New Year NEW CLIMATE!

SUMMARY: Why the wild weather & floods across N. Hemisphere, rain at N. Pole? Then Alex talks with David Montgomery, author of "Dirt The Erosion of Civilizations", with co-author Anne Bikle, new book "The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health". Radio Ecoshock 160106

Welcome to Radio Ecoshock in this new year of 2016. In this program I'll talk with two guests who tell us about the erosion of civilizations, climate answers in the soil, and the danger of killing off your own ecology - of microbes in your body. But first in this new year of 2016, I need a little time to talk with you.

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB) Or listen on Soundcloud right now!



Image courtesy endoftheamericandream.com

AWE AND DREAD

I suppose I knew it would come to this. We've just flashed past another awful marker toward a new climate age. At the end of 2015, the hottest year ever recorded, it rained, in the 24 hour darkness, at the North Pole.

Your remember where you were on September 11, 2001. You knew it was a giant wave, a marker where nothing would ever be the same. Scientists around the world felt the same dread and awe in 2007, when the Arctic ice melted back, revealing a dark sea to the sky for the first time in many thousands of years, maybe even in a million years. It wasn't supposed to happen in this century. We knew then, the Arctic would never recover. The pendulum swung toward the great melting. More heat from the sun would be absorbed by the planet, changing the energy balance not just in the Arctic, but everywhere.

We've run interviews with scientists like Dr. Jennifer Francis of Rutgers, explaining how the loss of that white shield at the top of the world, and a warming Arctic, has changed the Jet Stream. With less difference between the polar cold and the tropics, those high atmospheric winds have morphed from a powerful West-to-East stream, to a meandering river. That river has bends that tend to freeze over regions, and extending the breadth of continents and beyond. As Paul Beckwith has told us, what you get on the ground depends on which side of the stream you are on. It can be extra hot in the West, and extra snowy in the East, or visa versa.

Lately in the northern Hemisphere, we have not had the record-breaking hurricanes that slammed into North America in 2005. We have had straight-running power winds, called "Derechos". Multiple massive hurricanes, called typhoons in the Southern Hemisphere, hit East Asia this year. The Philippines was raked over, time after time.

What the Northern Hemisphere experienced in late 2015 leads to this quote from Dr. James Hansen, in his book "Storms of My Grandchildren". He wrote about " ‘continent-sized frontal storms packing the strength of hurricanes.". Robert Scribbler reminded me of that.

Hansen writes about such mega-storms as coming in the future, in the next generation. I say we are seeing it now. In fact, we just experienced another transcontinental storm, stretching from California beyond Scandinavia, with waves reaching Russian Siberia.

HOT OCEANS DRIVE WEATHER WEIRDNESS

This story is written in heat maps of the ocean, as measured from satellites. Scientists say up to 90% of the excess heat created by a more carbon-rich atmosphere has been soaked up by the oceans. That's a slow process, slow to heat, and slow to release. With that buffer, there is at least a 30 year delay for the impacts of our carbon emissions. The climate disruption we are feeling now is from rising greenhouse gas emissions in the 1980's. We've poured in almost as much again since then.

[image: earth.nullschool.net]

The oceans of the world communicate, slowly, sometimes at great depth, using the system known as "the great conveyor belt". The seas have been hot, and getting hotter, around Australia, the Philippines, Indonesia, and in East Asia generally. That heat has been moving downward toward the depths for about 15 years, since the last great El Nino of 1997/98. It mixes with colder waters below, which rising, create the La Nina weather systems we've taken for granted in this new century.

That cycle has to break. It always does. Now we have El Nino, but with the hotter seas, it's El Nino on steroids. It's the strongest El Nino recorded since the development of science.

You will hear endless collection of weather people on television explaining the floods, and soon snow storms, and even the strange warming in Eastern North America, on El Nino. That's why the cherry blossoms bloomed all up the East Coast. That's why folks in Phildelphia wore shorts and tee shirts on Christmas Day.

I've seen a report that out of over 200 local and national news casts monitored, only one even talked about the possible role of global warming. The other suspect, and notice we are never the suspects, is called "changes in the Jet Stream". It's true, but why don't they ask, why don't we ask, WHY is this such a strong El Nino? WHY has the Jet Stream changed. Why is the weather so weird, and why is never going to be normal again?

Usually, scientists tell us El Nino has little impact on the Atlantic Ocean. It is an affair of the Pacific. And yet we now see storms that blow over Texas, Missouri, and eastwards, seeming to continue on. In just days there are record winds in Iceland, and still more flooding across Ireland, Scotland, England, and Scandinavia.

In those ocean heat maps, we can see raging heat in the seas off New England. It's been so hot, the species are changing. It's still relatively warmer this winter. But that warmer water is being pushed away from Greenland by a new phenomenon that will stay with us for centuries. We now realize that massive meltwater from Greenland has created a pond of cold water in the very North Atlantic. Like putting ice into a drink, the ocean there is colder than it was, even with global warming.

So where are the hot waters of the Gulf Stream to go? They are pushed lower, heading toward Europe. The clash of the Greenland cold blob, and these record-hot waters, create mega-storms, and a storm track that is battering the British Isles again this winter. Centuries-old towns, that have not flooded since the Middle Ages, are flooded now. Historic bridges have washed away. In England, they call this storm "Frank", but it stretches from Spain to the North Pole.

Yes the mania to contain everything in concrete has had an effect. All those new suburbs and their roads, all the moors drained to raise grouse for the rich - all our activities have disturbed nature's buffers for heavy rains. Does any of that really matter when more than a foot of rain drops down from the sky in just 24 hours? No one alive in Great Britain has seen anything like this.

CLIMATE INSANITY: SUMMER IN THE ARCTIC WINTER

It doesn't stop there, or even with the big floods in Norway. The heated waters are pouring up the Norwegian coast and into the Arctic, above Finland and Russia. There is a rural inhabited area in Central-Eastern Siberia called Khatanga. According to Wikipedia, the previous December hight for Khatanga was -.2 C (31.6 F), and the average high in December is -25.5 C, or -13 F. Blogger Robin Wenstra tells us that there, in the Arctic Circle, this December it was 79 degrees Fahrenheit, or 26 degrees Celsius. I can't begin to tell you how insane and how impossible that is.

Here I'm just going to quote from Robert Scribbler's blog. Nobody can say it better.

"Unprecedented doesn’t even begin to describe rain over Arctic sea ice above the 80 degree North Latitude line on the evening of Tuesday, December 29, 2015. It’s something we’d rarely see during summer time. But this rain is falling through the black of polar night during the coldest time of the year.

There, over the Arctic sea ice today, the rains began in winter time.

As the first front of warm air proceeded over the ice pack to the north of Svalbard, the rains fell through 35-40 degree (F) air temperatures. It splattered upon Arctic Ocean ice that rarely even sees rain during summer-time. Its soft pitter-patter a whisper that may well be the sound to mark the end of a geological age.

For we just don’t see rain over Arctic sea ice north of Greenland during Winter time. Or we used to not. But the warmth that liquid water falling through the black of what should be a bone-cold polar night represents something ominous. Something ushered to our world by human fossil fuel industry’s tremendous emission of heat trapping gasses. Gasses that in the range of 400 ppm CO2 and 485 ppm CO2e are now strong enough to begin to roll back the grip of Winter. Gasses, that if they keep being burned until we hit a range between 550-650 ppm CO2 (or equivalent) will likely be powerful enough to wipe out Winter as we know it entirely over the course of long and tumultuous years of painful transition.

What does the beginning of the end of Winter sound like? It’s the soft splash of rain over Arctic Ocean sea ice during what should be its coldest season."

