Climate Change and the War in Ukraine

The IPCC (the climate change scientific body of the UN) recently released another report verifying that climate change is having disastrous effects in many parts of the world—even worse than previously understood. This is not the news we want to hear, of course. However, it does remind us that the climate crisis is shared by all of humanity. If we can remember more often that we are each part of a global community, connected to people everywhere by our shared humanity, we are more likely to be able to handle bad news about the climate. We will be more likely to let bad news spur us to take increasing action to make whatever difference we can in the climate crisis.

Climate change and the war in Ukraine have the same roots
The new climate report was released 4 days after Russia invaded Ukraine. A Ukrainian botanist on the IPCC had to make his last text checks on the report from a bomb shelter in Kyiv. Meteorologist Svitlana Krakovska, the head of the Ukrainian IPCC delegation said, “We will not surrender in Ukraine, and we hope the world will not surrender in building a climate resilient future. Human-induced climate change and the war on Ukraine have the same roots—fossil fuels—and our dependence on them.”

EU paid Russia $10 billion for gas and oil during the first two weeks of the war
For years, Russia’s oil and gas industry has been a huge part of the Russian economy, accounting for 60% of its export earnings and 30% of Russian federal budget revenues. About half of their fossil fuel exports go to Europe. Purchases of Russian oil and gas, necessitated by the world’s dependence on fossil fuels, have been propping up Putin and the Russian economy for years. Since Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, the western nations have been imposing sanctions on Russia, but the EU can’t impose the most significant sanction—boycotting Russian oil and gas—because people in the EU would be unable to heat their homes and their economies would suffer drastically. (During the first two weeks of the war, analysts estimate that the EU bought $10 billion worth of fossil fuels from Russia.)

More fossil fuels or finally switch to renewables?
Now, as some countries are cutting back on imports of Russian oil and gas, fuel prices are climbing steeply. Oil companies are raking in record profits. Whether this is the result of supply and demand or of price gouging is a matter of some debate. Regardless, increased prices at the pump are, of course, a hardship on low-income working people.

Some reactions to reduced supplies of Russian oil and gas have been predictable and revealing. The fossil fuel industry and its backers are calling for more drilling, more export terminals, and more pipelines to meet the “need” for more oil and gas. (Ignoring, of course, that these things would take years to build and have no effect on the current crisis.) Meanwhile, climate advocates are calling for us to see this crisis as a wake-up call to get off of fossil fuels—both because of their disastrous climate effects and because our dependence on them increases the power of Russia and other petro-states, and limits our options in international affairs.

Send millions of heat pumps
Three days after the Russian invasion, Bill McKibben, the founder of 350.org, wrote a piece in which he recommended that President Biden invoke the Defense Production Act to get U.S. manufacturers to produce electric heat pumps in large quantities so they can be shipped to Europe and installed before next winter. His research revealed that the European electric grid could handle fifty million new heat pumps. Any significant number would lessen Putin’s power, create thousands of manufacturing jobs in the U.S., and help with the climate crisis.

The Defense Production Act has been used recently by President Trump and by President Biden. McKibben says we could provide Europe with heat pumps at cost, or below cost, just as we did with the “lend-lease” program leading up to World War II. The Washington Post reports that White House aides are seriously studying the idea.

IPCC calls for local solutions
The IPCC report says that billions of people’s lives are already being affected by climate change, and that climate change is “a threat to human wellbeing and the health of the planet.” It affirms that there is still an open, but rapidly closing, window of opportunity in which “concerted global action can secure a livable future.” The report also states that “climate change is a global challenge that requires local solutions.” I take this to mean that as we engage in local campaigns to prevent new fossil fuel infrastructure, require that new buildings be net-zero, reduce emissions from all sources, and increase carbon sequestration, we are playing significant roles in the global effort that is required.

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The photo above was taken some years ago at the Hope Botanical Gardens in Jamaica by Amy Vernon-Jones.

An earlier version of this post appeared in the Daily Hampshire Gazette newspaper, Northampton, MA.

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