Climate Change: Humanity’s Code Red

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Transcript

Alyssa Hurst:

You're listening to RadioEd.

Lorne Fultonberg:

A University of Denver podcast.

Nicole Militello:

We're your hosts, Nicole Militello.

Lorne Fultonberg:

Lorne Fultonberg.

Alyssa Hurst:

And I'm Alyssa Hurst. If you're like me, you've been feeling pretty doom and gloom about climate change over the last several years. This year has been no different, even with the competing concerns of the pandemic. So far, we've seen fires ravage Greece, air quality continue to decline, and record heat waves bake the US. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change confirmed some of our worst fears in the first part of their sixth assessment report. In fact, the findings of that report had officials declaring a code red for humanity. As we wade through some of the IPCC's findings and look toward the future of addressing climate change on a global scale, we turn to Cullen Hendrix, professor in the Korbel School of International Studies and senior research advisor at the Center for Climate and Security. He shares with us his key takeaways from the report, what they mean for people today, and why he still holds out hope.

Alyssa Hurst:

Can you share with us what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change actually is and why we might or should trust them as a resource on climate change?

Cullen Hendrix:

So the IPCC was founded way back in 1988 as a body within the United Nations system. That's responsible for providing governments at all levels, and therefore by extension companies and communities and other types of organizations, with scientific information about climate change that they can use to develop climate policies. It has 195 country members, but the IPCC is really, I think, more a process than it is an organization. It's a process for establishing scientific consensus, a process that consists of thousands of experts from all over the world, including climatologists, hydrologists, physicists, engineers, social scientists... Pretty much every subset of science nerd you can imagine.

Cullen Hendrix:

And those scientists are split into teams of experts who review thousands, over 14,000 this time around to be more precise, studies that assess and consolidate what we know about climate change. Its extent, what's driving it, it's effects for natural and human systems, and what we think we know about attempts to mitigate climate change and adapt to its effects. It's really not a stretch to say that this is the most widely vetted and strongly vetted scientific document on earth. It's highly, highly credible, and it's all volunteer-based. No one's getting rich off of the work on this.

Alyssa Hurst:

Oh, that's really interesting. I didn't know all of those details of it. I've certainly learned a little bit about it, but it definitely lends some credibility to know how many people are working on this and that they're not making money off of it. I think that's such an important point.

Cullen Hendrix:

No, no. You would be amazed at the dedication and the incredible numbers of hours that scientists from all over the world are dedicating and have dedicated to trying to paint a full picture of the extent of climate change and its effects for all of us over the past several years.

Alyssa Hurst:

And can I ask real quick, how long does it take for them to prepare these reports?

Cullen Hendrix:

Well, I guess it's a little bit like Santa Claus. Santa Claus delivers the presents and then starts making the new toys that day after. The last IPCC report or synthesis report came out in 2014 and work for this report began way back in 2015. So this is the end of a five, now six year process.

Alyssa Hurst:

Wow. So the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released part of its sixth assessment with the most up-to-date information that we have on climate change, as you mentioned. So as somebody who studies climate change, was there anything in that report that you found particularly surprising or that was really the key takeaways for you?

Cullen Hendrix:

Oh, goodness. Well just first, the overall picture is extremely alarming. The changes that we are experiencing right now are of a magnitude that really hasn't occurred in hundreds or thousands, or even in some instances millions of years. The last time atmospheric carbon was at our current level, the level we're at now, was well over 2 million years ago. This was the time of the first humans on earth. So we're talking about way, way far before the dawn of what we now call civilization.

Cullen Hendrix:

In terms of my biggest takeaways, I'd say that one of them is that the 1.5 degree warming target which was outlined in the IPCC special report published just a couple of years ago is just not going to be met. The emissions reductions that would be necessary to hit that target just aren't going to be feasible. And a lot of bad things start happening at 1.5 degrees, from increasingly frequent storms and coastal flooding to mass extinctions of plant and animal life.

