From “A Gift for Conversation. Let’s discuss Climate Change: Why it matters. What to do about it.” A Book by Dr Louis Keal

Previous Chapter 4: What’s going on

Chapter 5: What’s going to happen

There are two vital things you could take away from the rest of this book above all else:

Firstly, in public discussions about Climate Change, we hear projected global average temperature increases of 1.5°C, 2°C, and 3, 4 and 5°C. But how much worse is, for example, 3°C than 2°C? This is almost never discussed. We need to know what these temperatures mean for our lives and the lives of our children. The world will be very, very different in each case.

The second takeaway is that it’s not too late to take action and prevent the higher temperatures from happening. Providing our action is massive enough, and fast enough, a better life is possible. The alternative – what happens if we maintain our slow, halting pace of change – we will see in this chapter.

What exactly do you mean by 1.5°C of warming?

After the Industrial Revolution in the 1800s, society’s global greenhouse gas emissions started to blanket the world. The sun’s energy was trapped, warming the Earth. The temperature, averaged over the whole year and averaged over the whole earth, crept up. Slowly at first but accelerating ever faster and faster.

Measured in the air, on land and in the sea, tens of thousands of temperature measurement stations made their contributions. Since 1880, this average temperature has risen by 1.2°C¹, to around 15°C today. The more greenhouse gas emissions we produce, the higher the temperature will rise. In the 2015 ‘Paris Climate Agreement’, world leaders agreed to act to limit this rise to 1.5°C, and under no circumstances to allow a rise above 2°C. In this chapter, we’ll see why.

A child born today

Our brains aren’t well designed for imagining future threats. Much less for truly facing statistics of harm, suffering or death brought to large numbers of future people. These psychological challenges are part of the reason this emergency has got so bad.

Let’s consider what a child born in the spring of 2020 would experience. Maybe it’s your son or daughter. Maybe it’s your niece, nephew, or grandchild. In a few pages’ time, we’ll follow them through their lives and talk about what they’ll witness in the different scenarios we’re examining.

Let’s name them “Ash”. At time of writing, Ash would be learning their first words.

Things you say “will” happen, are they certain?

In the following sections, I’m going to tell a story of what the world will be like for Ash, and Ash’s children. In every case, every part of each story is based on (and provides references to) research publications from peer-reviewed scientific literature, humanity’s highest standard of evidence.

However, science seldom deals in certainties, and to avoid the clunkiness and confusion of writing “a 2019 study showed that with X amount of carbon emissions, by 2060 with 3.4°C +/- 0.3°C of warming there is a 78% chance that Y can happen”, I simply say “At 3°C, Y will happen”. Read the original research referenced in the stories to learn the nuances.

What is it worth to me?

One last thing before our first scenario. Let’s see how much change we can accept in our lives to avoid these futures. But let’s flip it – not “what are you prepared to lose to stop it” but “what would you need to gain?”

For example, imagine you were being offered money in exchange for having a healthy arm chopped off. How much would you ask for? £100,000? A million? How much would you want to get yourself if instead it was a loved one’s arm facing the chop?

As you read about the future scenarios discussed in this chapter, ask yourself: “How much would I need to be paid to ask for this to happen to me? How much money would I need to ask for this to happen to my children and grandchildren, and their children?”

What would the world be like if humanity manages to stay below 1.5 C?

This scenario, I wouldn’t need to be paid to experience. Although there will certainly be hardships, staying below 1.5°C would mark humanity’s ultimate success.

Wherever in the world Ash lives, they face the prospect of a better life. The enormous spread of community-owned renewable energy and remote working raises people out of poverty all over the world. At the same time, a shift to efficient, locally-produced, sustainable food alleviates long-standing global food shortages^1,1. Fresh drinking water is made through capturing rainwater from buildings, or by desalinating sea water, powered by renewable energy².

Human happiness and nature are inextricably linked, and Ash is experiencing a world that becomes greener each year. Trees are everywhere – forest covers literally half the globe³, compared to 30% when Ash was born. Ash’s children know the names of the plants, flowers, insects, and animals, which form stable ecosystems.

