Greta Thunberg's UN Speech

 Greta Thunberg's UN speech

It has been a few years since I last posted here, because the majority of the world does not care. This young lady will make all the difference.

Transcript of her UN speech on 23rd September 2019

Greta Thunberg 

"My message is that we’ll be watching you. This is all wrong. I shouldn’t be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean. Yet, you all come to us young people for hope. How dare you? You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words, yet I’m one of the lucky ones.

People are suffering. People are dying. Entire ecosystems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction and all you can talk about is the money and fairytales of eternal economic growth. How dare you?

For more than 30 years, the science has been crystal clear. How dare you continue to look away and come here saying that you are doing enough when the politics and solutions needed are still nowhere in sight?

You say you hear us and that you understand the urgency, but no matter how sad and angry I am, I do not want to believe that because if you really understood the situation and still kept on failing to act, then you would be evil and that I refuse to believe.

The popular idea of cutting our emissions in half in 10 years only gives us a 50% chance of staying below 1.5 degrees and the risk of setting off irreversible chain reactions beyond human control. 50% may be acceptable to you, but those numbers do not include tipping points.

Most feedback loops, additional warming hidden by toxic air pollution or the aspects of equity and climate justice. They also rely on my generation sucking hundreds of billions of tons of your CO2 out of the air with technologies that barely exist. So, a 50% risk is simply not acceptable to us, we who have to live with the consequences.

How dare you pretend that this can be sold with just business as usual and some technical solutions? With today’s emissions levels, that remaining CO2 budget will be entirely gone within less than eight and a half years. There will not be any solutions or plans presented in line with these figures here today because these numbers are too uncomfortable and you are still not mature enough to tell it like it is.

You are failing us, but the young people are starting to understand your betrayal. The eyes of all future generations are upon you. And if you choose to fail us, I say, we will never forgive you. We will not let you get away with this. Right here, right now is where we draw the line. The world is waking up and change is coming, whether you like it or not. Thank you.

Thank you."

Do you believe in the Gaia Theory?

Is the Gaia Theory possible?

First it must be explained what the theory is, and the best way to do this is to link you to the Wikipedia listing. James Lovelock, the author has proposed that the Earth is a self-regulating system.

Using this hypothesis it should be possible to identify what changes are already under way due to the actions the human race has made to the planets life support systems.

We are already experiencing a change in the local climate in many parts of the world, and this trend is expected to continue. Locally we had a storm that was rated the worse in a 100 years and flooded houses for the first time ever, took out the power and trapped us in a restaurant for 3 hours due to the water.

Other parts of the world are experiencing uncommon draughts and wild fires. Nature is stressed and confused and is likely to react strongly over the next few years.

Or is this all just normal and has nothing to do with the global population and all the consumption of fossil fuels? How are you going to explain the climate changes to your grand children?

Clean Energy from water

The trend to clean energy has started

Now that the Paris COP21 has concluded with significant progress, the race is on to create a large scale, zero emission power generator. The companies that solve the many problems will become a global player and disrupt many industries, including oil. coal, gas, power transmission and the many support services.

Each country should be aware that the large companies will try to buy up solution companies or take out patents to stop progress. This practise must be managed and control for the benefit of all, not just a few.

Hydrogen has to be the answer. 

In Greek, hydrogen means "water-former".

Because it is contained in water and after separation becomes a high efficiency fuel. The waste product is water. Traditionally hydrogen has not been cheap enough to produce for large applications, but that might be changing. The Space Shuttle Main Engine burnt hydrogen with oxygen, producing a nearly invisible flame at full thrust.

The Chinese maybe first.

Using three abundant sources on earth, enough hydrogen could be produced to power every electricity generating station in the world, or could be used for local district micro-generation to avoid power transmission lines. Check out this article from the Hong Kong University

Time to think about Climate Change

If you had not noticed, the world is changing

Most people are too busy taking care of their own lives and those of their immediate family to be worried about climate change. But if you watch what is happening around the world, you will see more "Natural Disasters" on TV, Floods in Peru, draught and water rationing in California, Arctic ice melting at an every increasing rate, and limited coverage on the causes.

It has been forecast that as the Arctic ice melts, sea levels will rise, which is already happening, little is talked about the reduced weight this reduction makes on the earth structure beneath.

As the weight distribution is move around the globe, expect more earth quakes, tsunamis, draughts, floods, fires and increased desertification.

This all sounds very depressing, and it is.

What can a single individual make to stop this self created problem from getting worse. The answer, very little, so why bother, enjoy life, leave it to somebody else. There are more immediate problems such as no jobs.

Remember the Cree Prophecy:

Only after the last tree has been cut down,
Only after the last river has been poisoned,
Only after the last fish has been caught,
Then you will find that money cannot be eaten.