Cullen Hendrix:

I think that one of the most shocking findings regard sea level rise. The report indicates that sea levels will rise six to 10 feet, even capping emissions at the 1.5 degree level. So if we were incredibly successful at mitigating climate change from here forward, that's still going to happen. And by the end of the century, there's actually a remote chance that sea level rise could be up to 30 feet on average globally.

Cullen Hendrix:

That's an amazing number. Even 10 feet of rise... Huge populated areas like Miami, large parts of New Jersey, and even New York City would be massively inundated. And the effects in other parts of the world, like in China and South and Southeast Asia, would be even more extreme. And I think it's important to keep in mind that this iteration of the report, the working group one assessment report, only covers the physical science, that is the changes in climate and the environment, but they're coming down the pike. It doesn't get into the human impacts, which are the subject of the second working group's report and which I'm sure we'll talk about in a few minutes.

Alyssa Hurst:

Yeah, absolutely. Those are some pretty bleak figures for sure. And as you mentioned, the report notes that there has been a rise in extreme events since the 1950s. And we've certainly felt that for the last several years, but certainly this year with the fires that we've seen in Greece, Denver's declining air quality... What does an increase in these events mean in terms of development, especially for countries that have fewer resources or lack the robust infrastructure that we have here?

Cullen Hendrix:

Unfortunately I'd say that the effects are pretty much uniformly terrible. Here in the United States, as you point out, we see the negative impacts of things like heat waves and fires and droughts that they're having on our economy and on our wellbeing. And we live in one of the most advanced economies on earth and our infrastructure, for all its faults, is miles ahead of where many parts of the world are. I like to say that we live largely climate-controlled lives and for people in much of the developing and even middle-income world, be they farmers or fishers or herders or things like that, the environment is in fact the key determinant of their livelihood security. They do not lead climate-controlled lives. So promoting resilience and adaptability there will have to be really key, because the purely economic forecasts are very grim.

Cullen Hendrix:

So very credible reports coming out of Stanford, for instance, suggest that many countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America could see their economic output cut in half by the year 2100. Again, that's a staggering figure, but it really masks the human suffering and the lack of human development and progress in addressing things like hunger and infant and child mortality that would come from such significant economic contractions. I tend to think like a political economist, so I tend to throw out numbers related to GDP and whatnot, but it's important for us always to keep in mind that when we see those numbers on the page, those actually reflect real changes, and in this case unfortunately negative changes in the lives of many people the world over.

Alyssa Hurst:

I think that focus on the individual is really important to keep in mind here and not to get lost in some of these figures and miss the human side behind it. So I want to talk a little bit more about the outcomes of some of these extreme weather events. If indeed we do see these extreme events continue, what are some of the likely outcomes for the global community? And do you expect to see things like increased conflict, increased migration?

Cullen Hendrix:

I do think we can expect a lot of upheaval of various kinds, but before talking much about migration I just wanted to establish the fact that most of the time migration is one of the best adaptive strategies that we have for dealing with problems like climate change. And most of the time migration occurs peacefully and builds resilience at the national and international level. So think about the role that say something like remittances from Central American migrants to the United States play, the money they send home, plays in keeping the Central American economies and those societies afloat.

Cullen Hendrix:

But the climate change is going to increase the pace of migration and in doing so may cause frictions within and between countries, the kind of frictions that we see at the US Mexico border and indeed the kind of frictions that exist at the Mexican and Guatemalan border, those are likely to increase as the pace of human mobility increases. And I do think that we can anticipate a future of more armed conflict related to climate change, events like the Syrian Civil War. So in 2019 myself and a group of about 12 or 13 other scientists published a piece in the journal Nature that was based on expert assessments of both climate science and past patterns of armed conflict. And the conclusion that we came to as a group is that we would likely see by mid century a five-fold increase in the level of climate-related armed conflict under a business as usual four degree warming scenario. And that's a really significant change.