Our economies have long since adapted to a new way of working: with human needs at the centre, increased economic output for the first time goes hand-in-hand with what humans need, and what makes us happy^4,4.

The heat, floods and hostile weather are bad, but we’ve managed to stay in a stable zone where they’re unlikely to get worse unless we raise emissions again⁵.

For the first time in a century, humanity can live without the threat of future climate change weighing us down. Finally thriving within our natural limits, our growth will be sustainable, rather than suicidal.

How can humanity prepare for a sub-1.5°C world?

Nevertheless, there still will be threats to life and property that our communities must prepare for. Many communities have experience of uniting together to deal with threats like these already. Wildfires, floods, droughts and heatwaves will be a constant challenge, but efforts to manage these threats will also create massive economic opportunities.

Air conditioning, powered through renewables, will be a life-saving necessity in many parts of the world, so innovation in sustainable manufacture is needed here. Alongside this will be massive increases in the efficiency of other essential appliances and industries. Again, the prospects for economic return on investment are enormous.

Public transport infrastructure will be massively increased, and ownership of private vehicles decreased – planning for the electric rail and bus networks to support this will need to begin soon. The drastic increase in home working that started under COVID will continue wherever possible, with technology giving us new ways to feel connected.

Our societies must develop fair ways of supporting millions of climate refugees from now-uninhabitable areas of the world – usually those areas that contributed least to Climate Change are most affected¹.

But above all, the biggest preparation we must make is to reduce emissions fast enough for this world to be possible.

What future do CASaV’s members want to see if we choose to act on Climate Change?

What are CASaV’s members vision of the future that we’re working towards? How will life be better? What would CASaV’s members save from being lost if they could? What would they create?

Read about our members’ futures – here.

What future do you want to see if we choose to act on Climate Change?

What is your vision of the future that you’re working towards? How will life be better? What would you save from being lost if you could? What would you create?

Please send us your vision of the future – conversation@casav.uk and let us know if we can share it to inspire others.

What would the world be like if humanity reaches 2°C of warming?

There’s only one creature more deadly to humans than ourselves: mosquitoes. Mosquitoes love the 2°C world. Almost wherever Ash lives from London to New Zealand, they will contend with mosquitoes passing on some of the deadliest diseases in the world: Dengue Fever, Yellow Fever, Zika Virus and Malaria¹.

Mosquitoes won’t be the only mortal danger. In 2010, Russia was hit by a heatwave so hot and persistent that it killed 56,000 people and destroyed a fifth of the country’s grain crops^2,2. By Ash’s 30s, these deadly temperatures will be an average European summer³.

On top of these heatwaves, Ash must hope that they won’t be one of the 1 in 20 people worldwide who will be exposed to drought⁴, with water rationed or non- existent, and entire crop harvests dying.

Even in 2021, baby Ash would be lucky not to be one of the 1 in 10 people suffering from lack of food. But food crops did not evolve to survive the temperatures, lack of water and collapse of reliable weather patterns in store for them at 2°C. Wheat, rice, maize and soy provide two thirds of the food calories humans eat. In the 2°C world, they will lose up to 20% of their yields⁵, even before floods and storms have taken their toll. Countries like the UK that rely on food imports will struggle, but those around the equator will suffer most.

Floods, driven by both wildly unpredictable rainfall and sea level rise, will bring health issues too – mould, floating sewage and contamination of drinking water. The global damage from sea flooding alone at 2°C is expected to reach $11,700,000,000,000 every year⁶.

Discussion Points

1. How much would you ask to be paid to have this scenario to happen to you? Or to all future generations?
2. Many companies and governments consider the 2°C world desirable. What do you think?

How can humanity prepare for a 2°C world?

Living with our new summer extremes will take some getting used to. The discomfort and danger of working outdoors in summer may demand that farming and other outdoor jobs make much more use of robotics and automation. Our agriculture too must be revolutionised to increase efficiency and reduce the required land area, as habitable farmland decreases.

But not all exposure to outdoor summer heat will be avoidable. Practically everyone in the world must learn how to distinguish uncomfortable heat exhaustion from dangerous heat stroke, and how to help.

