CORONAVIRUS

WERE THERE ANY POSITIVE EFFECTS FROM THE VIRUS?

The Coronavirus, or Covid-19, pandemic had at least one positive effect on the planet: it reduced pollution and carbon emissions. The air was cleaner as was the water. In the Spring of 2020, the effects of the pandemic were immediate and astonishing. Satellites observed decreases in nitrogen dioxide pollution (a gas closely linked to vehicle exhaust) everywhere there were lockdowns. In the meantime, scientists across the globe were tracking and quantifying meaningful reductions in greenhouse gases and carbon emissions due to the pandemic.

Importantly, Covid-19 revealed that climate change and global health are entangled issues, and should not be treated separately. 

NEGATIVE EFFECTS?

• One unfortunate consequence came to light as oil prices dropped significantly — causing the price of making “virgin” plastic cheaper than using “recycled” plastic.
• Observers also pointed out that the crisis drained key government and private sector resources that were needed to make the transformation to sustainable and clean energy, while the falling costs of oil and other fossil fuels doubtless discouraged investment in energy efficiency and renewable energy, and, instead, encouraged the use of carbon-spewing oil and gas.
• The hardships of the pandemic and the rise of populism, seeking to sow doubt about the seriousness of global warming and the role of human activity in causing it, led to dozens of climate rules being rolled back during COVID-19.
• The direct link between the worldwide economy and CO2, and greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution is nothing new. The last time emissions and pollution came close to flat-lining was during the economic crisis of 2008-2009.
• Exposure to air pollution was linked to an increased incidence of COVID-19 related hospital admissions. 
• Climate change might be causing the emergence of more infectious disease pandemics - halting deforestationcould actually help prevent another pandemic.

DID WE LEARN ANYTHING USEFUL THAT WE CAN APPLY GOING FORWARD?

• The good news is that this time, as then, leading scientists hailed the news as clear evidence that it is within humanity’s power to reduce worldwide carbon emissions. But economic crises are not how we want to combat climate change and, anyway, once this coronavirus crisis was contained, the world’s carbon-emitting economic engines cranked up again, erasing the drop in emissions.
• A report published by the Breakthrough National Centre for Climate Restoration concluded that the pandemic was a dress rehearsal for climate change. In other words, many policy makers and scientists are now both lamenting and stressing that the pandemic clearly showed that only through tough government intervention can carbon emissions be cut at the rate needed to stop the warming of the planet.
• Governments moved “faster than we ever did,” the lead 2015 Paris Agreement negotiator, Christiana Figueres, told the New York Times at the end of 2020. But the world as a whole remains dangerously behind schedule in slowing catastrophic climate change, according to a United Nations report released at the end of the year.
• According to NASA, as useful as the pandemic was in reducing nitrogen dioxide pollution, thus cleaning up air pollution, it also limited the atmosphere’s ability to cleanse itself of another important greenhouse gas: methane. Methane emissions grew at a faster rate than at any other time in the last decade. 

WHAT CAN WE DO TO LEARN MORE? 

• You might want to listen to Bill Gates in his TED talk on the subject, hosted by TED’s curator-in-chief, Chris Anderson, and current affairs curator, Whitney Pennington Rodgers, recorded March 24, 2020.
• Listen to this podcast interview with Dr. Robert Bullard, who has been called the “Father of Environmental Justice.” Dr. Robert Bullard discusses how both climate change and COVID-19 magnify pre-existing gaps and inequalities. 
• Read this interview with activist and author Naomi Klein on the pandemic and the climate. 
• And, if you have kids, here is a project for kids to take action and influence congress in supporting clean energy and climate justice initiatives.

FOR YOUR INFORMATION

• In 2021 emissions resumed at record levels (6.4%).