Climate change is here and it is worse and happening far faster than the very conservative estimates of the scientists had predicted…
Ross Ice Shelf: part melting ten times faster than the rest
A part of the world’s largest ice shelf is melting ten times faster than the rest of it, and water heated by the sun is responsible, a study shows.
…it hurts the poor…
- Climate change, which has different effects on the economies of cold and warm countries, has already made poor warm countries substantially more poor, a new study says.
- Without climate change, the per capita GDP of India would be 40 percent higher today.
- Poor countries’ problems also affect rich countries, since climate change drives migration.
…and it is causing extinction event die offs in the natural world…
A landmark UN report has laid bare humanity’s devastating impact on the natural world, detailing unprecedented rates of decline in biodiversity and nature on land, in the seas and in the sky.
Published on Monday by the UN’s Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), the sweeping 1,800-page study drew on the work of 145 scientists and 15,000 source materials.
But at its core, IPBES chair Robert Watson said, the report contained one simple message: “The health of ecosystems on which we and all other species depend is deteriorating more rapidly than ever.”
…we know it’s happening now, yet we delude ourselves that recycling and riding a bike will make some meaningful impact and pray technology can save us.
The Right wing defend the farmers, big polluters and big oil while the Left wing descends into identity politics factions screaming at each other that all men are rapists and free speech is cis white male privilege. And Trans Rights uber allas. Don’t forget about Trans Rights above all else.
As the planet melts rapidly, we are avoiding three glaring facts.
1: Neoliberal capitalism is exacerbating and amplifying global warming.2: Climate change is an existential threat to our species.3: The current political spectrum simply can not rise to the challenge.
We can’t change how we have bungled our way into this, we can only radically adapt towards a self sustaining economy with a strong State to protect what we have left.
It is not enough to jam the jails as Extinction Rebellion are espousing to force change, we must challenge the ever growing growth model of neoliberal capitalism. We can’t continue growing because we have passed that point and the very biosphere is now collapsing.
We need to take this ethical reality into our economics.
BeyondMeat launched on Wall St this week & blew past its opening by 160%!!! Memo to Dairy NZ – the game is over – NZ should no longer support an industry that pollutes, steals water, tortures animals and creates climate change gases!
Synthetic meat and milk is the end of an industry we’ve lazily relied on since the formation of this country.
China is a major contributor to green house gasses – we should stop selling milk powder to them.
The Saudi’s crucified innocent people after beheading them – we should stop trade with them now.
It is not difficult to start listing nations we don’t want to trade with to slow our growth model.
As vast parts of the planet become uninhabitable, we need to start thinking about Fortress Aotearoa.
We must look to increase our military spending to 10% GDP to protect what we have.
Look at this…
…you think as fishing stocks collapse this is going to get better?
To survive climate change we must embark upon Fortress Aotearoa…
- Move away from intensive farming and look to become domestically self sustainable in terms of food.
- Immediately ban all water exports
- 5 year Parliamentary term.
- Upper and Lower House (Upper House 50-50 split between Māori & Pakeha that can hold up legislation if unhappy about Treaty issues)
- Massive investment into R&D from Government with the understanding research is to benefit NZ first before sold offshore.
- Large scale increase in Navy, Army & Airforce.
- Mass limiting of tourism numbers with increased tourist taxes.
- Only citizens can vote.
- Sustainable immigration and an end to exploitative international student workers.
- Resettlement Programms for all pacific island neighbours.
- Increase refugee in take to 5000 per year
- Fully funded public services.
- Mass Green housing rebuild.
- 100% renewable energy for entire country.
- Massive tree planting across previous farming land.
- Wholesale re-write of state services act to end commercial values.
- Investment into basic pharmaceutical production.
- Financial transaction tax
- Wealth tax
- Multinational tax
- Inheritance tax
A climate changing world will descend into chaos, NZ will be one of the few lifeboats available, we need to rapidly adapt with foresight before we are forced to blindly adapt because of necessity.
For those on the Right, your days of denial and worship of capitalism are over.
For those on the Left, if your politics are not focused on climate change adaptation first and foremost, then you are part of the problem.
The dairy industry is what made New Zealand prosper 160 years ago. You just really need to question yourselves if you haven’t learnt anything more than holding a cows tit for a hundred years. Simon Bridges is walking around with a cows udder in his pocket trying to live in the past. We can not leave it up to these muppets.
We have to wake up to the possibilities of what the economy could be instead of what is or isn’t affordable. There’s so many corperate welfare subsidies that need to end particularly government subsidised wages and housing via WINZ so those oversight The Welfare Working group just have to get aggressive and quit letting these nobody bureaucrates run the place.
It’s good to be kind and all but you also need some one to kick in some teeth every now and then just to keep people honest.
Well done there Sam,
We must move to ‘solar powered trains’ for infrastructure now as overseas are doing. we need to catch up to our global partners.
We need to discuss this rationally even if the right wing zealots don’t care.
Rail with electric locomotives is our future here now; they have wagons with solar panels on them all and they can self power themselves now.
https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/feb/15/solar-powered-trains-uk-india-renewables-tracks-electric
The Southern Ocean has more pact layers of wind so I’d say about 50% base load from on/offshore wind farms for commercial use and about 40% solar for residential (solar on your roof) and about 10% hydro or 2hydro electric dams just incase when renewable capacity dropes out for what ever reason.
The fossile age in New Zealand is numbered. Just a matter of time really before New Zealand is 100% renewable energy.
Look what’s being suggested for Wellington. They’re like a tram but with wheels and have overhead wires. Rather like a trolley buses in fact – those ones which were dumped and the overhead electrical wires ripped out recently. sigh….
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/388693/trackless-trams-would-be-perfect-in-wellington-consultant-says
I’m kind of meh about the whole above ground transport solutions because there’s a whole bunch of working concepts being produced by all the major manfacutrues Volvo, Telsa, Mercedes, Mack, Fuso. Electric powertrains are coming to trucks and bus designs.
But one reason why I would go for overhead electrical wires is if the volume justifies it so a minimum 50 seat / people fare per hour peaking at 50 every ten minutes, and you’d probably only get that type of volume in certain parts of Auckland.
And our fancy sci-fi buses are so going to get graffitied.
You are a retard. NEW ZEALAND DOESN’T HAVE ENOUGH SUNLIGHT TO RUN THESE IDIOTIC THINGS
That’s a bullshit statement. New Zealand has at least 5 million acres of land suitable for solar right now not including household roofs which is about enough to supply the electrical need of 20 million people which is such a rediculous number it dosnt need to be justified.
A couple of quibbles.
It’s unqualified, disqualified, capitalism, that is the problem not neo-liberal capitalism.
To get rid of capitalism we don’t use the word ‘we’ to mean NZ citizens.
‘We’ means the world working class.
So we need the 100s of millions of Chinese workers, as the allies of NZ workers fighting for a workers government, to stop Chinese imperialism invading NZ.
Fortress NZ is a Muldoonist delusion.
Fortress Aotearoa has populist appeal and you know it.
Yeah, and China has to fit some where in Oceania. We rejected Chinese priority owners, rejected Huawei. But there money seems to be green enough.
Chinese ships flow past New Zealand, there planes fly over head and there people live here and now we must live with in those limits.