As our emissions leave poorer countries uninhabitable, we must again develop a system to fairly support the tens or hundreds of millions of climate refugees whose homes we have destroyed^1,1. This effort must be far larger than at 1.5 °C due to drastically higher numbers².

At 2°C, our coastlines will gradually disappear under rising seas, forcing millions to move³. If you’re considering locations to put down roots and buy a house you could pass to your children, choose wisely. The map below shows some of the areas expected to be underwater or flooded every year by 2100⁴, if we keep global temperature rise to only 2°C.

Our civilisation is likely to cope with the pressure. But at 2°C, we must prepare psychologically for the worst. Such a high temperature takes us to, or possibly over, the edge of any safe future for our civilisation. We may trigger climate feedback loops and ‘tipping points’.

What are climate feedback loops?

The familiar example of a feedback loop is when a singer’s microphone gets too close to a loudspeaker. The amplified sound from the speaker is captured by the mic and then amplified again, and again. It’s not long before it’s loud enough to hurt your ears.

There are feedback loops in Climate Change. Let’s take the example of forest fires: As Climate Change progresses, hotter and drier conditions all over the world are leading to wildfires becoming far more fierce and far more common. However, these fires also release large quantities of heat and carbon dioxide. Both contribute to global warming, with the resulting climate change warming and drying forests still more. It’s an endless loop of destruction.

Let’s look at some other examples.

Ice Albedo Effect: Albedo is the word for how reflective something is. Lower albedo surfaces absorb more heat from the sun. Ice and snow, being white, are very reflective (as skiers will know), with high albedo. Deep water and dry ground on the other hand are darker, with lower albedo, and warm faster in the sun.

As the Arctic and other formerly ice-covered areas warm up, ice and snow melt. The darker ground or water exposed absorbs more of the sun’s heat, warming the local area further. The more warming formerly ice- covered areas experience, the faster they heat up.¹

Amazon Dieback: The Amazon Rainforest is ‘the lungs of the planet’, absorbing humanity’s carbon dioxide emissions and releasing oxygen. When healthy, the forest’s humidity produces its own ‘micro-climate’, generating rain clouds that sustain the system.

The warmth, heatwaves and drastic drought caused by Climate Change are pushing the Amazon out of its fine balance² sustained for 55 million years. Meanwhile, for decades, humanity has been clearing trees to make room for palm oil, and for soy for animal food³.

If this continues, entire sections of the rainforest will die, and some burn. As the dead matter decays, it will stop absorbing our CO₂ and will start to give it off in enormous quantities⁴. This will further amplify the disruption to the local climate, killing more trees.

What are tipping points?

Imagine Ash is sitting at the top of a long, steep slide. Left alone, they will stay there, but if given a push, Ash will be ‘tipped’ over the edge and start sliding down. Standing at the top, you’d no longer have any power to stop the slide.

Many global-scale systems in Earth’s climate and ecology can be imagined as slides that our children are on top of. Our greenhouse gas emissions, if not stopped, will provide the push. But what lies at the bottom is horrifying.

At 1.5°C, we were fairly safe. But at 2°C of warming, many of these ‘tipping points’ risk being triggered^1,1, sending temperatures far, far higher. There will be no going back. However, every 0.1°C of warming we can prevent reduces their speed, and their power.

Nothing scares me more than tipping points.

Examples of tipping points

Permafrost Melting: For people living around the Arctic Circle, much of the ground beneath their feet is composed of ‘permafrost’: soils, water and dead plant matter that has been frozen for millennia¹. As the Arctic and Antarctic warm faster than the rest of the planet, this permafrost is melting, Cities, roads, airports and railways built on top of it will collapse, evicting as many as 4 million people in the 2°C world².

However, there is an inconceivably deadlier threat hidden in the permafrost. Dead plant matter inside, once thawed, will begin to release greenhouse gases in vast quantities. At 2°C of warming, much of this stored gas will gradually but unstoppably release³. This will, as Ash’s family grows and their grandchildren grow up, likely start them down the path to a 3°C world.

