As the United Nations’ COP29 climate change conference came to an end, it became clear that the COP conferences (29 total since 1995) have failed completely to stop the environmental crisis that is enveloping us.
This year’s conference was not only held in Azerbaijan, one of the largest oil producers in the world, it also became notable for not even attempting to halt the worsening crises. Instead, representatives of wealthy nations busied themselves haggling over substantial yet still not nearly sufficient payments to hand out to the nations being hurt worst by the climate crisis. All this is being done in such a way that oil companies and petro-states can continue to profit while claiming that they are doing something to mitigate the worst suffering. A final agreement, only solidified after the conference was supposed to end, pledged that by 2035 the wealthiest capitalist nations, which historically polluted the most, will provide $300 billion per year from a variety of funding mechanisms to help poorer nations address the damage from climate change. While a huge sum, it is far from the $1.3 trillion estimated to be necessary, and decades too late. More important, the conference didn’t in any way pledge to cut the use of, much less end the use of fossil fuels. And even these numbers are likely to fall apart, as the incoming U.S. President will likely refuse any funding for climate mitigation and will likely give oil companies a green light to intensify fossil fuel production.
As well-dressed representatives did their negotiating in conference rooms in the capital city of Baku, evidence has been pouring in from around the world that the crisis is intensifying, getting far worse far more rapidly than scientists had expected.
In the Northeastern U.S., summers are generally hot, but rains usually come at least weekly to offset the heat and fill reservoirs. This summer, no significant rain fell for nearly three months. Since early October, the northeastern United States has seen consistent drought warnings, fire warnings, and hundreds of small fires. In the first days of November, a fire on the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland burned 100 acres, and the proximity of the fire to unexploded ordinance created a potentially hazardous situation. Firefighters in New Jersey have responded to at least 500 small fires since the summer, and a firefighter was recently killed fighting the largest blaze running along the border between New York and New Jersey. And in Brooklyn, New York City two weeks ago, a two-acre patch of lush Prospect Park burned in the first forest fire there in decades. New York City is under a drought warning, its first in 20 years. None of this is normal.
In India and Pakistan, air quality in major cities like New Delhi and Lahore is poor every year during the agricultural burning season, but the situation is getting worse. This year, those and dozens of other cities in northern India have declared states of emergency, shutting down entire school systems and urging people to stay indoors. In large parts of Pakistan, outdoor events were banned and many public workers told to stay home. Hospitals saw an unprecedented rise in patients arriving with lung and respiratory complications, and allergies and eye and throat irritation. For the past 15 years, the problem has been worsening every year.
China is often noted for developing more wind energy than any other nation on earth. Yet over the past 30 years, it has also opened more than 1,000 coal-fired power plants! China has now surpassed the United States as the largest single emitter of greenhouse gases on earth on an annual basis. Although the United States still burns far more greenhouse gases per person than China, that proportional difference does nothing to change the fact that, even as it builds record numbers of solar panels and wind turbines, China is still polluting more than ever before. India is also rapidly increasing its use of coal-fired power plants, and thereby contributing to more greenhouse gas emissions. Worldwide, there is a greater volume of fossil fuel emissions than ever before, with no signs of slowing down.
Perhaps worst of all, statistics from the past year for the first time indicate that the planet has already reached and perhaps exceeded 1.5 degrees Celsius above the temperature of the pre-industrial era. That number, 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial era, is what scientists in 2015 and since have considered the point at which humanity must stop all warming, and beyond which scientists have predicted we could see irreversible and potentially catastrophic consequences.
We are already seeing them. We are seeing them in more intense droughts and wildfires. We are seeing them in hotter temperatures and warmer ocean surface temperatures. We are seeing them in stronger, more rapidly intensifying storms and hurricanes. We are seeing them in more people dying from heat-related illnesses. We are seeing them in record-setting rainfalls that inundate coastal plains and mountain valleys, washing away everything in their paths. We are seeing them in increasing loss of plant and animal species all over the planet. We are seeing them in the Amazon River, its many tributaries, and many other rivers and lakes on earth which are drying to record low levels.
The crisis is here. Those at the COP conferences have known about it and continue to watch it happen, yet they won’t stop the guilty parties from continuing the damage. Every year that this continues, the consequences will be longer term, and likely worse. We can’t rely on COPs or the United Nations. We can’t rely on our governments. And we definitely can’t rely on the corporations, the banks, the oil and gas companies and their politicians that have brought us to this point.
But this is not the time to give up hope and despair. We CAN do something.
We can rely on ourselves. It is in our interests to fight back against what is happening. We can do so, but only if we organize ourselves and focus our power on the root causes of the problems. And if we want to succeed, we must begin to organize now. Only then, with our own organization and our own collective power, will we be able to take back our world from those who are destroying it.
