I am worried and very concerned, yes. My background is originally materials science.
From my perspective, the problem is that there is an environmental cost to every single material that you buy — be it gold, cotton, steel, or whatever. People forget that. The economy may benefit from materialism, but the environment certainly doesn’t.
Now, keep in mind that when I did my degree over 15 years ago, the ‘environment’ wasn’t even really discussed in that course. It was all about the properties and structure of materials.
First off, there is a lot of energy required to make materials. So if the country of manufacture uses coal power to generate their electricity, and they are not offsetting those emissions, then whatever physical goods you buy from them is contributing further to climate change.
Why? Because almost all materials either require either energy, heat, or other chemicals (which, in turn, require heat) in order to produce them. That’s a bit of a worry in itself. Because people are generally becoming more materialistic.
So for instance, hunters that shoot animals and think that is a ‘sustainable’ way of life, well I have news for you. If your gun is made of plastic or metal, where does that come from? It all comes from mines. And plastic comes from oil&gas. And your bullets. What are they made from? That too comes from mines. And the gunpowder contains chemicals like sulfur and potassium. And they have to come from somewhere too. And mines don’t last forever…
Currently, the manufacture of every single synthetic material results in carbon emissions somewhere along the line, if only from the energy that is required to create them. I think the correct term is “embodied energy”.
It wouldn’t be so bad if countries used more solar and wind power, but they don’t.
It wouldn’t be so bad if countries stopped land clearing and allowed forests to regenerate and even increase in size, but they don’t.
Even the production of natural materials requires space (land area), chemicals in the form of fertiliser (which, again, are mined in places like Nauru), pesticides and fuel (for transport).
Secondly, there are loads of (frequently toxic) chemicals that go into the manufacture of materials that you don’t ever see. So even if company “B” doesn’t produce carbon dioxide (or any toxic chemical) when manufacturing a final product, the chances are, company “B” buys other source materials from company “A”. And company “A” may well pump out something into the environment that is toxic. So even if company “B” is doing the right thing by the environment, is company “A” also doing the right thing? And what about company “C”, the distribution company? And the profit from the companies. What is being done with the profit? Are the stakeholders, the 1%ers, leading very unsustainable lives? http://www.vidaenigmatica.org/our-environmental-footprint/
Quite apart from the state of the Earth, one of the things that is a worry are all the rare-Earth elements that go into making electronic devices. Our civilisation is relying more and more on technology, but electronic devices are not recycled properly. How many elements do we extract from electronic waste? Gold. What about all the semiconductors? That is bad, because it means more new mines have to be opened. And where are new mines always opened? New mines are always opened in natural spaces. See here: https://ejatlas.org/
They are never opened underneath cities or urban areas, because people always complain (and rightly so). The trouble though is that nature cannot protect or defend herself against mining companies. You do not see endangered frogs protesting and hiring lawyers. Right?
So until we can start making biodegradeable electronics, well, I don’t think we are being very ‘smart’ at all. And what if we wanted to make biodegradeable electronics? Well, we’d have to start investigating things like chameleons, cuttlefish and electric eels. But see, there again is yet another problem — species are going extinct all over the place. so it’s going to be even harder to be more sustainable in future as this 6th great extinction goes ahead. See: http://www.iucnredlist.org/about/overview
It wouldn’t be so bad, except we are teaching ‘undeveloped’ countries to be more like us. It should be the other way around. We should be learning how to be more sustainable from them.
And then there’s the fact that all of the indigenous cultures the world over are not respected enough. The very ones that know most about TRUE sustainability. To the point where they have suicide rates that are 2, 4, 6, 8 or even 10x higher than the OECD average.
The worst for me is that the “conservatives”, the ones that think industrialisation is best thing since sliced bread —and therefore the answer to all of our current problems— when it is actually industrialisation & urbanisation that got us here in the first place. Yes conservatives are laughing at environmentalists behind our backs. Because they think we are all “hippies”. And yet, look where industrialisation has gotten us. Henry Ford has a lot to answer for.
Of course, if it wasn’t for the seldom-debated thermodynamic and electronic principles of science, industrialisation would never have even occurred in the first place. So the same people that never argue about electron-phonon interactions, well, when they are told about climate change and asked to give up something voluntarily (like their precious motorcar) for the sake of future generations, suddenly the most basic principles of science are not worth their weight in salt.
For some strange reason, now you have people that “don’t believe”. Climate change is all some twisted conspiracy theory. So to those deniers I ask: Do you believe in ipads? Washing machines? How about all the other electronic devices that work on basic and undisputable scientific principles? Because you can’t have it both ways. You put your trust in science every single day of your life. You can’t not believe one thing we tell you, when you’re benefiting from so many scientific discoveries every single minute of your working life. All climate change deniers should be forced to give up all electronic devices. How about that?
Now, once again, this wouldn’t be so bad if some of the 1%ers donated more of their ridiculous income levels towards environmental conservation. But most of them never do. Do they? Yes there are a few exceptions. But most billionaires always seem to care more about “human rights” issues.
And finally. Yes we do have the ability to change. But humans suffer from something called “social inertia”. That could well be our undoing.
Hardly anybody is talking about these issues day-to-day it seems. And if you do sell services and not products, and if you do point out something to a manufacturer that is not doing the right thing, then you just lost a potential client.
So you see, our civilisation is setting itself up for a massive failure. We depend on other species. We need them more than they need us.
And the only thing that really controls the earth’s atmosphere is really… biodiversity. If too much carbon is produced, then eventually a species will come along and take advantage of that. That is the way that it has been for millions of years. But, instead of letting nature do its job of stabilising our climate, we go and clear land all over the place. Forests being cut down over the place.
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