You mean a workers’ one world government, right? Anything else will not solve anything, because workers and thus nations will continue competing among themselves for the remaining resources.
But a one world government would be the ultimate dictatorship.
It will never happen the way you dream of, it will continue more or less as per usual, every one for themselves and nation against nation, while some groups of nations may ally themselves.
Not going to happen until each nation has been a participatory democracy for a few decades at least and probably more likely centuries.
People need to learn how to govern themselves rather than being governed by a select few first.
And, of course, the capitalists are fully against that because they insist that they should be the ones to govern.
Change will not come peacefully, be sure of that. The powers and systems that are in place will do all to fight off real change, as that would mean handing over control, which they never will.
So prepare for the worst, also stop relying on what the present system ‘offers’ you, it will one day not be able to deliver, which may include anything, even pensions, welfare payments and wages.
Only radical change is an option, radical change, and it cannot happen in a neoliberal capitalist framework, as that is simply not going to offer any oxygen or space for those that want real change, it is inert and clings to the status quo, the system we have.
As most are locked into the system, only mass pressure can change things, but whether that happens, that is the huge question mark.
I cannot see humans give up their comforts, for some only small ones, they have. You see hardly anyone stop driving cars or even thinking of giving up their car, for some it is necessary to get from A to B, to the job and elsewhere. Electric cars are options only for better off, it seems, generally.
And re plastic waste, the one way bags are only a token gesture, who does anything to stop buying plastic wrapped consumer goods?
So there is no progress, rather the opposite, and the huge human population in itself is unsustainable, who is going to bring in a one child policy for ALL nations?
Who is going to stop having babies after one child?
Like in the Philippines, loyal Christians believe in ‘salvation’ to come one day in the form of God and the Messiah, meanwhile overpopulating their nation in poverty, same do many Muslims in other nations continue to oppose birth control and have up to ten or even more kids.
Still now the world human population grows, also in China.
China’s population growth has been forcibly slowed and will soon peak and decline.
Beware the American bullshit about China.
Some times it’s our own bureaucratic guys talking shit about China. When the bureaucrates are setting the foreign policy agenda – Y’know we’re about to step into another one of America’s pile of dog shit.
Up to our necks
I agree with a lot of this, but also a lot fits in with XR Aotearoa NZs talk of putting the government of on a war-time footing. Here we get a bit nervous as such a thing is an invitation for any government to trample over our liberties.
In the past, warlike conditions and major disasters typically have been reason enough to justify the temporary abolition of democratic liberties, but how long will they last for this fight, what will be the endpoint, or will the special war-time powers last indefinitely?
Giving more power to the state is also a case of putting all your eggs in one basket as there is no one simple response to fixing climate change. Climate change will bring many issues, those that we can have a go at predicting, but also many unforeseen. Increasing the powers of the state reduces its ability to be flexible and capable of learning from policy mistakes.
The fight against climate change must be associated with greater local democracy. We need more democracy, strengthening local and regional capacities to respond to climate change. For those who think that we need to strengthen the state to addressing climate change, the erosion of democracy might seem to be “convenient.” History, however, tells us that suppression of democracy undermines the capacity of societies to solve problems.
Power to the People
Sid
on behalf of Aotearoa NZ Anti-Capitalist Green Front
Since when does ‘the state’ exclude the general populace?
Democracy is the answer but that excludes Representative Democracy that was designed to prevent the general populace having power.
I don’t understand your point…the state is an organ of the ruling class, and they mutually reinforce each other. It is certainly above the general populace. I agree about democracy being the answer, but democracy in our communities and workplaces
You may be describing cooperative socialism.
My point is that you’re misnaming things and thus causing confusion.
No its not.
This is the meaning from google:
a nation or territory considered as an organized political community under one government.
That is actually government and that is a tool of the ruling class and needs to be removed and democracy put in place.
“Since when does ‘the state’ exclude the general populace?”
Yeah…no. That kind of thinking is what lead to the horrors of communism and fascism. The state and the people are not the same. There is overlap, yes, but only that. Democracy and freedom require a strong non state civil society with limits on state power.
Limits on Corporate power in NZ is much more pertinent.
“the horrors of communism”. Tell me more.
Fascism we have here now, its a mater of degree.
Freedom – to be responsible or do as you wish.
Democracy by the Westminster system is nothing but a stacked process where corporate media decide what people think and vote for.
The UK has had a small disgustingly wealthy ruling class that people have been groomed to worship. The inequity is a part of their system we have adopted. Look at it.
Yeah – no.
According to the researchers communism in the USSR lasted between 35 and 50 days.
Fascism was always a direct result of capitalism which is why US capitalists wanted to turn the US into a fascist dictatorship.
Communism isn’t the horror of the USSR or China or the DPRK. Communism is actual freedom for the individual.
The rationale behind communism was that state ownership of everything meant that any surplus value that came about would accrue to the state and could be used to benefit everybody, instead of being pocketed by capitalists. However the lack of profit to motivate people probably would lead to corruption and stifle innovation.
There may be something in Galbraith’s suggestion that large enterprises should be regulated, and perhaps even nationalized, while small firms which lacked market power should be left to pursue their own interests.
No it wasn’t.
The rational behind communism was that everyone would work together to ensure that everyone had a reasonable living standard, that innovation was widespread and for everyone to participate in governing themselves.
How do you tell if a country is communist?
Its a participatory democracy with workplaces run by the people who work there and not by owners or directors.
The profit motive is presently causing massive corruption in our governing cultures, preventing us from acting on climate change and causing poverty to the majority of people and all so a few people can be ‘rich’.
State ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange was one conception of “communism”. The others may, of course, have different ideas.
The shape of any socialist system can depend very much on the community adopting it.
Research in Catalonia finds cooperatives work well but as they grow larger corruption can show itself.
So smaller community cooperatives do well and can coordinate activities between them without becoming behemoths.
Community held values are often hard won though times of hardship and learning to help each other.
Community is a supportive survival structure that capitalism subverts.
Humans evolved though community strength and protection not capitalism which may be tolerated short term but is alien to community well being.
Trouble is, we are islands in a world of sea. Sea levels rise, our land disappears. How are we going to combat that?
Capitalism. esp Laissez faire capitalism is indeed peculiarly ill suited to managing the environment we live in. But…
One day the IPCC scientists are going to wake up to the realisation that the reason evidence of warming keeps on exceeding their predictions is because it is not being caused by our CO2 emissions, or the CO2 content in the atmosphere. The CO2 increase in the atmosphere is being caused by the warming of the ocean as it has always done in the past warming fazes of the earths climate.
The ocean holds 60x the CO2 that the atmosphere does and it is in constant interaction, rapid enough that in effect our emissions are going into a pool of CO2 sixty times as large as the atmosphere. If everything else stayed the same the ocean would absorb it in the same proportion and the change in the atmospheric content would be too small to measure. But the ocean is warming and driving some of its CO2 out of solution like out of a warming beer.
And no-one is looking for why, or how much it will warm, or for how long, or whether we can do anything to stop it which is extremely unlikely. So we should be energetically making preparations for sea level rise of the kind that has happened from time to time throughout the earth’s history without humans burning coal and oil. Everyone is hyperventilating about our CO2 emissions while a real problem is likely happening and being ignored.
