Melting Easter Eggs

We’re having a lovely Easter here. So lovely in fact that temperature records are being broken all over the UK – with Northern Ireland breaking a 95 year old record. Naturally people have been out there enjoying themselves especially after a rather grey and drizzly last few weeks. However, when temperature records tumble the inevitable question always gets raised: Is this the result of Climate Change? The standard answer we get back from Climate scientists is that ‘no single incident can be directly tied to Global Warming/Climate Change’ which, scientifically, is true. But it does allow most people to dismiss their nagging doubts that, although we’re happily sunbathing now we’ll be roasting later. But for a few more months or years we can, by and large, put off doing anything drastic or demanding our politicians do something on our behalf.

But there does seem to be a growing realisation that we simply can’t go on like this. We’ve been putting things off in the hope that someone or something will ‘sort it’ without causing the rest of us too much pain. I guess we’ll all OK with a few extra percent on our tax bills or being encouraged to buy hybrid cars, to recycle our plastic bottles and so on but nothing too drastic. We are, essentially, hiding our heads in the sand whilst simultaneously whistling past the nearest graveyard. The problem, we think, is simply too big and just too damned scary to think about. But there are those who are thinking about it and who are acting too. There’s a protest group called Extinction Rebellion (good name) holding a series of protests in London over the past week causing a lot of traffic issues in the capitol. So far over 1,000 of them have been arrested. They’re SERIOUS people! I think also they’re the start (or maybe just the latest) of the new phase of climate protest. Over the next few decades I’m guessing, unless something starts to happen with a Government response, that the level of protest, the anger of the protestors and the violence of their actions will increase as the desperation increases. I can see the equivalent of throwing red paint over fur wearers happening with people who drive gas-guzzling cars or those who don’t have solar panels on their roofs. I can see attacks on petrol stations or coal powered power stations. How bad it will eventually get will largely depend on how much the people push for it and the level or the number of climate related disasters.

One thing we can be certain of is that these disasters will happen more often and will be increasingly deadly. We’ve already seen the wildfires in California and the deadly heatwaves across Europe and especially in India and Australia which reached eye-watering temperature levels. But the response to all of these has been, to say the least, sluggish and understated. Unfortunately humanity is going to need a number of kicks to its collective butt before it does anything radical in response to the threat. Presently it’s just a case of how many people will need to die or be displaced before we spend the money and reallocate the resources required to do something about what’s predicted to be coming down the road at us. But the longer we wait – maybe until we know for certain how bad it’s going to get – the more it will cost in blood and gold to fix it. I’m cynical enough to think that one climate disaster won’t be enough. Those in power and those with influence will call it a one-off, a once in a century event even if such a thing has never happened before (like a category 5 hurricane in the Arabian Gulf). We’ll need at least two and most probably three in reasonably quick succession. At that point we might just leap into action. At that point it’ll be too late to stop what’s coming but it should lessen the immediate impact and then start to reverse things. The response we’ll need at that point will be something along the lines of the efforts we put into both World Wars. The whole planet will need to be on a war footing for a decade or more before we turn the corner. I don’t believe that the war is over yet – far from it. I still have enough confidence in our abilities as a species to finally recognise we have a problem and to develop ways of dealing with it. We might even get a temporary halt to the insane squabbling we incessantly take part in. But for now at least we have more important things to do. First we need to save the planet and ourselves – we can fight about the rest later or we can fight over the scraps in the ruins of our civilisation. The choice, as always, is ours.