CLIMATE EVENTS GREATER THAN ANY TERRORISM

So you see, that is a 911 moment that hardly anyone sees. In fact, it's far greater than mere terrorism, or human wars over religion and oil. At Chrismas 2015, we saw "the beginning of the end of winter."

I also suspected the time would come when I could just rebroadcast old Radio Ecoshock shows, since the truth about climate change is already known, already told, and now already come. I said what we've just seen is another transcontinental storm. That's because I first noticed one in 2006, the year I began this radio show. I had to dig that out of the Radio Ecoshock archives on our web site. I think you'll agree it's eerily familiar, except now we've had another ten years of very driven science, to explain why these things are happening.

So here it is: a few minutes from the Radio Ecoshock show in late 2006, as I describe a transcontinental storm, that sounds so much like today.

Audio "Stormy Future" here. Blog here (posted in early 2007)

PAINFUL TO KNOW

In a way, it's painful to make this radio show. I hope it's not too painful to hear. For whatever strange reason, it hurts me to think of rain falling in the winter Arctic. I know that means more people flooded out of their peaceful homes, or blown out of them, further south. I know that means more millions of trees will die in California from the drought, including some of the ancient giants. I know that farmers will struggle, and we will pay more for what can be run through the weather gauntlet. I know it gets harder and worse. I know too much.

Over Christmas I played with my grandson. We made towers where marbles roll down through mazes. We read stories about lions and elephants. Will they still exist when he's grown? Will everything around him be tossed about by fires, strange frosts, weird rains?

What will I tell him if we give up, and stop trying to save what's left? What will you tell the children, that you did during the great climate crisis?

NEAR LOSS OF A CLIMATE WARRIOR

All this was driven deeper by the sudden news that over Christmas we nearly lost a powerful climate warrior. You may remember how Daphne Wysham organized the conference call of Mayors and activists against building more fossil fuel infrastructure. If you missed it, download or listen to this 14 minute report from Mayors and activists, as edited for Radio Ecoshock here.

For eight years Daphne hosted the syndicated radio show "Earthbeat". She recommended Radio Ecoshock to those stations, helping to make Ecoshock what it is today. Daphne has been fighting to save the climate from her new home in Portland Oregon.

Just before Christmas, Daphne and her partner suddenly found themselves plunging into a cold mountain river, their car sinking fast. She was in the water, gulping air from a tiny pocket, for long minutes, before a Sheriff's deputy managed to rescue her. Both Daphne and her partner were air-lifted to a Reno hospital. Both are going to recover. Daphne has already declared another year of continuing battle to prevent catastrophic climate change. We need her.

So life is short and tenuous. We have a few thousand years of human history behind us, and millenia yet to come. What changes will we leave, in our short visit here on Earth? I shudder to imagine what our descendants will think of us, as we rush to buy more new things, to fly off on vacations, to waste away the world. Or did we strive to localize food without petrochemicals? Did we walk or bike more than drive? Did we use social media and circles of friends to create allies? Is this the year, after the polar rain, after the emergence of transcontinental storms, that we break out of the deadly paradigm of the old fossil age?

You decide what you will do with your life and powers. I'll keep making radio, keep talking with scientists and activists. I'll wrap up this selfish little chat with a powerful comment left on the Radio Ecoshock blog, following last week's optimistic talk by scientist and author Tim Flannery.

NOT REALLY CHANGING ANYTHING...

Listener Wanda Harding wrote:

"I would like to be positive, but, it seems to me, that all these "solutions" are dreamed up to allow for the current, CAPITALISTIC SYSTEM TO CONTINUE... when ...and I am going to say it this way... WE KNOW THAT IS A REALLY BIG PART OF THE PROBLEM.... I do not see ANY ideas about REDUCING CONSUMPTION...ESPECIALLY FOR THE RICH... LESS FLYING, LESS BUYING... we just want to keep buying cars and stupid plastic stuff... that we DO NOT NEED... I do not hear anything about coming up with a whole new global culture that is not about consuming....especially things we do not need and activities we shouldn't be doing... LIKE PROFESSIONAL SPORTS... NASCAR...

Also, Tim brings up women in developing countries needing birth control... yes, they do and I am all for them having it and I bet they really want it...

However, why do we allow the upper classes, the rich to do what ever they want? Why do they not have to change their lifestyles? ... Oh,wait, gee they have to buy an electric car.... when someone says that there is a law passed that states that anyone making over maybe, 150,000 a year IS LEGALLY REQUIRED TO PUT SOME TYPE OF RENEWABLE ENERGY SYSTEM ON THEIR HOME ... THEN, WE WILL START TO MAKE SOME PROGRESS.. When the rich or even the business sector, is legally limited to how much they can fly or even IF hey can fly... then, I'll believe we are making progress...

when we start to REALLY go in the direction of small farmers...and use THAT AS A JOBS PROGRAM...and give out land grants for people to do so, and then, the do not have to travel to work in rural areas, negating the necessity of a car... at least not having to run one every day... then, I'll start to believe we are making progress... so far, all we do is come up with GADGETS... we STILL DO NOT BELIEVE WE HAVE TO CHANGE OUR BEHAVIORS AND LIFE STYLES.. "

Thank you Wanda Harding.

You see how it is? I know many of my listeners are powerful and articulate people. I appreciate so much all the emails you send me. In fact, without listener tips, ideas and criticism, I simply could not continue this program. Radio Ecoshock has become listener-powered. Thank you for giving me another year of opportunity, as hard as the news may be.

I've got some great guests lined up for you, including a top scientist from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, to explain this year's Arctic report card. Let's get to our first guests of 2016 now.

"DIRT", CLIMATE, AND HEALTH - DAVID MONTGOMERY AND ANNE BILKE

We're going to take a big journey, into time, and across the globe. Eventually, we will arrive right back at the center of your own body. Our tour guides are Dr. David Montgomery from the University of Washington, and biologist Anne Bikle.

I know this team just released a new book "The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health." That is a personal journey with a big message for us all.

But at the risk of being rude, I start with David. A recent guest, Benoit Lambert, and several listeners, asked for this interview, based on his previous book "Dirt The Erosion of Civilizations." That is coming back, not only because we may farm ourselves right out of soil in this century - but also because of the promise we could reverse the process of climate change, putting giant amounts of carbon back into the soil.

David is a "geomorphologist" at the University of Washington. He also won a $500,000 MacArthur Foundation “genius” award in 2008.

This is a deep interview. We talk about how formerly fertile places like Syria and Libya became soil poor, leading to the troubles we see today. It happened even in Colonial America, where tobacco farming stripped the south, forcing migration westward. Soil degradation is happening all over the world, but now there are few frontiers left with new soil to use up. "Dirt" as Montgomery wrote in his classic book, determines the course of civilizations, including the present one.

But the soil also holds promise as a place that can be enriched, rather than eroded with ploughing , agrichemicals and monocrops. The process of putting organic life, and life-supporting microbes back into the soil means enriched food possibilities, but also means carbon can be removed from the atmosphere on a large scale, helping to alleviate climate disruption. Montgomery says we could alleviate up to 15% of fossil fuel use by relatively simple changes to the way we farm.

Here is a fascinating talk by David Montgomery, on You tube. I took extensive notes for my own use, including this: "Agricultural soil loss is not because humanity farms but arises from how we farm." From Plato to Roosevelt, from his study of 1400 papers on soil loss, Montgomery gives the big picture.

In our Radio Ecoshock interview, we discuss how long carbon can stay in the soil, and the possible role of biochar, to keep it there longer.

Montgomery got a personal lesson on how to restore soil with his partner biologist Anne Bilke. They rejuvenated poor soil in their Seattle area yard for a garden, without using petrochemicals. That gave Montgomery more hope for the future of humans.

