Without Anyone Noticing, We Are Closer To The Distruction Of Our Planet

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On the 17th of April, Italians were called to vote in a national referendum, on the extension of licenses to extract petrol and gas from the sea.

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On the 17th of April, Italians were called to vote in a national referendum, on the extension of licenses to extract petrol and gas from the sea. The government, the media and the economic circles, all took position against the referendum, claiming that 2.000 jobs were at a stake. The proponents of the referendum (among them five regions), lost.
Italy has been following a consistent trend, after the Summit on Climate Change (Paris December 2015), in which all countries (Italy included) took a solemn engagement to reduce emissions. Two weeks after the Summit, the British Prime Minister took the initiative to extend the licenses to extract coal, explaining that at stake were 10.000 jobs. Then it was India’s time, to declare that licenses for coal powered stations would be increased, as the country development comes before environment. To this, the Polish government declared that it had no intentions to reduce the use of polish coal, in the short term. Then Hungary made similar statement, about its use of fossil energy..  Meanwhile, no significant initiative for emission’s control has been announced after Paris. And all the Republican candidates have announced that, once in the White House, they will declare dead the agreements reached in Paris, where Obama took a crucial role. In fact, several republican initiatives are asking the Supreme Court to cancel measures taken by the administration to limit pollutions. And with different accents, all the xenophobe and right wing parties which are emerging everywhere in Europe, have indicated that they do not consider the Paris agreement as a priority in their agenda.
The main criticism of the scientific community, on the Paris agreements, was that while the accepted   goal was to limit the increase of the world temperature to 2 degrees, compared with that at the beginning of the industrial revolution (while accepting that 1.5° would have been a more adequate target), in reality the sum of all individual targets freely established by the countries, was coming to at least 3.5 degrees. The idea was that with further negotiations, the target of 2° would finally emerge, also thanks to new technologies.
But now, an equally crucial flaw is emerging. No control of implementation of the agreement will be done before 2030. Until then, each country is responsible for implementing its target, and also for checking the implementation of its commitment.
It would have been interesting to see a similar philosophy, adopted on a tax level. Every citizen can decide how much tax he pledges to pay, and he will be responsible until 2.030 to check that he is keeping its engagement. Only in 2030, mechanisms of verification will come in place. And those mechanism will bear no enforcements or penalties. They would just indicate to public shame those who did not keep their engagements.
Of course, the fact that industrialized countries, like Italy and United Kingdom, far from reducing sources of pollution enlarge their life, is not a good example for developing countries, who are now coming into industrialization, and have to limit their emissions because since the 19 century industrialized country have been polluting the world. In fact, subsidies to the fossil industries, according to the World Bank, run now at 88 billions per year. According to a report from the Overseas Development Institute G20 countries spend more that twice what the top 20 private companies are spending on finding new reserves of oil, gas and coal, and do so with public money…Meanwhile, the Fund for helping underdeveloped countries to adopt new technologies, established at 100 billions in Paris, has yet to be completed…Of course a check up is due by 2030…
Well, every week we receive alarming data on how the climate is deteriorating much faster than we thought. I am not talking of the uninterrupted news about natural catastrophes. I am talking of the cries of alarm that the scientific community is launching from all over the world.
The National Centre for Climate Restoration from Australia has published a kind of summary about all those calls, in an alarming report by Prof. Kevin Andersen of the UK Tyndall Centre for Climate Change. Let us quote just the most recent ones.
According to new data released by the US National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration, measurements taken at the Marina Loa Observatory in Hawaii show that carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration jumped by 3.08 parts per million (ppm) during 2015, the largest year-to- year increase in 56 years of research. 2015 was the fourth consecutive year that CO2 grew more than 2ppm.
Scientist say that they are shocked and stunned by the “unprecedented NASA temperatures figures for February 2016, which are 1.65 higher than the beginning of the nineteen century and around 1.9° C warmer than the pre-industrial level.
That means, Prof. Michael Mann says, that “we have no carbon budget left for the 1.5° target and the opportunity for holding the 2°C is rapidly fading unless the world starts cutting emissions hard right now. The current el Nino conditions have contributed to the record figures, but compared to previous big El Ninos, we are experimenting blowout temperatures.” We have just to look at Venezuela, where now public offices work three days per week to cut water and power usage, to have a glimpse of our future world.
Stefan Rahmstorf of the Potsdam Institute of Climate Change Research says we are now “ at a kind of climate emergency”.
In 2014, the US National Academy of Science analyzed in detail how a major drought in Syria – from 2007 to 2010 – was a crucial factor in the civll war that began in 2011. More than a million people left their farms to go to crowded and unprepared cities, where they were inspired by the Arab Spring to rise up against a dictatorial regime which was not providing any help.
Baher Kamal did publish a two part series on the impact of Climate Change on the Middle East and North of Africa region, which makes clear the region, could become largely uninhabitable by the year 2.040. Just to give an example, the Nile could loose up to 80% of its flow. Bahrain, Kuwait, Lebanon, Palestine, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the Emirates are at a very high risk. But so is also Algeria, Iraq, Jordan Libya, Morocco, Syria, Tunisia and Yemen.
Dr. Moslem Shathout, deputy chairman of the Arab Union for Astronomy and Space, considers that Arab North African countries are the most affected, by large, by the climate change impact.
In other words, we have to expect a mass of displaced people, on the shores of the Mediterranean, and therefore of Europe. The category of climate’s refugee does not exist in any legislation.
While is a fact that Europe’s population was 24% at the beginning of the nineteen-century, it will be 4% at the end of the present one. Europe will lose 40 million people that will need to replace by immigrants, to keep productivity and pensions running.
But the arrival of just 1.3 million people, two third young and educated, has created a massive political crisis, and the unravelling of Europe.
The climate refugees will be of all age, and many from the agricultural sector, the most conservative and uneducated of the Arab world.
Do Mr. Renzi and Cameron, who for electoral reason play the chord of a few lost jobs from the fossil industry, have any idea on how to face this imminent future? Probably no, but they do not care. This problem will not be during their tenure…. So climate change is not in the political agenda as a very top priority. And media follow events, not processes, so no cries of alarm; yet, from event to event, a continuation of disasters make a catastrophe…Then, everybody will realize…But as a say goes, God pardons, man sometimes, nature never.

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* Italian-Argentine journalist. Co-founder and former Director General of Inter Press Service (IPS). In recent years he also founded Other News, a service that provides “information markets eliminate”. Other News. In English: www.other-net.info In Spanish: www.other-news.info/noticias/

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::autore_::by Roberto Savio *::/autore_:: ::cck::1228::/cck::