We are the "Architects of the Future"

Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983) was an architect, writer, systems theorist, designer, inventor and futurist. He once said, “We are called to be architects of the future, not its victims.”

People, at least in my circles, seem to be finally talking about the climate crisis. But there still aren't many who are actually taking some action — action that will create the future. 

So, in the interests of the new year, and new year's resolutions, here is a short list of actions that you can take to do your part in 2019 to help safeguard the future.

1. Create Political Will

• write a letter 
• sign a petition
• send an email or a fax
• make a phone call
• visit your elected officials, at all levels, and ask them what they're doing about climate change
• vote in the candidates who understand climate change and who include viable climate change solutions in their campaign
• talk to others about how they can create political will

2.  Make the Following Demands of Your Elected Officials

• declare the climate change emergency (if London, England can do it, then your municipality can, too)
• end fossil fuel subsidies

3. Meet with Like-Minded and Like-Hearted Members of Your Community

• it's important (for our mental health) that we learn to mourn and lament all the sadness and "climate grief" surrounding this greatest crime ever against humanity
• cry, laugh, and come up with solutions for local resilience together over tea
• support a local coffee shop or library as a meeting place

4.  Set an Example for Others

• choose a plant-based (lower greenhouse gas-emitting) diet; go vegan (and share vegan foods with your friends and family)
• grow some of your own food using no-till, no synthetic chemical methods
• be an early adopter of new (lower/zero carbon) technologies, if possible (and if not, learn about them so you can promote them in your community)
• be seen with your low/zero-carbon technologies (renewable energy, transportation ... like walking!)

5. Seek Out Courageous and Compassionate Ways to Make the Conversion to Zero Carbon

• there are so many possible (viable) solutions to the climate crisis — and we need them all ("clean coal" is not viable)
• spend some time to do some research; become passionate about some of the solutions
• do this for all the children, of all species
• ignore the deniers — or, if you've done enough research, stand up to them (but, be forewarned, it's time-consuming)

After all, as Peter Drucker says, "The best way to predict the future is to create it." And it's our future to create.

 Plant something in 2019!

Another Compassion Tune-Up: OneRepublic's Truth to Power

Heartsick, by Banksy

I just don't have it in me today to write a blog post. I am so saddened and horrified by the utter lack of empathy, compassion and simple human decency I'm witnessing more and more in social media comments. It's like a tidal wave of ignorance and scientific illiteracy is crashing over a shore of totally not giving a shit about anywhere or anyone else. I am heartsick and despondent.

So instead, I'll leave you with OneRepublic's Truth to Power, which powered the 2017 sequel to Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, in which "he pursues the inspirational idea that while the stakes have never been higher, the perils of climate change can be overcome with human ingenuity and passion." Like I try to explain to people, this is the most exciting time ever to be alive.

Folks, if you want to do something besides feel bad, do this:

Help create the political will to stop direct and indirect subsidies to the fossil fuel industries (bam! investment will move over to renewable energy technologies — and isn't it time for fossil fuel energy to stand on its own to feet ... or remain in the ground?) Write, phone, email, fax or visit your elected officials.

Tell your government to get your country's carbon emission targets in line with the IPCC's special report on limiting warming to 1.5ºC before the next big climate conference (COP24 in Poland), which might *possibly* help us avoid cataclysmic climate chaos (a 45% reduction in emissions by 2030; that will get us on our way to zero carbon by mid-century, but we have to start NOW!)

Lyrics below.

Truth to Power
by Ryan B Tedder / T Bone Burnett

I could tell you I was fragile
I could tell you I was weak
I could write you out a letter
To tell you anything you need
 

I've seen minutes turn to hours
Hours turn to years
And I've seen truth turn to power

If you could see me the way I see you
If you could feel me the way I feel you
You'd be a believer
You'd be a believer

Minutes turn to hours
Hours turn to years
And I've seen truth turn to power

I could tell you I was ageless
But I know you see the light
I could tell you I'm immune to everything
But that's a lie
Dust don't turn to flowers
Skies don't disappear
But I've seen truth turn to power
 

