What you will find on this page: LATEST NEWS; climate changes and (US) security issues; REPORT: Conflict vs Climate; cost of sanctioned violence (video); trends in military spending; climate change as a stressor; security & national interests (video); REPORT: Combat vs Climate; sanctioned violence; battle for resources
Latest News 3 January Jeremy Leggett Blog, State of The Transition: As fossil fuel diehards take over The White House, the evidence of a fast-moving global energy transition has never been clearer. As captains of the fossil fuel industries and their lobbyists prepare to take over the White House – appointed by a President elected by a minority, claiming to represent the people on an anti-elite ticket yet possessing by far the highest cumulative wealth of any cabinet ever – they will face evidence breaking out all around them of a fast-moving global energy transition threatening to strand the fossil fuels they seek to boost. “World energy hits a turning point”, a Bloomberg headline read on 16th December. “Solar power, for the first time, is becoming the cheapest form of new electricity,” the article marvelled. Analysis of the average cost of new wind and solar in 58 emerging-market economies – including China, India, and Brazil – showed solar at $1.65 million per megawatt and wind at $1.66. Google leads the giant corporations eagerly going with this flow. The largest corporate buyer of renewable energy announced on 6th December that it expects to hit its target of 100% renewable power in, wait for it, 2017. Google is a huge consumer of power, and going solar means deep emissions cuts, especially when solar infrastructure is hooked up with all the digital efficiency-enhancement fandangoes that Silicon Valley giants are zeroing in on in the fast emerging era of artificial intelligence in an internet of things. Read More here 3 January 2017, The Conversation, Why don’t people get it? Seven ways that communicating risk can fail. Many public conversations we have about science-related issues involve communicating risks: describing them, comparing them and trying to inspire action to avoid or mitigate them. Just think about the ongoing stream of news and commentary on health, alternative energy, food security and climate change. Good risk communication points out where we are doing hazardous things. It helps us better navigate crises. It also allows us to pre-empt and avoid danger and destruction. But poor risk communication does the opposite. It creates confusion, helplessness and, worst of all, pushes us to actively work against each other even when it’s against our best interests to do so. So what’s happening when risk communications go wrong? People are just irrational and illogical If you’re science-informed – or at least science-positive – you might confuse being rational with using objective, science-based evidence. To think rationally is to base your thinking in reason or logic. But a conclusion that’s logical doesn’t have to be true. You can link flawed, false or unsubstantiated premises to come up with a logical-but-scientifically-unsubstantiated answer. Read More here 1 January 2017, The Conversation, Cabinet papers 1992-93: Australia reluctant while world moves towards first climate treaty. Cabinet papers from 1992 and 1993 released today by the National Archives of Australia confirm that Australia was a reluctant player in international discussions about climate change and environmental issues under Prime Minister Paul Keating. Internationally, it was an exciting time for the environment. In June 1992, the UN Earth Summit was held in Rio de Janeiro. Here the world negotiated the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (which last year gave us the Paris Agreement) and opened the Convention on Biological Diversity for signing. So what was Australia doing? Australia stumbles towards climate policy Domestically, the focus was on Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD), a policy process begun by Prime Minister Bob Hawke. Working groups made up of corporate representatives, environmentalists and bureaucrats had beavered away and produced hundreds of recommendations. By the final report in December 1991, the most radical recommendations (gasp – a price on carbon!) had been weeded out. Democrats Senator John Coulter warned of bureaucratic hostility to the final recommendations. Keating replaced Hawke in the same month. The August 1992 meeting, where the ESD policies were meant to be agreed upon, was so disastrous that the environmentalists walked out and even the corporates felt aggrieved. Two interim reports on the ESD process from the cabinet papers fill in some of the detail. The first interim report, in March 1992, said that government departments had not been able to identify which recommendations to take on board. Cabinet moved the process on, but the only policies on the table were those that involved: …little or no additional cost, cause minimal disruption to industry or the community, and which also offer benefits other than greenhouse related. Read More here 27 December 2016, The Conversation, Universal basic income: the dangerous idea of 2016. The resurrection of universal basic income (UBI) proposals in the developed world this year gained support from some prominent Australians. But while good in theory, it’s no panacea for the challenges