Alyssa Hurst:

I have to tell you, my eyes are popping out of my head throughout this conversation just with these figures and this information. One thing I'm curious about is if you could talk a little bit about the way that climate change influences conflict, because I feel like that's a connection not everybody draws.

Cullen Hendrix:

No, that's a great question. And this is a link that's hard for lots of people to wrap their heads around because what we know from the best available science on this subject is that climate change is typically not decisive in any given conflict. Rather, it loads the dice a bit and makes conflict a little bit more likely in a lot of very small ways, across many, many, many conflicts. So the effect of climate change on armed conflict can be large in the aggregate, even if when you look around in the world, you don't tend to think that most of these conflicts you're looking at are generated by climate change. Climate change doesn't cause a lot of the conflicts you see. It makes the conflicts you see more likely to happen and potentially worse.

Cullen Hendrix:

Now, even in circumstances where it seems like there's a pretty clear influence of climate change, like the historic drought that preceded the Syrian Civil War, it's really important to understand that that drought took place in a very specific political and economic and social context that was characterized by a very highly repressive government, a high degree of exclusion of people from participation in government and basically from receiving benefits from the government, and under immense social strain as a result of the Arab Spring that was going on around it. And so that highlights that even in a context like Syria, which is widely cited as being the most disastrous climate-sparked conflict that we've seen at least in recent history, there's more to the story.

Cullen Hendrix:

And so our job as social scientists is to understand what are the specific kinds of social and political and economic contexts in which these conflicts are likely to occur? And it's in societies that are highly dependent on agriculture, have exclusionary patterns of rule and political systems that don't force leaders to be responsive to the needs of the populace, and also unfortunately in countries where there's a high degree of social polarization.

Alyssa Hurst:

So we've been talking a little bit about these human impacts of climate change and that is what the second part of this IPCC assessment will focus on and that's expected to come out later this year. So can you talk a little bit more about what you expect to see come out of that report and what some of the findings you're going to be looking at might be?

Cullen Hendrix:

Well, technically I'm not at liberty to say a whole lot about that because I'm a contributing author to the working two group report. I can say that some of the topics we've already covered in terms of the effects of climate change for say economic development and human development and topics like threats to peace and stability and human migration are likely to loom very large in that report. You will also see elements of that report that targets specific sectors. There'll be discussions of the energy sector. There will also be discussions at the regional level to try and contextualize the differences in the way that say climate change will affect Northern Europe versus the way it will affect Southern Africa.

Cullen Hendrix:

And that report really builds on the previous report, because this is an interesting area of research insofar as the social scientists have to use the climate scientists, the hard scientists' or natural scientists' work, as a key input to how we think about the world, because their findings and the results of their projections of what climate change impacts will be moving forward are the context in which we social scientists have to extrapolate or imagine different ways in which the world will develop. And technically there's a way of doing this now called the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways, which are a set of different models for what future versions of the world will look like in terms of how much cooperation will we see in the international arena? Will we see convergence, i.e. a coming together of levels of development? Or will we see a highly unequal global society moving forward? All of these elements combine to shape the way that social scientists think about what our lives will be like in the future and how we will be interacting with our environment in the future.

Alyssa Hurst:

Interesting. So we talk about climate change a lot of times, and in this conversation we have, as these horrible effects that might happen someday or that are going to happen down the line. So from an international studies point of view, from the work that you have done what are you seeing already?

Cullen Hendrix:

Well, in short, someday is today. We're seeing these impacts now. I'll just give you a couple of them. We're already seeing climate change contributing to global conflict. For example, the Syrian Civil War, which I just discussed. We're seeing increasing tensions between countries that share rivers, like the conflict between Egypt and Ethiopia over the Grand Renaissance Dam project. We're seeing recession of Arctic sea ice, which is sparking a competition between the United States and Russia and other countries like China for influence over the anticipated shipping routes and economies that will emerge there and the natural resources that may lie under the ice sheet. And we're also seeing increasing conflict over fisheries' resources, which are critical for millions around the world and have been a significant source of international tensions in the past. And many of the current hotspots for maritime conflicts, so naval conflict, like the South China Sea are only anticipated to see their fisheries' resources decline even more, which is going to fuel competition over further dwindling resource bases.

