We can’t afford to choose adaptation over cutting emissions – suggesting otherwise is dangerous - The Guardian
We can’t afford to choose adaptation over cutting emissions - suggesting otherwise is dangerous | James Shaw | The Guardian
I cannot say how the world will look for our kids, but what I do know is that it will reflect the decisions we take today. The past two years we’ve witnessed a seemingly never-ending cascade of climate-turbocharged disasters. Canterbury, the West Coast, Nelson-Tasman, Tairāwhiti, Auckland, Waikato, and Northland. Aotearoa New Zealand knows clearer than ever the immediacy of the climate crisis. We simply cannot rest. Far from it: despite huge progress, we are still nowhere near where we need to be.
A slew of opportunistic right-wing voices is lining up to use recent disasters to argue that the government should shift its efforts away from cutting emissions towards adaptation. This is as unscientific as it is dangerous. It is also utterly out of touch with the needs of the people they purport to represent. It is a disingenuous, harmful and bad faith argument that distracts from the conversations we need to be having.
Let me use an example: it will be almost impossible to farm in a world that is three degrees warmer. Absent any plan to cut emissions, National and Act look willing enough to sacrifice the future of rural communities on the altar of short-term electoral politics.
Adaptation is critical but has its limits. We must limit warming as much as we can so we have a chance to adapt. Even with the progress we’ve made, our likely future still lies well beyond thresholds considered “safe”. Without urgent action to limit warming, we will very quickly reach adaptation limits. To be resilient, we need both immediate and urgent action to limit warming, and action to adapt to what we know cannot be avoided. With a new cyclone recovery taskforce up and running, I have three guideposts that should direct where we go from here.
First, the world warms in response to emissions. The impacts we’re experiencing will get worse until we’re no longer putting climate pollution into the atmosphere. Two degrees of warming is not as bad as three degrees – and 1.5 degrees not as bad as two degrees. Urgent action to cut emissions is the frontline of defence. Every fraction of a degree matters. Every tonne of climate pollution that is stopped matters.
Second, even if we limit warming, there will be effects we cannot avoid. The world has already warmed by about 1.1 degrees. Even if we stopped polluting the atmosphere tomorrow, the climate will continue to change. Extreme weather events will increase and overlap, each one testing the limits of our resiliency and recovery. We need to plan for this.
Our focus needs to shift from short-term preparedness towards creating stronger communities. Resilient, affordable, inclusive communities that can meet everyone’s needs despite the challenges of the disrupted climate.
We need to get serious about this new approach. Otherwise, the changes we experience will be forced on us by extreme weather disasters, rather than our efforts to create vibrant, connected communities, even as climate change shapes how we live.
The solutions must be necessarily wide ranging. Some will require changes to our legislation, so developers stop building in high-risk areas. New rules, so that when we do build, we’re constructing more resilient homes and buildings designed to handle extreme weather. Greater use of areas that filter and store water for increasingly long and severe droughts will be critical. More housing is essential for our cities, but we also need to make sure we’re meeting this demand without car-dependent sprawl that concretes over natural areas, or builds in flood-prone areas.
Work is under way to establish a framework for funding and financing the potential relocation of some communities. The priority will be to ensure low-income families do not carry the burden of paying for climate impacts.
Other approaches will rely on nature, like protecting floodplains and wetlands, restoring urban green spaces, and enhancing our native forests. Investment will also be needed in better stormwater management, and improving household and community energy resilience through small-scale solar and wind power. Rural areas have been left without power and uncertainty about when it will be reconnected. A resilient energy system of household and community solar can reduce the impact of disruptions to the main grid.
Third, although extreme weather affects everyone, it hits hardest for those with the least. The option to move somewhere safer, less prone to flooding doesn’t exist for many people. Some people will be forced to go into debt to replace essentials like beds or curtains. This unequal impact puts people at greater risk when the next inevitable climate-fuelled weather event arrives.
How we go about building resilient communities is a question that we all need to be asking ourselves. For me, the answer is clear: a more equal and inclusive society is a more adaptive and resilient society.
After any major disaster, it is entirely reasonable that people want things to “return to normal” and “go back to the way they were before”. But climate change has redefined what is normal. Recovery is necessary, but insufficient. We have to build back better not just for ourselves, but for our children, and their children.
James Shaw is New Zealand’s minister for climate change