Oh, if you could see me the way I see you
If you could feel me the way I feel you
You'd be a believer (believer)
You'd be a believer (believer)
You'd be a believer (believer)
You'd be a believer (believer)

Hard to keep goin' on (hard to keep goin' on)
I said it's hard to keep goin' on (hard to keep goin' on)
It's hard to keep goin' on (hard to keep goin' on)

If you could see me the way I see you
If you could feel me the way I feel you
You'd be a believer
You'd be a believer
You'd be a believer

The Talanoa Dialogue for Climate Ambition — An Opportunity to Have My Say

The United Nations 2017 climate conference (Conference of the Parties or COP23) was hosted by Fiji (though, sadly I'm sure for many attendees, it was held in Bonn, Germany). 

A lasting keepsake of the Fiji talks is the Talanoa Dialogues, to which I contributed yesterday.

Talanoa is a traditional word used in Fiji and across the Pacific to reflect a process of inclusive, participatory and transparent dialogue. The purpose of Talanoa is to share stories, build empathy and to make wise decisions for the collective good. The process of Talanoa involves the sharing of ideas, skills and experience through storytelling.
—https://talanoadialogueplatform.godaddysites.com/background

The goal of the Talanoa Dialogue is to help implement and increase ambition in each nation's commitments to emissions reductions and other climate action (their Nationally Determined Contributions, or NDCs) by asking stakeholders to answer three questions:

1. Where are we?
2. Where do we want to go?
3. How do we get there?

I responded to the first question on behalf of GreenHeart Education (my professional me), and would like to share it with you here. The Dialogue is open for submissions until 29 October 2018, so that input can be compiled before the next UN climate change talks in Katowice, Poland in early December. Go for it if your organization has got something to say!

By the way, you'll see why I laughed at my captcha ("school") when you read my contribution. 

--> Question 1: Where are we?

a) The commitment (planned and/or announced) as well as the actions taken so far that are in line with aims of Paris Agreement, the 1.5/2 degrees’ goal and the transition towards a net-zero emission society by this mid-century [Maximum 300 words]

Where we are is in a climate change emergency, but one we refuse to acknowledge. Where we are is still talking all sorts of numbers when the only number that counts is ZERO – zero carbon, zero combustion, zero emissions of greenhouse gases. Where we are is the poor and the vulnerable being hit by climate diasters first and worst. 

Where we are is smack in the middle of a crisis of imagination and empathy – only compassion and innovation can save us now, but it seems they’re in short supply. Where we are – but we just don’t know it yet – is in the most exciting time ever to be a human being: at the very start of a huge global race to ZERO … or bust. And luckily, because developing countries perhaps aren’t as (politically) entrenched in fossil fuel energy as the so-called developed nations, they all have a headstart in the race to ZERO.

b) Progress made so far against the above commitments, including success stories, case studies and gaps [Maximum 300 words]

Sadly, in many educational circles, climate change is still seen as controversial (thanks to the highly funded and highly successful denial campaign), and therefore barely gets taught. Because human beings have evolved over the last 10,000 into a species dependent on agriculture, and because agriculture depends on a stable climate (which we’ve mostly had for the past 10,000 years), the impacts of a destabilizing climate are threatening food security around the world. 

The Most Important Curriculum

We cannot grow food overnight and nor can we LEARN to grow food overnight, therefore learning food growing skills must become an important part of every school’s curriculum (along with soil building, water collections, and energy generation). While literacy and numeracy will always be part of education, they are of no importance to people who are starving. 

This is one area where we are seeing progress around the world, although we still have far to go. The spread of permaculture, agroforestry, carbon farming, and organic and regenerative agriculture is helping to build resilience in food
systems while we work toward ZERO
greenhouse gas emissions.

c) Quantitative impact so far with respect to mitigation, adaptation, resilience and/or finance [Maximum 300 words]

I’m sorry I don’t have numbers to share. But perhaps this is where 100% (the opposite of zero) should come in, in the form of a global goal to get a learning garden into every schoolyard around the world.

**************************************
UPDATE
I just received this message re my input:

On 2018-09-12 06:12, Talanoa Dialogue wrote:

Dear Sir/Madam, 

Thank you for your message. In order to inform the Talanoa Dialogue, the COP president invited Parties and stakeholders to the Convention on Climate Change as well as expert institutions to submit input.

