The Planet Has Limits. So Must We.
The Planet Has Limits. So Must We.
Perilous times on planet Earth
This essay is about 3000 words with pictures and graphics. If it’s too long for email, please read in your browser or the app. Thank you!
We are on the brink of an irreversible climate disaster. This is a global emergency beyond any doubt. Much of the very fabric of life on Earth is imperiled. We are stepping into a critical and unpredictable new phase of the climate crisis.
These are the chilling and unequivocal opening words from an article published October 8 titled The 2024 state of the climate report: Perilous times on planet Earth, by Oxford University Press’s research platform Oxford Academic. The work of fourteen climate scientists from institutions across the world, the paper is built on decades of research and monitoring of our planet’s vital signs across multiple disciplines.
The planetary boundaries illustrated above were mapped by the Stockholm Resilience Centre of Stockholm University. They don’t represent specific climate change tipping points such as loss of the Greenland ice sheet or of the Amazon Rainforest becoming carbon emitters, but rather points at which the risks of fundamental changes in the Earth’s physical, biological and chemical life support systems rise significantly. These boundaries encompass climate change, but go beyond, identifying additional threats to our future posed by our poorly thought out attempts to play god. Genetic engineering and “novel entities,” the massive introduction of synthetic chemicals, persistent organic pollutants (POPs) and microplastics to not just our air, water, and soil, but our bodies and brains are examples.
Again from the Oxford article: lightly edited for clarity with a two links added:
For many years, scientists, including a group of more than 15,000, (15,372 to be exact) have sounded the alarm about the impending dangers of climate change driven by increasing greenhouse gas emissions and ecosystem change. For half a century, global warming has been correctly predicted even before it was observed — and not only by independent academic scientists but also by fossil fuel companies.
Yes, Exxon, Shell, BP, all the Big Oil players knew the outcome of profligate burning of fossil fuels in the 1970s. Exxon in particular was out in front of this, employing its own scientists to research their suspicions. I highly recommend this three-part series from Frontline to understand how this global crime against humanity came to pass.
Get your money out of fossil fuel sponsoring banks. Don’t wait.
The evidence of worldwide climate disaster is now with us daily. Let’s briefly consider a few of them before turning back to planetary boundaries.
Australia Black Summer of 2019-2020
The Australia Black Summer resulted in a terrifying 24.3 million hectares burned. That’s 60 million acres. Three billion animals died, including 143 million mammals, 2.46 billion reptiles, 180 million birds and 51 million frogs. Property damage and economic losses exceeded $1.3 billion in US dollars.
Canadian Wildfires of 2023
From March to October, over 6,500 fires raged coast-to-coast in Canada, requiring the evacuation of up to 232,000 people. The blazes emitted 410 megatons of carbon, four times that of global aviation in 2022, and smashed the previous record 138 megatons released in 2014. By September, the fires had consumed 17.3 million hectares, some 42.7 million acres.
Amazon Rainforest always burning
The first eight months of 2024 have produced the highest number of wildfires in the Amazon since 2005. 13.4 million acres have burned (5.4 million hectares), equivalent to the entire countries of Costa Rica or Denmark, take your pick. In 2023 26.4 million acres burned (10.7 million hectares), a sobering 35.4 percent increase over 2022. As noted above, even the wetlands of the Pantanal are burning. In 2021, an estimated seventeen million vertebrate animals died there. Most depressing is that large scale cattle farming, the world’s love of beef, is the largest driver of deforestation, both slashing and burning for grazing land and resulting in additional accidental fires. Equally troubling, beef in and of itself is by far the largest source of GHG emissions in the agricultural sector from burning of fossil fuels and cow methane. Eliminating beef from our diets makes a difference.
Central to North America heatwave 2024
Just as in 2023, record heat again took lives from Central America to North America. In Mexico, ten cities set new heat records. Heat deaths in the country stand at 155 with 2,567 known to have suffered heat stroke and dehydration. Howler monkeys fell out of trees and toucans, parrots and bats fell victims as well. In Mexico City, both wealthy and poor residents have become dependent on water truck deliveries.
Meanwhile, Las Vegas set an all-time new temperature record of 120°F on July 7, after a record-breaking seven consecutive days of temperatures at 115° or higher. Heat related deaths currently stand at 402, up from 309 in 2023 and 169 in 2022, according to the Clark County coroner’s office. The rise in heat deaths in Arizona’s Maricopa County since 2014 is simply stunning. This year, the county has 389 confirmed heat related deaths, with 292 still under investigation.