Ocean Current Shutdown: Where does Europe’s pleasant weather come from? Why is Britain around 10°C warmer than parts of Canada, which are just as far North? We can thank ocean currents, moving vast quantities of warm water from the tropics. A driving force of ocean currents is the sinking of cold, dense, salty water near the poles, shown in the diagram below.

But there are two massive forces undermining this process: heating of the poles, and the massive influx of salt-free water from melting Greenland ice sheets¹. This water is less dense than seawater would be, and so slows down the sinking of water at the poles.

With enough warming, ocean currents could stop altogether². The consequences will be cataclysmic, for example leaving Britain almost unable to grow food³.

Further Tipping Points: Scientists have discovered at least seven more climate tipping points that so far¹.

Most risk being triggered above 1.5°C². Most, once triggered, will cause further warming, or colossal disruption to our climate and natural life support systems. But this opens us to the horrifying prospect that tipping points can trigger each other, in what scientists call a ‘cascade’. The stopping of ocean currents is a likely trigger³. Today, the main Atlantic Ocean current giving Britain its weather is already 15% slower⁴ due to the changes we’ve caused in the climate.

Staying under 1.5°C of warming is the only safe path. 2°C may lead to 2.5°C, and 2.5°C on to 3°C, and so on.

Discussion Points

1. Have you heard tipping points mentioned in media and political discussions of Climate Change?
2. Do you think everyone should have a right to know about this danger?

What would the world be like at 3°C of warming?

In a 3°C world, some time in Ash’s middle age, they will witness several weeks of darkened sky. Parched by ‘mega-droughts’ and heat, research shows that the Amazon Rainforest will not survive a temperature rise above 2-3°C¹. In 2019, satellite imagery detected over 89,000 forest fires in the Amazon². As the forest dies and dries in a 3°C world, fires will spread at astonishing rates. Most of the forest may burn in as little as a few days or weeks³. The smoke, seen around the world, will mark the deaths of 400 billion trees⁴ and many trillions of living creatures. The Amazon will be gone.

Ash too is likely to be facing deadly heat. As ever, a small increase in global average temperature leads to an immense increase in the extremes people experience. Over half of the population of the 3°C world will experience mega-heatwaves every year so hot they can kill people⁵. At the same time, over half the land area of the Earth will be experiencing near-rainless conditions⁶. Entire tropical and sub-tropical countries will be considered practically uninhabitable.

Any conditions that can kill us will be far more deadly to the crops we were planning to eat. Daytime summer temperatures in almost all of Africa and South Asia will be too hot for farmers to work outdoors most of the time anyway. In the United States, from temperature and rainfall stress alone, corn and soy fields, two of the most critical crops for survival, will produce between half and a third of their current amount of food⁷.

If we hit 3°C, Ash will witness civilisation crumbling, and temperatures likely rising unstoppably higher.

Discussion Points

1. How much would you ask to be paid to have this scenario to happen to you? Or to all future generations?
2. The Amazon is more than just a carbon sink. It is also home to around 900,000 indigenous people. Is it our right to destroy their home?

How can humanity prepare for a 3°C world?

It would be wise to start preparing for the 3°C world, because this is where humanity is currently choosing, through our inaction in reducing emissions, to go¹.

It may sound dramatic, but each of us should learn the basic skills of survival. How to survive a flood, storm, an extended drought, or a deadly heatwave, perhaps without electricity or running water. Our civilisation will be straining at the seams, and little that we currently take for granted can be guaranteed.

This will be the last ‘preparation’ section – the conditions of the world at 4°C are so unthinkably horrifying, so completely and universally deadly that preparation may be futile except for an immensely wealthy minority who could retreat to the now-warm Arctic circle or areas of high ground across the world.

Taking a breather

Let’s take a break for a moment. Perhaps take a moment to walk, paying attention to how you feel.

The process of coming to terms with Climate Change is not unlike hearing a terminal diagnosis. For many people, there are stages of grief for humanity and the natural world, just as there are when losing a loved one. Whatever you feel, whether it’s ambivalence and mild suspicion, or a burning desire to leap up and plant some trees, that’s okay.

There are also plenty of grounds for hope. Those of us raising the alarm over Climate Change have seen a real transformation in public opinion and promises of action over the last two years. You are part of that now.

