Adam Clare

Ontario Climate Emergency Campaign Wants You to Vote

Canada’s most populous province goes to the polls in a few weeks, and climate should be at the forefront of everyone’s mind. Politicians are talking about the increased costs of living, but they aren’t connecting that to the ruling Conservative Party’s anti-climate actions. Energy costs are up because they ended renewable power contracts early, revenue is down because they left the carbon market (and paid a billion to do so), so the Ontario Climate Emergency Campaign wants to change that.

If you live in Ontario then check out what you can do to get politicians talking about the biggest issue of our time.

As you may know, the latest IPCC report in April said we must peak emissions by 2025 and nearly halve emissions by 2030 to have a chance at a 1.5 degree world. You may also know that we play an outsized role here in Canada–we are among the top three global emitters per capita and among the top ten emitters in absolute terms, which doesn’t even count the emissions from the fossil fuels we export. That means this next Ontario government is going to play a critical role in doing our part to limit climate destruction. And the good news is that climate action is good for health! We will reduce air pollution related illness, increase access to green space and nature, and increase access to public transit and active transportation.

Our campaign’s first action is out and ready to go, and I would so appreciate your participation. Go to this page to send a message to all your local candidates about this critical emergency, and tell your family and friends to do the same.

Take action now!

Thanks to Samantha!

Let’s Green the Gaming Industry

Games are fun and we should play more of them! That being said, we should also be conscious of the impact our technological-driven gaming has on the environment. Ben Abraham recently launched a new project called Greening the Game Industry to promote the concept of sustainable gaming. The project stems from his work on a very good book, Digital Games After Climate Change, and he hopes to get more people thinking about ways gaming companies can better respect the environment.

One of the best ways to reduce your impact in any industry is to buy second hand and use things to their end of their life. Thus, the thinking of a “patient gamer” is one we should all follow.

The initiative is called the “Games Consoles EU Self-Regulatory Agreement”, and I won’t go into the details of self-regulation but suffice to say most of what you need to know is right there in the name. This is not the EU trying to bring energy-profligate console manufacturers to heel, and is more like a simple mechanism to get them all to the table to see what stuff they already agree on and can codify into some (not even particularly binding) rules of the road. It is also not really a climate-focussed initiative, at least not primarily, which might work backwards from the known impact of the industry and/or a given constraint and say ‘you can use this much no more’ (and there are substantial barriers, practical and conceptual, to being able to do that yet anyway). Since the EU already has rules about “vampire power”, or the power consumed when switched off or in standby.

Sydney Scientist Sorts SIDS

Thanks to the tireless efforts of a scientist in Sydney we now know a key factor that causes sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). The worst thing that can happen to parents is an unexplained passing of their baby, as a result parents are constantly concerned that their child may fall victim to SIDS. Knowing what works to prevent SIDS will bring relief to parents and save infants.

The butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) enzyme is lower in babies who suffered SIDS than other babies. Knowing this connection means infants can be screened for now and a solution will be easier to find in the future.

“Now that we know that BChE is involved, we can begin to change the outcome for these babies and make SIDS a thing of the past.”

It is hoped the finding could lead to the development of a screening test in a few years’ time.

Hailed as a “game-changer” to “every parent’s worst nightmare”, the discovery of BChE also provides answers to parents, like Dr Harrington, whose healthy babies died “on their watch”.

Space Lawyer Protected Us From Mercury

Exciting personal space law news! In 2018 a whistleblower told me about a new satellite thruster that used mercury, the poisonous liquid metal, as a propellant, and that it would inevitably fall back to earth when used, thus beginning my Space Lawyer arc

— Kevin H Bell ???? (@KevinHBell) March 28, 2022

Kevin Bell, space lawyer, got word from a whistleblower that a company planned on making satellites that use mercury as a propellent. Thanks to their efforts a global rainstorm of mercury was avoided.

They took their concerns to the American government and were confronted by a lot of departments denying it was their responsibility. So they went further and got the United Nations to ban the use of the deadly metal in orbit!

“The Minamata Convention on Mercury seeks to eliminate all mercury uses where technically-achievable non-mercury alternatives are available,” said Elena Lymberidi-Settimo, ZMWG Coordinator at the European Environmental Bureau. “In the case of satellite propulsion systems, mercury-free alternatives have been available and used for decades.”

Make Big Oil Care by Cutting Profits

We’ve heard lots of big claims from oil companies about their commitment to sustainable energy production, but those are all words. Their actions are still to extract fossil fuels which undercut all their efforts to produce renewable energy. The simple reason oil companies are still killing the environment is profit. So to get them to actually live up to their words we need to ensure that oil makes little money. Step one should be to cut market-manipulating subsidies governments give to oil companies.

The best way to hurt oil companies in the meantime is to cut back on your use of gas. Also, remember to vote for politicians that support public transit and clean air.

In terms of electricity generated from clean energy sources, BP has made the most progress of any of the oil companies — but even then, its global renewables capacity only adds up to 2,000 megawatts, the equivalent of about two gas-fired power plants.

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Mei Li, a co-author of the report, suggested that the ability to continue profiting from fossil fuels was the chief reason that oil companies haven’t lived up to their climate promises. Wall Street is more likely to reward quarterly profits than moves to overhaul a business over the long-term. “They do not have the incentives to force them to make a clean energy transition,” Li said.