Transcript Eco-Footprints and Climate Cnange: The Perfect Moral Storm

Climate Justice
The Moral Imperative
William E. Rees, PhD, FRSC
UBC School of Community and Regional Planning
Climate Change Impacts on Bangladesh:
Global Responsibilities
UBC Liu Institute, 9 December 2009
The Global Climate is Changing
 Mean global temperature has increased .8
C° over the last century.
 Wind and rainfall patterns are shifting.
 Deserts are spreading.
 Glaciers are melting.
 Sea levels are rising (80% faster than
predicted).
 The Arctic Ocean will be ice free decades
ahead of ‘schedule’.
Humans are Probably (90%) “At Cause”
 Climate is primarily determined by non-human
factors, (e.g., solar output and shifting ocean
currents).
 There have been no changes in these factors
sufficient to explain ongoing temperature increases
and related impacts.
 By contrast, human activities have significantly
increased atmospheric greenhouse gas
concentrations. Carbon dioxide is up 38% from a
preindustrial 280 parts per million to 388 ppm
today. Other GHGs have climbed proportionately
even more.
 The CO2 increases alone are more than sufficient
to account for the observed warming effects.
Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide: A 38% anthropogenic
increase since the 19th Century
Rate of increase
(ppm/year)
1970-79: 1.3
‘Safe’ is less than
350 ppm CO2e
1990-99: 1.5
2000-07: 2.3
(This exceeds the
IPCC worst case
scenario and is
accelerating!)
Global T has risen 0.8°C in 125 yrs
°C
Green bars show 95%
confidence intervals
Upward trend continues; 2005 was a
new record; we’re at 0.8°C above
1880-1900 average; 0.5°C since 1970.
J. Hansen et al., PNAS 103: 14288-293 (26 Sept 2006)
Recent findings turn the screws
“Reframing the climate change challenge in light of post-2000 emission trends”
 To stabilize GHGs at even 650 ppmv CO2e, the
majority of OECD nations must begin to
make draconian emission reductions soon
(within a decade).
 Unless we can reconcile economic growth with
unprecedented rates of decarbonization (in excess of
6% per year), this will require a planned
economic recession.
 650 ppmv CO2e implies a catastrophic 4 degree C
mean global temperature increase.
(Anderson and Bows. 2008. Phil.Trans. R. Soc. A doi:10.1098/rsta.2008.0138)
Harbinger of Future Extremes:
Australia (Jan-Feb 2009)
Context: The income gap – steadily increasing
Social Justice and the Income Gap
 Eco-Apartheid is the effective segregation of
people along environmental gradients.
 Eco-apartheid is a contemporary reality—the
poor and ethnic minorities are forced to inhabit
the most degraded urban settlements and rural
landscapes on Earth.
 These areas are increasing affected by pollution,
resource depletion and the effects of climate
change, all driven by excess consumption,
usually elsewhere.
Developing countries will be hit hardest
and can least defend themselves
 5% or more of the world’s
people (350,000,000) are
likely to be displaced from
their settlements by sealevel rise (Stern report, 2006).
 This could be 2 billion or
more with 4 C degrees
warming. In any case:
 Up to two billion people
worldwide will face water
shortages and up to 30 per
cent of plant and animal
species would be put at
risk of extinction if the
average rise in
temperature stabilises at
1.5C to 2.5C (IPCC, Sept 2007)
Impacts and Morality
The Age of Consequences (November 2007)
Washington, Center for Strategic and International Studies
 “We predict an [inevitable] scenario in which
people and nations are threatened by massive
food and water shortages, devastating natural
disasters and deadly disease outbreaks”
(John Podesta, contributing author).
 Rich countries could “go through a 30-year
process of kicking people away from the lifeboat”
as the world’s poorest face the worst
environmental consequences”
(Leon Fuerth, contributing author).
With Knowledge, Responsibility
 Wealthy consumers who are ignorant of the
distant systemic consequences of their material
habits might be excused. However,...
 Once we raise to collective consciousness the
link between consumption, climate change and
eco-violence, society has an obligation to view
such violence in the appropriate light.
 Not acting to reduce or prevent avoidable ecoinjustice converts erstwhile blameless consumer
choices into acts of aggression.
The Common Law
 Negligence law focuses on compensation for
losses caused by unreasonable conduct.
 Unreasonable conduct is taken to mean: the
failure to do something that a reasonable person
would do (or doing something that a reasonable
person would not do).
 In short, fault may be found even in the case of
unintended harm if the latter results from
careless or unreasonable conduct.
Criminal Code of Canada
 Everyone is criminally negligent who (a) in
doing anything, or (b) in omitting to do
anything that it is his duty to do, shows wanton
or reckless disregard for the lives or safety of
other persons (where “duty” means a duty
imposed by law).
 A person commits homicide when, directly or
indirectly, by any means, he causes the death of
a human being, by being negligent (Section
222[5][b], emphasis added).
Extending the Moral Logic
 There is no prima facie moral reason why the
behavioural standards imposed by international law
should not be as rigorous as those required by
domestic law.
 If human-induced climate change is a cause of death
and destruction, then are not countries like Canada
and the United States guilty of “wanton or reckless
disregard for the lives or safety of other persons” in,
for example, their failure to act effectively to reduce
their profligate fuel consumption and carbon dioxide
emissions?
“Ottawa dashes
hope for treaty in
Copenhagen”
(Headline, Globe and Mail 23 October 2009)
On Responsibility:
What the Science Says
 “Industrialized world reductions in material
consumption, energy use, and environmental
degradation of over 90% will be required by
2040 to meet the needs of a growing world
population fairly within the planet’s ecological
means” (BCSD 1993).
 For sustainability with equity, North Americans
should be taking steps to reduce their
ecological footprints by 80% to their equitable
Earth-share (1.8 gha) (Rees 2006).
Urban-Centered
Bioregionalism: Ultimate
Our Contemporary
Design
and Life-Style Goals
Conundrum
 Achieve ‘quasi-sustainability’—an equitable eco-footprint of two
hectares per capita.
 Spatially reintegrate ecology and economy, production and
consumption, living and working, of city and hinterland.
‘The ecologically necessary is
support functions of the ecosphere.
politically
unfeasible
but
 It’s
an old idea echoing
Geddes, Mumford
and the
The
regional eco-city,
‘… ratheris
than
being merely the site of
politically
feasible
ecologically
consumption, might, through its very design, produce some
ofirrelevant.
its own food and
’ energy, as well as become the locus of
 Stop being a parasite on, and become a contributor to, the life-
work for its residents’ (Van der Ryn and Calthorpe 1986).
Be the change!
Thank You