Hurricanes Debby, Helene and Milton
Perhaps freshest in our minds in the eastern US are the back-to-back hurricanes that devastated southeastern states and Florida. I wrote about Helene, Milton, and “little” Debby in August, because I realized Debby, a “mere” $12.3 billion event, would quickly be forgotten. All three disasters were predictably under or uninsured. Costs are still being assessed, and figures remain undetermined but, AccuWeather has pegged Helene costing up to $250 billion. That’s pushing a third of the 2025 Pentagon budget. The AP is assessing both Helene and Milton to join the ranks of $50 plus billion hurricanes. Well, yeah, easily. Whatever the final figures, they represent lives that will never completely recover and will result in thousands of uncounted early deaths from lingering trauma.
This rundown is of just a handful of climate change disasters playing out around the world. As I write in my home office in Buffalo, NY on October 22, the temperature has climbed to 71° F, today, easily 30° to 40° above what it should be. No corner of the Earth is spared. We’re in a climate emergency right now and the majority of Americans don’t grasp the profundity of the issue based on the polls I have seen as we wait to see if corporatocracy or fascism prevail in November.
The nine planetary boundaries and their status
Once again from the Oxford article, lightly edited for clarity:
Despite these warnings, we are still moving in the wrong direction; fossil fuel emissions have increased to an all-time high, the 3 hottest days ever occurred in July of 2024, and current policies have us on track for approximately 2.7° C peak warming by 2100. Tragically, we are failing to avoid serious impacts, and we can now only hope to limit the extent of the damage. We are witnessing the grim reality of the forecasts as climate impacts escalate, bringing forth scenes of unprecedented disasters around the world and human and nonhuman suffering. We find ourselves amid an abrupt climate upheaval, a dire situation never before encountered in the annals of human existence.
Climate change, status BREACHED:
Climate change is determined by the balance of incoming and outgoing energy of the Earth, caused by heat trapping greenhouse gases (GHGs) and heat reflecting aerosols. Unfortunately, our reduction of unhealthy man-made aerosols results in additional warming. Water vapor is by far the greatest greenhouse gas and counts as zero against the baseline measurement of carbon dioxide (CO2).
Carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O) and fluorinated gases including hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) used in refrigeration, air conditioning, and industrial processes are the enemies ordered below from greater abundance to less abundance, but each increasing greatly in power. One equivalent of CO2 is the amount of heat an equal amount of CO2 would trap over the next 100 years. Aerosols (particulates) have a cooling effect by reflecting heat to space. You can track CO2 levels here.
CH4 = 28 CO2 equivalents, with 10 to 12 years of persistence. Track here.
N2O = 273 CO2 equivalents, with over 100 years of persistence. Track here.
HFCs, of which there are many varieties, carries up to 14,600 CO2 equivalents. Persistence varies up to 15 years. Information on HFCs here.
Novel entities, status BREACHED:
Novel entities include synthetic chemicals and substances such as microplastics, endocrine disruptors and persistent organic pollutants (POPs). The word “organic” is misleading, as it merely refers to the presence of carbon in a pollutant. POPs are always synthetic. Examples include favorites such as pesticides (DDT, the famed example) and industrial PCBs. Additional novel entities include nuclear waste and weapons, and human manipulation of evolutionary processes, such as genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and other direct modifications of evolution.
Stratospheric ozone depletion, status SAFE:
The stratospheric ozone layer protects life from harmful ultraviolet radiation. Once breached, ozone-depleting gases have been successfully regulated by the Montreal Protocol. There is still large year-to-year variability in the stratospheric ozone’s size and strength, but its current status is considered within safe levels, and projected to return to a healthy level by mid-century.
Atmospheric aerosol loading, status SAFE:
Airborne particles from human activities or natural sources influences the climate by altering temperature (reflecting heat into space) and precipitation patterns. The 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption cooled the Earth by 1.0° F (0.6° C). Currently, atmospheric aerosol loading is considered within tolerance.
Ocean acidification, status NEAR BREACHED:
Ocean acidity has increased by about 30 percent since the industrial revolution. As oceans heat and acidify, calcifying organisms such as shellfish are harmed, marine ecosystems are impacted, coral reefs are bleached, and the ocean's ability to absorb CO2 is weakened. Since the ocean currently absorbs about 31 percent of CO2 released into the atmosphere, this is cause for great alarm.
