Showing posts from category climate change.
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Consequences of Climate Change: Imagining a World Without Tequila and Lattes
›June 25, 2007 // By Alex FischerOver the past months, climate change has been the darling of the news media. Now, reporters are starting to identify ways that climate change may threaten the American way of life. For example, what if the change in weather patterns affected the world’s coffee production? According to the UNEP Global Outlook Report this may not be an abstraction: “Coffee is the first, second, or third largest export crop for 26 mostly poor countries in Africa and Central America. Yet coffee is sensitive to changes in average temperatures.” The average U.S. coffee drinker consumes 3.1 cups of coffee a day. Can we imagine reducing that to one cup? Or paying double or triple for a single shot of espresso?
We are also seeing more stories about the consequences of hasty efforts to limit carbon emissions. Increasing demand for low-emission fuel is already causing shortage of blue agave, the source of tequila. The Christian Science Monitor’s Sara Miller reports on the dramatic shift from the growth of the spiky-blue native Mexican plant to tall corn stalks; and writes that agave is the latest casualty of the corn-based ethanol craze.
The quest for climate-friendly fuel could also have unintended security consequences. Another recent article quotes Andrew Pendleton of Christian Aid: “You could have blood biofuels in the same way as you have blood diamonds.” What if biofuels are the next hub of conflict resources, akin to diamonds in Sierra Leone, timber in Cambodia, or minerals in the Congo?
The news media should be mindful of speculative reporting. Of course, terms like “blood biofuels” are eye-catching, but by using them, news outlets run the risk of overselling potential threats. ECSP’s Geoff Dabelko recently spoke about this phenomena at an event on environment, conflict and cooperation, noting the fallout from Robert Kaplan’s 1994 article “The Coming Anarchy,” which launched a strand of environmental fatalism whose gloom-and-doom predictions never came to pass.
This reminds me of the warnings I was told as a child, related through the classic fable of “The Boy Who Cried Wolf.” Critics of climate change are ready in waiting for the Al Gore’s of the world to be revealed as metaphorical “boys.” It is imperative, then, that concrete evidence and studies are conducted to support the claims connecting climate change and security. And for their part, the news media should be cautious in their coverage of climate change, but also be commended for hitting on a question about the developed world’s priorities: Could the threat of losing luxury items produce more action than predictions of increasing natural disasters and coastal flooding? Is the thought of losing that morning cup of coffee enough to shift public opinion and behavior? And will these global shifts have a greater impact on the already fragile security of poor and post-conflict countries? -
Climate and Security Meets YouTube
›June 20, 2007 // By Geoffrey D. DabelkoYou can now watch commentary from some of the 11 retired U.S. generals and admirals who contributed to National Security and the Threat of Climate Change, a report that is one of the more recent voices on the links between climate and security. A seven-minute video on YouTube features interview clips, press conference footage, and narrated background on the CNA Corp’s Military Advisory Board. If you would like longer versions, you can watch Generals Sullivan and Ward and Admiral Truly testify before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; or watch Generals Wald, Kern, and Farrell present the report for the Environmental Change and Security Program (ECSP) at the Woodrow Wilson Center.
One of the recommendations of these 11 retired flag officers is for the National Intelligence Council to produce a government-wide National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) to assess climate’s threats from a U.S. national security perspective. Legislation calling for a NIE has been contentious on the Hill, with some Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee claiming precious time could not be wasted on such investigations in the midst of the war on terror.
Representative Edward J. Markey (D.-Mass.), who is chair of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, has a different view. In this video from the House floor he favorably cites the CNA report and defends the allocation of intelligence community resources to climate assessments.