We regret to inform you that we cannot publish inputs by individuals.

We would encourage you to affiliate yourself with a non-Party stakeholder to the Convention for submitting your input.

Best regards, 
Talanoa Dialogue Team 

Here's the response I sent:

I'm sorry to hear that you don't consider GreenHeart Education an "expert institution." However, I do appreciate you letting me know. (I'm not sure how far you'll get in the fight to safeguard the future by only listening to those who haven't yet managed to safeguard the future. But there's the conundrum.)

Julie Johnston
GreenHeart Education  

Toothache as Metaphor for the Climate Change Blame Game

From LifeHacks Mama

I, quite blessedly, reached the autumn of my life without ever losing a tooth or suffering from toothache. Well, all that has changed. And whose fault is it, anyway?

The year I turned 40, I landed in hospital twice — both times for "old people" problems. It was quite a shock to so suddenly "turn old." I'd thought I was healthy and fit. What the heck? (I'm happy to report that I haven't been in the hospital since, although I have sat in the emergency ward several times with a sprained or broken ankle.*)

Twenty years later and shortly after my 60th birthday, I'm suddenly in excruciating pain and facing my first root canal or tooth extraction. The funny part is that I've started playing the blame game!

• Is it that new dentist's fault? Did he go a millimetre too deep when drilling to replace that lost filling?
• Is it my old dentist's fault for not repairing the tooth properly in the first place?
• Is it my fault for not getting to the dentist sooner?
• Is it my community's fault for not finding a new dentist to replace the old dentist in a more timely way?
• Is it my fault for not taking care of my teeth properly for the last 55 years?
• Is it my parents' fault for giving me lousy teeth genes? 

And all of a sudden, I've realized how ridiculous the blame game is. What matters is not whose fault it is. The inventors of the internal combustion engine? The captains of industry who saw big profits in a world of manufacturing using fossil fuel energy? The car makers who, perhaps quite genuinely, pushed their automobiles as a way to clean the streets of smelly, unhealthy horse manure? Rich people in the USA for spewing more than their fair share of greenhouse gases in order to luxuriate in their wealth? Hollywood for promoting that lifestyle? The millions of people in Africa and Asia for burning wood to cook their paltry meals? Each one of us for partaking in what's available to us?

Sure, each and every sector must now be accountable for their role in the climate change emergency. Each must take responsibility for doing their part to save my tooth, er, the biosphere.

What matters is that I need to get my tooth fixed so the pain will go away. And we need to stop spewing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. We need to get our carbon emissions down to practically zero, as rapidly as possible. We need to work together as a global community of nations to achieve this zero-carbon economy — or perhaps race each other to zero. 

I think a global race to zero carbon would be fun! Am I alone in this? The USA loved the race to the moon. Why not a race to ensure our survival? Developing nations have a head start, in a sense, because they haven't gone as deeply down the fossil fuel energy rabbit hole as we have (in the same way that they leapfrogged over landline telephones and went straight to cellular phone technology). 

So, getting my tooth fixed — or losing it completely — is going to be painful, but trying to pin the blame on anyone is not helpful. And I'll feel much better once it's done. Getting our energy mix down to zero carbon is not going to be easy, but we are going to feel so much better once it's done.

* Completely unrelated, here's the best advice I've ever heard for people with weak ankles. Every time you brush your teeth, stand on one foot for half the time, and then the other foot. This balancing act is what will strengthen the ligaments in your ankle. It's working for me. Touch wood, after seven sprains and three fractures, my ankles have been strong and healthy ever since I received this advice. (And tooth brushing has become much more fun ... even if it didn't work for this poor aching tooth!)

One Day to Go Till the Lima Climate Conference - We Know How to Save the World

Well, there's only a day left before the UN Climate Change Conference in Lima, Peru (COP20) begins.  I'm not a betting woman. I prefer to work a little magic. So let's, instead of taking wagers, conjure up the best possible outcome. 

