Category: FOOD-WASTE_CN TA_Individuals_CN

When you think about climate change, food waste might not be the first issue that comes to mind. But over two-thirds of household food is lost or wasted — a staggering amount — and approximately 8% of global human-caused greenhouse gas emissions result from food loss and waste. Those emissions enter the atmosphere, causing global temperatures to rise and drive climatic changes across the globe such as more frequent heat waves, stronger hurricanes, and rising sea levels.

They’ve taken hammers to gas pumps and glued themselves to museum masterpieces and busy roadways. They’ve chained themselves to banks, rushed onto a Grand
Prix racetrack and tethered themselves to goal posts as tens of thousands of British soccer fans jeered.

WHEN KIMBERLY NICHOLAS, a sustainability scientist at Lund University in Sweden, decided that she needed to confront the climate effects of her frequent flying, she took a scientist’s approach. She spent hours making meticulous spreadsheets comparing the costs of all the modes of transport she might take—in terms of time, finances, and emissions—and when she finished, she still didn’t know what the right choice was. She had, she says, “analysis paralysis.”

The late afternoon sun washed over the United States Supreme Court building as a group of protesters hauled a 15-foot tall prop, modeled after the United States Constitution, through the nearby streets. Instead of “We the People,” though, it read “We the Corporations,” above logos of companies like Shell, Chevron and Amazon. Cardboard flames licked the edges of the banner, and nearby signs read “Supreme Climate Deniers” and “SCOTUS Kills.”

Three protesters were arrested and charged with unlawful entry at the annual Congressional Baseball Game at Nationals Park on Thursday as dozens of climate activists turned out to demand more urgent action on climate change.

Green travel is a contentious topic. The notion of embracing low-impact and environmentally conscious travel is a laudable one, but in reality, it’s complicated. And the popularization of a number of related terms, such as “sustainable travel,” “responsible travel” and “eco-tourism” has further obscured the issue.

To fight climate change, companies and nonprofits have been promoting worldwide planting campaigns. Getting to a trillion is easier said than done.

Germany put its energy sector on war footing last week, warning of impending shortages as Russia further tightens deliveries of natural gas to Europe. By reducing Europe’s ability to fill inventories that will be needed when winter comes, Russia is boosting its leverage to weaponize energy exports as part of its campaign to conquer Ukraine and break Western resistance. In escalating the gas system to the second-highest “alarm” stage—one step away from government energy rationing—German Energy and Economics Minister Robert Habeck called on Germans to “make a difference” by voluntarily changing their consumption behavior to conserve energy.

Since the pandemic, I’ve worked from home, and since then I had a realization. Not driving to work is still more efficient than a Tesla. If I drive to work with or without a Tesla, I’m still consuming more energy than I would have working from home.

This is not another story about why you should feel bad about your carbon footprint. The idea of “doing your part” for climate change has become synonymous with changing your personal consumption — your diet, travel, and habits. It’s too narrow a mindset to focus on your household footprint, because it doesn’t begin to tackle how entire industries and economies profit from fossil fuels. It’s also an argument that has been debunked repeatedly by academics and scientists. The United Nations’ climate science body, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, has described individual action as “insufficient,” unless it is “embedded in structural and cultural change.”