of our modern economy. UBI proposals centre on the idea that the government would pay a flat fee to every adult citizen, regardless of his or her engagement in skill-building activities or the paid labour market, as a partial or complete substitute for existing social security and welfare programs. Of the schemes run in developing places like Kenya, Uganda, and India, some have been evaluated statistically, delivering some evidence of positive impacts on educational investments, entrepreneurship, and earnings. In the developed world, Canada is trialling a UBI scheme. Finland also just rolled out a UBI trial, involving about 10,000 recipients for two years and costing about A$40 million. While Switzerland’s voters just rejected a UBI proposal via referendum, a similar proposal is presently looking like a goer for Utrecht in the Netherlands. Here in Australia, it has been suggested the government might hand out somewhere between A$10,000 and A$25,000 a year to every man and woman. Can we afford it? There are two big questions to ask before taking a UBI proposal seriously, and the first is the most obvious one: where would the money come from to pay for it? The present Australian welfare system (excluding the Medicare bill of A$25 billion) costs around A$170 billion per annum. Our GDP is around A$1.7 trillion per year, so this welfare bill is about 10% of annual GDP. Read More here End Latest News US/DNI Releases Report on Implications of Climate Change on National Security © MCT 2014 Since man first became aware of his neighbours “resources” war or more precisely “sanctioned violence” has been the mechanism for obtaining from others what you believe should be rightly yours. The battle for resources is not new and continues unabated in our supposed “civilised” world of today. With all the misery, lost lives, displaced peoples, wasted resources that war produces climate change has now added to this already complex mess. And as pressure builds to keep fossil fuels in the ground the battles to access and use them more apparently goes on. A bit like Golum and his “precious”…..What on earth are they thinking! There are many direct and indirect ramifications of war – all of which distract/undermine the capacity of the global community to respond in a concerted and positive way to the pandora’s box of climate change. Source: Center for Naval Analysis The cost of sanctioned violence Environmental Costs: The impact of the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan can be seen not only in the social, economic and political situations of these areas but also in the environments in which these wars have been waged. The long years of war have resulted in a radical destruction of forest cover and an increase in carbon emissions. In addition, the water supply has been contaminated by oil from military vehicles and depleted uranium from ammunition. Along with the degradation of the natural resources in these countries, the animal and bird populations have also been adversely affected. Read More here And what has this to do with climate change? It is adding to the problem. Human Costs: UNHCR’s annual Global Trends report, which is based on data compiled by governments, non governmental partner organizations, and from the organization’s own records, shows 51.2 million people were forcibly displaced at the end of 2013, fully six million more than the 45.2 million reported in 2012. “We are seeing here the immense costs of not ending wars, of failing to resolve or prevent conflict,” said UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres. “Peace is today dangerously in deficit. Humanitarians can help as a palliative, but political solutions are vitally needed. Without this, the alarming levels of conflict and the mass suffering that is reflected in these figures will continue.” Read More here. Access Global Emergency Overview here. Civilians Killed and Wounded:The ongoing conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan have taken a tremendous toll on the people of those countries. At the very least, 174,000 civilians have been determined to have died violent deaths as a result of the war as of April 2014. The actual number of deaths, direct and indirect, as a result of the wars are many times higher than this figure. And what has this to do with climate change? It is often stated that the “vulnerable” are the ones that will suffer the most in facing the impacts of climate change as they have not the resources or resilience to adapt or “bounce back”. The futility of war has literally placed over 50 million people, to date, into this vulnerable category and have denied them the opportunity to be part of the solution. A loss that the rest of the world must cover. Economic Costs: A quote from James Madison, Political Observations, 1795: “Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes … known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few.