Collectively there is a chance to make a difference, so what would you suggest?

Aircraft do harm the environment

Just a post to make you think. How many aircraft are flying at the moment?. how many are overhead right now? Where did it come from and where is it going? All questions we ask our selves from time to time. There is now the opportunity answer all these questions in real time. Head over to Flight Information and see for yourself.

Sandy, is this the future?

Hurricane Sandy

The Hurricane Sandy, should show to everybody the power of Nature. Never has a Hurricane been more destructive or effected more people than Sandy. This is all part of the expected changes already taking place to our only climate.

Naturally there are many people that still claiming this is just a one off event, but is it? Time will tell but this could be a tipping point that makes ordinary people start to ask questions and demanding some answers.

On 20th January is a UK vote on moving clocks forward one hour

There is a compaign in the UK to change the UK clocks one hour forward. This will have an important effect on reducing CO2 emissions. A link is here for more information. Every country should consider adjusting the clocks to minimise emissions, it's cheap and effective.

It's just an idea

A major use of electricity is heating water. I used my electric kettle this morning and thought, do we really need to heat water to boiling point everytime? How about a small thermostat in each kettle so you could set it to switch off at a lower temperature. This could save a significant amount of energy without loss.

What do you think, have you ideas?

PS some business ideas at www.drachsi.com

What is just one person do?

One fills so insignificant when considering the problems facing the world on climate change. Yes, I have done most of the normal things, low energy lamps, insulated my property, reduced car journeys, transferred heat from a room heated by the sun, to other parts of the house. Now the big step.

I am installing 12.5Kw of photovoltaic panels, what I don't use is sold to the local energy company at a profit. I will be able to measure the C02 saved. My contribution to future generations and my own pocket.

Pete

If you are concerned about the environment, here is an idea for everybody

Create your own environmental website for free. The services is provided by Microsoft. I have created a simple example website, to show what is possible at Business Services. When you have your website ready, come back and post details here.

Enjoy

Do you think this solution might work?

The world will always have different opinions about Climate Change, how to limit temperature increases, what does it cost, who pays, when must we start? Then there are the Climate Change sceptics.

Some countries like Germany are setting their own Climate Change agenda, high electricity prices, high tax on petrol, subsidy's for solar energy, and a good public transport network. Now they have to tackle the coal burning power station companies.

Just suppose for example. Jamaica reduced it's CO2 emissions. Insulating their houses, more public transport., then subsidised the installation of solar panels and painted all roof tops white. There is enough sun in Jamaica to dramatically reduce other forms of electricity generation. This costs money. So how to fund it?

This is where the WTO (World Trade Organisation) IMF (International Monetary Fund) and rating agencies like Mood's, Standard & Poors come in. Each country is rated for it's current CO2 emissions and then on a sliding scale, the IMF offers low cost loans for each CO2 reduction step. The rating agencies increase the county's credit rating, and the WTO sets low global tariffs for all exports.

Every country can do their own thing, in their own way, in their own time. But after a date to be set, these organisations start to change the ratings and rates charged. So would something like this work? Politicians are in the end just politicians, most are not leaders and certainly not risk takers. The world will only agree at some point in the future when it is already to late.

So what do you think? would it work?

Managing Climate Change, is a little bit like having life or home insurance, you hope you never need it, but if you do, then you are thankful you paid the premiums.

Additional Thought

Using current satellite technology, it would be very easy to view areas of the world that are using "slash and burn" to clear the Rainforest. Could this not be another way to make countries pay higher rates of interest on borrowed money?

See the video

Some additional information on Tar Sands in Canada

I have spent these last few months trying to reduce my carbon foot print, by limiting journey's, reduce heating and adding insulation to the house. Now is time to be more active after the disaster of Copenhagen. I have updated one of nmy environmental Lens on Squidoo. Hope you will join me and make comments.

The disaster of Tar Sands

Drachsi

Check out this link

A link to information found in the Guardian Weekly is worth checking out. It makes you think if nothing else http://bit.ly/worldfree

Prince Charles RainForest Project

Prince Charles has launched his new YouTube video, please take time to view, and afterwards think about his message.

Visit his website for more information at http://www.rainforestsos.org/

In the 1980's Germany had the right idea

In the 1980's, a German car sticker carried the following environmental message. It is as true today as it was then. There is a lot of information on Wikipedia on the Cree Nation if you are interested. I have modified the image, and add the English translation, I acknowledge all copyrights.

A great idea for the world

Check out this product, seems a great idea. http://www.novacem.com/

"TheBox" from the BBC

A super article and project from the BBC is called "TheBox" Check out what is happening here

Just see how everything we do, adds to Climate Change.

World First. A Climate Change Law

A Blog for comments on Climate Change

Just created, but will be updated shortly. If you like the basic idea, please post a comment.