We aren’t going to reduce emissions anyway, not while oil is available so adjustments to where and how we can expect to live need to be made whatever the cause.
D J S
That being said, concerns about climate change tend to grow in countries the more wealthier they are. I’m not sure that a farmer in the Congo or some one living in the slums of Rio give two hoots about the Paris Accord, when they’re struggling to put food on the table.
Capitalism has lifted millions out of poverty, and yes caused environmental damage. But the other economic systems didn’t fare any better, in fact some would say were worse. Because not only did they destroy the environment, the people were still miserable.
The paradox is that only wealthy countries tend to concern themselves with the environment, so destroying their means of wealth would actually be more detrimental to the environment.
I don’t think capitalism should be eliminated. I think it is basic human nature. But it will need to be constrained under much more hands on governance if natural systems our life depends on are to be preserved / managed.
We can’t increase both population and standard of living indefinitely.
D J S
Both population and resource exploitation are well into overshoot some time ago earlier last century.
Human nature is not a measure of a sustainable strategy.
Any hope of a limited future appears to need a massive die off of humans before we adapt to reality.
“Human nature is not a measure of a sustainable strategy.”
Yes that is a valid point.
D J S
BG
“Capitalism has lifted millions out of poverty, and yes caused environmental damage. But the other economic systems didn’t fare any better, in fact some would say were worse. Because not only did they destroy the environment, the people were still miserable.”
As a general summary that is not true.
Your arguments to support it would be interesting.
Capitalism DOESN’T manage the environment nor population numbers.
Capitalism is a rape based activity. We are the victims along with all living things and ecosystems.
The environment is getting screwed as all within it are getting screwed.
The few have made us dependent on money.
That has to change.
As does time spent discussing irrelevant details.
Rebellion and over throw of growth, wealth and power to spread lies.
Oh, look, another denialist spouting BS.
All the evidence shows that it is us that is causing climate change. You’re just too scared to admit your fault in that truth.
I accepted the beliefs of my better educated associates that we are causing the changes until a couple of months ago when I started trying to get my head around it for myself. I find that the folk I thought knew it all did not know some elementary things about the theories. Like that the theory that CO2 is causing all the warming has to presume that a slight warming induced by CO2 is multiplied up by causing more water vapour to be formed; Water vapour being 1.6x as effective a greenhouse gas as CO2 and 10x more plentiful in the atmosphere.
But water vapour when it rises and condenses in the upper troposphere transfers its heat to the higher atmosphere. It does nearly all the cooling that is done down here, so the more water vapour that is created at sea level, the more energetically it rises being only 2/3s the weight of the air, and the more energetically it cools the earth.
It would be more convincing if you pointed out where my reasoning or my information is wrong than to simply say I’m peddling BS.
D J S
Some aspects of your description hold true but the conclusions cannot be drawn from reductionist consideration of parts of a system.
The whole system is harder to analyse but that is the game of many specialists working in concert to form a pool of understanding which must be continually challenged.
Answers are not as important as more information fed into the interaction attempting to gauge what is happening.
Water vapour rises, cools and then precipitates releasing heat. The more water vapour in the atmosphere the the less available for evaporation.
The sum total of warming absorbed from outside of the atmosphere is affected by many things.
What I think is most important in this issue is that while everyone who matters is obsessed with the belief that the warming of the ocean is being caused by us; no one is considering the possibility ( probability by my reckoning) that something else is causing it, and we can’t stop it from happening. So everyone is trying to find ways of stopping something that can’t be stopped, instead of getting on with the massive necessary adjustments to populations and facilities that are going to be inundated as has the land where they are has been inundated at times in the earth’s past.
“The more water vapour in the atmosphere the the less available for evaporation.”
There is no shortage of water for evaporation in the sea. As soon as it evaporates it is in the atmosphere.
D J S
The atmospheric conditions limit evaporation and as the atmosphere becomes saturated evaporation slows.
For any body of air when water vapour reaches its limit, we get precipitation triggered by a small drop in temperature,, change in air pressure or presence of dust and/or other factors.
There is a limit to how much water that the atmosphere will hold for any set atmospheric conditions including temperature.
The likelihood is that as global Temps rise more water vapour will be present in the atmosphere and that will affect ground water systems also.
As sea level rises then a larger surface is available for evaporation so the rate of precipitation can be expected to increase
David, you really don’t know what you are talking about (again).
Most heat is lost by radiative cooling. And atmospheric CO2 interferes with that -especially now that it is 185 ppm above the 800,000 year average.
https://scripps.ucsd.edu/programs/keelingcurve/wp-content/plugins/sio-bluemoon/graphs/co2_800k.png
Sure, water vapour plays a part in blocking the exit of radiation but water vapour is controlled by temperature, not the other way round.
Over 60% of heat leaves the earth’s surface by latent heat transfer in water vapour. Only a tiny pro portion of radiant heat escapes the greenhouse envelope.
In an earlier discussion you seemed to suggest that latent heat transfer of water vapour only occurred at ground level. If that were so it would never rain.
Water in it’s phase changes , between a snowball earth total freeze situation, and a temperature where all water is evaporated , is what moderates earths temperature in both directions. Nothing else comes near. It has enormous latent heat that warms it’s surroundings when it condenses and when it freezes , and cools it’s surroundings when it thaws and evaporates. And there’s a lot of it around.
D J S
Heat leaves the planet by radiation. Any heat loss by conduction would be so small as to be insignificant.
How heat transfers within the atmosphere involves both radiation and conduction.
Heat is stored and released by water changing state but that heat is still within the Earths system including the atmosphere.
The Earth has tilt on its axis so radiation from the sun warms the surface unevenly causing summer and Winter. Evaporation and precipitation along with freezing and thawing are cyclic for both hemispheres. Hence you get a total energy stored leveling effect as it does also for night and day.
Wind and sea currents transport heat also but when we refer to global warming generally the sum total of heat held withing the atmosphere is referenced to a set procedure for measuring and averaging to give the best shot at establishing statistically significant variation over long periods.
While most of the mechanisms for the Earth heat absorption and losses are complex the overwhelming scientific opinion seems to be that we have measurable warming. Both empirical data and theoretical analysis of this closely concur at this stage.
No doubt finer detail will be explored but a background of long period shifts in temperature patterns are fairly well mapped.
Humankind’s activity appear to have made a change in the observable pattern of atmospheric heating. This change is over a relatively short time frame consistent with humankind’s exploitation of energy sources and other activities that disturb the balance of the atmosphere and ecosystems.
The precautionary principle has been purposefully ignored for over 50 years and until recently, denial took many forms. BAU being the most obvious one.
“https://atmos.washington.edu/~dargan/587/587_3.pdf”
A bit late John but you might like to look down this series to the schematic showing what happens to incoming radiation from the sun.
D J S
Thanks David.
I am reasonably familiar with the concepts and most of the processes involved but that pdf is a little short on accuracy of some of its statements which may be misleading.
The cooling of the Stratosphere with increased atmospheric CO2 is not at all well covered for example. The heating of the ocean is also misleading.
Probably well meaning but may be set out to be a part of a course rather than a stand alone document.
