{"id":49539,"date":"2019-11-12T08:31:35","date_gmt":"2019-11-12T13:31:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=49539"},"modified":"2019-11-12T08:31:37","modified_gmt":"2019-11-12T13:31:37","slug":"memo-from-a-climate-crisis-realist-the-choice-before-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=49539","title":{"rendered":"Memo from a Climate Crisis Realist: The Choice before Us"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thetyee.ca\/Analysis\/2019\/11\/12\/Climate-Crisis-Realist-Memo\/\">Memo from a Climate Crisis Realist: The Choice before Us<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>If we don\u2019t take these 11 key steps, we\u2019re kidding ourselves. Second of two.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/thetyee.ca\/Analysis\/2019\/11\/11\/Earth.png\" alt=\"Earth.png\"\/><figcaption>A rational world with a good grasp of reality would have begun articulating a long-term energy and consumption wind-down strategy 20 or 30 years ago.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>That first query was this:&nbsp;<strong>The modern world is deeply addicted to fossil fuels and green energy is no substitute. Am I wrong?<\/strong>&nbsp;Read my fact-based argument&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/thetyee.ca\/Analysis\/2019\/11\/11\/Climate-Change-Realist-Face-Facts\/\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today I ask:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Question 2: Human nature and our methods of governance are proving incapable of saving the world. We need to \u2018get real\u2019 about climate science. Am I wrong?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Remember the self-congratulatory hubbub following \u201csuccessful\u201d negotiation of the Paris climate accord in 2015? Was all that ebullient optimism justified?&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/support.thetyee.ca\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The&nbsp;Tyee&nbsp;is&nbsp;supported by&nbsp;readers&nbsp;like&nbsp;you&nbsp;Join us and grow independent&nbsp;media in&nbsp;Canada<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Consider that in the past 50 years, there have been 33 climate conferences and a half dozen such major international agreements \u2014 Kyoto, Copenhagen and Paris the most recent \u2014 but none has produced even a dimple in the curve of rising atmospheric CO2 concentrations.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And things are not about to change dramatically. The 2019 Energy Information Administration&nbsp;<em>International Energy Outlook<\/em>&nbsp;reference case projects global energy consumption to increase 45 per cent by 2050. On the plus side, renewables are projected to grow by more than 150 per cent, but, consistent with the trend I rudely pointed out yesterday, the overall increase in demand for energy is&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.eia.gov\/outlooks\/aeo\/data\/browser\/#\/?id=2-IEO2019&amp;sourcekey=0\">expected<\/a>&nbsp;to be greater than the total contribution from all renewable sources combined.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Fact: Without a massive rapid course correction, CO2 emissions will continue to climb. This threatens humanity with ecological and social catastrophe as much of Earth becomes uninhabitable.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Memo from a Climate Crisis Realist: The Choice before Us If we don\u2019t take these 11 key steps, we\u2019re kidding ourselves. Second of two. That first query was this:&nbsp;The modern world is deeply addicted to fossil fuels and green energy is no substitute. Am I wrong?&nbsp;Read my fact-based argument&nbsp;here. Today I ask:&nbsp; Question 2: Human [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4,7],"tags":[141,1053,23884,17115],"class_list":["post-49539","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","category-survival-2","tag-climate-change","tag-climate-crisis","tag-thetyee-ca","tag-william-e-rees"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49539","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=49539"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49539\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49540,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49539\/revisions\/49540"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=49539"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=49539"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=49539"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}