Transcript Face à la crise climatique

The climate challenge
Climate mecanisms
The greenhouse effect
Rayonnement
solaire
Infrarouge
Piégeage
153 Wm-2
H2O
CO2 , CH4, N20
Conduction,
Evaporation
390 Wm-2
+15°C
The greenhouse effect
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A natural phenomenon
Makes life on Earth possible
Higher temperature: liquid water is available
 Brings inertia to the system
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Main gases responsible:
Carbon dioxide (CO2)
 Methane (CH4)
 Nitrous oxide (N2O)
 Water vapour (H2O)
 …
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Direct link to the carbon cycle
The carbon cycle
The imbalance of the carbon cycle
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Vegetation / Atmosphere
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Oceans / Atmosphere
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Respiration : 60 Gt / year
Photosynthesis : 62 Gt / year
Net result = - 2 Gt / year
In solution : 92 Gt / year
Release : 90 Gt / year
Net result = - 2 Gt / year
Deforestation : +2 Gt / year
Burning of oil, coal, gas = +6 Gt / year
In total :
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+8 Gt / year released by human activities
THIS IS TWO TIMES TOO MUCH!!
The phenomenon of warming,
causes and consequences
Causes of global warming
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Since the beginning of the
Industrial Revolution:
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CO2 : + 31 %
CH4 : + 150 %
N2O : + 15 %
3 crucial « events »
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Industrial Revolution
Post war boom
Globalisation of exchanges
Causes of global warming
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Emitting sectors in France:
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And globally :
The prospects for climate change
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The IPCC:
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Notes the state of affairs in research and
technologies
Publishes a report every 4 years
Works with scientific consensus
Prudent in its positions by nature
Yet they are not reassuring us…
The future evolution of the climate
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Today: the highest
concentration of CO2
and CH4 since 400,000
years
This is only the
beginning … if do
don’t do anything
The prospects for climate change
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No more doubts on the existence of future
climate disorders
Sudden and irreversible changes
The facts confirm the most pessimistic forecasts
Yet retroactive changes are not even taken into
account: melting of the permafrost, destruction
of the ice shelfs at the poles …
What concrete consequences?
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Central scenarios:
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Highly probable scenarios:
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Between + 2°C et + 4°C
Between + 1,1°C et + 6,4°C
The facts confront us with the most
pessimistic scnearios
Concrete consequences
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With + 2°C :
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With + 3°C :
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Decrease of agricultural yields
Risk of famine : + 200 million people
Lack of water : 1,8 billion people
Rising water levels: : 10 million people
Expansion of zones with malaria : + 50 million people
Extinction of 25 to 40% of all species
- 30% of the yield of wheat in India
Risk of famine : + 600 million people
Lack of water: 4 billion people
Rising water levels: 170 million people
Numerous islands erased from the globe
With + 4°C :
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Collapse of agricultural yields
Expansion of the zones with malaria: + 400 million of people
Rising water levels:330 million people
Stop temperature rise at+ 2 °C
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+ 2 °C : danger limit
How do we do it?
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Stabilise the temperature
Stabilise the concentrations of GHG’s (450ppm)
Bring emissions back to natural « recycling »
capacity
Divide worldwide emissions by half
The factor 4 to garanty equal rights for all
Maximum emission
rights (TC/inhabitant) to
divide world emissions
by 2, with 6 billion
people…
…or to
divide by 3
with 9
billion
people
Berger 2005
To stop at + 2 °C
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Emissions must decline before 2015
Developed countries (compared to 1990)
-25 à -40% in 2020
 -80 à -95% in 2050
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From 2020 on, developed countries must
deviate substantially from the trajectory
(except Africa)
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World emissions : -50 à -85% en 2050
Climate policies of the
dominant Powers
The general trend
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Subordinate adaptation to the rhythm and needs of
capital
 Cost-risk analysis (example = Stern report)
 Priority of technological solutions
 Creation of new markets
 New developement cycle of capital : « green
capitalism »
Point to the responsability of emerging countries
Use climate menace to impose their neoliberal
policies
The Kyoto protocol
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Some positive aspects :
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« common but differentiated responsabilities »
Concrete targets and sanctions
BUT noumerous problems
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Insufficient targets: -5,2 % (reduced to -1,7%)
Emissions of maritime and air transport not taken into
account
Carbone sinks =Emission reductions
Possible delocalisation of the efforts (CDM,MOC…)
Emission rights and carbon market: a form of privatisation
of parts of the atmosphere
Recent evolution of policies by the
great powers
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Insufficient commitments:
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Ever more flexible mecanisms
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-20% in 2020 for the EU
Obama wants less than Kyoto
Their role was limited with Kyoto
New technologies integrated as clean technologies: carbon
sequestration, nuclear, biofuels…
A specific market for the forests:REDD
Make the lower classes take the brunt of the effort
(ex : Carbon Tax )
The answers to the climate and the economic crisis
are contradictory, inconsistent public policies: cars,
public transport…
In the face of a predicted failure,
the menace of barbaric
management
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New Orleans
Tuvalu, Vanuatu
The « Climate » report of the Pentagon:
« the numbers of deaths caused by wars, by
famine and by disease will decrease the size of
the population which will readapt to the carrying
capacity ».