It would depend, I suppose, on how much water vapour was created by that “slight warming induced by CO2”. Water vapour may have 10x the concentration of CO2, in the atmosphere, but presumably that has always been the case – even before deforestation and the burning of fossil fuels etc.. What matters presumably is the increase in these latter phenomena in recent times.
I agree that capitalism is driving climate change and many other downwards spirals.
There is nothing to be afraid of as fear with not change the outcomes of rabid psychopathic suicidal quest to be richer than others. Agreeing with them sort of says a lot about the Stockholm syndrome.
My views have altered slightly over years with increasing evidence of human ignorance becomes compounded.
DTR
Your views expressed on Red Alert also seemed to have shifted a little over time.
Carrying on from the link thread to give myself more room.
I was hoping you would find the diagram “Global HeatFlows” I was not so concerned with the cooling of the upper atmosphere. I fund this looking for confirmation or refutation of the concept I had already formed of what must take place. I did not derive my idea of what water vapour does from this.But the diagram perfectly supports the situation as I had imagined it must be. ( I have always found articles that confirm ideas I already had to be very convincing .)
There’s a lot left to the imagination in that diagram. But first are you fully recognising the enormous amount of energy it takes to turn liquid water into vapour. The energy is not like bringing a jug of water from cold to boiling, It is like the time and heat required to boil the whole jug full dry. It isn’t a matter of water going up warm and then coming down as rain a bit cooler. To transfer from gas to liquid it has to lose all the energy it took to turn it into gas. It is huge compared with changing the temperature a few degrees.
But going back to the diagram , the tiny proportion of radiant heat getting through must be because it begins being trapped at ground level (rather than some way up a depicted). Remember it is in tiny sub atomic particles that collide with the GHG molecules and either effectively ricochet off in ant direction or “billiard ball” off an already resident similar particle , again in any direction. Setting up a chain reaction as the ricocheted particle strikes another molecule . From ground level the particles have the whole envelope of the troposphere to work their way through , or for some of the disturbed particles to get through so most are sent back. The water vapour however carries it’s heat through varying levels of the troposphere before releasing it’s heat. Some in thunderstorms and in cyclones is carried right through the troposphere . Beyond this level though there is still atmosphere and CO2, there is no water vapour , or hardly any , so the greenhouse effect is reduced to almost nil . Remember the main effect attributed to CO2 is dependant on it initiating a multiplying effect by causing more WV to form. The proportion of heat delivered from the earth by WV will depend then on how far through the main GHG envelope it gets before it condenses.
This all happens pretty quickly too ,as they reckon a WV molecule only lasts an average of 9 days before it condenses into rain again , and then waits 3000 years before it gets turned into a gas again.
Sorry if all this is surplus to requirements. But it seems to make sense of what the diagram depicts to me.
D J S
‘The CO2 increase in the atmosphere is being caused by the warming of the ocean as it has always done in the past warming fazes of the earths climate.’
Really???!!!
So, according to you, CO2 is coming out of the oceans. That leads to the obvious questions: why is the pH of the oceans falling? And why are so many scientists, including those at the University of Otago, so concerned about the build-up of CO2 in the oceans?
https://www.otago.ac.nz/oceanacidification/whatisoa/index.html
‘Up to 50% of the carbon dioxide (CO2) released into the atmosphere since the start of the Industrial Revolution has been absorbed by the world’s oceans. The resulting changes in carbon chemistry mean that the pH of seawater is dropping, a process termed “ocean acidification”.
Acidification of seawater causes major problems for marine calcifying organisms, both large (e.g., calcareous macroscopic seaweeds, shellfish) and small (e.g., individual coral polyps, microscopic phytoplankton) because the lower pH both impairs the ability to build a shell, and dissolves existing calcareous shell. Scientists have established that ocean acidification will affect all primary producers – from microscopic phytoplankton to giant kelp forests, as well as higher trophic levels, including coral reefs, shellfish, and fish.’
Are you saying all the oceanographers and chemists that have spent decades studying the phenomenon have all got wrong and you have got it right?
While you’re about it, you’d better let Wikipedia know the ocean acidification page is invalid, since Wiki states:
‘Ocean acidification is the ongoing decrease in the pH of the Earth’s oceans, caused by the uptake of carbon dioxide (CO
2) from the atmosphere.’
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_acidification
Your post above shows a complete misunderstanding of the science of the greenhouse effect. The oceans are warming because the GHGs in the atmosphere are trapping the sun’s heat. The oceans are absorbing most of the heat, creating dangerous feedback loops such as the melting of the ice sheets, therefore absorbing more heat rather than reflecting it back into space ans helping maintain the planet’s temperature. It is all caused primarily by industrial scale burning of fossil fuels and production of agricultural methane and nitrous oxide. If you really believe your theory then please write to the IPCC scientists and have your papers published on the matter, you could make all the difference to our predicament I’m sure.
I apologise for the apparent arrogance of my comment. It is only my opinion from what I have learned, but constantly making that qualification takes time and space.
I was going to keep that opinion to myself as it was bound to attract ridicule and censure, but it concerns me that the possibility that we are hoping to correct a warming that can’t be corrected , and not taking steps to allow for it .
I’m sure the IPCC scientists know very well that there are other possible reasons for warming. But they are in an invidious position in that we might be causing a catastrophe , and it is their responsibility to warn of it. If they don’t they will be responsible for it. But they lack the complete understanding of what is happening and what has happened in the past as all articles acknowledge. So they have to assume the worst case scenario pending more complete understanding.
D J S
You must have noticed that each IPCC report shows the earlier one had understated the extent of the problem we face.
Hardly a scaremongers apporach.
What appears in the IPCC reports is the result of rigorously edited and there are changes made that reduce the impact of what scientist are reporting and sometimes the message is completely lost during massaging by writing the writing groups.
I make that statement after listening to members of the IPCC writing groups, discussing the report writing processes and seeing drafts at different stages of rewriting.
There is frustration among some groups of contributing scientist about the influences brought to these writing groups.
Also in discussion with representative from NZ it became apparent that many interaction were not considered or included in the “final analyses”. In other words there is loads of missing stuff.
The methane question was not quantified nor the resources to make changes recommended.
And that lifeboat is going to be a civil war zone… because while you have the right idea, Martyn, it’s not going to happen without the removal (by force) of the Neo-liberal elements of the Right and the Left (the Left is also Right, Bomber)…
As regards foresight, it’s getting a bit late for that (should have invested hugely in robotics, instead of importing foreign workers and Chinese overlords… oops!)…
At least you can see the light at the end of the tunnel that is the oncoming freight train, Martyn…
What do we need robots for apart from producing / servicing stuff we don’t NEED.
Industrialisation is close to falling into decline.
Let it go and plan living more simply and with fewer people, more wilderness and wildlife before it is all gone.
Robot thinking by captured capitalist drones.
This American agrees 100% with you!
How Wealth Rules the World & The Dictatorship of Property
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiJ7Ec01zDs
Adam Brennan
Marx 101..
Ben Price reveals that our Constitution and legal system were intentionally designed to give more rights to the wealthy propertied class than the rest of us and exposes how this hamstrings our ability to effectively address a host of pressing social and environmental problems–and what we can do about it.
Many of today’s most serious issues–homelessness, gun violence, fracking, prison privatization, predatory lending, and many more–resist resolution because the “rights of property” undermine the rights of people. Issues that undeniably affect whole communities are determined by the courts to relate primarily to property, contracts, and corporations and are removed from the public sphere and immunized from public governance.