And a final climate and security video recommendation, again from an ECSP meeting. Although the NSF-funded research is still in progress, initial results from Marc Levy (CIESIN), Charles Vörösmarty (University of New Hampshire), and Nils Petter Gleditsch (PRIO) on drought’s connections to violent conflict in sub-Saharan Africa indicate a statistically significant relationship. A substantive meeting summary gives you more details on their use of geo-referenced rainfall data and newly coded conflict data to provide the largely elusive quantitative evidence for these linkages. -
Climate and Security Reaches a Crescendo
›April 20, 2007 // By Geoffrey D. DabelkoThe week of April 16th will go down as climate and security week. Monday found us in a fancy hotel ballroom within the shadow of Capitol Hill where eight former three-and four-star U.S. generals and admirals made a plea for more aggressive U.S. action on climate change. It was not a bunch of granola chomping, tree-huggers arrayed across the stage. Instead it was in front of 20 American flags that General Gordon Sullivan USA (Ret.) said in introducing the report National Security and the Threat of Climate Change: “We are not your traditional environmentalists.” Gordon, former Chief of Staff of the Army and chair of the CNA Corp’s Military Advisory Board, ran quickly through the group’s findings and recommendations before each of the seven other senior officers drew on their particular backgrounds and tailored how they viewed climate change as a security threat.
Former Admiral Frank “Skip” Bowman USN (Ret.), the submariner, said not planning for climate change made about as much sense as not planning for a hostile underwater environment.
General Charles Wald (USAF) Ret., who worked extensively in Africa from his deputy commander post in European Command, spoke of the resource pressures and instability he witnessed in West and East Africa – factors likely to become more challenging security threats with sea level rise and prolonged droughts.
Admiral Joseph Prueher USN (Ret.), former Commander of Pacific Command and U.S. Ambassador to China highlighted sea level rise implications for population and business centers like Shanghai and Navy bases like San Diego and Norfolk. He went on to say the U.S. can’t tackle the climate change problem alone, necessitating deeper engagement with key players like China and India.
Many of the officers emphasized that the panel “wanted to move beyond the debate over cause and effect” in climate change. As military men, they stressed they were accustomed to making important decisions with incomplete or uncertain information. They called on policymakers to do the same in the climate realm.
Three other senior officers on the Military Advisory Group weren’t in Washington that day. One of the missing members, General Tony Zinni USMC (Ret.) gave a very dynamic NPR interview that was also generating a buzz among those who follow these issues. Zinni has been making the case for linking environment and security for at least eight years. It was as Commander of Central Command (CENTCOM) in 1999 that Zinni said at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington that he wasn’t doing his job as head of CENTCOM if he was not following environmental and demographic issues as both threats and opportunities in his theaters of operation (North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia).
One day later the spotlight shown on the shore of the East River at the United Nations. The United Kingdom, chair of the Security Council in April, sent Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett to oversee the Council’s first consideration of climate change as a security threat. The session was not without its disagreements.
Beckett emphasized that climate change posed threats beyond the “narrow” sense of security to threaten “collective” security of the international community and human well-being. The UK, France, Italy, the Secretary-General, and some developing countries such as Ghana, Panama, and Peru, highlighted the extra stress placed on already vulnerable populations in developing countries where pastorlists and agriculturalists already compete for scarce land and water. They suggested more of these conflicts would likely become (more) violent. Papau New Guinea representative, speaking on behalf of the Pacific Islands Forum, stressed that climate change posed a fundamental security threat – to their sovereign territory and their people.
Lining up against the Security Council considering climate change as a security issue were China, Indonesia, South Africa, and Pakistan speaking on behalf of the Group of 77 and China. The countries acknowledged the tremendous challenges posed by climate change but situated them as sustainable development, not security issues. They argued the more representative UN General Assembly and UN Economic and Social Council, the Commission on Sustainable Development, and multilateral treaties in general were the more appropriate forums for debate. China emphasized the “common, but differentiated responsibilities” language found in the Framework Convention on Climate Change – a reminder that the developing world expects the developed countries who have contributed most to the greenhouse gas emissions to go first and move aggressively on mitigation.
The United States seemed unable to make up its mind and fell back on its familiar script of “it is all about goverance and state capacity” that it uses in just about every occasion on environment and development issues. Singapore’s representative shared the G77 and China reservation on the Security Council playing a key role on climate change, but suggested it still should have “some sort of a role, because it seems obvious to all but the wilfully blind that climate change must, if not now, then eventually have some impact on international peace and security.”
On Wednesday April 18 it was back to Washington where General Gordon Sullivan testified before the Select Committee On Energy Independence And Global Warming of the U.S. House Of Representatives. Sullivan laid out concisely the Military Advisory Board’s four findings and five recommendations:
Findings:- First, projected climate change poses a serious threat to America’s national security;
- Second, climate change acts as a threat multiplier for instability in some of the most volatile regions of the world;
- Third, projected climate change will add to tensions even in stable regions of the world; and
- Fourth, climate change, national security, and energy dependence are a related set of global challenges.
