The 1.5°C Reader
1 NOVEMBER 2021
Steve D. Whittaker, PhD, MSc - edited by Sherine Andreine Powerful, MPH
Since the 2020 storm season started, the Caribbean region has seen (perhaps) unprecedented downpours disrupt the daily lives of many communities and citizens. Even the most unorganized of cyclonic systems resulted in substantial damages* to infrastructure in Dominica, St. Lucia, Jamaica, Guadeloupe, Antigua & Barbuda, St. Kitts & Nevis, and Trinidad & Tobago. And yet, despite flooded streets, sweeping power outages, and buildings literally sliding off their foundations, many regional residents defer, if not decline, to act or adapt, even as the risks of these incidents increase. Almost entire governments, a plethora of private sector representatives, and a generous portion of the general public continue to operate as though these extreme weather events are within some familiar range of hurricane-adjacent horror, as opposed to reacting to the aforementioned incidents. It’s as if these events fail to serve as evidence of the existential crisis that is a change in global climate.
→ READ MORE ON TENEMENT YAAD WEBSITE
Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley: #COP 26 World Leaders Summit Speech (UNCC - YouTube)
Climate Tracker / Vishani Ragobeer: "The best of both worlds? Guyana wants to be a low-carbon oil producer"
Climate Tracker / Zico Cozier: "‘A matter of life or death’"
Jamaica Gleaner: "Antigua, Tuvalu to seek justice over climate change damage"
The Guardian: "Climate experts warn world leaders 1.5C is ‘real science’, not just talking point"
The Guardian: "What is deforestation – and is stopping it really possible?"
The Guardian: "US rejoins coalition to achieve 1.5C goal at UN climate talks"
28 OCTOBER 2021
JAKE HESS, RESEARCHER AT THE WORLD BANK (WASHINGTON)
The World Bank is facing the biggest test in its history. Next week, Bank executives are attending the Cop26 global climate summit in Glasgow, where key decisions about the fate of humanity will be made. If the Bank wants to achieve its official goals of eradicating poverty and building shared prosperity, now is the time to step up. Because nothing will increase poverty and undermine prosperity more than runaway global warming.
I have watched this drama unfold from the inside, because I work at the World Bank. Sadly, I have little confidence that my employer will become a climate leader any time soon.
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15 OCTOBER 2021 - BILL MCKIBBEN
“There are economic as well as non-economic costs that result from both extreme weather events like hurricanes and floods and slow onset climatic processes such as sea level rise and salinization,” he said in an email. “Loss and damage includes permanent and irreversible losses such as to lives, livelihoods, homes and territory, for which an economic value can be calculated, and also to non-economic impacts such as the loss of culture, identity and biodiversity, which cannot be quantified in monetary terms.”
→ READ MORE ON YALE ENVIRONMENT 360
26 october 2021
Countries' latest climate plans will deliver just a tiny percentage of the emissions cuts needed to limit global heating to 1.5C, the United Nations said on Tuesday in a damning assessment ahead of the COP26 climate summit. Just days before the Glasgow meeting, which is being billed as crucial for the long-term viability of the Paris climate deal, the UN's Environment Programme said that national plans to reduce carbon pollution amounted to "weak promises, not yet delivered".
19 October 2021
'Seriously' podcast series
British-Jamaican audio artist and DJ Weyland McKenzie-Witter explores the sometimes uneasy relationship between the Black and the Green, as political movements and ideas: "As the climate catastrophe becomes worse, the effect it is having on our homelands is something affecting Black people uniquely. With the face of climate activism being so predominantly white, and with Black political attention elsewhere, which voices will be heard?"
21 OCTOBER 2021
A huge leak of documents seen by BBC News shows how countries are trying to change a crucial scientific report on how to tackle climate change. The leak reveals Saudi Arabia, Japan and Australia are among countries asking the UN to play down the need to move rapidly away from fossil fuels. It also shows some wealthy nations are questioning paying more to poorer states to move to greener technologies. This "lobbying" raises questions for the COP26 climate summit in November.
15 October 2021
THE GUARDIAN'S FULL STORY PODCAST SERIES
In the second part of our special podcast series, we travel across the Pacific to islands in Papua New Guinea where people are being forced to leave due to rising sea levels, and to the tiny nation of Tuvalu where people are fighting to remain. We speak to islanders who have been forced to make devastating decisions due to a climate crisis not of their making
→ LISTEN TO THE PODCAST ON THE GUARDIAN'S WEBSITE
14 OCTOBER 2021 - HANNAH THOMAS-PETER, CLIMATE CHANGE CORRESPONDENT
Grenada's minister for climate and environment has told Sky News that the COP26 climate summit is a "make or break" moment for the survival of dozens of island nations.
Simon Stiell said: "I think it's make or break. The support of the international community... is absolutely essential for us, and other developing nations... for our survival. And our right to thrive - survival is such a base term. I want more for my children than just to survive. I want more for my people. I want more for myself than just to survive. We need to be able to thrive."
→ READ AND WATCH MORE ON SKY NEWS
What will the world be like if temperatures rise by 1.5, 2 and 3°C, leading to an inevitable rise in sea level? This is the question that Climate Central, an NGO working on global warming, has tried to answer, which has modeled the rise in sea levels possible with such a rise in temperature in more than 180 places around the globe.
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