News from a Changing Planet -- #53 -- How to Keep a Planet
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Hi there —
To longtime subscribers and those who have joined over the last few months while I haven’t been writing, I’m happy to be writing to you all. As I wrote in my last post from May, I was planning to go on maternity leave for the summer, but things have changed and I have been dealing with some serious health issues which have made it impossible for me to keep writing as I wanted to do. But I’m powering through this week to remind you (in case you still need reminding….) to VOTE!
Climate change has barely come up in this election, apart from the periodic reminders we get from the planet that nothing is the same as it was — Hurricane Helene, Hurricane Milton, flooding in Spain, Typhoon Yagi (which killed nearly a thousand people across Asia and caused over $16 billion in damage), severe drought in the Northeast causing unprecedented spikes in wildfires in places like Massachusetts, a record-breaking wildfire season in Oregon, a million acres in California with some of the most active parts of the season still to come, and Canada, (which had its worst fire season in 2023, but many of the fires this year were “zombie fires” that burned underground over the winter), and the hottest summer on record in the U.S., 2.23ºF above the 20th century average.
Just because the threats to other institutions and freedoms are urgent and significant — democracy, female bodily autonomy, among others — doesn’t mean that climate becomes less of an emergency.
According to a United Nations report from earlier this year, just one year after many countries had pledged to move dramatically away from fossil fuels, virtually no progress has been made in cutting emissions or addressing global warming. Greenhouse gas emissions hit a record high last year and are not on track to decline much. There has been a lot of growth in renewable energy sources, but electricity demand is growing faster. It’s looking more and more unlikely that the global community will be able to limit warming to the levels they agreed to under the 2015 Paris agreement (1.5ºC or 2ºC at worst).
If you’re reading this newsletter, I’m assuming it’s because you care about our planet and all of its inhabitants, and the future ability for life to flourish here. I’m assuming, therefore, that you have voted already, or have a plan to.
When people ask me what they can do about climate change in their own daily lives, I always say that the most important climate action you can take is to vote, and to encourage or help others to vote. It doesn’t feel like a lot, and it doesn’t give you immediate satisfaction but it is actually the most consequential action you can take. Addressing climate change at the speed and scale it will require takes collective action, from governments and markets and corporations and all of us acting together.
When Donald Trump was president before, he rolled back more than 100 environmental laws and regulations, appointed three justices to the Supreme Court, forming a conservative majority that is actively hostile to environmental (and specifically greenhouse gas) regulation. He has courted big oil, promised to “drill, baby, drill,” especially on public lands, and would most likely attempt to undo the most important climate legislation passed anywhere in the world: the Inflation Reduction Act. He would be better positioned in a second term to “dismantle environmental and climate rules, aided by more sympathetic judges and conservative allies who are already mapping out ways to bend federal agencies to the president’s will,” according to the New York Times.
We truly cannot afford to go back — not to an administration where science is openly vilified and rejected. We no longer have the luxury of time.
Kamala Harris is the only choice if you care about the future of the planet. As Attorney General for the state of California, she prosecuted oil companies for violating environmental regulations. Her candidacy has been endorsed by environmental groups, who know what they’re talking about. Evergreen Action said this about her economic plan:
“It charts a course not just on cleaning up climate pollution, but for a more affordable, prosperous country that truly invests in our communities…Climate isn’t just one issue: It touches on every issue in our lives, from health care to justice to economic security. Kamala Harris and Tim Walz have shown they understand the critical role that clean energy and climate change play in our nation’s economy.”
So vote. And if you have already voted or have a plan to, talk to anyone you know who might be undecided about who to vote for or if they will vote at all about why you care so much, and why this election matters for climate change (but not just climate change). If there’s a chance of convincing someone you know who is planning to vote for Donald Trump that his policies will destroy decades of progress on environmental pollution, and make clean air and clean water a privilege for the prosperous instead of a universal right, have that conversation. Phone bank! If you live in a swing state, canvass!
If we don’t work to make the government and the society the one that best represents our values, someone else will. It’s a risk we can’t take.
As I often do, I will leave you with one of my favorite quotations about climate/environmental action, from Rebecca Giggs’ book, Fathoms: The World in a Whale:
Being hopeful follows from being useful; this has been my experience, and to be useful, it matters that you identify a part of the problem that you might see change in, using the talents and the resources that you possess. Hope is fellowship. Hope is in the doing. We may be the only species capable of imagining a future robbed of the wonder of encountering other species. This knowledge, in the end, gives us cause to start.
Democratically yours,
Tatiana