But as the two studied the astounding world of microbes in the soil, disaster struck. Anne was hit was a bad kind of cancer - which it turns out is also caused by microbes. There are life-giving microbes, and from a human perspective, life-threatening microbes.

Their second book "The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health" describes a new threat, and a new hope for the health of all of us. Not only is petro-industrial culture killing off life in the soil, it's killing off the essential balance of microbes in our own bodies. Over-use of antibiotics is just one facet, added to chemical-laden food. This is information you need to know.

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock interview with David Montgomery and Anne Bilke (31 minutes) in either CD Quality (30 MB) or Lo-Fi (8 MB).

Follow David and Anne at their web site: dig2grow.com. That is also their Twitter handle: @dig2grow. Here is their Facebook page.



Thanks for listening again this year! There's lots more Radio Ecoshock to come.

Alex

Paris Climate Vs. A Real Future

Welcome to Radio Ecoshock. I have lots for you in this program. Two reports direct from Paris, plus an interview on the best, maybe the only, way to really save the future.

But first I want you to hear 10 minutes from the former NASA scientist who warned us all about climate change, back in 1988. Here is Dr. James Hansen speaking December 2nd, at a press conference at COP21, the big climate summit in Paris, as posted on You tube by envirobeat.com

Dr. James Hansen

Statement by Dr. James Hansen, at a COP21 Paris press conference, December 2, 2015. Video on You tube. Transcript by Alex Smith, with bold face and sub-titles added by Smith.

"The problem is that fossil fuels appear to the consumer to be the cheapest energy. They're not really cheapest because they don't include their full cost to society. They're partly subsidized, but mainly they don't include the effects of air pollution and water pollution on human health. If you child gets asthma, you have to pay the bill. The fossil fuel company doesn't. And the climate effects, which are beginning to be significant and will be much larger in the future are also not included in the price of the fossil fuels.

So the solution would be fairly straight-forward. Let's add in to the price of fossil fuels the total cost - which you can't do suddenly but you can do it gradually over time, so that you can... people have time to adjust.

So I argue this should be done - and it has to be across the board, across all fossil fuels - coal, oil, and gas, at the source, at the domestic mine or the port of entry. And I also argue that that money should be given to the public, given equal amount to all legal residents of the country. That way the person who does better than average in limiting their carbon footprint will actually make money. In fact two thirds of the people would come out ahead. And it would also address the growing income inequality in the world, which is occurring in almost all countries, because low income people would tend to have a lower carbon footprint. People who fly around the world and have big houses would pay more, but they can afford to do that.

That's a transparent, market-based solution, a conservative solution which stimulates the economy. The economic studies in the United States show that after ten years, if you had a ten dollars a ton of CO2 carbon fee, distributed the money to the public - after ten years if would reduce emissions thirty percent. And after twenty years, more than fifty percent. And it would spur the economy, creating more than three million new jobs.

[SOLVING THE INTERNATIONAL PROBLEM]

Furthermore, this is the only viable international approach. You cannot ask each of 190 countries to individually limit their emissions. What we have to do is have the price of fossil fuels honest. That requires only a few of the major players to agree 'Let's have a rising common carbon fee'. And those countries that don't want to have that fee, we'll put a border duty on those countries and furthermore we will rebate to our manufacturers that carbon fee when they export to a non-participating nation. This, economists agree, is a fair way to do it, and it could rapidly move us off of fossil fuels.

But what we are hearing, is that although Christiana Figueres says many have said we need a carbon price, and investment would be so much easier with a carbon price, but life is much more complex than that. So what we are talking about instead is the same old thing. The same old thing that was tried in Kyoto asking each country to promise 'oh I'll reduce my emissions, I will cap my emissions, I'll reduce them twenty percent' or whatever they decide they can do.

You know, in science when you do a well-controlled experiment, and get a well-documented result, you expect that if you do the experiment again, you are going to get the same result. So why are we talking about doing the same thing again? I don't like to use crude language, but I learned this from my mother, so I'll use it anyway. This is 'half-assed' and it's 'half-baked'.

"HALF-ASSED AND HALF-BAKED"

It's half-assed because there's no way to make it global. You have to beg each nation. So I went to Germany to speak with... I was hoping to speak to Merkl but I got cut off at Sigmar Garbriel, the Minister. He said 'Oh, we're gonna do cap and trade, cap and trade with offsets.' And I said 'But that won't work, we've tried that.' So I said 'What's the cap on India?' And he said 'We'll tighten our carbon cap.' Well Germany is now two percent of the world emissions. So him tightening the German carbon cap is not going to solve the problem. You've got to have something that will work globally.

And it's half-baked, because there's no enforcement mechanism.... You know what I hear is all the Ministers are coming here, the heads of state, and they are planning to clap each other on the back, and say 'Oh we're really doing great. This is a very successful conference, and we're going to address the climate problem.' Well if that's what happens then we're screwing the next generation, and the following ones. Because we're being stupid and doing the same thing again that we did eighteen years ago.

"WE CAN'T PRETEND WE DON'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN"

So what's the effect? You know you try very hard and you reduce our nation's emissions. Or an individual reduces their emissions. One effect of that is to reduce the demand for the product, and keep the price low. As long as fossil fuels are dirt cheap, they will keep being used. Burning coal is like burning dirt. You just take a bulldozer and you can bulldoze it out of the ground. It's very cheap but it does not include it's cost to society. It's a very dirty fuel with some negative effects which we now understand very well. We can't pretend that we don't know what's going to happen, if we stay on this path.

This is the path we're on, you know. To pretend that what we're doing is having any effect... It might slow down the rate of growth, but that's not what's needed. Science tells us we have to reduce emissions rapidly. And furthermore, the economic studies show that if you put an honest price on carbon emissions, you would reduce emissions rapidly. But if you don't have that price on there, you are not going to reduce emissions. You will reduce emissions some place, but then it keeps the price low, so somebody else will burn it.

[Another panelist asks: And that economic study you are refering to also found that if you put ten dollars per ton, and increased it ten dollars per ton over ten years, what was the effect in jobs?]

James Hansen: Well in the case of the United States economy, that's where the study was done in detail, it was three million new jobs in ten years and a significant increased in GNP [Gross National Product]. We need energy. But people thinking 'Oh, we have to do less...' - yeah we should have energy efficiency, but that would be encouraged by a rising price.

[ENERGY SHIFT]

We do need energy. We need energy to raise the poor people out of poverty. That's the best way to keep population under control. Those countries that have become wealthy now have fertility rates that are below the replenishment level. And the reason these countries became wealthy is because they had energy, and that energy was fossil fuels. Unfortunately we can't continue to use that as the mechanism to get out of poverty.

We need clean energies. And the way to make that happen... You know, I've met with 'Captains of Industry' I call them - leaders of not only utilities but even oil companies. These people have children and grandchildren. They would like to be part of the solution. If the government would give them the right incentive, by putting this across-the-board rising carbon fee, they say they would change their investments and they could do it rapidly.

It's not that the problem can't be solved. But it's not being solved. And nothing that I've heard so far indicates that we're intending to ... it's not too complex. It's the simplest approach you could have: an honest, simple rising carbon fee."

End of transcript of James Hansen in a Paris press conference, Dec 2nd, 2015.

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LINDSEY ALLEN, RAINFOREST ACTION NETWORK, REPORTS FROM PARIS

Lindsey Allen, Executive Director of RAN













Next up, Lindsey Allen, the Executive Director of the Rainforest Action Network, or RAN, dials in from Paris.