Source: An Abrupt Climate Change Scenario and its Implications for the US National
Security, SCWARTZ & RANDALL, 2003
A catastrophy can perhaps be
avoided (in part…)
Energy savings
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A policy of« small gestures » is not
sufficient
Fight against attempts to make you feel
guilty
An important part of what you buy, of
transportation … is unavoidable
Necessity of collective action to make
possible a lifestyle that saves energy and
is low in carbon use
Saving energy
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What possibilities?
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Suppress useless productions
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Energy efficiency
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Armement, the army…
Numerous manufacturing of chemicals, of fertilisers…
Advertisements
Rehabilitation of housing
Norms for electrical devices
Norms of car engines…
Reorganisation of society (the most important source)
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Ex. of transportation :
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Urbanisation : working class expulsed far from the city centre
Problemes of freight : production « just in time », international
division of labour according to the cost of labour
Renewable energies
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Solar : an IMMENSE potential
Its caracter limits its valorisation in a
capitalist system:
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Low density in energy
Difficult to appropriate
Necessity of a new orientation of research
Necessity of making available and of large
distribution of technologies: not only for
those who can pay …
Budgets R&D Energie (AIE)
Researhc to be
urgently redirected!
EnR
8,1%
Our anticapitalist project
Necessity of an anticapitalist
strategy
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The market is powerless:
 A change which is too radical
 Time is too short
 Any change needs the « agreement of the citizens »
Capitalism confronts social forces with a dilemma
 « To save nature or to increase the conditions of
exploitation of the workers »
 Increase the costs of the exploitation of nature versus
a lowering of the cost of the work force
Our ecosocialist project :
 Planning based at the same time on the democratically
determined needs and taking into account the
ecological problems
Transitional method linked to an
emergency program
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A pedagocial role:
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Demonstrate that it is possible
Confront capitalism with its contradictions
Link the social and the ecological dimension
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The crises are fed by the same mecanisms:
competition, search for profits, dictatorship of the
markets …
Put the fulfillment of social needs and the respect of
ecological equilibria at the centre of our program and
our struggles
An emergency plan
Examples of sectorial demands
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Suppression of unnecessary and harmful industries
The building sector :
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Transportation of commodities:
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Free public transport
Development of the possibilities for public transport infrastructure
Stop the development of suburbia
« reintroduction » of the working classes in the city centres
The energy sector:
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Ban on long distance transport by road
Public policy for the development of infrastructure for rail transport
Transportation of people:
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Public service of housing and renovation
For a public service of the whole of the energy sector
Nationalisation of the big companies in the sector
Decentralisation of the means of production of energy
… in order to allow control by users and by employees
Agriculture : food souvereignty and organic/ecological farming
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Drastic reduction of nitrogen containing fertilizers
A break with the productivist logic in the farming world
An emergency plan
Profound transformations
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Reorganisation and transformation of labour
People’s control on production
Get out of the contradiction consumer/worker:
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Reduction of working hours must be a central axis
of our program
Indispensible industrial reconversions :
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Garanty employment, contracts, wages and work
collectives
This must be realised by the workers themselves