Haein paper straes does he-haw tae save onybody

Mair bad news: haein paper straes wi yer juice does he-haw tae save onybody. In fact, a team o 40 academics frae Heriot-Watt University has cam oot tae tell us replacin plastics wi alternatives could lead tae a triplin o greenhoose gas emissions.

The science o Climate Brakdoon (the preferred term noo fir Climate Chynge) is sair complicatit an can be gey hard tae get yer heid roon. So’s tae feel we’re daein somehin fir this muckle issue, we’ve tendit tae get hung up oan wee fouters o ideas insteid o acceptin that the ainly wey fir tae avert a catastrophe is huge, life-alterin chynge at a polítical an personal level.

Fir noo oor fouter is plastic straes. Oor brains cannae fankle oor wey oot o nummers an statistics an estimates o sea ice depletion. Whan we see a bonnie turtle wi a drinkin strae in its pair neb, we hae a simple an sad story we can follae, an something we can dae aboot it.

Plastic straes is aboot 0.025% o ocean plastics. But near haulf, 46%, is fishin nets. The neist warst offender? Ither fishin graith. An here’s whaur we stert tae come tae dífficulty. Straes is no ainly simple, an concrete, but they feel like a victimless win. Especially gin fowk replace them wi paper straes. But fishin? Fir a stert, fowk is aye set in thir weys wi food. An second, tradítional culture an identity is rummelit up wi industries the likes o fishin, fairmin o sheep an cattle, een coal minin an ile production – aw hings wi a terrible carbon impact. A mind haein a conversation in a chipper in the North East as A ate chips an the fowk aroon me aw had fish – “It’d feel like a betrayal o ma faimly an the culture o the place A’m frae gin A wir tae gie up eatin fish fir whitivver reason”.

An A ken it’s no naehin. A grew up oan a fairm masel. We hid tatties, barley, wheat, rock music (T in the Park wis oan oor fairm), beasts an sheep. We wis surroondit bi chicken fairms oan the auld WWII airfield aroon oor fields. Ither neighbours hid dairy kye. Fairmin wis, an is, a wey o life. Whan A went vegetarian in 2008 it wis no taen awthegither weil. The chynge tae veganism a few year later wis an ither dunt.

Bit here’s the fact o the maitter – fae farm tae fork an ayont, veganism haulfs the carbon cost o yer food compared wi an omnivore diet. An, aye, that’s includin aw thae fancy avocados and chickpeas that, fir reasons passin unnerstaunin, fowk loo tae thraw as insults tae lichlie “Millennials” (wavin haun emoji frae Millennial me).

It’s mibbe no juist the taigle o the haird science ahint climate brakdoon that maks us hairt-lazy wi oor actions. It’s mibbies the simple fact that budgettin is borin an a wheen o wark. A ken that – ma 2017-18 tax return girns at me frae the bottom o ma To Do leet ilka Januar. Bit carbon budgetin is whit we’re needin tae dae.

The braw Mike Berners-Lee, brither o the inventer o the Warld Wide Wab, his an excellent buik, How Bad Are Bananas?: The Carbon Footprint of Everything. In it Berners-Lee rins through the relative carbon costs o whit we yaise in oor lifes, an gies a idea o whit we suid be spendin, carbon-wise. It’s no aye whit ye presume, an aw – the bananas o the title turn oot tae be a braw, low-carbon food. They keep weil sae can be grown in naitural sunlicht (nae hothooses) an shipped slawly frae whaur they’re grown at ainly 1% o the carbon cost o flichts. He een feels that the plastic poke peys fir itself carbon-wise, as it sauves the customers ruinin fruit whan they ettle tae rive a bunch apairt. If ye can yaise Fairtrade, at dinnae yaise pesticides an fungicides hairmin plantation warkers, ye’d be haird-pressit tae fund better mait.

As warld representatives frae 200 countries meet this week in Poland fir talks on Climate Chynge at COP24, we need tae stert thinkin o dífficult an radical shifts we’ll can mak in Scotland. We suid be discussin veganism, carbon rationin (mibbe we can get the 1950s nostalgics o Brexit intae ration buiks insteid?), bannin cars frae cíties, liein North Sea ile i the grund an no taen it as a meal ticket – independence or no. We must lead oan this – we maun.

As capitalism sees oor fash anent climate chaos an gies us the bonnie kickmaleeries o Keep Cups, an tote bags wi ecological and intersectional feminist slogans oan, we maun mind that capitalism is also sendin White Hoose representatives tae the COP24 tae hae a “side event” oan the role of fossil fuels in sauvin us frae Climate Brakdoon. If it’s no paper straes that’ll get us oot of hairm’s wey, jinglin geordies it’s certies no gonna be coal an ile.