I was glad to talk to Lindsey, partly because world media has failed to report non-governmental actions and voices in Paris (giving us the impression the NGO's and aboriginal people are not even there - they are). And partly because the Rainforest Action Network has done some great climate work.

For example, RAN has led the pack in exposing which big banks are loaning out billions to fund the construction of new coal plants around the world. They are profiting from the destruction of the climate. Check out that campaign here.

During our phone interview, Lindsey reveals that the very bank that is funding so much of the United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP21) meeting in Paris - the French giant BNP Paribas - is one of the top funders for coal expansion around the world! Lindsey Allen says BNP Paribas has invested about 17 billion dollars in coal. That tells you a lot about the world we live in, and the UN Climate talks.

But yes, climate activists are in Paris, and they are speaking out, despite clamp-downs by French police in the name of anti-terrorism. I notice crowds are allowed to gather for memorials, and for sports events, but not to call for real climate action...Naomi Klein agrees, and calls for a big march in Paris anyway.

Listen to this interim report from Paris with Lindey Allen here.

A PARIS REPORT FROM SCIENTIST PAUL BECKWITH

Paul Beckwith has been a regular on Radio Ecoshock. He's the scientist with two Masters degrees, working on his PHD in climate science at the University of Ottawa, in Canada. Paul takes the late Stephen Schneider's call for activism by scientists very seriously. Paul has his own You tube channel with lots of great videos, a new web page, and an active Facebook following.

Don't miss some fine videos Paul took in Paris. These include a financial panel with UK Bank of England Governor Mark Carney and American billionaire Michael Bloomberg. Paul was encouraged to hear some billionaires and financial heavyweights are prepared for serious action on climate change. We talk about that.

Beckwith also recorded a Paris keynote presentation by Al Gore, found here.

One thing we briefly discuss is the effort by climate deniers to look like legitimate participants in the climate "debate". The Heartland Institute, which is partly funded by the infamous Koch Brothers, has organized a press event in Paris, with the usual suspects - scientists and others, some of whom are known to accept funding from fossil fuel companies in order to say carbon dioxide is great for us! See this hot Greenpeace expose of climate deniers admitting they get paid by Peabody coal and other fossil fuel interests.

Paul, and other at the hostel where he is staying, debated whether to go and expose the false science being presented - or would that just add the conflict that media is always looking for, and thus spread these falsehoods? My opinion is go ignore the extremists. Most of the world knows them for what they are - while climate damage is becoming much too obvious to ignore any longer.

Download or listen to this report from Paris by Paul Beckwith in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

Use this tiny url to share Paul's talk in Twitter or other social media: http://tinyurl.com/hs94gfc

BENOIT LAMBERT - THE BIOCHAR SOLUTION

Now it's time to talk about real solutions in the real world. This is part of my continuing coverage of ways to stuff carbon back into the soil, with nature-based agriculture and biochar.

After interviewing many guests and scientists, I've come to the conclusion that our best way out of the climate mess is to use different agricultural methods to sequester carbon back into the soil.

It's just common sense. We have too much carbon in the atmosphere already (at least 430 parts per million carbon equivalent, when we need to be below 350 parts per million to keep our current climate.) Where will be put the extra carbon from the atmosphere? We don't have the technology to put it into the oceans. We do know how to put it back into the soil, and into the deeper ground as biochar.

Benoit Lambert lived in Europe for a couple of decades, returning to Quebec Canada to found a company which advises on biochar, and related carbon capture technology. It's called Biochar Generation.

Benoit Lambert

As world politicians and their experts meet in Paris for the COP21 climate summit, most will seek industrial answers for what they see as an industrial problem. Perhaps, they'll hear about machines to capture carbon and feed it back through a maze of new pipelines to old wells. Dangerous geonengineering will be on the menu.

But they almost didn't hear about the least known source of greenhouse gases, and the single best solution to reducing carbon in the atmosphere. I'm talking about clearing land for food, industrial agriculture, and ways to put carbon back in the soil. All that wasn't even on the menu, until a recent move by France to put it there.

I didn't know the role of the French Agriculture Minister, Stefane Le Foll, or the special ambassador for France at COP21, Laurence Tubiana - until I heard it from Benoit.

Just to be clear, our current industrial farming uses loads of fossil fuel products, including fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides. It is a major SOURCE of greenhouse gas emissions, not a help. How big a factor is food production to the overall burden of greenhouse gases?

According to Wikipedia: "Food systems contribute 19%–29% of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, releasing 9,800–16,900 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (MtCO2e) in 2008. Agricultural production, including indirect emissions associated with land-cover change, contributes 80%–86% of total food system emissions, with significant regional variation."

So we need a huge turnaround in our food systems. First of all, we need to get to zero emissions farming. But that's just the start! Then we need to turn the food system into a carbon capture mechanism.

We discuss how long carbon stays in the soil, the carbon cycle, and the truly amazing role played by biochar. Benoit thinks Canada is the perfect country to start the biochar industry on a huge scale, with all the forest waste in the country.

Lambert also explains the French "4 out of 1000" campaign. Get more on that here. It could really save the world climate.

Others have already called this one of the most important Radio Ecoshock interviews.

Download or listen to this interview with Benoit Lambert in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

Use this tiny url to share the Benoit Lambert interview on social media, including Twitter: http://tinyurl.com/omrtuzf

My thanks to everyone who Tweeted about last week's show with Dr. Kevin Anderson. It literally went around the world. I also appreciate the listeners who continue to donate money to keep this show going. If you think you can help, find out how on this page.

I'm Alex Smith. Thank you for listening, and let's get together again next week.

TRUE VOICES

Welcome back to Radio Ecoshock. Last week's program "Facing the Harsh Realities of Now" with David Wasdell set records for radio and listeners on soundcloud. If you missed it - don't. David Wasdell makes his case that we are already committed to at least 6 degrees of global warming, plus dozens of meters higher seas. Grab it from my web site at ecoshock.org, or listen at souncloud.com/radioecoshock.

This week I've got a broad mix for you. Courtney White says we can capture carbon back into the soil, even if only 2 percent of the population act. I'll talk new science with Justin Mankin - how disappearing snow cover will impact people around the world. We wrap with octogenarian activist and author Peter Seidel, saying we still have time.

CLIMATE - LET'S NOT GIVE UP YET

Before we get to our guests, dozens of listeners wrote in, saying they were dismayed by the damning climate revelations by David Wasdell. While I agree with David, that our true situation has been downplayed by governments, media, and misplaced scientific caution, I also try to keep balance.

You may want to consider three more ideas. First:

The very high temperatures and sea level rise David describes would likely only be attained in a few hundred years from now. That might give us time to develop ways and technologies to drastically reduce greenhouse gases. We might manage to reduce greenhouse gas levels, say to 280 ppm as was the case in pre-industrial days.

Some glaciers would still melt (once they start they are hard to stop). So we would still get sea level rise. The oceans would continue to give off residual heat. However, temperatures could start to decline, decade by decade. By then of course, the world, and all living creatures would be greatly changed, I think.

Second: In the coming week or two, I hope to present some other points of view, and possible reasons to hope. You'll hear some of those voices in this program.

Third: Keep in mind some scientists, including climate scientists, disagree with David's conclusions. Wise as he is, David is not officially a climate scientist. His high sensitivity figures can be disputed. I'm still looking into that.

But yes, I found Wasdell's interview convincing and rather crushing. I'm still mulling it over, as we all must. The Wasdell show takes the record on Souncloud for the most Radio Ecoshock listeners ever.

Meanwhile, thanks for joining us, and on with the show!

Download or listen to this new Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

Or listen on Soundcloud right now!



Photo courtesy of the Guardian newspaper, UK.