Recommendations- First, the national security consequences of climate change should be fully integrated into national security and national defense strategies;
- Second, the U.S. should commit to a stronger national and international role to help stabilize climate changes at levels that will avoid significant disruption to global security and stability;
- Third, the U.S. should commit to global partnerships that help less developed nations build the capacity and resiliency to better manage climate impacts;
- Fourth, the Department of Defense should enhance its operational capability by accelerating the adoption of improved business processes and innovative technologies that result in improved U.S. combat power through energy efficiency; and
- Fifth, DoD should conduct an assessment of the impact on U.S. military installations worldwide of rising sea levels, extreme weather events, and other possible climate change impacts over the next 30 to 40 years.
What it will add up to is unclear. What is clear is that political space has been created for discussing climate and security’s links as part of the larger momentum for debate on climate change opened up by a tangled mix of factors: the new IPCC report and other scientific findings, An Inconvenient Truth, state action in the US, EU renewable energy targets, Hurricane Katrina, European heat waves and floods, high gas prices, faith-based efforts (What would Jesus drive? He wouldn’t, he’d walk.) Climate and security is now on the agenda – the challenge is now to find practical steps for a variety of actors to take to help break the negative links and grasp opportunities presented. - First, projected climate change poses a serious threat to America’s national security;
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Generals/Admirals Flag Climate Change
›April 15, 2007 // By Geoffrey D. DabelkoPress coverage has started the day before the official launch of “National Security and the Threat of Climate Change,” a report by 11 retired U.S. generals and admirals organized by the CNA Corporation, a security think tank based in Alexandria, Virginia. Sherri Goodman, the former Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Environmental Security during the Clinton Administrations has assembled this group with financial support from the Rockefeller Family Foundations.
The Washington Post, New York Times, CNN, and BBC all have coverage. An extended press release is available on the CNA site. The report will be available here on Monday, April 16.
Stay tuned as UK Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett will make April 17 climate and security day at the UN Security Council. -
Pop Goes the Environment: Op-Eds Break the P-E Silence
›April 11, 2007 // By Meaghan ParkerThe population-environment connection is riding the climate change bandwagon into the Op-Ed columns—at least overseas. The Observer’s Juliette Jowit lays out four reasons why “No one is willing to address the accelerating growth in the world’s population” including:“[T]he uncomfortable suspicion that environmentalism is a soft cover for more objectionable population agendas to stop or reduce immigration or growth in developing countries. Sometimes it might be. But that doesn’t take away the underlying fact: that more people use more resources and create more pollution.”
But, she concludes, this is no reason to “to ignore one half of the world’s biggest problem: the population effect on climate change.” The lively comment board takes sides on this sometimes-controversial linkage with gusto.
London-based journalist Gwynne Dyer argues in the New Zealand Herald that despite some progress, the “Population bomb [is] still ticking away” in many developing countries. Like Jowitt, he bemoans population’s perceived political incorrectness, which means it “scarcely gets a mention even in discussions on climate change.”
But not talking about population growth is a “failure of government”—especially when the consequences include not only poverty, but war, he says:“Often, however, the growing pressure of people on the land leads indirectly to catastrophic wars: Sierra Leone, Liberia, Uganda, Somalia, Congo, Angola, and Burundi have all been devastated by chronic, many-sided civil wars, and all seven appear in the top 10 birth-rate list. Rwanda, Ethiopia, and Mozambique, which have suffered similar ordeals, are just out of the top 10.”
Aside from the rough correlation he draws between fertility rate and civil conflict, Dyer doesn’t cite any reasons or research supporting this indirect link. Experts writing in the ECSP Report’s “Population and Conflict” series provide a more nuanced look at this relationship. -
Climate and security links heat up
›April 5, 2007 // By Geoffrey D. DabelkoOn April 17, the UK will use the prerogative of the chair of the UN Security Council to devote a day to the security implications of climate change. UK Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett is scheduled to deliver a major address meant to put climate-security links squarely on the high table of security policy.