Okay, let’s get the tough bit finished. Let’s look at 4°C.

What would the world be like at 4°C of warming?

The 4°C world is slipping into chaos. Almost everyone stuck further south than Alaska or further north than New Zealand¹ will be focused on a desperate, doomed battle for survival with their now hostile and lifeless homeland, while armed conflicts escalate over the few resources left in the ruins of our collapsed civilisation.

Should Ash be able to look up from their local struggles to global events, they will witness a world falling down the ‘slide’ of tipping points into higher, deadlier temperatures. The Amazon is long dead, and all permafrost is gone, emptying its carbon into the air².

Along with the collapse of food and water supplies, Ash will be contending with heatwaves, droughts, storms and floods far more deadly than in the 3°C world³. The UK may be the worst hit in Europe by flooding⁴, but fully one third of Bangladesh’s and Vietnam’s current populations would live below the high tide line⁵.

During heatwaves, there is a combination of temperature and humidity that is entirely deadly to warm-blooded mammals like us. In these conditions, the air is so humid that sweating no longer cools us, and so warm that our bodies start to shut down. When exposed to this for just a few hours, we will die⁶.

Areas such as the fertile Indus and Ganges valleys in India home to hundreds of millions will experience these conditions the most, being both warm and wet⁷. But ‘biologically uninhabitable’ conditions will be widespread also across the Middle East including the Muslim holy city of Mecca⁸, and in Indonesia, Bangladesh and large areas of China⁹.

Discussion Points

1. How much would you ask to be paid to have the 4°C scenario to happen to you? Or to all future generations?

What would the world be like at 5°C of warming?

For Ash, witnessing 5°C is unlikely in their lifetime. But our choices now in the early 2020s decide whether their children or grandchildren will experience it.

5°C of warming will be hotter than the Earth has been for around 56 million years¹ – that’s only 10 million years after dinosaurs roamed the Earth². Pockets of high land close enough to the poles not to suffer deadly heatwaves, floods and cyclones will eventually be home to the surviving members of the human species.

However, as with the 4°C scenario, 5°C will likely be just a moment during Earth’s spiral upwards towards a ‘hothouse’ state³, riding a cascade of tipping points⁴. Conditions may approach those seen during a time 250 million years ago called the “Great Dying”, where 90% of organisms on earth were wiped out⁵.

Discussion Points

1. How much would you ask to be paid to have the 5°C scenario to happen to you? Or to all future generations?

Do we have a choice which of these happens?

Yes. There is absolutely nothing stopping us staying at least under 2°C and even 1.5°C – except that we have not yet made the collective decision to do so. Those in power have done a very good job of pretending to care about the issue while doing practically nothing – emissions are still rising¹. They have made the internal decision to pass the problem on to someone else.

But there is no-one else to pass the problem to: any delay in taking the necessary scale of action to reduce our carbon emissions beyond the next year or two is making the decision to blow through 2°C. The decision to go up to or beyond 2°C is the decision to trigger tipping points, and to see 2.5°C, then 3°C, then 4°C…

Which of these scenarios is humanity choosing right now?

The world’s climate systems are vast and immensely complex, and predicting the future is always difficult. But there are three things that can help scientists calculate where Ash’s world is headed:

1. – Government Promises: Pledges made for how fast the government wants the public to believe they will cut carbon emissions. For example, “Net zero emissions by 2050”.

2. – Government Policies: What the government actually changes to try to lower future carbon emissions. For example, “no new Fossil Fuel vehicles sold by 2030”. Currently there is little relation between promises and actual policies to bring them about.

3. – Actions: What happens in real life, the choices we make as a society and as individuals, and how fast we make them. Action is obviously the most important of the three, yet is the most absent.

Where are we headed? At time of writing, if all the countries that have made climate promises take the necessary actions to deliver them, we are still headed for a 2.4°C warmed world¹, with the potential to reach 2.9°C² if we’re pessimistic, even without tipping points.

However, examining actions and policies rather than currently empty promises, governments are choosing a world warmed by 2.9°C. But with bad luck, 3.9°C or more is still very possible. Up to now climate scientists have been over-optimistic worryingly often^3,3,3,3.