There’s a reason for this. Ben Price tells the story of how the Federalists–the more conservative faction of the Founding Fathers–secretly drafted the Constitution as a counterrevolutionary document. It restored to the colonial 1 percent privileges overturned by the revolution, avoiding a popular backlash by bestowing rights on wealth itself, rather than creating a British-style personal aristocracy. These rights of property deprive the majority of their ability to self-govern and weaponize government in ways that let the “minority of the opulent” (in James Madison’s phrase) use the Constitution to block local policies that compete with their interests.
Price details often shocking examples of how the supposedly unalienable rights of individuals and communities are blithely disregarded. But he also describes how over 200 communities have drafted their own bills of rights that push back against the primacy of property and how we all can join this struggle to return America to what the revolutionary generation intended.
The beige coalition will be at the ready, instigating another working group /inquiry which they can shelve pronto. It is after all their
“nuclear free moment”
Our very economic system has locked the world in to ecological destruction, where everything except nature has a dollar value.
Rough times ahead, we need a better resourced military, world government is the very last thing we want. Look at the EU.
Any international state with sufficient economic/military might will do with our green and fertile lands whatever they want.
This was true during the Holocene, & will continue in the Anthropocene.
So whilst the notion of a fortress may be popular with some, it is ultimately futile. The concept of sovereignty was always a myth, cruelly exposed by the unfettered imperial machinations of Western military/industrial groupings during the last couple of centuries.
We’ve already been invaded by the corporations. The masses will undoubtedly follow. And there’s sweet f@ck all we can do to stop ’em.
I am amazed that whenever someone points out the existential threat of climate breakdown, the role of militarism is never mentioned. NZ could and should show international leadership by withdrawing from Waihopai, from military commitments and challenge the rest of the world to follow NZ’s example. It’s the world’s military forces, financed by politicians pressured by bloated military corporations, that are by far the biggest emitters of greenhouse gases.
(And no, I disagree with “Large scale increase in Navy, Army & Air Force”)
Like all the countries that rushed to go nuclear free after we did in the 80?
Totally agree.
But Lois , you and me and the countless others who are sick to death of war and murder are naive, lacking in realism,hopelessly out of touch, doncha see?
The way of the world you see (according to the worldly) is that we are irretrievably murderous competitive creatures.They’re coming for our water, our women, our stuff!! It’s in their nature
We have to defend our treasure!
In reality we are defending the US and its corporate raiders right to pillage and plunder and endlessly kill to preserve the rules based order(patented by the US)in order to have the endless stuff thats killing life on earth
I think we’re fucked.
I think we’re sooo fucked.
As strangers, we can’t look each other in eye at the supermarket.
The reason we die in car crashes is because we’re wracked in passive aggression. We tail-gate, we shove our way in, and out. We’re blind to each other on the street. We’d rather die in a fiery car crash as our kids fly out the window than eye-contact each other with a smile and a kindly offer of an” Off you go mate. All good.”
And reading the comments above? Oh dear me.
” The Right wing defend the farmers,”
No. No, no, no, no, no. No. Nope. No siree. Narp.
Now? Foot on the clutch. Hand brake off. A little accelerator, ease up on the clutch, engage brain. Off we go.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/business/388562/westpac-nz-makes-555m-profit-in-six-months
The Right Wing, as you call the criminals, are, in fact, in reality, defending the Banks. You honestly think the national party with it’s dubious cadre of arse kissing Remuera Ponces care one small fuck for the average muddy farmer? The Banks simply enslave farmers, because that’s where the money is once the farmer waves goodbye to it at the gate; to ensure on-going funds for the Herne Bay Private Helicopter Club members.
Farmers put food in your mouths. Farmers put clothes on your backs. It’s farmer earned export revenue that affords you the modern trappings of a modern world while you consume it as you cock your snoots at the filthy fama dahlings.
The real problem is you city idiots. You pop on your Sparkling Space Nikes and jog your fat arses around the streets past your multi million dollar three bedrooms, plus deck, plus spa pool debt tombs with the depreciating-liability, Big Black 4X4 Curb Crawler 2000 resting it’s turbo chargers in the garage with the double overhead rumpus rooms dumbasses! It is you! Yes! You! You over consume. You over waste. You over-borrow and you over do it and you do it because you’ve been brainwashed by the Banksters. Yes, you were, do and are. And the more you over-consume, the more of an opportunity the banks see you as to pimp shit via Briscoes,The Warehouse etc at you. You, in fact, are the idiots a film called ‘Idiocracy’ was specifically made for. Look closely? You’ll see yourselves in there. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idiocracy
It is you! Stop looking elsewhere for anyone else to blame. You’ve become exactly what the banks wanted you to become. Fat, useless, self absorbed, self centred, narcissistic and careless. And now you’re all going to pay the price for that. And so is our beautiful planet and all its wondrous wee beasties.
As a farmer, as a photographer, as a writer, as a plumber, an electrician, a gardner, mechanic, builder, fencer, someone who can lamb a ewe, ( I know. But it is a thing. ) deflate a bloated cow, ( Tap to find a drum-like sound, stab with clean knife, stand well back! ) ride a horse, bellow at a dog, punch a dick head and shoot a gun I sadly no longer own, I can tell you , you soft, pasty, asset riche, cash poor angst-joggers who’s only skill set is snorting lines and dancing to electronica; You. Are. In. Deep. Shit. And unless you have space alien mates who can take you the fuck out of here you’d best learn how to grow a spud quick smart and learn the difference between who’s of value within your society and who you can do without.
Again, lest you skim read right past it. As they will hope you would, here it is again.
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/business/388562/westpac-nz-makes-555m-profit-in-six-months
One more thing. ” In the gardner. There lies the gentle hand of God.” That’s a clue as to what you should learn to do. Now! Today!
We are soooo fucked! I know it and you know and and few who know the truth know it. What I also want you, countryboy to know is that I have always appreciated your straight shooting. I have never lambed a ewe, but I have kidded many a doe!
@ KD. Thank you. Brilliant stuff. So? A baby deer is a kid? Like a goat? I never knew that.
I heard that roger douglas was pulled out of keith holyoak then he was called an arsehole. ( Sorry @KD. No disrespect x )
Ba Haa @ KD. Took me all night to ponder that.
I’ve fawned over a few deers myself.
john f…….g key, now CEO of ANZ. Criminal at large.
But we can’t afford all the farms due to the damage to our environment that they’re doing.
Yes, we need food. What we don’t need is to go on deluding ourselves that exporting food is all we can do. Especially when farming only employs ~7% of the population and dropping.
What are the other 93% of the population to do? Bow and kiss farmers arse?
Or should we go on doing what we’re already doing and produce more value sustainably than farmers can?
Rural life is under attack.
Farmers are being farmed by the banks, factory farm, pollute to profit or fail.
Capital gain or bust.
City slickers turn on the farmer instead if their own selfish voting choices which made the rules, or their non natural city lifestyle.
Countryside is to be looked at from the bus window or from the Milford track or from ones bicycle.
Pest control shan’t be done by nasty guns, but by aerial toxin, slow excruciating death nicely at arms length.