Alyssa Hurst:

So the UN Secretary General echoed what you just said, which is that someday is today, when they said that this is a code red for humanity. So this isn't the first time that we've heard these dire warnings about climate change. Do you expect this one to get through to the international community in any way? And do you expect it to get through to the US leadership?

Cullen Hendrix:

Let me try and answer that by saying at the outset that climate change is a type of problem that really strains the abilities of humans and therefore our institutions and governments to take decisive action. The metaphor I often use is that climate change doesn't most of the time present itself as the wolf at the door that's threatening to blow your house down. What it presents itself as is a problem like termites. So it presents itself as thousands or millions of little small problems that are accumulating that collectively can have a massive impact. And so I like to say that the wolf at the door presents a more clear and present danger, so to speak, but the termites will also cause the roof to cave in.

Cullen Hendrix:

And the problem is that human beings, for whatever reason, are not very good at anticipating or figuring out ways to concretize the way that they're going to deal with changes that occur drastically. And so to the extent that climate change begins manifesting itself as these extremely dramatic events... So you can think about the flooding that we've seen in various places around the world or the wildfires we're seeing here in North America. To the extent that that continues, that's much more likely to catalyze political action around it than these slower incremental increases in temperature and declines in rainfall levels and those kinds of things which tend to be the bread and butter things that historically we've we've thought about when we think about global climate change.

Cullen Hendrix:

Thinking about the US leadership more specifically, I do think that that the Biden administration is probably the most climate forward administration that we have had. I can certainly say that it's the most climate forward in terms of the way that the Biden administration is directing the national security communities and the intelligence communities to essentially catalog and try to better understand and therefore devise response strategies to this threat.

Alyssa Hurst:

That's another question that I have, which is how much power does the United States have in terms of leading the global efforts toward climate change? Or how much responsibility should the US take?

Cullen Hendrix:

Well, those are two different questions. So the United States has immense responsibility, along with the economies of Europe, the developed economies of East Asia, and to a lesser extent the economies of the former Soviet block. Those countries essentially are responsible for about 70% of the historic emissions that are in the atmosphere that are causing the warming. So our obligation to do something about it and exert leadership is huge, also because this is still one of the world's largest economies and it's the most powerful, in military terms and economic terms, democracy. It should be leading the charge.

Cullen Hendrix:

The problem is that because of the disastrous climate record under the Trump administration, the ability of the United States to do that is going to be contingent on the Biden administration being able to reestablish the credibility of the United States as a faithful actor in trying to combat global climate change and also that the United States will do its part. A lot of people in the media have been pointing to the irony of the fact that essentially the day after the IPCC report was released the Biden administration, in fact Joe Biden himself, called on OPEC countries... So these were oil-producing countries. To increase the amount of oil that they were producing in order to bring down energy prices. Well, at best that's a mixed message we're sending.

Alyssa Hurst:

I also saw that news yesterday and the irony of it was not lost on me either. And I'd like to talk a little bit more about some of these things that countries are doing at the top levels of their governments to try and combat climate change. So various countries have made climate commitments, including the US, and efforts like the Paris Agreement exist to change the tides of climate change. So how effective are these international agreements? And are they enough at this point to avoid the bleak outlook that this report from the IPCC paints?