As the surface water heats up from the carbon dioxide, it becomes more buoyant, preventing it from mixing with deeper, colder water that absorbs CO2. At some point, the gas-saturated surface water will be unable to absorb carbon dioxide at the same rate, leading to higher concentrations in our already overheating atmosphere and increased ocean warming. Phytoplankton are both a base ocean food source and critical carbon sink. They take up CO2 and sunlight through photosynthesis. When they die, they sink into the ocean sediment, taking the carbon with them. If favorable conditions for phytoplankton aren’t protected, a critical carbon sink will be lost.
According to MIT’s Stephanie Dutkiewicz:
“If you were to kill off all the phytoplankton, about 200 ppm (parts-per-million) of CO2 would be released into the atmosphere. To put this in perspective, the amount of pre-industrial atmospheric carbon dioxide is about 280 ppm.”
CO2 today stands at 422 ppm. We cannot lose the ocean.
Modification of biogeochemical flows, status BREACHED:
Biochemical flows or cycles are the movement and transformation of chemical elements and compounds between biotic (living organisms), and abiotic (nonliving systems) such as the atmosphere and the Earth’s crust, soil and rocks for instance.
Natural nutrient cycles of key elements like nitrogen, and phosphorus through the environment and organisms crucial for supporting life and maintaining ecosystems are being disrupted. Both global phosphorus flow into the ocean and nitrogen are diverted for industrial purposes beyond a safe level and undermine natural nutrient cycles. The industrial fixation of nitrogen Haber-Bosch process (the extraction of nitrogen from the atmosphere) to produce fertilizers and nylon are examples.
There are fast cycles and slow cycles. The three described below are examples of the former, while the slow breakdown of rock and release of minerals the latter.
Carbon cycle: Carbon, the main component of biological compounds, is found in all living things, as well as non-living things such as minerals, the atmosphere, the oceans and the interior of the planet. As we know, a specific balance of atmospheric carbon which we are breaching is critical to allow life, as we know it, to exist.
Nitrogen cycle biogeochemical cycle through which nitrogen is transferred through biotic and abiotic components of an ecosystem.
Water cycle or hydrological cycle describes the way that water is circulated and recycled throughout Earth’s systems.
Freshwater change, status BREACHED:
Altered freshwater cycles, including rivers, lakes and soil moisture, impacts carbon sequestration and biodiversity, leading to shifts in precipitation levels. The increased frequency of extreme weather variations worldwide has resulted in dramatic changes to soil water content from ever more extreme drying and rewetting cycles. Study has revealed this causes the release of 35.7 percent more CO2 compared to soil with constant water content. Human disturbance of rivers, lakes and soil moisture have exceeded the safe level.
Land system change, status BREACHED:
In 1970, Joni Mitchell created the album Big Yellow Taxi. She sang:
They paved paradise, put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique, and a swingin' hot spot
In 1972, Bruce Dern starred in the movie Silent Running, where as a botanist he preserves the Earth’s last plant samples in a space station greenhouse. We have foreseen the predicament we’re in for a very long time.
Our destruction of natural landscapes through deforestation and urbanization has diminished essential ecological functions like carbon sequestration, moisture recycling, and habitats for wildlife, all crucial for the Earth’s health and therefore our health. They cannot be separated. Globally, forest coverage in all three biomes —tropical, boreal, and temperate — have fallen below the safe levels.
Biosphere integrity, status BREACHED:
All the boundaries described to this point, summarized here, add up to undermining of the planet’s basic processes to regulate itself.
The decline of biodiversity, shrinking extent of that diversity, and compromised health of the remaining living organisms and ecosystems, has put the biosphere’s ability to maintain the energy balance and chemical cycles which we depend on for life as we know it on the edge. We have exceeded their safe levels. There is little time to take radical action to save what we can.
The challenges and outlook
If humanity is to survive, and the creatures and organisms we depend on, share it with and give the world beauty, we need an evolution in our consciousness, not technology. We are approaching The End of Oil, which I wrote about here. Without oil and diesel for heavy equipment for mining and producing steel, the build out of renewables is destined to fall far short of the lives we in wealthy nations are accustomed to. Mining is its own ecological destruction as well. And there is a long unanswered moral and ethical question posed by our long, brutal colonial pillaging of the Southern Hemisphere. With droughts, floods heat, and the loss of fossil fuel derived fertilizers, radically reduced agriculture is a reality already under way as is massive climate migration which Matt Orsagh wrote about well here, a necessary read. Heat alone is endangering the farmworkers we depend on. The ocean, which as many as three billion people depend on, is under severe stress.