COURTNEY WHITE: PUT DANGEROUS CARBON BACK IN THE SOIL!

You know carbon is already too high in the atmosphere for our own climate safety. Perhaps you've heard the biggest and best solution is to put carbon back in the soil. But what are we supposed to do - go shovel carbon into the lawn after work? Our next guest says organic carbon capture is not a job for most of us, although we can help.

In June of 2014, I asked author and activist Courtney White about his book "Soil, Grass and Hope". You can download or play that interview here, or read the blog about it here.

Now Courtney is back with a collection of inspiring stories which point to fundamental answers. It's called "Two Percent Solutions for the Planet".

From Santa Fe New Mexico, we welcome Courtney Whiteback to Radio Ecoshock. Courtney founded and runs a non-profit called the Quivira Coalition. I ask Courtney what "quivira" means: it is a Spanish word found on the old maps of the rough country now known as "New Mexico". I suppose it could literally mean "who has been there" - but essentially it means "an unknown country". What a handy word and concept. With humans dumping eons worth of carbon into the air in just 2 centuries, we are all headed into "unknown country".

When Courtney left the Sierra Club in the late 1990's, he was heading into unknown country for sure. He wanted to find common ground between environmentalism, ranchers, and farmers - a group formerly not known for deep friendship and working together. Instead of conflict, Courtney literally was searching for common ground, a place to move forward.

Now of course, it turns out both ranchers and farmers may hold the key to preventing the very worst of climate change. Even though this small group forms only two percent of the population of the United States, they could drag all of America's carbon emissions back into the soil.

We learned from our Ecoshock guest Alan Savory that changes in livestock management can turn practices from desertification into enrichment of nature, and particularly add more carbon to the soil. You can download or listen to that 24 minute Allan Savory interview here. Or read the blog about it, with more links, here.

Likewise, farmers who stop plowing the soil, to use cover crops and no-till agriculture, can capture carbon into the soil by mimicking nature. We are not talking about insignificant amounts. Various experts have worked out we can reduce carbon in the atmosphere well below our current levels in just a couple of decades. It would take a multi-billion-dollar public works program, with support from every level of society, but it can be done. Combined with a big bio-char program, It's a climate solution that doesn't make the problem worse, and leaves our soil stronger for every generation that follows.

We end up talking about "Farm Hacking" and all sorts of resources.

Find the Quivira Coalition web site here. A vimeo video for the new book "Two Percent Solutions for the Planet" is here. The subtitle is: "50 Low-Cost, Low-Tech, Nature-Based Practices for Combatting Hunger, Drought, and Climate Change."

Download or listen to this 24 minute interview with Courtney White in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

JUSTIN MANKIN: DISAPPEARING SNOW, AS WORLD WARMS, CHANGES EVERYTHING

This is Radio Ecoshock, beaming the real eco-truth out to the world. Now it's time to talk with a leading climate scientist.

Last summer, the river in my little valley displayed it's bottom for the first time. No one living can remember seeing it. It wasn't really lack of rain. It was the thin, thin covering of snow in the mountain head-waters. On a warming planet we will get less snow. But few of us have really worked out what that means, around the world.

A multinational team of crack scientists just released the paper "The potential for snow to supply human water demand in the present and future”. It's not looking good.

From the Columbia University Earth Institute, and affiliated with the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, we talk with Dr. Justin Mankin.

Scientist Justin Mankin

Justin is lead author of the paper that stimulated this call: “The potential for snow to supply human water demand in the present and future.” As the Columbia U press release says: "The other authors of the study are Daniel Viviroli of the University of Zurich; Lamont-Doherty postdoctoral researcher Deepti Singh; Arjen Y. Hoekstra of the University of Twente in the Netherlands; and Noah Diffenbaugh of Stanford University."

You can read the full text of that paper, as a .pdf file, here. Or read it online as an open access full text paper in the Journal "Environmental Research Letters" here.

It's probably best and easiest if I just reprint the paper abstract here:

"Runoff from snowmelt is regarded as a vital water source for people and ecosystems throughout the Northern Hemisphere (NH). Numerous studies point to the threat global warming poses to the timing and magnitude of snow accumulation and melt. But analyses focused on snow supply do not show where changes to snowmelt runoff are likely to present the most pressing adaptation challenges, given sub-annual patterns of human water consumption and water availability from rainfall.

We identify the NH basins where present spring and summer snowmelt has the greatest potential to supply the human water demand that would otherwise be unmet by instantaneous rainfall runoff. Using a multi-model ensemble of climate change projections, we find that these basins—which together have a present population of ~2 billion people—are exposed to a 67% risk of decreased snow supply this coming century. Further, in the multi-model mean, 68 basins (with a present population of >300 million people) transition from having sufficient rainfall runoff to meet all present human water demand to having insufficient rainfall runoff.

However, internal climate variability creates irreducible uncertainty in the projected future trends in snow resource potential, with about 90% of snow-sensitive basins showing potential for either increases or decreases over the near-term decades. Our results emphasize the importance of snow for fulfilling human water demand in many NH basins, and highlight the need to account for the full range of internal climate variability in developing robust climate risk management decisions."

In the interview, we flesh that out for the rest of us. There are a lot of uncertainties. Some places will receive more rainfall, even enough rainfall to cover the losses from disappearing snow cover. The Indus Valley (Northern India and Pakistan) is such a case, Mankin tells us.

Other regions, including California, will not make up for lost snow with rain. As you can tell from the abstract, around 300 million people will find themselves with insufficient water. They can pump from the underground water table for a while, but then that gets exhausted, because it is not being recharged. Richer countries may be able to build more reservoirs - although that option may already be tapped out in the Western United States.

At that point, assuming desalinization of sea water can't scale up fast enough, I presume disappearing snow will become another driver of vast climate migrations. You heard it here first.

Download or listen to this 18 minute Radio Ecoshock interview with Justin Mankin in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

PETER SEIDEL SAYS: "THERE IS STILL TIME"

Our next guest was an architect who published designs for ecologically sound cities starting in 1968, and for a model eco-city in the Cinncinati area in the 1970's. Like many who offer technical solutions, over the years Peter Seidel's books began to ask "what is wrong with us?" Why can't we adopt obvious answers to serious problems.

Author Peter Seidel





His 1998 book was "Invisible Walls: Why We Ignore the Damage We Inflict on the Planet ...and Ourselves."

Apparently Peter hasn't given up yet. His latest book is titled "There Is Still Time".

This is how our conversation began:

"ALEX: Just the other day, I considered giving up on this Radio Show. I thought "Humans are not capable of solving the problems we create.

Let me tell you the story of Jack Alpert. Working at General Motors in the 1960's, he found the major cause of death in car accidents was people being thrown through the windshield. As an engineer, Jack invented seat belts and they worked. But he was horrified when people wouldn't wear them, until decades of tickets and fines later. Peter, what is it about human nature that we won't act to save our own lives?"

We talk about the probability that our inability to solve problems may be institutional. For example, can corporations and capitalism really prevent a climate catastrophe? I also ask Peter about his earlier work. For example, in 2009, in the journal "Futures", he published a piece called "Is it inevitable that evolution self-destruct?" Then Seidel took another route to painting our predicament, in his science fiction book "2045: A Story of Our Future". That takes current trends, including climate change and corporate conglomeration, and extends them forward to 2045.

I know some Radio Ecoshock listeners feel deep in their hearts that there isn't still time. The infrastructure for a 5 degree hotter world is built, and we don't show any signs of changing. Major ice sheets at the poles seem committed to melting. I ask Seidel why he thinks "there is still time"? Despite the title of his book, Peter admits like most of us, he isn't sure. Maybe we have passed key tipping points. But despite trying to communicate these mega-problems for decades - Peter just can't give up trying. Looking into the faces of our descendants, and the innocent creatures around us, none of us can.