… No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” Nothing much has changed in 200+ years has it? Trends in World Military Expenditure 2014 Source: From 13 April 2015 the SIPRI Military Expenditure Database includes newly released information on military expenditure in 2014. This Fact Sheet describes the global, regional and national trends in military expenditure that are revealed by the new data. Look at the following map of the 15 leaders in military expenditure – and what questions come to your mind? Access map for further details here Trends in World Military Expenditure 2014 A sign of things to come? Climate change impacts becoming a “stressor” in conflicts Did Drought Trigger The Crisis In Syria? What caused the conflict in Syria to erupt when it did, pushing citizens from discontent with the regime to outright rebellion? One possibility is that environmental factors, particularly a long-lasting drought, helped ignite the crisis. Drought affected north-eastern Syria (as well as adjacent regions in Turkey and Iraq) from 2006 to 2011 and resulted in widespread food insecurity, malnutrition, internal displacement from agricultural areas, and the creation of shanty towns on the edges of cities. Read More here National/global security issues and climate change If the deniers want us to believe that climate change is a fabrication and it isn’t a problem then they forgot to convince those “looking after” the security interests of governments. Following are a number of reports that indicate that they are treating climate change as a high profile security issue. From the Center for Naval Analysis. In the videos below, CNA Corporation Military Advisory Board (MAB) members discuss the new report, National Security and the Accelerating Risks of Climate Change. In the first video, Brigadier General Gerald Galloway details how climate change impacts American national security and military readiness, affecting the lives of thousands of military personnel and American civilians around the U.S. In the second video, Admiral Frank “Skip” Bowman emphasizes how climate change is already impacting our national security and international military dynamics. The work of the MAB has been important in advancing the understanding that energy choices are not future threats—they are taking place now—and that actions to build resilience against the projected impacts of climate change are required today. US: National Security and the Accelerating Risks of Climate Change (2014): As a follow-up to its landmark 2007 study on climate and national security, the CNA Corporation Military Advisory Board’s National Security and the Accelerating Risks of Climate Change re-examines the impact of climate change on U.S. national security in the context of a more informed, but more complex and integrated world. The Board’s 2007 report described projected climate change as a “threat multiplier.” In this report the 16 retired Generals and Admirals who make up the board look at new vulnerabilities and tensions posed by climate change, which, when set against the backdrop of increasingly decentralized power structures around the world, they now identify as a “catalyst for conflict.” US 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review: A rather chilling document (a quote: ” The rapidly accelerating spread of information is challenging the ability of some governments to control their populations and maintain civil order.”) Note risk of climate change exec summary and pages 8 & 25. The impacts of climate change may increase the frequency, scale, and complexity of future missions, including defense support to civil authorities, while at the same time undermining the capacity of our domestic installations to support training activities… Climate change poses another significant challenge for the United States and the world at large…. Climate change may exacerbate water scarcity and lead to sharp increases in food costs. The pressures caused by climate change will influence resource competition while placing additional burdens on economies, societies, and governance institutions around the world. These effects are threat multipliers that will aggravate stressors abroad such as poverty, environmental degradation, political instability, and social tensions – conditions that can enable terrorist activity and other forms of violence.….The Department’s operational readiness hinges on unimpeded access to land, air, and sea training and test space. Consequently, we will complete a comprehensive assessment of all installations to assess the potential impacts of climate change on our missions and operational resiliency, and develop and implement plans to adapt as required. Climate change also creates both a need and an opportunity for nations to work together, which the Department will seize through a range of initiatives. We are developing new policies, strategies, and plans, including the Department’s Arctic Strategy and our work in building humanitarian assistance and disaster response capabilities, both within the Department and with our allies and partners. War – Sanctioned Violence/ protecting national security interest Thus, we take another step deeper into the tragedy of U.S. intervention in the Middle East that has become a noxious farce. Consider just one of the head-spinning subplots: We are allied with our declared enemy, Iran, against the bloody Islamic State, which was spawned from the chaos created by our own earlier decisions to invade Iraq and to overthrow the Assad regime in Syria, which has us fighting side-by-side with jihadist crazies financed by Saudi Arabia, whom we are supporting against the Houthis in Yemen, the bitter rivals of Al Qaeda — the perpetrators of 9/11! Read More here NOTE: For those readers that have got this far, if you wish to explore further the dysfunction of our world you may need to include the vast implications of organised crime and corporate and political corruption and the implications for climate change response as well. Climate change and national security issues