Farmers have had good information about environmental subsidies for their lifestyle.
They have ignored it.
Sympathy is poorly placed on the perpetrators of human decline.
Banks have made a killing and farmers have gone long with that.
Play with criminals and you become an accessory or accomplice.
Asking for immunity to carry on defies sense.
The wealth many farmers have is robbed from the environment, now much depleted and dangerously out of balance.
Well the $800 million to a billion dollars given to farmers for micro plasma bovis disease was a gift to subsidies there losses. And they’re damned lucky they got it because The National Party of New Zealand fuck up bio security when they had there turn on government. So bloody lucky the cards fell the way they did.
Some of that is true. Some farmers have become very rich.
But the ponzi always ends, family farms are sold to corporates and there are decreasing pathways to ownership for workers managers or sharefarmers.
So most farmers are not benefiting from our current settings.
So what is the government doing to fix the problem?
Change banking rules? Limit nitrogen fertiliser?limit cow numbers?
Nothing.
So the same will continue while the system favours exploitation, it’s called capitalism. I don’t agree with it but I don’t blame the farmers, beyond a few dinosaurs.
It doesn’t help that the city left knows fuck all about what they are talking about for rural people:
see a post some months ago bemoaning dirty dairying but showing a photo of beef cattle.
Or the anti gun rhetoric wilfully unaware of the difference between automatic and semi automatic firearms. Some rural pest control businesses are shutting down as we speak.
Such ignorance also has consequences in rushed gun law : if you are caught with a “prohibited”weapon (banned semi auto) you can get 5 years jail, but if you convert it to full automatic it is a “restricted” weapon which gets 3 years jail instead. And of course the Ill prepared Palmy police station robbery that seems to not get talked about…
Consult, listen, make meaningful change.
Can’t say I’ve seen one of those three things happen for rural issues.
The shame is that farmer organisations and some farmers have set themselves into a position of opposing any significant and urgent change needed to stop the damaged they are causing.
We all pay for that environmental damage but they claim to see us as the enemy.
Until they cooperate effectively towards major changes then they deserve no support.
A few farmers have switched to more cropping, no fertliser and biocides as well as using more eco supportive practices such as using permaculture and producing spray free or organic crops.
Examples have been on Hyundai Country Calendar and a swath of information from both Massey and Victoria seems to be deliberately ignored by farmer organisations.
Stuff them.
Yes. Federated farmers are a millstone around everyone’s neck, especially those they represent.
“bellow at a dog” ? Did you never learn to whistle through your teeth CB ?
D J S
Ha! @ DJS. I have gaps in my fangs so whistling is for me no more an urgent rush of air with spit. I had a dog once whom I taught sign language to. I’d shout her name across some a ridge line so she’d stop and look. I’d hurl an arm in the direction I wanted her to run then I’d wave my arms about like one of those street side ad wavy things and she’d start barking while running about. Works for kids too.
They are wonderful in how intensely they try to determine what it is you want them to do. Often they know more about working the stock than their boss does, but they still try to do what the boss wants.
I haven’t had a working dog for decades, I miss them sorely.
Wonderful beasties as you have said.
D J S
Growth ,growwwth ,growwwwwth , till the planet dies.
Well said Black Lemming. It’s growth that’s the issue. Dave Brown and others above blame capitalism, but I’d challenge all systems…look at what the Soviet did to the Aral Sea to grow agricultural production.
So in the absence of any innocent systems what really is the issue? I’d suggest that it is our addiction to energy slaves aka oil. We each have around a hundred human equivalents in the fossil energy used to support our current consumption.
We won’t replace that with renewables for a number of physical reasons, and maybe that’s a good thing because it will curtail growth and consumption. In between rather than blaming systems the best every person can do is to cut back on their own consumption and energy use.
With all the recent development of renewable energy sources we have not reduced our oil consumption in any way.
We have increased our oil consumption and on top of that increase used more oil again to create renewable energy sources.
We cannot use enough oil to create renewable energy sources to replace our oil consumption. That is an impossibility.
We have to use less energy, drastically less.
To meet emissions reduction agreed to it would see we need to use at least 6% per year and that will mean at lest 6% reduction in GDP per year and more than 5% reduction in energy use.
The parasites will have to go and our system be reorganised.
not all us city people are idiots but some are Country boy
Just NO. The concept of an upper house keeping a lower house in line in a representative democracy is pure delusion. There are enough examples in the world today to prove that it just doesn’t work.
All that happens is that legislation is slowed or stopped when each house is controlled by two different parties and both become a rubber stamp when controlled by the same party.
We actually need a participatory democracy. Where policies are suggested and voted on by the people and then parliament puts in place the legislation to bring those policies about.
Such massive R&D used to reduce BS Jobs and so free up more people to do more R&D.
It’s no good just saying that we need R&D – we need to say what the purpose of the R&D is for to give direction. That’s how the US became so good at R&D – the federal government took the reigns of the R&D and directed it.
True.
This is where a large part of our R&D would go with the proviso that all our weapons of war be produced in NZ using NZ resources.
Most definitely. We should never have allowed non-citizens to vote. We should, like many other countries, only allow single citizenship.
Yes. In fact, we should limit the amount of farmland to 15 to 20 percent of our total land area and allow the rest to go back to being ‘wild’. The land to be used for farming to be determined by some of that R&D.
Every nation needs to be able to support its own population. Trade in food is unsustainable.
True again but I need to point out that we actually have significant pharmaceutical production and R&D.
All sounds good but what has to happen first is people need to stop promoting the mainstream brand of politics we see in this country.
In my view a good portion of the MSM is the main culprit. Many still slavishly bang on about our wonderful leadership over the years finding excuses and scape goats for their failings whilst ignoring the fact that in any organisation the buck stops with upper management.
Not surprisingly people with busy lives and not time to fact check take these opinions on board and then vote based on what they are told.
Anyone who stands out and makes and effort to expose serious shortcomings ends up under surveillance or hiding an embassy. If this does not stop I do not think real change is even remotely possible.
just a little quibble about the dissing of China as major carbon polluter as it provides the tonnage of crap we in the west demand …cheap!!!…
https://www.forbes.com/sites/dominicdudley/2019/01/11/china-renewable-energy-superpower/#5c0c9704745a
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/04/china-is-going-green-here-s-how/
Rather than debate worst country, maybe look at worst corporate polluters who seem to be the most responsible and probably tax domiciled at a tax haven!
Just 100 companies responsible for 71% of global emissions, study says
A relatively small number of fossil fuel producers and their investors could hold the key to tackling climate change
https://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2017/jul/10/100-fossil-fuel-companies-investors-responsible-71-global-emissions-cdp-study-climate-change
India could eclipse China as worlds most populous country and apparently some of the biggest population growth is in Africa, so wait till industry moves to Africa as the next cheap place for industry, and get the people out of rural villages and all living in cities churning out T shirts and e waste, to afford to buy washing machines washing, air conditioning, milk powder, financial products and cars!
There is so MUCH opportunity too (sarcasm) for fast food in Africa to grow, as apparently African countries have the best diet.
Think how much health care and bad food you can sell when they go to the western/globalist ‘better’ (sarcasm) way of life!
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/foodanddrinknews/11422652/Which-country-has-the-worlds-best-diet.html
China pollutes far less per capita than NZ and uses much less energy per capita than NZ.