Let's manifest that all the delegations from the laggard nations, developed or developing (you know who you are, Canada, Australia, Japan, the Netherlands!) never make it off the runway due to freak snowstorms and heat waves, or get lost en route along with their luggage. (Or maybe someone simply locks them in their hotel rooms in Lima.) They just don't show up and therefore can't stall the proceedings.

Then let's manifest that the big industrialized nations all shake hands with China and the USA, congratulating them for their hokey little historic pact. At least they're finally recognizing that Houston has a problem (translation: that there really is a climate change emergency). So we've got the two biggest emitters on board, and their cronies (Europe, Russia, etc.), wanting to bask in the accolades, jump on board, too. (Reminds me of my father, a 3-pack-a-day smoker, who quit smoking because of all the attention we gave my mom when she quit!)

Then the big players, who have found their hearts and their conscience, decide to listen to the little players. You know, the countries where people are already losing their lives, their loved ones and their livelihoods; their food security and their water sources; their homes and entire homelands, all due to climate disruption and chaos. They listen to the stories and the pleas of the G77, the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), the Least Developed Countries (LDC), the Africa Group ... all negotiating blocs that have basically been ignored until now. 

Next up is a little international fireside reading of a very grim (get it? Grimm?) storybook: the IPCC's AR5 Synthesis Report, which "leaves no doubt: Climate change is set to inflict 'severe, widespread, and irreversible impacts' on people and the natural world unless carbon emissions are cut sharply and rapidly." SHARPLY and RAPIDLY, as my hubby points out, means at the least adopting the IPCC's best-case scenario, RCP2.6. "We have a rallying cry," he says.

And then, all together, these nations -- their negotiators and their leaders (who have just jetted in for the last couple of days) -- decide to lend an ear to the members of Climate Action Network (CAN) International, who have come up with the best-ever civil society emergency response to the climate change crisis. 

• Start the decline in emissions next year. 
• Get to zero carbon by mid-century. 

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the simple magic that can save our world. Abracadabra!

A Big Step in the Right Direction: China and the US Agree to Do the Right Thing on Climate Change

Several years before I started hearing about climate change (and way before I morphed into a climate change activist), I made a childhood dream come true by travelling around the world. I took a leave of absence and my plan was to be gone for a year, but China's capitalist economic development had other plans for me.

My date of departure was carefully chosen. I left my home in British Columbia, Canada on the gorgeous September morning that I would normally have been heading back to school as a teacher.  The first stop on my trip was more random. The airline I booked with was about to start flying to Beijing. It seemed as good a first stop as any. I was on their inaugural flight. 

I hadn't thought it through very well. At my very first destination, I found myself completely illiterate and quite helpless. I quickly learned the character (or hanzi) for women's washroom, I can tell you. And I only found out later how blessed I was to spend my week there in sunshine. The Gobi desert didn't want me taking its sand home, and the streets were still filled with buses and bicycles, not cars.

Anyway, I had lots of adventures in China (and a few misadventures), but what I really want to share with you is what I witnessed there: the rapid rise of Chinese capitalism. And it was not a pretty sight. I met two doctors, married with one child, who were making the equivalent of $30 per month between them. They made me an absolutely delicious (and delightful) dinner, and when I suggested that they could open a restaurant, their food was so good, they admitted that they'd wanted to do that, but didn't know who to bribe in order to get the permits.

I wrote in my journal, "The Chinese are adopting all the very worst aspects of capitalism so fast that it's annoying." They just didn't seem to get that I was not going to buy their souvenirs on my way UP the Great Wall, no matter how much they accosted me. 

Not only that, but the Chinese economy was heating up so fast that with my Lonely Planet Guide for China only a year or two old, I spent three months' worth of my savings on only two weeks in China! That's how much the prices had soared. 

All that to say that it makes complete sense to me that China would want to make a commitment to fight fossil fuel greenhouse gas pollution. Over at ClimateProgress, Kiley Kroh explains:

"Late Tuesday night [11 November 2014], the U.S. and China announced an historic agreement to combat climate change, a major step forward from the world’s two largest greenhouse gas emitters. Not only does the agreement hold the two nations to taking additional steps to bring down the carbon emissions that drive climate change, but China just pledged to deploy a tremendous amount of clean energy."