Even as he approaches 90, Peter Seidel tries to stimulate action to save the ecosphere and the future. I admire that.

Download or listen to this 14 minute interview with Peter Seidel in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

IS THERE A FUTURE?

In my opinion: humans have a couple of unfortunate psychological traits that can interfere with our ability to see eco-truth, especially about climate change. First of all, I've noticed a tendency among older men to confuse their realization of their own mortality, with the death of everything. If I'm going, it's all going to end with me, they think.

Related to that, and proven by at least two thousand years of history, we have an in-bred cultural expectation that we will live to see the end of days, at least for humanity, if not all existence. It's sad to think that many people left lives well-lived in disappointment, because they did not see the apocalypse, or the return of the Savior.

Both these ideas, or drives really, can lead us to demand the most extreme interpretations of reality. At Radio Ecoshock, I know we are in for difficult struggles ahead, but I hope we all know the last chapter has not yet been written, if there is a "last chapter". The story of natural life on Earth is composed almost entirely of twists and surprises.

I remain convinced there is a future, and we should try, and try again, to make it the best possible for all those who come after us.

I'm Alex Smith. My special thanks to all the wonderful people who supported the continuing production of this program, during our brief fundraising drive this fall. If you missed it, and want to help out Radio Ecoshock, please check out this page for details.

Next week, I've got some special guests to discuss the problems with the Paris climate talks, and real solutions.

Thank you for listening, and caring about your world.

CLIMATE CATASTROPHE INDONESIA!

Over the past few weeks, Planet Earth has experienced a severe climate crisis, and it hasn't made the front page, or the top story on TV news. This catastrophe will hasten warming of oceans and land, add to rising seas, threaten more species with extinction - and change our whole view of environmental action, and what we need to do to save the climate.

Massive fires have been burning in Indonesia. In satellite images, large parts of Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore were buried under smoke. Red dots of fires and hot spots want to cover the whole map of the islands.

In a few minutes, I'm going to bring you interviews from two very informed people. We get a report directly from the scene, with Dr. Daniel Murdiyarso, at the Center for International Forestry Research in Bogor Indonesia. Then I'll thrash this crisis through with one of the long-standing reporters on tropical forests, Mongabay founder Rhett Butler.

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

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INDONESIA FIRES LINK-FEST AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS BLOG

Scroll down to the end of this blog for a selection of links to satellite images, news coverage and must-read reports on the Indonesian fire catastrophe of 2015.

PEAT FIRES ARE NOT ORDINARY FOREST FIRES

These are not common forest fires as experienced in Western North America, as bad as those were. For one thing, unless climate change prevents it, Western forests are expected to grow back, recapturing some of the carbon. Indonesia tropical forests are not expected to return. They are being replaced with either palm oil plantations or just waste land.

At least half of the hundreds of major fires in Indonesia are burning peat. You know, like the peat bales purchased by gardeners. Or the peat formerly used as fuel in the Middle Ages. It's a thick layer of very compressed vegetation, built up over the ages.

About 12% of the land in Southeast Asia is peat swamp forest. Eighty three percent of that is in Indonesia. Peat there can be one meter, or 3 feet deep, or up to 12 meters, or 40 feet deep. When peat dries out, it begins to emit both carbon dioxide and the more powerful greenhouse gas methane. When peat burns, it releases a mix of toxic dust and gases with grave effects on human health, and animal health, and the climate of the world.

You can't put out a peat fire with a water-bomber or ground crews. The fire goes underground. It smolders and smokes until seasonal rains or snow comes. Some peat fires last for years, resurfacing every year.

INDONESIA CATAPULTS PAST U.S. GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS

Tropical peat fires release phenomenal amounts of greenhouse gases. Calculations by the World Resources Institute find that Indonesian fires over the past three months have released more greenhouse gases than the entire annual emissions of highly-industrialized Germany. For the past month or so, Indonesia has been emitting more greenhouse gases daily than the entire United States economy.

This is a burst of carbon not seen since the last great Indonesian fires in 1997. The Indonesian greenhouse burst throws off all previous calculations of how much carbon we could still burn before crossing the 2 degree C unsafe level. It will force a re-draw of our models, and will create, sooner or later, more swift and unpleasant surprises in our climate system. The unknowns loom larger.

You would think that a sudden jump in emissions would be raised at the Paris climate talks coming up in December. But Indonesia didn't mention control of tropical fires in their emissions reduction plan.

Oh, and by the way, there are massive forest fires in the Amazon of Brazil at this same time!

Some of us know that our actions now are determining the fate of the planet for the next few thousand years at least. But now our plans, actions, and environmentalism have to change.

A THIRD STAGE OF CLIMATE CHANGE

Previously, in my own ignorance, I suggested there are two major stages of climate change. In the first, human greenhouse gas emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels, create climate disruption, and then a hotter world. This is a process we hope can be changed, as coal goes bankrupt, and renewable energy becomes the main source of power. Or it might change because economically recoverable oil runs out. We are talking about the scale of human agency.

After that, very large natural systems, operating as positive feed-backs, kick in. For example, scientists know that once giant glaciers begin to retreat, in some parts of the world simple geography dictates nothing can stop them from melting into the sea. NASA says we are already at that point with the Totten Glacier in East Antarctica. Another example would be melting frozen methane from the sea bed, known as clathrates. When these big "natural" system kick-in, there may be little humans can do but run toward the mountains and the poles, trying to adapt, while killing off the fossil civilization that makes it worse and worse.

But now we see there is a third force. The small number of campaigners who work trying to save tropical forests have been trying to tell us for years. But they've always been a smaller party among the environmentalists and scientists who struggle to stop orgy of fossil fuel burning.

Now we have to open our minds to a horrible new truth. If humans continue to convert the gigantic biomass of tropical forests and peat bogs into carbon in the sky, it may not matter if you install solar panels on your home, or stop flying. The current crisis in Indonesia shows us that a less-developed country can create more greenhouse gases than the largest industrialized countries. Think about what that means.

One result is that environmental campaigners, and the public, have to quickly become global citizens, rather than nationalists. Let's admit it. Hardly anyone in the America's, and few in Europe, know anything about Indonesia. We don't need to know. Our societies are self-contained. We go to work, we hope to buy things, we have our family. Who cares?

HALF A MILLION HOSPITALIZED DUE TO SMOKE

I know some of you will be surprised to learn Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world. There are at least 250 million people spread out over thousands of volcanic islands, north of Australia, and south of the Philippines. Actually, the population is not spread out very much. In 2012, 141 million Indonesians lived on the single island of Java. That's the real center of the country, and of the culture. Periodically, the central government in Jakarta, on the island of Java, tries to pursuade more people to move out to the less populated islands, like Sumatra, or their part of Borneo, known as Kalimantan.

We'll hear about Kalimantan in our guest interviews. That's where dense and toxic smoke has covered everything for over 100 days. The Indonesian government considered an evacuation, but hasn't been able to mount it. Kids play in the smoke, while hospitals fill up with babies and the elderly.

That's another side of this disaster. At least a half million Indonesians have been hospitalized due to breathing difficulties and other health problems caused by the smoke. If the Indonesian economy managed to grow at all this year, all was lost due to the damages from these fires. Indonesians pay now and directly for this crisis. We will all pay, possibly for centuries, for the greenhouse gases released.

This isn't the only terrible climate news recently. Perhaps we'll have time to summarize more of it toward the end of the show. But as UK Guardian newspaper columnist George Monbiot wrote this week: the fires in Indonesia are "the greatest environmental disaster of the 21st Century (so far)".