Energy use it the main useful yardstick but ignored.
NZ homes are full of stuff from China and the energy to produce and transport that is attributed to China as is the pollution and mineral extraction.
US bullshit about China is everywhere and repeated by those who are unaware of what is happening.
Democracies are ill equiped to deal with existential threats, as it requires consensus and planning way passed the typical parliamentary term. The only hope we have is that China, with almost a quarter of the world population, decides to act decisively, to curb global warming. No other nation has the political means or the the tradition of long term planning (100 year plans). If China moves, the rest of the world might have to follow.
Totally agree.
But Lois , you and me and the countless others who are sick to death of war and murder are naive, lacking in realism,hopelessly out of touch, doncha see?
The way of the world you see (according to the worldly) is that we are irretrievably murderous competitive creatures.They’re coming for our water, our women, our stuff!! It’s in their nature
We have to defend our treasure!
In reality we are defending the US and its corporate raiders right to pillage and plunder and endlessly kill to preserve the rules based order(patented by the US)in order to have the endless stuff thats killing life on earth
pardon me as I grovel if this has been duplicated
We might be less effected from world climate change in NZ, but our people will still be in poverty from our love of neoliberalism.
Hard to justify why qualified plumbers are still being advertised at $30p/h…
19 jobs advertised (including polytechnic training jobs @ $30 p/h!)
https://www.seek.co.nz/plumber-jobs-in-trades-services?salaryrange=30-999999&salarytype=hourly
put in $50 p/h and there are zero jobs for plumbers to apply to.
https://www.seek.co.nz/plumber-jobs-in-trades-services?salaryrange=50-999999&salarytype=hourly
Put in $20 p/h and there are 7 pages of jobs for plumbers!
https://www.seek.co.nz/plumber-jobs-in-trades-services?salaryrange=20-999999&salarytype=hourly
Put in jobs for registered builders at $40p/h and above and you get 0
https://www.seek.co.nz/registered-builder-jobs-in-trades-services?salaryrange=40-999999&salarytype=hourly
put in jobs for registered builders and you get one hit for a carpenter job.
https://www.seek.co.nz/registered-builder-jobs-in-trades-services?salaryrange=35-999999&salarytype=hourly
Does not seem like there are all these unfilled vacancies in construction. The money to be made in construction seems to be making money out of the idea of shortages of workers to get industry hand outs, subsidies and immigration ponzi’s while blaming everything under the sun for such bad workmanship and substandard construction here.
If there were real trade shortages then the job adds should be overflowing at excellent wages to try and get people. That ain’t the case!
(interestedly trades like electricians where you can kill yourself or others if you don’t know what you are doing, seem to buck the trend because you can’t operate the ponzi’s so easily when untrained people kill others straight away with bad electrical and it’s less obvious than hidden faults like building and plumbing errors).
https://www.seek.co.nz/electrician-jobs-in-trades-services?salaryrange=75-999999&salarytype=hourly
Work harder NZ, industry needs A LOT more low paid workers to profit from and make the NZ taxes go further to support our low wage ponzi economy!
And don’t expect a cheap house your way any time soon or repairs quickly form that next natural disaster coming your way!!
Construction has become a dysfunctional substandard industry in NZ with too much ponzi’s for immigration and materials and corruption.
“And Trans Rights uber allas. Don’t forget about Trans Rights above all else.”
Wow! Why did you feel the need to slag off at trans people?? Wtf did they do to cause climate change?
You made good points Martyn but that swipt at trans community was a sour note
Why not gays and lesbians as well?
Oh yeah. Folau
He’s not slagging off at trans people. He’s slagging off at the identity politics of people who see themselves as victims any time anyone looks sideways at them.
Rosielee:
When you look at the vicious bigotry expressed at transmen and transwomen it not just a matter of “seeing yourself” as a victim. You ARE being victimised.
Folau’s disgusting attack was made to denigrate gays.
How would you see a comment conflating transpeople with a reference to Nazism?
Martyn makes good points about the looming crisis of climate change. He doesn’t need to smear a minority who is already victimised by the religious right and misguided TERFs.
Folau and many of those who have come out in support of his diatribe, all appear to be directed by Hierarchical Authoritarian cults who also drain their pockets each week.
Yes churches who actively and currently preach this sort of shit, should not be let off the hook nor their disciplining of any of their “flock” who criticise the churches or dare to think for themselves.
You have to feel sorry for them as somewhat diminished but obedient peoples, but not accept what they do.
Excellent analysis of root causes and, subsequently, definition of main objectives, and many good suggestions are made. May I offer my thoughts on some points:
Farming
Appropriate rural development, sustainable development of agriculture, forestry, livestock and fisheries management, would have to be core pieces of a climate adaptation strategy for NZ/AO.
Adaptive family and household farming systems are an important means for climate resilience.
Military
A new concept to assure security and safety of the common men and women has to developed and discussed in more details. Just calling for a ‘fortress NZ’ is not sufficient. The new security and safety strategy should be closely associated to disaster risk management, and must be embedded in concerns of other South Pacific nations.
Not only in this context; a most important topic is the future of Antarctica.
China
In 2017, the PR China makes 18.5% of the world population (India 17,9%). Considering demographic developments is the baseline for a successful climate adaptation and resilience strategy.
Over thousands of years, both Chinese and Indian cultural spheres are assets of human development and without their strategic, constructive and practical engagement, global adaption will probably fail.
NZ/AO is well advised to intensify critical dialogue, evidence-based scientific communication, socio-economic analyses and consequences of agro-ecological limitations with relevant intellectuals, academics and other organizations in both countries.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4rqsAAMBIA
I watched the fool from Federated Farmers on TVNZ news this evening
He really doesnt get it
Doesn’t want to get it at any cost.
Neither does Business NZ.
The fundamental dilemma remains unaddressed.
The Earth is overheating because atmospheric CO2 is 125 ppm above the pre-industrial level and 185 ppm above the 800,000-year average as a consequence of burning fossil fuels. (Other greenhouse gases are contributing to overheating but CO2 is the primary culprit.) And complex industrial societies cannot function without utilising fossil fuels.
All so-called renewables -hydro, wind, photovoltaic etc.- are dependent on fossil fuels for manufacture and maintenance, and are a subset of the fossil fuel system; additionally, none are at all suitable as sources of energy for mass conversion of metal ores into metals, nor for the conversion of limestone into cement or the manufacture of glass etc., all of which require huge amounts of energy per unit of production. No steel, no copper no aluminium, no glass equals no industrial society.
It naturally follows that no semblance of present living arrangements can be maintained into the future without fossil fuels.
Therefore complex societies will continue to use fossil fuels as long as they are available or will choose to not be complex industrial societies; there is no evidence for the latter and much evidence for the former. Hence expect further overheating and further destruction of the natural world.
Just as disturbing is the fact that the bulk of the food supply is currently produced and distributed though the use of fossil fuels, and there are no viable alternatives. At some stage widespread mass starvation is inevitable.
It makes no difference how many times this logical case is presented the delusions about maintaining complex energy-intensive systems and delusions about having continued access to modern materials far into the future remain. Therefore, there is no preparation for the future that will actually arrive….increasing climate instability, further depletion of resources, substantial sea level rise (less productive land and lost infrastructure) and further loss of the organisms that collectively make life possible for humans.
