Climate change rhetoric must be met with action now in race to net zero

As the month of June drew to a close, reports flooded in from across the world about record-breaking temperatures, with the hottest day ever recorded in Lytton – a village in British Columbia, Canada – at 49.6 degrees Celsius, with more than 100 dead in the Vancouver area alone as a result. Across the border in Washington State, Seattle recorded a temperature of 38C, a record for this city at this time of the year, with California declaring a state of emergency as they reported dangerously high temperatures in places such as Death Valley which reached a roasting 54C. Climate and fire scientists predict this is only one of several possible heatwaves in the Pacific North West before the summer is out.

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Meanwhile, the NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, reported the amount of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere had already peaked this past May. Atmospheric CO2, now at its highest level since measurements commenced 63 years ago, is comparable only to the Pliocene Epoch more than four million years ago, with the lull in emissions created by the global pandemic failing to make a dent in this terrifying and accelerating growth.

In a leaked report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, (due out officially in August), climate scientists revealed their concerns over tipping points triggered by global warming beyond which humans will not survive, and that these thresholds are far closer than most people realise.

None of this is good news. Just this week a historic heatwave in Lapland resulted in their highest ever recorded temperature at 34.3C in Banak, and 33.6C at Kevo in Finland. And if you think these temperatures are comfortably far enough away as not to affect Scotland, then you’re either wired to the moon or you’re deliberately ignoring Greta Thunberg (above) and David Attenborough’s easily digestible climate warnings. Out of sight will not be out of experience at this rate and it will be our children and our grandchildren who will suffer if we continue to sit on our hands, or even sit on the fence in terms of decision-making on radical change and the funds needed to effect this change.

It’s this kind of precarious fence wobbling that brings it all closer to home when we look at the UK Treasury’s reluctance to finance bolder action on climate change despite Johnson’s grandiose pledges of a “green revolution”. A recent editorial in The Times warned that Rishi Sunak is “balking at the likely cost of the green transition”. He’s also attempting to placate the climate sceptics in his party whose reaction to the Chancellor’s Covid measures has frightened the horses in terms of a repeat on cost and spend when it comes to vital decarbonisation measures and building back better.

The independent body which advises the UK Government on emissions targets, the Climate Change Committee (CCC), is well aware of this reticence on the part of, not just the Treasury, but also across governmental departments to act together on climate change.

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In June the CCC published its latest progress report which utterly condemned said government’s failure to come forward with sufficient policies to tackle their ambitious climate goals. With only four in 21 key decarbonisation targets met so far and very little progress on adaptation priority areas, Johnson, Sunak and chums have a long way to go to match action with rhetoric never mind balance the books on climate action. CCC chair, Lord Deben’s damning indictment that “the delivery has just not been there” in important areas such as housing and transport, means that by 2035, only 20% of their climate targets will have been met.

To be brutally blunt, “balking” at “cost” now will not save us from irreversible climate change and threats to human existence. The bare financial facts of a continued head-in-the-sand attitude to climate action should be a wake-up call to people who think that net zero will be too expensive or doesn’t need an over-arching, ambitious financial thrust.

Estimates from the CDP, a not-for-profit charity that runs a global disclosure system for business and sub-national governments to manage their environmental impact, show that in 2018 the USA sustained $91 billion in damages from climate-related disasters such as tropical cyclones, droughts and wildfires.

On the other hand, the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate points out that transitioning to a low-carbon, sustainable economy could deliver as much as a $26 trillion boost to the American economy and more than 65 million new jobs by 2030.

The Biden administration is awake to these opportunities and has pledged eye-watering sums to address climate catastrophe. Add to these trillions reports from organisations such as the International Renewable Energy Agency on the incredibly low cost of renewables as compared to fossil fuels and for the States it makes sense to invest now to save later.

The UK Government’s reticence on the other hand means we could be the last to the party when it comes to clean, sustainable energy from our abundant natural resources while making good on their levelling up agenda. And the last to boost the economy, create green jobs and opportunities for marginalised communities as the so-called party of business promised the electorate.

Amidst the doom and gloom and sheer hard, factual, scientific evidence of global warming and out of control carbon emissions such as this heat dome across Canada and America, the race to net zero has never been more crucial. When the benefits of action outweigh the costs of mealy-mouthed inaction to this extent, business as usual will mean business suffers. And failure to act will mean failure to protect human life never mind the economy.

That’s not a “new normal” that any of us should accept.