by Anne MacLennan
The latest State of the Global Climate report tracks key climate indicators: temperature, greenhouse gases, ocean heat, sea level, ocean acidity, sea-ice extent, and glaciers. They’re all going in the wrong direction, and that is before the Middle East emissions extravaganza.
It also introduces a new indicator: Earth’s energy imbalance. Our planet’s temperature varies according to the energy entering and leaving Earth’s system. Higher concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere hold onto more energy, accumulating an excess. Humanity continues to pump greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide into the atmosphere, so the energy imbalance continues to increase, changing our climate and disrupting nature, lives and livelihoods across the planet.
But the magnitude and speed of these changes can be downplayed by climate deniers as only 1% of the accumulating energy is reflected in warming of Earth’s atmosphere and troposphere. 91% is being absorbed by the oceans as heat; a massive load steadily building up around us, changing the marine environment which so many ignore in everyday terrestrial life. That is a mistake. ‘The ocean has been absorbing about eighteen times the annual human energy use each year for the past two decades.’
The rest of the surplus energy is busy melting ice (adding to the expansion of warming water to increase sea levels) and being stored in land masses to heat and interfere with terrestrial processes.
Despite warnings over decades, politicians and other leaders have failed to take adequate steps to avert catastrophe and in fact, have often tried to stifle calls for change.
The National Emergency Briefing on the Climate and Nature Crisis is just one of several groups calling for the truth to be shared with the general public, to inform them of the real extent and urgency of the climate and nature crises. Politicians were invited to attend 10 high quality briefings on the emergency, back in November. The briefings were chaired by Mike Berners-Lee, author of A Climate of Truth: why we need it and how to get it (2025). The briefings were certainly confronting, but they were not hopeless. Future directions were signposted.
The aim is to get the truth of the situation and solutions across to the masses, so that informed decisions and actions will follow. To this end, a 45-minute film has been produced to launch on 7th April, screening in as many communities as possible. We’ve been a bit slow to organise, but would welcome a few folk to get together so that this important film – and the even more important conversations and subsequent actions – can take place in Skye and Lochalsh. Contact info@skyeclimateaction.org if you’d like to be part of this.