🔎 What’s going on?
As Coronavirus spreads around the globe halting business as usual, there is a silver lining - it’s also slowing down emissions and offering remarkable lessons and opportunity for the climate crisis.
📉 So let’s break it down...
News of positive impact on the environment has been coming out all week:
- Reduced oil demand - demand for oil has drastically reduced due to Coronavirus’s impact on industry and transportation, leading to an economic price war between oil-exporting countries. This naturally leads to a reduction in global emissions.👇
- Emissions have dropped - China saw a sharp drop of 25% during the first quarter of this year, compared to last year. This is mainly due to reductions in coal and oil production.
- Air quality has improved - space agencies recently published maps of China and Italy which show air pollution (of nitrogen dioxide and PM2.5) has drastically reduced. Researchers from Stanford have estimated that 4,000 children under 5 years old and 73,000 adults over 70 might have been saved over the last two months in China. This provides a wake-up call, given that deaths caused by Coronavirus (3,189 as of March 14) are lower than those caused by air pollution.
But there are also valuable lessons:
- Virtual life - to contain the virus spreading, most businesses, schools and universities are embracing working and studying from home. An incredible opportunity for everyone to turn this positive experience into a way of life going forward, at least for the summer.
- Virtual conferences - with major conferences being cancelled and travel bans in place, virtual conferences have started to replace them - this reduces emissions from flying.
The coming opportunity:
- Individual actions matter - washing hands and staying at home to stop spreading the virus has the biggest impact. As we’ve now seen, governments by themselves can't do everything and so much can also be achieved by individuals and businesses. Similarly, changing your energy supplier to renewables and swapping to a plant-based diet can make a big difference.
📊 Is it going to last?
Probably not. From previous outbreaks, we know that emissions will start rising again once the virus is contained and vaccines are developed.
❓Why should I care?
We are in two crises at the moment: the Coronavirus pandemic and a Climate crisis. Both need an equal amount of urgency applied, with the pandemic requiring immediate and temporary attention. However, the climate crisis also brings with it a (long term) public health crisis where infectious diseases (such as Malaria, Dengue Fever) will migrate between countries as seasons and weather patterns change.
🚦 Where do we need to be?
After every economic turmoil, there is an incredible opportunity to rebuild and reorganise the economy. Fiscal stimuli (government cash injection) will soon be announced by governments to restart the economy. This is a remarkable golden opportunity for a green stimulus. Large scale green investment into infrastructure and clean energy technologies such as solar, wind, hydrogen, batteries and carbon capture can all help. Let’s kill two birds with one stone by accelerating the economy and cutting carbon at the same time.
👤What can I do about it?
As an individual, academic, business or government take a look at this long list of solutions that we can start deploying today.