Of course, it's not enough. Not by a long shot. Neither country is talking zero (carbon emissions) or 100% (renewable energy), but Obama is finally doing what he should have done in 2009 for the Copenhagen climate talks. And China ... well, much of China can barely breathe, so they couldn't hold out much longer either. 

Congrats to both President Obama and President Xi Jinping for taking this step in the right direction. Now, if they could just drag Australia's prime minister Tony Abbott and Canada's prime minister Stephen Harper along, kicking and screaming, we'd really get somewhere.

Is "Hope" Making a Comeback?

We are all connected. Each baby born carries a miracle inside. A unique purpose and that miracle is promised to one person and one person alone. We are voyagers set on a course towards destiny, to find the one person our miracle is meant for. But be warned: as we seek out the light, darkness gathers and the eternal contest between good and evil is not fought with great armies... but one life at a time. (from the movie Winter's Tale)

The one friend I have whom I can talk to about the bleakness of our climate-changed future is feeling so low, she told me yesterday, that she's in the bell jar. So she's feeling pretty fragile.

But I've realized that the tiny glimmer of hope that's been peeking into the dark tunnel ahead, well, maybe if we adjust our eyes, we can use that glimmer to light our path.

There's the news that the IPCC's scenario RCP ("Really Cool Plan"?) 2.6 (especially when combined with some excellent suggestions from Climate Action Network International's new position statement, so RCP2.6+) presents the possibility of keeping global average temperature increases within a survivable range. (The oft touted 2ºC limit would be catastrophic and deadly.)

There's also evidence that more and more people are "getting" it. At this weekend's convention of Canada's Green Party, it seemed the strongest, loudest and longest applause came when leader Elizabeth May spoke about the urgent need to deal with climate change.

Different types of people are entering the fray. "Masters of the Universe" (today's version of the captains of industry of yesteryear) are meeting to explain that climate change is Risky Business.

The entertainment industry is starting to take climate change seriously (if in funny ways; Jon Stewart and John Oliver, anyone?)

American President Obama is steppin' it up on climate change, in a dance with China that, if they don't step on each other's toes, could lead to major movement toward decreasing emissions. Okay, so they still don't get the "zero carbon" part of the dance ("This week, the United States and China took important steps to advance their cooperation to combat global climate change and work towards the common goal of low carbon economic growth."), but at least they're twirling on the dance floor together. (See Key Achievements of U.S.-China Climate Change Cooperation Under the Strategic and Economic Dialogue.) (Seriously, can't these leaders see that keeping economic growth as their main goal is, um, see Risky Business above.) 

Parents in the US are starting to demand scientific teaching of climate science in schools. (What a concept! Apparently one that Wyoming cannot grasp.) Check out the Climate Science Students' Bill of Rights. 

And the Climate Psychologist (Margaret Klein) has developed a mobilization campaign, to get people motivated by joining a movement (think WWII). Read the full strategy document here.

Plus, the deniers are just getting sillier and sillier! To wit:

There is no global warming. There is climate change. This melting is caused by the underground volcano's..We are starting a mini ice age due to the suns inactivity..This is all a money thing for the bigwigs..Pollution is poison, we are killing our planet. This is not made by us. This is a nature process..We cant stop it. We can stop Fukushima. sharon b, ky,usa   18/07/2014 06:55

So folks, maybe, just maybe, it's starting to happen. Can we create a crescendo of public outcry that convinces negotiators at the December 2014 UN climate conference in Lima, Peru to adopt the RCP2.6+ for the text of the all-important agreement that will be negotiated in Paris in 2015?

Let's start here and now:    * * * **  ** * ***  ** * ** *** *** ** *
                                      * * * * *     * *      * * **** **
                                 * * RCP2.6+  * ** * * !!!
                                 RCP2.6+  ** *** * ** **** ** * ***
                            RCP2.6+                                *** * **     *** **     * * *** **
                  RCP2.6+                                                 
RCP2.6+

I'll tell you something that should chill your blood. No matter how far we tip the scales our way, no matter how many of them we turn dark, nothin' seems to break their capacity for hope. They pass it back and forth like the flu at a preschool fair. We're losing, Lucifer. One bright star at a time, we're losing. (from the movie Winter's Tale)

Which means we just might be winning!