Let's go to our guests. We'll start with the view from inside Indonesia, and then get an activist perspective.

FROM INDONESIA: TOP FORESTRY EXPERT DR. DANIEL MURDIYARSO

In Bogor Indonesia, I reached one of the top forestry scientists in the country. Dr. Daniel Murdiyarso is senior scientist at the Center for International Forestry Research, or CIFOR. He's led Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports. He has served as Deputy Minister of the Environment for the government of Indonesia.

Dr. Daniel Murdiyarso

Download or listen to my Radio Ecoshock interview (18 minutes) with Dr. Daniel Murdiyarso in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

THE FOUNDER OF MONGABAY: RHETT BULTER

When you want to know what's happening in the wild places of the tropics, you need to go to mongabay.com. Rhett Butler founded and ran that web site and news service starting in 1999. It's expanded a lot of places since then. That includes a mongabay project in the main Indonesian language - which may explain why Rhett gets those hard-to-find photos like illegal fires burning in an Indonesian National Park.

Rhett Butler

Western environmentalists focus on cutting tail pipe emissions and closing old coal plants. That's important, but we've just seen Indonesia skyrocket to almost the number one global source of greenhouse gases, surpassing the USA. The cause is not fossil fuels or industry. What does this tell us about the NEW need to protect tropical forests, not just to save exotic animals, but to save ourselves?

Download or listen to my 25 minute Radio Ecoshock interview with Rhett Butler in CD Quality or Lo-Fi

NEXT UP: THE ARCTIC PEAT

Here is yet another aspect of the Indonesian peat fire crisis. Despite the sky-high emissions coming out of the tropics right now, that could be just a preview for an ever bigger show. I'm talking about peat in the Arctic and sub-arctic.

The peat areas in the far north are even more vast than in Indonesia. Currently a huge portion of that is frozen all year round, in the permafrost. Just a few years ago, I listened to expert permafrost scientists at the convention of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Vancouver. They were a fringe study slowly being recognized as key to our future. You can listen to that whole Radio Ecoshock program, with talks by 3 prominent permafrost scientists, here. Or read my blog about it here.

Those scientists were not overly worried, thinking melting of the permafrost would take centuries, if not thousands of years. Now, we're not so sure about that. For example, scientists working in a tunnel in Alaska found that melting Arctic soil can lose half it's organic carbon in only seven days. About half of that carbon was grabbed by micro-organisms. The other half went into the atmosphere. In just one week upon thawing.

The study is titled "Ancient low–molecular-weight organic acids in permafrost fuel rapid carbon dioxide production upon thaw" with lead author Travis W. Drake, and published in September 2015 by PNAS, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Here is an easier to read summary of that science on Phys.org blog.

We know permafrost is melting all across Alaska, Canada, Scandinavia and Siberia. The study looked at a type of Arctic soil called "“yedoma” - formed about 35,000 years ago and kept in the deep freeze ever since. Scientists assumed yedoma was already degraded, but instead found it contains a lot of carbon. In fact, as Robert Scribbler reports, a significant methane pulse has already been detected from yedoma soils in Siberia.

Arctic peat bogs contain even more carbon. They are loaded with it. The largest permafrost peat bog is in Western Siberia. It's bigger than France and Germany combined, and it's been thawing for well over a decade. If these bogs stay wet, most of the emissions will be in the form of methane, the greenhouse gas at least 70 times more powerful than carbon dioxide.

If a climatic drought dries the Arctic peat, it will release carbon dioxide, pretty quickly, even without catching fire. The ancient plant material, frozen for over 10,000 years, will finally decompose into the atmosphere. Of course dryer peat is likely to catch fire, as fires in the rapidly warming Arctic have been rampant so far this century. When peat bogs bigger than most countries catch fire, thee is no one there to put them out, and now way to extinguish them if we tried. If and when this happens, it will be Indonesia on steroids.

HOW LONG BEFORE THIS NEW BURST OF CARBON HITS US?

Scientists have generally said there is about a 40 year time lag between a large injection of greenhouse gases and the start of real climate impacts. Dr. James Hansen and others published a paper which estimated about 60% of the effects of added greenhouse gases would kick in between 25 and 50 years. That is mainly because the ocean absorbed so much carbon, and then mixed it down to deeper levels.

Theoretically, about half the impacts of the Indonesian carbon burst of 2015 would appear around the year 2055. Thawing of Arctic peat would change the climate toward the end of this century. I have serious reservations about this estimate, and I think it's likely the timetables will have to be revisited.

First of all, there have been a series of papers in the past two years showing the climate is far more sensitive to even small temperature changes than previously thought. See here, here, here and a million other places.

Secondly, the oceans are already hotter than before. Some scientists wonder how much more carbon and heat they can absorb. The ocean sink may be ramping down, meaning climate impacts would come sooner. Everything is coming sooner.

I'm not a scientist, but my guess is we'll see the impacts from 2015 emissions as early as 2030. Even if I'm wrong, global emissions started to skyrocket around 1990. That means we'll find out what we've done around 2030. Right now, according to Hansen's estimates, were only feeling the impacts of oil, gas, and coal burning from the 1970's.

Just so you know, greenhouse gas emissions were 75% lower in the 1970's, compared to 2004. And look at the record storms, rainfall, droughts, and fires we've already got. When it comes to climate disruption, the worst is yet to come.

DISAPPEARING POLAR ICE: IF WE BURN IT ALL, WE LOSE IT ALL

Add into the lose/lose column: a scientist from the Potsdam Institute in Germany has calculated that if we burn all the fossil fuels, all the ice on Earth will disappear. An article in the New York Times September 11th 2015 quotes Ricarda Winkelmann saying "If we burn it all, we melt it all".

This piece in the ClimateCrocks blog has a whole bunch of videos with scientists on this question of how much it would take to melt all of Greenland and Antarctica.

There is an excellent radio special with short recent talks by Ricarda Winkelmann, produced by Maria Gilardin of TUC Radio in San Francisco. TUC stands for "Time of Useful Consciousness" and this program certainly is.

As an example, I play a clip explanation from Winkelmann on why the melting of Greenland is self-sustaining and unstoppable. In the end, she says on our current course, we are headed toward a world 5.8 degrees C hotter by the year 2100. That would threaten our survival on this planet, and certainly doom many ecosystems and species to extinction.

Ricarda also says the giant West Antarctic ice sheet is committed to melting, and the sub-sea based glaciers of East Antarctica are also going to go. We already know that Miami will go underwater, along with many other port cities around the world. Hear selections from Ricarda Winklemann at the conference "Our Common Future" on TUC Radio at tucradio.org.

I found this TUC program here at radio4all.net

Great work Maria.

MIDDLE EAST TO BECOME TOO HOT TO SURVIVE OUTSIDE

In fact, we learned last week that scientists predict by the end of this century parts of the Middle East will be too hot and humid for humans to be outside. Six hours outside, without air-conditioning, and you die. That's in a paper from Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Elfatih Eltahir and environmental scientist Jeremy Pal from Loyola Marymount University. The title is "Future temperature in southwest Asia projected to exceed a threshold for human adaptability", as published October 26, 2015 in the journal Nature Climate Change. Or read this story in Science Daily.

Other scientists on Radio Ecoshock told us a whole belt around the tropics, even into parts of the subtropics, will be too hot for humans to work outside. Whether it's fatal to simply be outside depends on a high humidity - because humans can only keep their organs cool enough when sweat can evaporate. Once the wet-bulb temperature, that combined measurement of heat and humidity reaches 35 degrees C, we humans, and most mammals, cannot live there.

