most people were not taking into account. In January of this year, she and the Dali Lama had a public conversation online with some leading scientists to promote the launch of a series of five new short videos, “Climate Emergency: Feedback Loops.” These were created by a documentary film company collaborating with top-flight scientists, and are narrated by Richard Gere.

Thunberg said, “If I could ask one thing of you, it would be to educate yourself…spread that knowledge, spread the awareness to others…. Most people I know haven’t even heard of feedback loops or tipping points, chain reactions, and so on. But they are so crucial to understanding how the world works.”

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Doughnut Economics

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In my previous post I raised the issue of “living lightly on the earth” — inviting us to think about our levels of consumption and what lifestyles are sustainable on a planet with 7.8 billion other humans. We will each need to make our own decisions about what a sensible and workable lifestyle is for us. As a society, we also need to think about a more sustainable and equitable economic system — what should be its goals and how can we bring it into being?

As I wrote last time, I’m intrigued by what I’ve learned so far about “Doughnut Economics.” First, there are no glazed or cream-filled pastries here — just an intriguing doughnut-shaped diagram that summarizes some important ideas. I believe we can all think about the most important issues facing our society. The “doughnut” approach provides us with an accessible entry point to some interesting and relevant perspectives on economic systems.

Kate Raworth, the creator of this way of thinking about things, says that “a healthy economy should be designed to thrive, not grow. …

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Living Lightly on the Earth

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I like the creature comforts of my middle class lifestyle. At the same time I believe in global equity. I’m sure that I’m using more than my fair share of the world’s resources and that the planet could not accommodate 7.8 billion people consuming as much as my neighbors and I do.

I’ve written about many climate action steps we can take — many of which won’t require much change in our lifestyles. Today I want to invite you (and me) to consider the almost certain reality that solving the climate crisis will require reduced consumption and reduced energy use by most of us in the so-called “developed” nations.

So many of us have been conditioned to believe that more is better, that it can be challenging for us to think in this area. I’m hardly an expert. Rather than trying to provide answers, I’d like to share three experiences….

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Plastics – Another Front in the Campaign to Save Our Climate and Health

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Globally, we produce about 310 million tons of plastic each year, about half of which is single use items such as shopping bags, plates, cups, straws, and packaging. Total production is expected to go up to somewhere between 750 million tons to a billion tons per year by 2050, unless big changes occur.

Plastic is made from fossil fuels. Greenhouse gasses are emitted at every stage of its lifecycle. The emissions begin with methane that’s emitted in the extraction of fracked oil and gas and continue …

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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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7 Brief Perspectives in a Difficult Time

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Here are some assorted thoughts — from the Presidential election to the Senate runoff elections in Georgia to the insurrection at the Capitol and beyond.

United front
In my mind the biggest story of the last few months is that so many people and groups came together around getting Trump out of the White House and taking back the Senate and we were successful! We formed a “united front” — people who disagreed with each other about many things, worked together and supported each other in a common goal. A united front may be more difficult to achieve on other issues, but it will be necessary in the future and it is possible.

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Retrospective – December 2020

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Season’s greetings to all!

Congratulations to each of you for having made it through 2020! My deepest sympathy and condolences to all of you who have lost loved ones this year. There has been so much death, hardship, and loss. No one would have chosen to have such a year. Nonetheless, I do think that we have learned much about our capacity to persevere, to adapt, to care, and to come through it all still wanting justice, still wanting a society that works for everyone. We have a clearer picture of both the challenges we face as a society and the strengths we embody when we pull together.

Rather than write a new blog post for this week, I thought I would simply invite you to look at parts of this website that you may have ….

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We’re Aiming for the Wrong Climate Targets — Let’s Talk About Improving Our Aim

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Let’s forget about national boundaries and governments for a minute and face the fact that the whole world needs to reduce its collective greenhouse gas emissions. We — meaning all of humanity — need to emit close to 50% less by 2030 (and get to net-zero emissions by 2050). So far global emissions are still rising, so we need to make a dramatic turn in the next few years if we are to avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate change. It’s a global problem — greenhouse gases emitted anywhere, cause problems everywhere.

Responsibility
How are we going to pull this off? Some would argue that each nation should reduce its emissions by roughly 50%. Despite the apparent even-handedness of that approach, it would be incredibly unfair and inequitable. Some nations have emitted far more greenhouse gases than others and played a much larger role in creating the climate problem.

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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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How to Defeat an Attempted Coup

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We can’t know ahead of time what will happen on Election Day or what will happen in the weeks following. I hope that Biden wins with such a landslide that Trump and his supporters see that they have no choice but to accept the results. However we do need to be prepared for the possibility that Trump meant it when he said he would only accept the results if he wins. If he prevents the votes from being counted or tries to stay in office after losing the election, that’s a coup, an illegal power-grab.

If that happens, everyone who cares about justice, democracy, racial justice and climate change must participate fully in an outpouring of opposition. None of us can “wait and see”. All of us must act.

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