Review the 3°C and 4°C sections again. Every one of us must make the choice: will I let this happen?

How do I deal with this knowledge?

Hearing all this could start anyone down the stages of grief. Anger, guilt, deep sadness, and even denial are natural phases. But our only real power comes in making peace with the truth. It comes with living through that inner conflict of “things are coming to an end. But we’re carrying on acting anyway.”

For many, a diagnosis of terminal illness prompts a hard re-evaluation of their lives. Perhaps they realise that they need to take action to ensure their legacy is a good one. Perhaps they have deeply unhealthy habits that they decide to change. And perhaps they realise that through making drastic changes in their lifestyle and health, miracles can happen.

This is what is happening with Climate Change – except it’s our civilisation’s collective end that must be eased or avoided, and our collective actions that are taking us there.

The ‘Serenity Prayer’ is the wisest advice we could receive: Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.

There is so much we can change. The path away from the precipice is challenging, but clear.

Discussion Points

1. How do you feel having read all this?
2. What other moments in your life forced you to accept uncomfortable truths, and move on? What did you learn?

What would it take to stay under 1.5°C?

The one uniting thread of all action on Climate Change is this: Humanity must reduce then end its use of Fossil Fuels – fast. Fossil Fuel companies are constantly exploring for new Fossil Fuel deposits to add to what they’re currently mining. But, there is already enough carbon in Fossil Fuel deposits currently being extracted to blow permanently past 1.5°C¹. If we extract oil, coal or gas from the ground, we can’t imagine that it won’t be burned. Leaving it in the ground is our only choice.

Emissions of more powerful greenhouse gases such as methane must end: as most of these emissions are by- products of Fossil Fuel extraction and transportation², this will be an extra bonus of ending use of Fossil Fuels.

We must electrify the world: replacing gas heating with efficient electric heat pumps, switching to electric transportation for people and goods powered by renewables. A revolution is needed too in our agriculture, and how we use land. By the time Ash is 30, 80% of animal products must be replaced with plant-based alternatives³.

We must also choose to stop deforestation, and removal of peatlands and coastal mangrove forests⁴. Growing crops to feed livestock is the biggest driver of this, so we get a bonus too for reducing meat⁵. Re-forestation and regeneration of lost natural habitats, which are natural carbon sinks, will become a major industry.

‘Negative Emissions’ technologies such as BECCS (discussed on Page 68) may not be needed to stay under 1.5°C⁶, though careful small-scale use might be wise. Nature can do the job more efficiently, with countless additional benefits and at a fraction of the cost.

Why do climate scientists say there is such urgency to act now?

To avoid the 3, 4 and 5°C worlds, there is only one safe route. Formerly any carbon emissions from natural sources, like wildfires, were balanced by natural sinks, such as new tree growth. But our own new carbon emissions are added on top, and stay there, raising temperatures. The total amount of humanity’s emissions since the 1800s determines the temperature rise.

So, limiting that rise to 2°C sets a limit on the all-time sum of our emissions. This is called the ‘carbon budget’. That budget is all we have for centuries, or millennia. Unfortunately, to stay below 1.5°C (or even 2°C), we have very little of that carbon budget left, and with our emissions so crazily high, it is vanishing very quickly¹.

Imagine everyone, all of humanity enclosed in the spacious but crowded hull of a large wooden ship, far from any land. We’re stuck in there. Imagine now that collectively we’ve been drilling holes in the walls for decades, letting the sea water in – this is our carbon emissions. Children and people from underprivileged

countries, down in the bottom of the boat, will drown first. But, if the water reaches high enough, the entire boat won’t be able to float. We’ll all go down. Today, there are a vast number of holes in the boat, the poor are dying and we’re nearly sunk. Yet, Fossil Fuel company executives are busy drilling more holes.

When should we stop drilling, and start plugging the holes? Every moment we wait, more water is coming in. Immediate and rapid action to plug holes, a.k.a reduce emissions, buys us time to patch trickier areas.

