Yesterday, I wrote an angry response to COP28, then deleted before posting because it didn't help, or add anything. A day later now, past the self-imposed "watch an ice cube fully melt before responding," I will try more creativity, reflection, and at least one solution. As I wrote in my March 17, 2018 post, the goal is "-- to speak the truth, and as [U. S. Poet Laureate from 2019-2022] Joy Harjo noted, 'to sing' while we are doing it."
For writer Douglas Adams, the number was 42. That was the "Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything" calculated over 7.5 million years by supercomputer Deep Thought in Adams' book The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. For us, that number is 198 because that is the number of parties at COP required to pass meaningful phase-out of fossil fuels thus preserving ecosystems in sea, land, and sky for billions of humans and nonhumans. If 197 parties say yes, and one says no, that means no deal. Future generations on a climate-degraded Earth will look back on this rule with astonished disgust. Sir Alec Issigonis was the car designer credited with the idea "a camel is a horse designed by committee." One could say yesterday's COP28 decision was begging nations to "Please, please, please, optionally, you know, if it's okay, if it doesn't affect your income or status, if it doesn't upset your Big Oil companies or high-level politicians, could you consider, maybe, sort-of 'transition away' from coal, oil and gas, any amount and timeline to be solely determined by you? Cough" This is worse than a camel posing as a horse. It calls to mind "Seven Social Sins" cited by Wiki as "a list by Frederick Lewis Donaldson that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi published in his weekly newspaper Young India on October 22, 1925":
"1. Wealth without work.
2. Pleasure without conscience.
3. Knowledge without character.
4. Commerce without morality.
5. Science without humanity.
6. Religion without sacrifice.
7. Politics without principle."
The "sacrifice" part rings strong. A well-known poet cried as he told me, and others, his son scolded him for not sacrificing enough regarding the climate emergency. In coming years, the vast majority of us will have to sacrifice more. The longer the COP waits to phase-out fossil fuels, the greater the sacrifices, and the more pain, suffering, and death. It would be better to take the phase-out medicine now in 2023.
The Guardian Environment Editor Damian Carrington wrote December 14, 2023 in "Cop28 failed to halt fossil fuels’ deadly expansion plans – so what now?," "Petrostates fought fiercely against the call from 130 nations at Cop28 for a fossil fuel phase-out. That is because they are engaged in a colossal fossil fuel phase-up, already working on double the extraction that the planet can cope with."
At least "130 nations" is better than the reported "80 countries" from last year, but out of respect for island nations and most vulnerable countries and nonhumans, progress must be faster and more. Regarding these numbers, the entire European Union, with 27 countries, counts as one COP party.
Former U. S. Vice President Al Gore was quoted December 4, 2023, by The Guardian's Oliver Milman in "Agreement to phase out fossil fuels would be huge for humanity, says Gore," "There is only one measure of success for Cop28: will it include a commitment to phase out fossil fuels or not[?]”
Instead of Carbon Capture and Storage, it seems COP28 was, like 27 COPs before, more about "Politician Capture and Storage."
Marshall Islands' head of delegation, John Silk, was more gracious than me. BBC.com Climate Reporter Georgina Rannard quoted him Decemeber 13, 2023, in "More island nations join criticism of deal," "I came from my home in the islands to work with you all to solve the greatest challenge of our generation. I came here to build a canoe together for my country. [par break] Instead we have built a canoe with a weak and leaky hull, full of holes. Yet, we have to put it into the water because we have no other option [ . . . . ] And so we must sail this canoe. It has a strong sail - the intent to transition away from fossil fuels is progress that we have fought hard for."
From another angle, The Guardian's Fiona Harvey and Nina Lakhani clarified the "hypocrisy" of "rich countries" claiming to be "climate champions" December 12, 2023, in "Last-ditch attempt to forge fresh Cop28 deal after original rejected." They quoted Meena Raman, "a climate policy expert at her 16th Cop with the Third World Network" who said, "The global stocktake has been full of dishonesty and hypocrisy from the global north, especially the US and umbrella group of countries, who are suddenly claiming to be climate champions talking about the 1.5C north star, while refusing to talk about their historical emissions and historical responsibility. [par break] This is a super-red line for the United States. They don’t want to talk about equity, and insist that the text refers to all parties without any differentiation. [par break] They are setting up the developing countries for failure so they can blame, and show themselves as climate champions even as they are expanding fossil fuel production and consumption … This is hypocrisy, it’s climate colonialism, and climate injustice.”
I agree with Raman these are huge problems.
In a related matter, three posts ago I wrote, "I recently told a group where I was invited to speak that watching University of Manchester professor Kevin Anderson interview Johan Rockström, co-director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, made me grateful to be a climate poet because 'Rockström seemed restrained by his position, but a poet is free of what I call The Four Horsemen of Distraction: stakeholders, funding sources, constituencies, and agendas.'" COP28 had these four "horsemen" in "rich countries" vs. laws of physics for what is quickly needed to support human and nonhuman health on most of Earth.
Imagining a future COP, sans greenwashing and distraction, this is from my next book Sharks and Flowers:
Big Oil Company Press Release at COP300
We understand
there are only
10 million humans left.
We’re not sorry.
This was war,
and we won.
So what if most
everything on Earth
must die?
We underwent
extensive blame
and denial therapy.
Reader,
you and your children
are the problem.
It’s not our fault
oil kills people
and nonhumans.
We’re not responsible
for anything
but making money.
We’re not saints.
We own politicians
and corporations.
Remember your
ancestors elected them,
and bought our products.
Comments on an earlier draft of the COP28 proposed agreement/global stocktake were revealing as shown below.