Launching the Climate EMERGENCY Countdown

Well, today's the day of our Climate Emergency Countdown conference in Toronto. But you, dear reader, are getting the scoop right here.

We figure we have until December 2015 to safeguard the future. Here's what we're picturing:

5         TELL THE WHOLE WORLD

Start now. Encourage all ENGOs (as well as human rights, development, and public health NGOs) to mount a massive education / agitation campaign. Educate about RCP2.6 and CAN International’s position statement (see below). Help everyone in the world understand the climate emergency and that there are simple yet powerful solutions (see below). And then encourage everyone to apply pressure to their own governments. Get everyone calling for an emergency zero-carbon global agreement in Paris (see below).

4         IN NEW YORK, DEMAND THAT GOVERNMENTS DECLARE THE CLIMATE CHANGE EMERGENCY

New York is the place to be this September. In every way possible, let's urge attendees at the NYC September 20-21, 2014 People's Climate March to call for a DECLARATION that CLIMATE CHANGE is an EMERGENCY. And in every way we can think of, let's urge all government representatives and negotiators at UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's Climate Summit 2014: Catalyzing Action to declare the emergency.

Once governments declare that we are “beyond dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system” (UN Framework Convention on Climate Change), things will start to happen. This declaration would be an automatic trigger for the bureaucrats who work underneath politicians and within governments to start working on climate change solutions. Scientists say that determining whether climate change is an emergency is a value judgement that society must make. So let's make it! We're society. Let's get the CLIMATE EMERGENCY DECLARED! 

3         FOR THE LIMA CLIMATE CHANGE CONFERENCE (COP20 in December 2014), DEMAND THAT NEGOTIATORS ADOPT THE IPCC's RCP2.6 SCENARIO + the CAN INTERNATIONAL POSITION STATEMENT

The essential text of the all-important 2015 Paris agreement will be determined in Lima, Peru this year. The best-case IPCC scenario (which is all that government negotiators can work with), one that can possibly keep us below a catastrophic 2ºC rise in global temperatures, is called RCP2.6. (RCP stands for Representative Carbon Pathway, but I think it really means REALLY COOL PLAN!) Let's start calling now for adoption of RCP2.6 PLUS these important new Climate Action Network (CAN) International positions:

•sharp declines in GHG emissions starting 2015 (RCP2.6 has emissions starting to decline in 2020, but really, folks, we're already out of time)  

•reaching zero carbon emissions by 2050, specifically by transformation of all fossil fuel energy to clean renewable energy (RCP2.6 does not go far enough to save our butts)

•limit warming to 1.5ºC (not the deadly 2ºC "target") 

2         CALL FOR THE END OF FOSSIL FUEL SUBSIDIES AND PUT A PRICE ON CARBON (by the December 2015 COP21 in Paris)

Governments "give" $1.9 trillion every year in direct and indirect subsidies to fossil fuel corporations. Direct subsidies must be switched to perpetual energy technologies. Period. Especially in developing nations to help them "leapfrog" over fossil fuel dependence. We also need to demand an economic shift that will make fossil fuel companies pay for their $1.4 trillion every year in economic externalities (indirect subsidies or "mispricing"). 

We need to charge a FEE on CARBON EMISSIONS to pay for their health and environmental costs and to help offset the transition to the Solar Age. This "price" on carbon can be applied to promoting the use of safer, cleaner, healthier, more equitable and more peaceful perpetual energy technologies ("perpetual" means renewable without biomass burning technologies, since burning emits carbon). This carbon fee will signal the market overnight, and investments will be switched to renewables.

1         IN PARIS, GET THE MOST IMPORTANT AGREEMENT IN THE WORLD SIGNED

“Though a great many obstacles remain in the path of this essential agreement, I am among the growing number of people who are allowing themselves to become more optimistic than ever that a bold and comprehensive pact may well emerge from the Paris negotiations late next year, which many regard as the last chance to avoid civilizational catastrophe while there is still time.”          — Al Gore 

0         ACHIEVE ZERO CARBON by 2050

Post Paris, we need to immediately begin a rapid decline in greenhouse gas emissions. And then we need to continue that decline for decades, until we reach zero carbon emissions by 2050 … and safeguard the future.