Exactly!
There is almost a tacit underestimation of the maelstrom that approaches.
And before ‘civilisation’ undergoes it’s final transformation into chaos, there will be wars for the dwindling resources required for life.
The notion that some are espousing of a ‘fortress NZ’, some sort of ‘noble lifeboat’ in the Pacific acting as a beacon and offering aid is laughable. Our isolation is no more protection from the desperate than it is protection from rising sea levels and extreme weather.
We. Will. Be. Overun. And. Plundered. (like we are now by banks and corporates, only much much much worse).
Who…? Or What… The…. Fuck….are these?
I just stumbled over a rock and these scuttled out and ran off…
https://www.nbr.co.nz/article/nbr-rich-list-2016-giving-it-away-jr-p-192158
Donated $100 MILLION ! ? Where. The. FUCK!? Did they get it in the first place?
Homeless person. ” Oh! I donated $100 million.”
No homeless person ever said that. I was kidding. Ba Ha? right?
Crickey! Some big picture stuff; but maybe that’s what’s needed. As you say, we are a “lifeboat country”, given the vast amounts of ocean surrounding us (look at a globe, turned around with NZ in the middle, and the most, by far, of what you can see is blue).
You didn’t mention population stabilization, although implied this, with “sustainable” immigration, and of course the implication in being a “Fortress”. But then a mixed message, increasing refugees; this, surely, is not in our interests.
“Mass limiting of tourism numbers with increased tourist taxes.”
Also should limit New Zealanders going overseas because as perhaps the world’s most travelled group of people, New Zealanders on a per capita basis probably contribute the most to carbon emissions through travel.
We should deter tourists from visiting New Zealand. But to be consistent we should deter New Zealanders from travelling to Thailand and China and Europe etc for holidays.
That is being consistent.
“China is a major contributor to green house gasses”
On both a per capita and cumulative basis, China’s contributions fall well behind the developed Western world.
We should start to ask Westerners to accept a drop in living standard, and allow the developing world the right to develop upwards, until the two achieve parity in living standards.
That would only be fair, as the developing world has not brought the planet to imminent demise – the already developed world has. And the developed world became developed off the plunder of the developing world. Time for the developed world, including NZ, to move aside and allow others their fair share.
China is a major contributor to green house gasses – we should stop selling milk powder to them.
The Saudi’s crucified innocent people after beheading them – we should stop trade with them now.
It is not difficult to start listing nations we don’t want to trade with to slow our growth model.
All very well Martyn.
Now tell us who the fuck we are left to trade with then. Since the EU and the US are all major polluters – probably the biggest fucken polluters in the history of the world, and still at the tops on a per capita basis, are you going to cut them out as well.
We like to be guilty so we pull the the strings so that responsibility falls on us. In principle we call also save ourselves by simply diversifying the economy, trade and foreign policy.
What is truly difficult for us to except is that we are reduced to a purely passive role as an impotent observer who can only sit back and watch what his fate will be.
To avoid such situations we are often involved in frantic obsessive activities. Spying to get Tim Grosser a job, painting civilians for American droning or what ever, so that we can be sure that we are doing something for our membership like a sports fan who supports his favourite sports team on this television at home, shouting and jumping up and down in the superstitious belief that some how this will influence the outcome.
It is true that trading with barbaric nations threatens our principles but for any one who sits far enough away doesn’t truly feel threatened or radical and change the way of there lives. And I guess we know very well that we can not influence the process that may very well lead to our ruin. But none the less I feel the urge to do something even if it is ultimately meaningless.
I like to by green, organic, cutting edge food & technology where ever possible not simply to demonstrate that we are apart of a global systematic project to be morale and green, it is assuming a more central role in the how of the way capitalism functions.
It’s not simply who we trade with, because to be ethical beings it is included in the price.
We can’t exist on our own. We can’t just say “diversify the economy” and have it magically produce much the same income. If it did, we would have done it already.
If it weren’t for dairy, we’d be poor. Desperately poor. If we reduce it by too much, then it means radical changes to welfare, health and education – namely, there will be little of any of it.
People won’t vote for that scenario. Any government proposing it will be decimated and the opposition, promising the opposite, will be entrenched.
Perhaps set your sights on what is possible?
When vacant ideas push the imagination imagination buttons, it’s like those white lines and static on the television.
We are not setting up the tax system to punish the farming industry right now because the tax system along with a suite of other investment regulations is being set up to encourage the investments for future consumption.
So we can’t ask work force to pay for future proofing when all the productivity gains are being housed on company balance sheets. And this is where I agree with Labours 100% renewable energy policy and massive R&D spends.
So the government gives business a few freebies just so they know the technology is good, in exchange for business fronting all of the upfront costs and risk.
Business wants certainty. So instead of taking money and redistributing it, we take the opportunities, we collect the research, the research funding, filter all the failures and then redistribute those opportunities to our own people, the ones with the skills and drive of course.
The climate change bill
Let’s hide in the Crowd, see if that works.
Consensus?
If we have to wait until we have consensus to act from the whole of parliament, we will be waiting for ever, or at least until it is too late.
I mean, seriously.
Is this what the Green MPs have given up all leadership on climate change inside parliament for?
The Green MPs have refused to lobby the government, they are part of, to remove the ban on allowing climate change evidence to be heard at planning hearings for new coal mines, in case it jeapodised this bill.
It is the same reason, the Green MPs have given for doing nothing towards repealing the Anadarko Amendment to the RMA that makes it illegal to protest off shore oil and gas exploration.
Is giving up all action on climate change in the hear and now really worth a vague promise that we (though we are not sure who), will do something about climate change, sometime in the future, before 2050 arrives
By yielding the floor to Labour and the Nats the Greens have given up leadership on climate change. For the sake of ‘consensus’ on climate change, the Greens have condemned themselves to public invisibility and electoral irrelevance.
We elected the Green Party MPs to lead not follow.
Farewell to leadership, let’s hide in the crowd.
https://thestandard.org.nz/zero-carbon-bill-announced/#comment-1614648
If New Zealand becomes a “lifeboat”, then we are screwed.
A “Large scale increase in Navy, Army & Airforce” isn’t going to achieve anything against the military might of Asia, which will be down here rather smartly if your scenario comes to pass.
What then, hmmm?
I live in a coastal city in this coastal country and my main source of protein each week is tinned fish processed in Thailand (my local fishmonger closed to to increased regulation I think). Please help Bomber.
Use plant protein, its healthier.
Fantastic article! Climate change is definitely true and it can wipe off our planet and its species. The good thing is that these discussions are now taking place; just a decade back harnessing electricity from sources like wind and sun was considered highly uneconomical. Now, globally there is much more awareness and even political systems are crafting policies to bring about a change. In US for the first time, renewables generated more electricity than coal plants in April 2019. We are expecting a positive surge in this clean energy drive.
This is worth a read.
https://theecologist.org/2019/may/08/social-collapse-and-climate-breakdown?fbclid=IwAR1uyMYA1XfVGcQpoXYWI1Gzn8vePQ27Mt8l6X3aheTHh7kFWKMSVjf8D5s
Thanks for the link. Well worth reading.
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