19 September 2016, American Security Project: The National Intelligence Council, part of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, has just released a new White Paper titled “Implications for U.S. national security of Anticipated Climate Change.” The report analyzes the potential effects of climate change on national security in the coming 20 years. The report uses previous IPCC reports as a scientific baseline for analysis. The report begins with a strong assertion of the dangers of climate change for societies, economies, and governments across the world: t goes on to list some of the pathways to “wide-ranging national security challenges for the United States and other countries,” including “threats to the stability of countries, adverse effects on food prices and availability, and negative impacts on investments and economic competitiveness.” The report gives possible time-frames for these emerging national security challenges, suggesting that based on “changing trends in extreme weather,” the future will almost certainly hold more “climate related disruptions.” The majority of climate change-related risks to U.S. national security in the next five years will come from “distinct extreme weather events”, and “the exacerbation of currently strained conditions,” including water shortages. The report comes after years of significant research inside and outside of the government on climate security. The National Intelligence Council last released a report on this issue in 2009. Many in the security community have spoken on the emerging national security risks posed by climate change. ASP and countless other organizations have urged policy makers not to underestimate the security challenges posed by climate change and the rising seas. Read More here and access full report here
10 November 2015, Yale Connections: Drought, water, war, and climate change” is the title of this month’s Yale Climate Connections video (above) exploring expert assessments of the interconnections between and among those issues. With historic 1988 BBC television footage featuring Princeton University scientist Syukuru (“Suki”) Manabe and recent news clips and interviews with MIT scientist Kerry Emanuel, Ohio State University scientist Lonnie Thompson, CNN reporter Christiane Amanpour, and New York Times columnist and book author Tom Friedman, the six-minute video plumbs the depths of growing climate change concerns among national security experts. Source: Yale Connections
Total world military expenditure in 2014 was $1776 billion. This is equivalent to 2.3 per cent of global GDP. According to the SIPRI Military Expenditure Database, Australia is ranked at number 13 as the biggest spender for 2014.Total Australia spending AUD29.3 billion ($b.,MER) 25.4. Share of GDP 1.8%. Share of world military expenditure 1.4%
And what has this to do with climate change? It goes with out saying that responding to climate change and transforming the energy and economic systems of the world in a carbon restricted world would be made a lot easier on everyone if military budgets were focused on what could help the world rather than plunder it. 
5 October 2016. The Military and Climate Security Budgets Compared. Fifteen of the sixteen hottest years ever recorded have occurred during this new century, and the near-unanimous scientific consensus attributes the principal cause to human activity. The U.S. military’s latest National Security Strategy says that climate change is “an urgent and growing threat to our national security, contributing to increased natural disasters, refugee flows, and conflicts over basic resources like food and water.” What they don’t say is that the overall balance of U.S. security spending should be adjusted to fit that assessment. And we know less about how much we are spending on this urgent threat than we used to, since the federal government hasn’t produced a climate security budget since 2013. In this new report, Combat vs. Climate, the Institute for Policy Studies steps in to provide the most accurate climate change security budget currently available, drawing data from multiple agencies. And it looks at how these expenditures stack up within our overall security budget. Then, the report ties the military’s own assessment of its urgent threats to a budget that outlines a “whole of government” reapportionment that will put us on a path to averting climate catastrophe. This is our status quo: As global temperatures hit one record after another, the stalemate in Congress over funding to respond continues. Climate scientists warn that, as in Syria, unless the global greenhouse gas buildup is reversed, the U.S. could be at risk for conflicts over basic resources like food and water. Meanwhile, plans to spend $1 trillion to modernize our entire nuclear arsenal remain in place, and projected costs of the ineffective F-35 fighter jet program continue to climb past $1.4 trillion. Unless we get serious about moving the money, alarms from all over about the national security dangers of climate change will ring hollow. Access article here. Access report here.