So, how much is now left? How long do we have before our boat sinks? Our remaining carbon budget which must last us millennia, with current emissions, will last:

Less than five years^2,,²:

How fast do we need to act?

To stay afloat, we must make the choice right now:

A:Continue to produce emissions with incremental reductions as before. Burn through the 1.5°C carbon budget in just under six years¹. At the end of that time, switch off the world’s cement and steel industries, all non-renewable electricity, all animal agriculture, all textile production, and all cars, planes, and diesel trains overnight, as if someone pulled the plug on civilisation. We stay under the budget, but at an unimaginable cost.

B:Take massive, intelligent action to reduce carbon emissions now, without a day’s further delay. Every reduction buys time for more challenging reductions. Quality of life improves for most while our emissions smoothly reduce over two decades, not overnight. The lights stay on, we stay fed, our children stay alive.

We will act.

The bottom line is, I believe we will choose to act. Because that is who we are as humans – we are incredibly adaptable, resilient and kind.

One of the many lessons of World War II was just how widespread were the stories of ingenuity, sacrifice and personal responsibility. Ordinary people doing extraordinary things, accepting new economic ideas, roles in society and transformed lifestyles during the war to protect their and their children’s futures.

The threat of Climate Change makes World War II appear like a minor disagreement – and our response to it will match the threat once enough of us know that.

In reading this book, and discussing its contents, you are taking a great step towards winning this battle – not with a foreign power, but with your own psychology.

Economics for Human Needs

Going forwards, how should we measure the growth and success of a country? The answer that seemed right to Simon Kuznets in 1934 was to add up the value of all the goods and services produced by a country in a year. This is when Gross Domestic Product, or GDP, was invented. But even back then, Kuznets insisted that GDP should never be used alone¹. It misses out factors equally vital to societies’ abilities to flourish: our resource use, unpaid work, and the welfare of people.

Listening to politicians and commentators today, this has been forgotten. The growth of GDP is seen as the solution to all problems. The result is an economic model that leaves our societies incapable of maturing, of thriving, and of allowing us to survive.

University of Oxford economist Kate Raworth is leading the way towards a new model². One which has already been adopted by Amsterdam and Brussels³, with other cities and economies soon to follow suit.

Her new model represents the economy not as the unending upwards rising curve of GDP, but as a doughnut. On the inside of the doughnut are the 12 basic rights agreed by every world Government that all citizens should expect, such as health, and access to electricity. On the outside are the nine limiting factors identified by Earth Systems scientists as the planetary boundaries to our civilisation, including land use, pollution and CO₂. In the middle is a circular economy focused on renewal and regeneration, not on waste.

Assessing our modern world through this lens, we see major shortfalls on all 12 basic foundations, even in wealthy countries. We see massive overshoots of our ecological ceiling⁴, leading to the terrible threats described in this book. This snapshot of our world is our economic ‘selfie’. Only through seeing exactly how things are can our societies grow and thrive.

Discussion Points

1. Is growth always positive? If part of your body grew forever, would that be good for your health?
2. Does it matter if unhappiness and inequality are the price of higher GDP?

Still have questions?

Here are some great resources covering specifics of what we know about our future, and how we know it, along with more information on topics in this chapter.

Book: Our Final Warning: Six Degrees of Climate Emergency – bit.ly/6DLynas By Mark Lynas. The main inspiration behind this chapter, this powerful book is an unparalleled summation of the scientific research on our future.

YouTube: Positive Tipping Points to Avoid Climate Tipping Points – youtu.be/UFJCc2-tHy0 Talk by Professor Tim Lenton, expert on tipping points and Director of the Global Systems Institute, University of Exeter. The good and bad of tipping points. [51m]

Carbon Brief – World can limit global warming to 1.5C without BECCS’ – bit.ly/3yqDTHZ What’s necessary to stay under 1.5°C of warming? This article from Carbon Brief explores research showing negative emissions technologies are not required.

Book: Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways To Think Like A 21st Century Economist – bit.ly/DoughE By Kate Raworth. As we briefly explored on the previous page, Doughnut Economics provides a viable alternative to the economic models that got us here.

Next Chapter 6 What do I do about it?