Add in the known historical trend of bands of deserts circling the Earth during hothouse ages, and we know that humans will have to leave large parts of the Earth as uninhabitable. That's the game we're playing now, as we change the atmosphere.

WHEN INDONESIA BURNS, OUR FUTURE CATCHES FIRE

So when Indonesia catches fire, we all catch fire in the long run. The world is not an island of isolated events. When the big alarm clock goes off, anywhere in the world, we need to wake up, get up, and get to work making a future worth living in.

Please Tweet, Facebook, or share this program with as many people as you can. You can use tools found in my blog, or our soundcloud page, at soundcloud.com/radioecoshock.

I'm about to launch a funding appeal for Radio Ecoshock. The show piggy bank is getting low. And while listeners are covering the costs of the show for now, to be frank, I'm not sure how much longer I can keep working 40 hours a week to produce this thing, for nothing. That's right, I'm a volunteer who doesn't get paid. That was OK when I had a bigger income, but now I'm on a tiny pension. Things are getting tight. I sure could use your financial support, if you can afford it. Can you help? Please visit this page to see how.

I'm Alex Smith. Thank you for listening, and caring about our world.

A SELECTION OF LINKS TO THIS KEY STORY OF 2015

Washington Post on links between El Nino and Indonesia peat fires.

World Resources calculations of Indonesian carbon surpassing U.S. emissions.

Plans to evacuate children from worst smoke areas.

The economics of fire and "haze".

Greenpeace calls on Indonesia to adopt a fire action plan.

The connections between palm oil and these deadly fires.

Satellite photos of the smoke.

Mongabay calls on Indonesian President to act.

INDONESIA FIRE RESOURCES FROM CIFOR (Center for International Forestry Research)

What is in the smoke? Science looks at the toxic contents.

Fact file from CIFOR: ‘Clearing the Smoke: The Causes and Consequences of Indonesia’s Fires’

B-roll footage of fires and haze in and around Palangka Raya.

Video: ‘Where there’s smoke, there’s toxic gas’

DG’s Column: ‘Preventing fire and haze: sustainable solutions for Indonesian peatlands’.

Photo story: ‘Life amid the fires and haze of Central Kalimantan’

Permaculture, Climate & Survival

SUMMARY: From 15th Annual International Permaculture Convergence in London, September 9th, 2015: "Cool Talk" by Albert Bates from The Farm in Tennessee. Albert interviews Transition Towns founder Rob Hopkins. Australian permaculturalist Rosemary Morrow tells us Western permies are the minority, compared to East Asia, India, Africa, and the Pacific Islands.

WELCOME

If you don't know what permaculture is when we start, you will by the end of this intensive radio feature.

Download or listen to this Radio Ecoshock show in CD Quality (56 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB)

Or listen right now on Soundcloud!



ALBERT BATES

Albert Bates is the author of books like "The Biochar Solution: Carbon Farming and Climate Change" and "The Post-Petroleum Survival Guide and Cookbook: Recipes for Changing Times". He is the host of "The Great Change" blog at peaksurfer.blogspot.ca.

But that just touches the surface. Formerly an environmental lawyer, Bates is one of the long-time residents of the Tennessee intentional community "The Farm". That's where so many great alternative ideas and low-tech solutions are created. We last had Albert on Radio Ecoshock for an interview on January 29th, 2014. Find the blog for that show here. Or you can download or listen to that previous interview here.

Albert Bates

This time around, Albert contacted me with some great suggestions for a couple of programs on his passion, permaculture. There is a huge long video of a day-long series of talks on You tube (links at the bottom of this post), from the 15th Annual International Permaculture Convergence held in London on September 19th. Actually there were official presentations, by most of the leading names in permaculture, but also workshops, and meet-ups of all kinds. I'll be playing you a couple of the best talks.

Even better, Albert arranged to interview some hard-to-find permaculture folks, specifically for Radio Ecoshock. You'll hear him talk with Transition Town co-founder Rob Hopkins this week, and with more internationally known permaculture leaders next week.

Here is Albert Bates' own presentation in London (19 minutes). He calls it "cool talk" and he explains why "cool" works better than something like "carbon sequestration". It's all in our tribal memes. Anyway, you'll hear about "cool food" and other cool products - including biochar paint that can actually clean the air in your room, and cows that don't need antibiotics.

Here's the big, big news in my opinion. You know that almost everything we do creates carbon emissions, as we burn fossil fuels. Bates says there is a different way to burn... almost anything - and not create greenhouse gases. In fact, the "pyrolysis" method of burning (can be done in a cheap camp stove even) - grabs and stores carbon instead of releasing it. The "bio char" remainders can be used in many products, fed to cows, or just dumped in the ground - where it will hold on to the carbon for up to 1,000 years.

That means we could create a society where almost everything we do LOWERS the carbon in the atmosphere. The test workshops for that society are the "eco-villages" which Albert and other permaculturalists are building in many countries. Bates has a big carbon negative settlement in the works, in an undisclosed location, working with a national government.

It's possible we could lower carbon in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million, or even lower. There is a way. That's big. Huge.

So listen to this 19 minute talk from Albert, in CD Quality or Lo-Fi.

ALBERT INTERVIEWS TRANSITION TOWNS CO-FOUNDER ROB HOPKINS

Next Albert interviews Transition Towns founder Rob Hopkins for Radio Ecoshock. Rob Hopkins is the co-founder of the original Transition Town in Totnes, England, and central to the spread of these low-carbon, more self-reliant communities world-wide. I think there are transition towns in up to 100 countries now.

Albert is also a realist. Things look dark right now. There is a possibility of petro-collapse, as oil and gas dwindle and become uneconomical to get out of the ground. A "ponzi-collapse" is also lurking around the corner. The international trade and monetary system is being kept alive by swindles and money printing. It could collapse at any time. Of course, climate disruption is already upon us, and getting worse.

So Bates asks Rob Hopkins, and again his other guests next week, do they still have hope, and if so, why? I think Hopkins gives a good answer, to help all of us.

Rob Hopkins

Listen to or download this 13 minute interview of Rob Hopkins in CD Quality or Lo-Fi. And don't forget these interview links in the Radio Ecoshock blog are permanent. Go ahead and share them on Facebook, Tweet about them, or share them however you can. Even years later, these links will work, and these interviews will be important for many people.

A PERMACULTURE CONVERGENCE TALK FROM ROSEMARY MORROW

We wrap with another speech from the latest International Permaculture Convergence in London England last September. Rosemary Morrow started learning about permaculture in Australia in the early 1980's. She's founded branches in Cambodia, Vietnam, and many other places. This speech was recorded at the 15th Annual International Permaculture Convergence in London, September 9th, 2015.

Rosemary Morrow

If you are looking for inspiration, when things look bleak and impossible, this is the talk for you. People who have nothing, living in a war zone, or worse, have improved their lives and survival using permaculture. If they can do it, you can do it, says Rosemary.

Plus, nobody needs to wait for a university education in permaculture. Learn what you can, get a little training if you can, watch some You tube videos, and start trying. You can only improve the planet. I've lightly edited this talk for radio. Listen to or download this speech by Rosemary Morrow in CD Quality or Lo-Fi.

Follow Rosemary Morrow on Facebook here. Her two best-known books are "Earth User's Guide to Permaculture" (2nd Edition, 2010) and "Earth User's Guide to Teaching Permaculture" (2014).

You can watch the whole 9 hours of Day Two of the Convergence on You tube here. Or find a listing of various videos from this Convergence here.

My thanks to Albert Bates for his talk, interview, and guidance in assembling this program. We'll have more to come next week. I'm Alex. Help support Radio Ecoshock is you can. Thank you for tuning in.