Cullen Hendrix:

Unfortunately, no, they are not enough. And that's in part because even if we shut off carbon emissions and methane emissions today, the global climate is a little bit like a freight train. It takes a long time to get moving, but it takes even longer to slow down even after you back off the throttle. So what you're referring to are these nationally determined contributions, where countries come up with targets for emissions reductions, which are usually expressed in terms of a percentage of their current emissions. Those are certainly welcomed, but in most instances these are targets that don't have any solid roadmaps for getting to the required emissions cuts and energy savings that would make the targets achievable.

Cullen Hendrix:

One way to think about it is like this. It's all fine and well to say that I'm going to lose weight and get in shape by the end of the year, but if I don't actually start eating right and working out, it's a pretty empty pledge, right?

Alyssa Hurst:

Yeah. So part of the thing that makes this sound so scary is that, like you said, it's a freight train. It's very hard to stop and what we're doing is not enough. So how likely do you think it is that this entire international community rallies together around this issue in a meaningful way in time? And have we seen the international community rally or come together in this way before that can give us some precedent?

Cullen Hendrix:

Well, unfortunately I think it feels like it's getting less likely, at least in the near term. Over the last basically decade or so we've returned to an almost Cold War-like period of intense economic and diplomatic and military competition between the two countries, in this case China and the United States, that we would really need to act as one in galvanizing global collective action around this threat. If they can't get on the same page it may all be for naught, because if the largest players in the mitigation problem or in addressing climate change cannot get their act together, no one else will because it wouldn't make sense for them to essentially take all the pain of making these emissions cuts when it's really going to be a drop in the bucket in terms of the actual effect for mitigating carbon dioxide build-up in the atmosphere.

Cullen Hendrix:

So the closest comparison and the one that the people who do what I do for a living often point to, the successful attempt at this was the efforts that existed in the 1980s that were to combat the growing hole in the ozone through the banning of chlorofluorocarbons, the CFCs like Freon, which used to be used in air conditioning and refrigeration. That venture was actually pretty successful. But in those days most of the CFCs were being made and used by a very small subset of the North America, Europe, and the developed economies of Asia. The problem was solvable. There were substitute products that were available. We still have AC and refrigerators, right? And the countries that were involved were on good diplomatic terms and wanted the same things. They all wanted to solve the problem.

Cullen Hendrix:

That's not necessarily the case with climate change. There are many, many more stakeholders. Many countries in the developing world... And they have some reason for arguing this. It's not an illegitimate argument. Argue that they need to become developed or they need to become wealthier before they will worry about cleaning up their act, especially given the fact that that's clearly what the advanced economies of the world did. In addition to that, this isn't about changing a couple of industries like air conditioning and refrigeration. This is about transitioning our entire economies or energy systems and ways of life to conform with less carbon-intensive models.

Cullen Hendrix:

This is not a problem for someone else to solve. Fundamentally it is a problem that we all have to solve, and it starts with our own actions and our own behaviors. And given that there are over seven billion of us running around, it's pretty difficult to coordinate all that activity.

Alyssa Hurst:

Yeah, definitely. So given all of these bleak figures and conversation points that we've been hitting on, what keeps you working on this issue? Besides the deep need for the work like yours, is there some element of hope that keeps you going or that you could share with us?

Cullen Hendrix:

We are living through one of the most consequential moments in the history of humanity's relationship with our planet. And sorry, Elon and Jeff, this is still the only planet that we have. And as you point out, the picture is often bleak, but what else is there but to keep trying to understand our relationship with our environment and bend it in a more sustainable direction, not just for ourselves, but for our children and their children and so on? There really is no alternative. Having said that, I do actually hold out some hope. We've been through bad times before. We're living through one of those now. And we're still here because frankly we can take it and we can adapt and build new ways of living and doing. We need to find the will. And maybe this is the code red that will help in finding that will.

Alyssa Hurst:

For more of Cullen Hendrix's climate expertise, visit our show notes at du.edu/radioed. Tamar Chapman is our managing editor. James Swearingen arranged our theme. I'm Alyssa Hurst, RadioEd's executive producer and today's host. This is RadioEd.