‘The brain-dead eco snobs’ otherwise referred to as ‘eco pagan pixies’ or ’well-heeled social parasites’ at the forefront of Extinction Rebellion have laid themselves open to satire as well as irritation as they cause havoc on the streets of London in the name of climate change. Plastic bottles and bags proliferate; careless talk is thrown around about workers, who have to earn a living, abandoning their jobs to join them on the streets; and luvvie Emma Thompson has swept in – by air from Los Angeles – to give them succour.
The reality is that the UK is way ahead of most countries in reducing CO2 emissions. The UK has made some of the largest reductions in the OECD and has recorded a 38 per cent decrease in CO2 output since 1990; and has almost entirely abandoned coal as an energy source. Emissions in the UK are now at their lowest point since the 19th century. The worst offenders are China (by far), India, USA and Russia.
And even for the UK the demands of the activists are unrealistic. To achieve zero net emissions by 2025, entire industries would have to be wiped out and there would be wholesale restrictions on household items, eradication of air travel and a ban on meat production. A Zero Carbon Britain would need to build around 130,000 new wind turbines in an off-shore location to achieve net emissions by 2030 – which would take up a space twice the size of Wales.
Emma Thompson, has long been an outspoken campaigner for environmental issues and human rights, at times attracting criticism for her strident tone. Born 15 April 1959 she’s an upfront Aries with an afflicted Mercury in Aries square Mars in Cancer opposition Saturn and inconjunct Pluto – so she will have a tendency to come across as rough-edged and at times overly forceful and aggravating. She doesn’t look as if she is winning much this year with tr Neptune slipping and sliding its way round three of her midpoints; tr Uranus causing a catastrophe or two as it collides with her Mars/Pluto midpoint with the prospect of worse in 2020 as her Solar Arc Mars is conjunct her Pluto and tr Pluto starts to square her Sun – maybe she’ll go full suffragette and get herself incarcerated to make a point.
Which isn’t to say there isn’t a sensible, indeed urgent point to be made about climate change. But the strategy of XR appears to be short circuiting badly.
Aleph, here is an excerpt from Greta T’s speech about that supposed 37% reduction:
“The UK is, however, very special. Not only for its mind-blowing historical carbon debt, but also for its current, very creative, carbon accounting.
Since 1990 the UK has achieved a 37% reduction of its territorial CO2 emissions, according to the Global Carbon Project. And that does sound very impressive. But these numbers do not include emissions from aviation, shipping and those associated with imports and exports. If these numbers are included the reduction is around 10% since 1990 – or an an average of 0.4% a year, according to Tyndall Manchester.”
She speaks to it in her speech to British MPs who acted like they couldn’t hear her.
YOURE A BITTER PERSON
the un says our planet has 12 years left, but instead you’re sitting on your ass, criticizing emma thompson for not organzing her protest correctly.
who cares what she does. at least she is standing up for something.
Perhaps some of what she and her associates are advocating is a bit unrealistic. However, I still admire Emma Thompson for her activism and dedication to combating climate change.
By the way, Emma Thompson is one of my top 15 favorite contemporary actresses (the others being: Meryl Streep, Glen Close, Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Kate Blanchett, Helen Mirren, Charlotte Rampling, Shirley MacLaine, Julie Christie, Audrey Tautou, Nicole Kidman, Olympia Dukakis, Catherine Deneuve, and Vanessa Redgrave)
Chris Romero
Jacksonville, Florida
Not to say the amount of unnecessarely airtraval isn’t insane and shouldn’t be tackled. And I’m not talking about families flying for vacations once a year, but business travel. This is actually something that has gotten seriously out of hand. You only have to look at any major airport. All have either had, are in process of having or will have their passanger hubs extended. It’s also telling people doing most air travelling are often the ones working on fields proposing alternatives, such as IT networking. These people may now work from home most weekdays, but fly from The US or Europe to China monthly or bimonthly. Their carbon footprint doesn’t diminuish, but grow exponentially. And we are not talking about a couple of top managers (who usually gain the “priviledge” of staying home), this basically starts at entry level in engineering and IT nowadays.
Aleph, they were working on hydrogen powered vehicles when I was at university back in 1984….
…and I was promised nuclear fission power in grade school, 1965. Where is it?
So you both gave up on those two things? Not happening, you think?
Their intentions are great, a lot of us are with you, but seriously go to BEIJING. People need to get to work.
I don’t know if you’re referring to the same government reports, but superficially and on first look it seems so to me, but there was a caller, perhaps a professor of some kind, on LBC who said that those statistics the government put out are misleading and that they haven’t calculated in all of the sources of pollution.
Another one, on the other hand, pointed out that there is a big problem with electric-car batteries: what to do with them once they’re past their lifetime. Huge source of toxic waste. His solution: hydrogen-powered vehicles.