John Ashton, the UK special envoy for climate change and an advisor to Beckett, has been making the case for treating climate as a security issue since he took up the post last fall. Writing for BBC On-line’s Green Room, Ashton saysConflict always has multiple causes, but a changing climate amplifies all the other factors. Katrina and Darfur illustrate how an unstable climate will make it harder to deliver security unless we act more effectively now to neutralise the threat.
Ashton is certain to be instrumental in framing Beckett’s upcoming Security Council session. Just last week in Berlin, Ashton laid out the rationale for the UN session and provided what is likely a sneak preview of Beckett’s main points. He highlighted climate’s coming contributions to conflict through border disputes, migration, contested energy supplies, water, land and fish scarcities, societal stresses from arrested development, and worsening humanitarian crises. In his prepared remarks Ashton states “The cumulative impacts of climate change could exacerbate these drivers of conflict, and particularly increase the risk to those states already susceptible to conflict, for example where weak governance and political processes cannot mediate successfully between competing interests.”
Even the French are picking up on the climate-security debates here in the United States. Le Monde covered a March 30-31 climate and security conference held in Chapel Hill, North Carloline under the auspices of the Triangle Institute for Security Studies and with U.S. Army War College funding. -
Environmental Security – It’s Big in Europe
›April 5, 2007 // By Gib ClarkeTo an American “outsider” like me, a recent conference in Berlin on integrating environment, development, and conflict prevention reflected the stark contrast between our policies and those of the EU. Though we are confronting similar situations – indeed, the same situation – we are dealing with them quite differently. In recent years, European policymakers have tried to balance environmental and energy concerns, working to decrease humans’ impact on climate and the environment and encourage environmental cooperation, while still generating enough energy for growth.
The tone of the conference was bleak, but the EU’s recent action on climate change is an encouraging sign of how governments can use scientific data to make difficult policy decisions. Only a month age, the EU agreed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2012.
Interestingly, the conference was situated at the center of German’s current political dominance, coming on the heels of the EUs 50th Anniversary celebration in Berlin and during the year of Germany’s joint Presidency of the EU and the G8. The conference’s timing also preceded the start of the UK’s Presidency of the United Nations Security Council. John Ashton, special representative on climate change at the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office, announced that the UK will hold a “thematic debate” in the Security Council exploring the relationship among climate, energy, and security. The debate, the first of its kind at such a high level, will focus on the security implications of a changing climate, as well as other factors that contribute to conflict, like population growth, immigration, and access to food, water, and natural resources. -
Britain’s Environment Secretary Sees the Security Light
›April 2, 2007 // By Christine CraddockBritain’s Environment Secretary David Miliband is calling for increased action on climate change, asserting that it would result not only in environmental and economic benefits but also a “peace dividend.” He said last Tuesday at a World Wildlife Fund conference:“[Action on climate change is] our best hope of addressing the underlying causes of future conflict in the world, and [it] is as significant for foreign policy as it is for environment policy.”
I agree that action on climate change can engender a “triple dividend” — to the economy, environment, and security. Encouraging a gradual transition toward a “low-carbon” economy is crucial for attracting investment and avoiding an abrupt, costlier one in the future. The welfare of many nations’ economies is linked to environment and security: rising sea levels would lead to displacement of coastal populations and potential battles over natural resources, while changing weather patterns could result in prolonged drought and famine in some places, or floods and the spread of waterborne diseases in others. As our planet changes, so too changes the availability of resources and how they are allocated.
I see Miliband’s comments as an articulation of the biggest economic, environmental, and security threat we currently face: a failure to successfully adapt to the impacts of climate change in the long run. Climate change “aggravates tensions that are already there and acts in conjunction with other sources of instability,” he said. The “peace dividend” he speaks of will result from soothing these tensions through adaptive climate policies on mitigating the foreign and domestic levels.
Miliband’s statement also comes at an interesting time for British policymaking, as parliament tries to establish a legislative framework for the country’s low-carbon transition. Additionally, with Prime Minister Tony Blair on the way out in 12 weeks, a storm of speculation brews over who will be the next Labour Party leader, and Miliband finds himself among the potential candidates. Rumored to also be a candidate for the foreign secretary cabinet post, his comments, at the very least, his comments rrepresent a growing awareness of the environment as a security issue in Britain.