Harvey, Lakhani, and Patrick Greenfield reported at The Guardian December 10, 2023 in "‘Come with solutions’: Cop28 president calls for compromise in final meetings," "Mary Robinson, chair of The Elders and former president of Ireland, asked for all countries to show true leadership, as Cop28 reached its critical final days. 'Those at the negotiating table at Cop28 are steering the course of our shared future [but] the science tells us we are in grave danger of bequeathing our children a completely unliveable world,' said Robinson. [par break] 'The nations thwarting progress are those with the greatest stakes in fossil fuels but also the most plentiful resources to act. Saudi Arabia and allies are holding talks hostage. However it is not the only country hindering progress: the USA, China, the EU and India have been happy to hide in the shadows cast.'”
In addition to COPs becoming a Big Oil charade, the process has also become a war of survival for some countries. On one side, the world's top climate scientists claim island nations will be lost to sea rise unless a phase-out of fossil fuels happens fast. On the other side, Xie Zhenhua, China’s climate envoy, was quoted by The Guardian's Fiona Harvey December 9, 2023 in "Cop28: China ‘would like to see agreement to substitute renewables for fossil fuels’," "I’ve already talked with the minister of one oil-producing country. And he said to me 80% to 90% of his country’s income depends on oil production. So if we phase out all the fossil energy, including oil, how will their country survive or develop?”
Regarding the new global stocktake draft, Samoa’s minister of natural resources and environment, Toeolesulusulu Cedric Schuster, was quoted by The Guardian's Adam Morton in its COP28 blog updates, "If we do not have strong mitigation outcomes at this Cop then this will be the Cop where 1.5C would have died. We will not sign our death certificates. We cannot sign on to text that does not have a strong commitment on phasing out fossil fuels."
Similarly, John Silk, head of delegation for Republic of Marshall Islands, was quoted in more of The Guardian's COP28 blog updates, "The Republic of the Marshall Islands did not come here to sign our death warrant. We came here to fight for 1.5 and for the only way to achieve that: a fossil fuel phase out. What we have seen today is unacceptable. We will not go silently to our watery graves. We will not accept an outcome that will lead to devastation for our country, and for millions if not billions of the most vulnerable people and communities."
Similarly, Teresa Anderson, Global Climate Lead at ActionAid, was quoted in more of The Guardian's COP28 blog updates, "[ . . . . ] It legitimises debunked technologies such as carbon capture and storage. It’s a paper fan being waved at a burning house. After all the momentum and hope that has been building here, it’s horrible. It’s devastating."
Given billions of human and nonhuman lives at stake, one possible solution would be for the global community to incentivize "Saudi Arabia and allies" with huge economic and social benefits to get a fossil fuel phase-out approved at COP29 November 11-24, 2024 "[tentative]" in Baku, Azerbaijan, or COP30, 2025, in Belém do Pará, Brazil near the Amazon forest. Otherwise, small-scale geoengineering seems likely with significant risk of wars due to intended or unintended effects on different countries. Large-scale geoengineering, if even possible over 1°C [above year 1850 baseline], would bring a financial burden for many, or all, future human generations, and serious risk of the dreaded "termination effect" if financing were cut for any reason. Tim Krueger, a James Martin Fellow at University of Oxford Geoengineering Programme, made a great Youtube about 3 minutes long explaining "The Termination Effect on GeoEngineering."
My favorite recent climate-related items are a short video of a "tipping point"; "Cabal of Oil Producers": Climate Scientist Kevin Anderson Slams Corporate Capture of COP28" at Democracy Now!; "COP28: will there be an agreement to phase out fossil fuels?" by Kate Abnett and Alison Withers December 7, 2023; "Sally Weintrobe: Climate Psychology & the struggle to care; Narcissistic v's Lively Entitlement," at Nick Breeze ClimateGenn; "Time to say ‘the F-words'? A fossil fuel fight takes center stage at the COP28 climate summit" updated December 4, 2023 by Sam Meredith at nbcphiladelphia.com; "At Cop28 it feels as if humanity’s shared lifeboat is sinking. There are only hours left to act" by Vanessa Nakate December 12, 2023 at The Guardian; "My Turn: Can we face climate truth and respond together?" by Russ Vernon-Jones modified November 20, 2023 at Greenfield Recorder; and "Our Global Economy Won't Survive | Sandy Trust" Youtube at Planet: Critical.
Regarding the last item above, actuary Sandy Trust explains vital information for pension fund managers, bankers, financial services, and all those depending on them. Trust said, "You don't have to be an astronaut to know that mucking with your life support system is a pretty bad plan. [ . . . . ] By the time you get to 3°C [above year 1850 baseline] [ 49:19 on video] you're somewhere between 40 to kind of 80 percent GDP damage depending on your rate of warming. [ . . . . ] At what point do we expect 50 percent GDP destruction? Somewhere between 2070 and 2090. [ . . . . ] You don't have to think too much to start to imagine what sort of events in terms of food stress, heat stress, sea level rise, etc, would lead to that scale of damages, and whether it's recoverable." Readers of this blog may recall former Harvard Fellow Ye Tao was quoted, "two degrees is already passed [no matter what we do]" and "At three degrees C [above year 1850 baseline] we're talking about planetary scale biological annihilation of any multicellular species [ . . . ]"
In the past year I'm grateful for 4,260 pageviews from Singapore, noted by Michelle Zhu September 21, 2023 at businesstimes.com.sg as "South-east Asia’s most likely climate leader" based on a 2023 survey by Iseas – Yusof Ishak Institute.
I'm also grateful for 308 pageviews last week from Luxembourg. Wiki notes its capital is "one of the four institutional seats of the European Union (together with Brussels, Frankfurt, and Strasbourg) and the seat of several EU institutions, notably the Court of Justice of the European Union, the highest judicial authority."