Do We Even Recognize Our Addiction?

I remember reading once about a woman who didn't recognize that she was an alcoholic until she looked objectively at her recycling bin and compared it to her neighbour's. 

There sure can be lots of denial around alcoholism, eh? People will have a drink to steady their nerves or to wind down after a busy day. Then they'll have a glass of wine with dinner and a nightcap before bed. Add a glass of wine at lunch, a second drink after a particularly stressful day, a whole bottle of wine at dinner, and ... well, I don't need to continue. It can be a creeping addiction. 

Not like crack cocaine, say, or heroin, where you have to procure an illegal (in my country) substance and a needle or pipe and then inject it or (um, I'm sort of drug-illiterate). The point I'm trying to make is that some habit-forming dependencies and addictions are socially invisible like drinking, and therefore are harder 1) to recognize, and 2) to admit to.

Lately, we've become more and more willing to admit to our addiction to fossil fuels. There have been many "interventions" over the last few decades. The "oil crisis" of the early 70s was one. Our growing awareness of greenhouse gases and climate change could be seen as another.

But I realized the other day that we're still not willing to admit to our addiction to growth. I attended a week-long event in a nearby city for the last week and stayed in a hotel. One evening, I was clicking through the TV channels (we don't have a TV at home, so it's always like a toy) and flicked quickly past the talking head of one of Canada's leading political parties, commenting on the country's latest budget. All I heard was "This budget does not have a plan for growth. It does nothing to help grow the economy."

Just with that tiny clip of an interview (on my way to finding a romantic comedy), I realized how hard it has been, is, and is going to be to get people thinking that we might want to examine our addiction to growth.

If our youngest, "hippest" political party leader can't speak to change, to green jobs, to a zero-carbon (or even low-carbon) economy, how will we ever break our dependence on continual growth? 

Folks, we need to speak the words. We need to say the words "zero" and "carbon" when we speak of the economy. We need to plant the seeds of transformation and revolution. This addiction is going to kill us if we don't end it soon. The "green economy" is our methadone ... a zero-carbon economy is more like a new, healthy lifestyle filled with fun exercise, fabulously healthy food and wonderfully sustaining relationships. 

The latest IPCC assessment (AR5) only offers one scenario (RCP2.6) that gives us any hope of keeping the global temperature increase below 2ºC (and it probably hasn't included carbon feedbacks, etc.). But that scenario is based on a centuries-long drawdown of CO2 from the atmosphere (lots of green jobs there!). If we don't start reducing CO2 emissions by 2015, cutting them by 5% per year, then we'll quite simply die of an overdose.

Five percent per year ... that probably sounds scary for anyone who can't see beyond the worldview of continual fossil-fuelled economic growth. But it's actually quite an exciting prospect because it represents a transition to an economy that is safer, cleaner, healthier, more peaceful, and much more equitable.

Let's talk about it in coffee shops and classrooms, waiting rooms and newspapers. Let's help people see that development of a zero-carbon economy is the antidote to our addiction to growth.

Why Canada's Prime Minister Prorogued Parliament This Time*

This week, I received a copy of Franke James's Banned on the Hill: A True Story about Dirty Oil and Government Censorship. It's an adult "graphic novel" styled book about Franke's experience as a Canadian artist whose work was going to be shown in a 20-city European solo show with financial support from our federal government. 

The key word there is was, because that government support was withdrawn and the tour was cancelled. But what's worse is that the pressure to cancel this artistic initiative seemed to come directly from the PMO (the Prime Minister's Office) because the message of her art didn't, you know, jibe with the Conservative government's take on the tar sands (which, in a word, sucks). Fortunately for us, and unfortunately for the PM and his O, Franke is not a quitter. Besides being an artist and a writer, she's also an environmental activist who deeply understands the climate crisis.

Now here is Not-Very-Prime Minister Harper proroguing parliament for the third time. According to the Globe and Mail:

"While Mr. Harper's uses of prorogation when he governed with a minority were controversial, majority governments often employ the procedure to signal a new legislative agenda. New sittings begin with a Speech from the Throne."