We also need to bring as many people radicalized by Trump and similar into the fold, to make it clear we are not the enemy, billionaires and their sycophants are. It’s class warfare as usual.
Change is coming, change is here. Vote. If Trump gains power again, it’s game over. Then be prepared to support Kamala Harris. It’s going to be up to us to pound the reality I have written here through the new administration’s head. We must demand and fight for our future and give Harris the courage and a people’s mandate for a completely new future based on degrowth.
Trust me. Degrowth is not a dirty word. These industrial lives we are leading are. Our bodies are saturated in chemicals and plastic, and most of us work in jobs we hate, slaves of our own demise. We can do better, but must demand it, even if it means taking to the streets. Here is a primer on degrowth. And here is an idea of what it might feel like, an excerpt from The Illusion of Fossil Fuels.
I am old now as I look out on my backyard. It’s all wildflowers and weeds. So is my front yard. I haven’t mowed a lawn in years. This is how my entire neighborhood looks. It’s alive with pollinators, butterflies, bees and birds. Rabbit and fox, are common, too. It raises my spirits to be part of this harmonious world. Later, I will ride my bike to the community gardens and put a few hours in conversing with my neighbors and friends, coming home with fresh, pesticide free produce. My body no longer hurts because it’s clean.
I often reflect early in the morning, when the birds greet the dawn and sun rays glisten on the beaded water of overnight dew. The new day seems like forever, filled with endless potential and promise. I marvel at this new world. We call it The New Dawn. I can scarcely believe we conquered The New Dark Ages, but we did. We woke up, just in time, and demanded better.
We realized our minds and bodies were polluted. We realized 8 billion people were too many. We realized that grotesque wealth inequality drove hatred and racism. We realized that consumerism drove slavery. We realized that our media was propaganda. We realized war machines were enforcing rape of the Earth. We realized the police had become enforcers of an immoral system. We realized justice was twisted by wealth. We boycotted. We organized strikes. We took to the streets and endured tear gas, bullets and incarceration. Some of us died, but we saved far more than we lost and created a future where there was none. I am so proud of us.
We saved our planet, and we’re never letting psychopaths threaten it again.
I agree 100 percent we are massively overpopulated and would just add that overconsumption by a minority, particularly the billionaire class, is equally troublesome. And of course predatory capitalism ties to that. Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine is my go to on that subject. There is no one source for complete information, Oxford or Stockholm, one of the reasons I peppered the article with many other links. Hell, on the rare occasions something from Fox or the NY Post lines up, I love it. I remember Elliot from Twitter, and have run across that Hiroshima comparison in a few places, boggling. Yup, Greenland ice sheet is done, and the Pentagon knew what was going on by 1990! I've touched on both of those issues. COP29 is coming up, and they are planning to expand oil production (I know, surprising). I hope to be as sarcastic as I was on COP28. Yes, screaming time is here. Watching the madness is infuriating. My theory is they want us dead, and I'm not joking. There's a gruesome logic to it. https://geoffreydeihl.substack.com/p/circumstantial-evidence
Thanks, Geoff, but I've seen this very incomplete report before. I totally omits the three most important elements of climate collapse, which, BTW, we are well into NOW: massive human overpopulation (3,000 times more numerous than were our last ecologically balanced and self-sustaining population--migratory Hunter-Gatherers/pastoralists), overconsumption driven by predatory capitalism, and atmospheric/land/ocean heat accumulation. The GHGs (CO2, water vapor, etc.) are responsible for a minor part of global heat accumulation, and nowhere is the central issue of heat production addressed. According to the calculations of polymath Eliot Jacobson, we are currently generating the heat energy equivalent of 20-30 Hiroshima nuclear bomb blasts PER SECOND, where each one releases 63 trillion BTUs. Nowhere have I seen a thorough accounting of heat energy production, and this piece from Oxford is equally lacking. For any nonbelievers, Greenland is losing 30 million tons of ice, as it captures 144 BTUs of heat energy/pound, hourly, and if that's not a "canary in the coal mine" indicator of our massive overproduction of heat energy, I don't know what else could possibly be more stark. The fossil fuel industry and, perhaps, a terrified Pentagon, do not want the general public to find out just how far down the road to total climate collapse we have already willfully blindly stumbled. Time to wake up the truth tellers and start screaming from every house top!