By Zander Sherry
Scientists around the world protested the governments and corporations contributing to climate change in the weeks following a United Nations (UN) climate report from Monday, Apr. 4th. The report stated that the world has three years to significantly lower emissions in order to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, a limit agreed upon in 2015 in the Paris Agreement.
The urgency of the report, issued by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC), sparked movements of civil disobedience and demonstrations in 25 countries. In developed countries, the Scientist Rebellion, a coalition of scientists who organized the demonstrations, targeted governments and their unwillingness to enforce reductions in the use of fossil fuels.
In the report, the IPCC’s insistence was that countries must reassess energy policies. Authors of the report and UN chair members called for quick reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from governments around the world.
“It’s now or never, if we want to limit global warming to around 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit),” Jim Skea, Co-chair of IPCC Working Group III, said in a press conference. “Without immediate and deep emissions reductions across all sectors, it will be impossible.”
The protests
On Wednesday, Apr. 6, Peter Kalmus, one of NASA’s climate scientists who works at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and three other scientists chained themselves to a JP Morgan Chase building in Los Angeles. Chase bank invests more heavily into fossil fuels than any other bank, according to Forbes. Kalmus and his fellow scientists were arrested that day, and removed from the building.
“Emissions from current and planned fossil energy infrastructure are already more than twice the amount that would push the planet over 1.5 [degrees Celsius] of global heating,” Kalmus wrote in an opinion-editorial for the Guardian after his arrest. “A level of heating that will bring much more intense heat, fire, storms, flooding, and drought than the present 1.2 [degrees Celsius.”
In a similar act of civil disobedience, scientists in Washington D.C. chained themselves to the fence of the White House. Scientific American reported that they were joined by climate activists and indigenous activist groups, and were arrested.
In Spain, scientists affiliated with the Scientist Rebellion threw fake blood on the entrance of the National Congress of Madrid.
“[We] don’t know what other language we have to express ourselves in,” climate scientist with the Spanish National Research Council Fernando Valladares told Democracy Now.
The Guardian reported on events in the UK, sharing that scientists with the Extinction Rebellion took to various demonstrations and blockades around London. In one protest, scientists glued climate-related scientific papers and their hands to the doors of the department building for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. In the same week, other protestors blocked four bridges and the entrances to an insurance marketplace in London.
The Scientist Rebellion
Behind most of the protests is the Scientist Rebellion, an organization created in 2020, largely inspired by the Extinction Rebellion. Composed of scientists and academics with the goal of bringing attention to climate change, they target universities, scientific journals and research institutes to push for action on global warming.
In a recent letter of demands to the President, they expressed their fears for the environment and humankind. Describing current environmental plans as “grossly inadequate,” the group condemned the governments and corporations that extract resources from the earth, leading to environmental destruction. In a call to generate new action plans, the letter was signed by more than 150 scientists at universities and research institutes around the world.
Climate scientist Rose Abramoff, arrested in Washington D.C. during a Scientist Rebellion Protest on Apr. 6, criticized the inaction of the US government and stressed the urgency of the situation.
“We have not made the changes necessary to limit warming to 1.5 [degrees Celsius],” Abramoff said through a press release, “rendering this goal effectively impossible.”
1.5 degrees Celsius
One of the main concerns of members of the Scientist Rebellion is the average global warming past pre-industrial levels exceeding 1.5 degrees Celsius. Considered the global warming threshold by the IPCC, an increase in 1.5 degrees Celsius would have severe effects on weather patterns, ecosystems and cities.
The UN’s most recent report revealed that global greenhouse emissions would need to peak before 2025, as some scientists claim the expectation of 1.5 degrees is hopeless.
The government’s unwillingness to change its energy policies sparked the protests and the demonstrations served to bring the up to date version of the issue to the public eye. The fight for fossil fuel reductions has been an issue for years in both the scientific community and public awareness.
“There’s a lot of talk and not a whole lot of action on a political level,” science teacher Jeff Larson said.
Science Education
In public education, science has been treated as an applied skill and, to some teachers, can be a valuable way to teach students how to approach environmental concerns.
“I think that it’s very difficult for science teachers and scientists to get information across that is very basic,” AP Environmental Science teacher Terah French said. “What is a greenhouse gas? Why does that cause a greater greenhouse effect?”
The issue she described comes from the way society views environmental science.
“Because we think that environmental science is political, and it’s not. It’s basic science that gets applied to human impact,” French said.
In the case of climate change, human impact will only go as far as government decisions will take it. The criticisms that the Scientist Rebellion had were related to the failure in governments across the globe to switch to cleaner forms of energy.
“The solution is easier than we’d like to think it is,” French said. “I think science education can discuss and make it feasible and also maybe understandable, how we can make small changes, and that can have a bigger impact.”
Science-minded academics all around the world push for sustainable alternatives everyday.
“Let’s get rid of fossil fuels, stop burning fossil fuels, and transition to non co2 based processes,” Larson said. “I guess for us that includes transportation, energy generation, the whole thing.”