Here is what Franke doesn't know. I have it on good authority* that Stephen Harper's reason for proroguing the Canadian parliament this time is to figure out what his government is going to do to fight the climate change emergency.

Yes, Stephen Harper (according to my source*) has finally got it through his thick, er, primeministerly skull that continuing to pump 90 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every day is not such a good idea after all. 

from Franke's book (used with permission)

He's finally recalling that he did indeed learn about the carbon cycle in school, and has acknowledged that methane, a potent greenhouse gas, is seeping into the atmosphere from thawing permafrost and destabilizing methane hydrates in the Arctic. 

He's at long last recognized the food security nightmare we're staring down as the Arctic's summer sea ice (the air conditioning for our growing season) disappears more and more in extent and/or volume each year.

My source* says that soon after his Throne Speech in mid-October, the Canadian Prime Minister is going to call on world leaders in government, business, religion, civil society and science to declare the climate change emergency and start the race to the zero-carbon economy. 

Reticence (aka, ahem, a flat-out refusal) to make that declaration is the only thing keeping us from launching (under the auspices of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and through a UN Security Council motion) an all-out emergency response to the climate crisis and its impacts on billions of people — not to mention most other forms of life. 

So there it is! Another month or two and Prime Minister Stephen Harper will become a world-renowned global hero on climate change. All those Fossil of the Year awards that Canada has been winning? He will personally be returning them to the 2013 climate talks in Warsaw in November. 

I've got to say, I'm looking forward to once again being able to hold my head up high as a Canadian.

* Sadly, my source is my imagination.

Cutting Down and Burning Up Our Future

A fairly new neighbour (one I've never met) had a truckload of giant logs delivered this past week. They weren't that long (maybe 20 feet, max) but they were huge in diameter. When I went past on my bike, a small crane was lifting them off the truck into his side yard. I thought, "Oh, cool, he's going to bring in a portable sawmill and build himself a little place."

Fast forward a day or two. As I ride past again, I glance over and see ... a pile of firewood. He's taken enormous logs, which obviously came from enormous trees, and turned them into firewood. He's taken immense logs that would have made stunning lumber, and turned them into firewood. Besides being amazed at how quickly he was rendering the massive logs into small chunks, I was not impressed.

I know, I know, it's none of my business on a day-to-day, neighbourhood level. But it's representative of what we're doing in the world, to the world. We've reached a time when the only fossil fuels we should be burning are those that are creating the energy to usher us into the Age of Zero-Carbon Perpetual (non-burning renewable) Energy (the Burning Age is over). Instead we're hunting for ever-increasing sources of fossil energy (tar sands, shale gas ... fracking? possibly the stupidest thing any human being has ever thought up) and still increasing our burning of fossil fuels every year. 

So our culture is like my neighbour who has taken fabulous logs (have I mentioned how big they were?) and, instead of "sinking" their stored carbon by building a structure out of them, is going to burn them for a bit of warmth, releasing their carbon into the atmosphere just when we need less carbon in the atmosphere. I just don't get it.

Here's another example. A friend who's had a tragic death in her family circle wrote to say that she's doing okay (just okay), but that she woke up the morning after the funeral to city workers cutting down a "100% healthy, beautiful, spectacular black walnut" on her street. (I've been there, and the trees in her neighbourhood are truly magnificent.) Then they cut the tree next to it. She did all she could think of to stop them, but to no avail. "Life is hard," she said, "when so few respect life outside of human life." 

See what I mean? In this age of wacky weather that's delivering record heat waves and droughts, why would a city decide to cut down trees that provide shade, lowering the temperature and making city life more livable? When we should be planting trees like crazy, my friend's street is now more vulnerable to extreme heat. 

Alas. Are these simply signs that as a culture, we're still ecologically illiterate (with no understanding of the short- and long-term carbon cycles, and no memory of transpiration from our study of trees and the water cycle in school)? Or perhaps we're just unable to see how we're shooting ourselves in the foot because we've been convinced that our ignorance is not a gun in our hands.