Our 2020 Eco-Faith posts focused primarily on actions that we as individuals can take to care for our physical world. In 2021 we will continue to occasionally offer a new idea for individual earth-friendly acts. But we’re also launching two new projects. We’ve been sowing the seeds for one of these in recent posts: Union Gardens, our socially-distanced community garden project that aims to grow a bit of food for ourselves—and a bit more that we as a community can share with Compass House, Lake Union Village and others. Now we’re waiting hopefully and continuing our preparations for the first sprouts in the coming weeks.
With Union Gardens underway, we introduce a second project area to think about: climate change, and specifically, what positive actions the Union community might take in support of our environment.
Climate change/global warming is seen by many as an existential threat to the quality of life—perhaps life itself—on planet earth, while a few may still deny or ignore the problem. Among those who acknowledge it, some feel climate change will be controlled through solar and wind initiatives, electric vehicles, the Paris Accord, and other efforts. Others, however, believe current efforts represent only a tiny fraction of what will be needed to avert catastrophic climate change.
avoiding climate disaster
a book review on Bill Gates’ new book
So how might Union as a community work on this confusing but critical issue? It seems that the necessary first step will be coming to a common definition and understanding of climate change. And to attempt to do this, we turn to a recently-published book, How to Avoid a Climate Disaster*, written by Bill Gates. This informative, reader-friendly, realistic-yet-hopeful book presents a structure for understanding climate change and its causes, what tools are available now to address the problem, what additional steps must be taken—quickly—and what roles governments, private enterprise and individuals must play. We will draw on this book in several upcoming posts, and heartily recommend it.
The problem
Greenhouse gases are added to the world’s atmosphere every year at the rate of 51 billion tons,** give or take, and cause the earth to warm, which in turn causes or will cause a variety of problems for humans—and everything else: rising sea levels, extreme weather, drought, crop failure, wildfires, poor air quality, famine, mass migration, economic distress, political unrest, …. And because greenhouse gases (aka, carbon dioxide or GHG) remain in the atmosphere for centuries, simply reducing the rate of yearly addition will not stop global warming. The analogy that Bill uses is that merely reducing the flow of water into a filling bathtub will not avoid an eventual overflow. Turning off the flow is essential.
GHG sources
Greenhouse gases are created by virtually everything humans do. In his book, Bill organizes GHG sources into five groups and provides estimates for the portion of annual emissions each represents:*
Manufacturing 31%
Electricity 27%
Agriculture 19%
Transportation 16%
HVAC 7%
Tackling the problem
Because pretty much everything we do creates greenhouse gases, and because driving GHG emissions to zero is critical, tackling global warming is a uniquely difficult problem: basically, we have to change EVERYTHING, more or less AT THE SAME TIME. And if that isn’t daunting enough, GHG emissions must be eliminated in economically and morally just ways that allow the world’s poor and emerging countries to benefit along with us. As Bill notes, “We need to accomplish something gigantic we have never done before, much faster than we have ever done anything similar…. But don’t despair. We can do this.”*** Let’s see if we can find a way for the Union community to help.
*How to Avoid a Climate Disaster, the Solutions We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need, Bill Gates
** Ibid., page 3
*** Ibid., page 5