More than half of the world's 60,000 tree species are now vulnerable to potential extinction threats like accelerating deforestation and unprecedented levels of heat by the 2030s with staggering implications for all life on Earth.
1. This is an Ecological Catastrophe.
However, it's not too late to take emergency individual-collective action to change consumption and production, organising for political and economic system change away from growth & corporate crimes.
2. 'At the current pace of warming, much of the world will be inhospitable to forests as we know them within decades.. And some recent research suggests that, in 40 years, none of the trees alive today will be able to survive the projected climate..'insideclimatenews.org/news/25042020/…
3. 'prevent them becoming extinct..'
'more than half of the species (58%) were only found in one country, suggesting they were vulnerable to potential threats, such as deforestation from extreme weather events or human activity' during capitalism. bbc.com/news/amp/scien…
4. Eight years after this 'Climate Departure' study, we're still on a high emisssoins trajectory: tropical regions with many tree species will experience new extreme climate conditions from the 2020s/30s, with the whole world hitting departure by the 2040s.
5. 'the conservation status of only about 20,000 tree species.. are currently known.'
60,065 tree species currently living on Earth: 'more than half were found to only occur in a single country, which could suggest an increased vulnerability to threats..' latestnigeriannews.com/news/4284501/a…
6. There is no carbon budget. All greenhouse gas emissions must be slashed to zero by 2030 for any reasonable chance of decent human survival.
We may yet still limit the damage with profound changes in the coming months and years.
8. 'Deforestation of the Brazilian Amazon has surged above three football fields a minute... pushing the world’s biggest rainforest closer to a tipping point beyond which it cannot recover.'
10. To protect forests everywhere, take action in the country you live in. Organise politically to save the world's trees, and humanity, from a terrible fate within decades.
“We are scientists who have been studying the Amazon for many decades. Today, we stand exactly in a moment of destiny: The tipping point is here, it is now"
TO DO
reforestation
raise quality of life in Amazonian cities
develop bioeconomy
stop agribusiness news.mongabay.com/2019/12/the-ti…
A recent peer-reviewed scientific paper showed the carbon 'budgets' for 1.5C, 1.75C, and 2C are either 'tiny' or else already at zero (virtually zero for 2C).
We may yet limit the damage, but only if we acknowledge that the planet we think we're living on no longer exists.
2. We're living through an Ecological Catastrophe.
It's not too late to take emergency individual-collective action to change consumption and production, organising for political and economic system change away from growth & corporate crimes.
Abrupt climate change will produce permanent catastrophic consequences in the tropics by the 2020s, and in the rest of the world by the 2040s according to the 2013 peer-reviewed study which was the first to integrate all prior scientific research.
THREAD
1.
'From now on, efforts to reduce climate-change will be efforts to reduce the extent of the catastrophe, not to prevent the catastrophe.'
Even today, without runaway climate change, we're already suffering. We don't want people to be hopeful, we want people to be angry and we want people to act.
I find it remarkable to mention nuclear weapons without confirming that total collapse at any time is possible and has been for many decades. A nuclear war would collapse civilization and kill pretty much everything.
1. We're at 417ppm
Dr J. Hansen: that's 3.5°C eventually
2. We face 427ppm by 2025
That's like climates +3M yrs ago
3. Business plans: +450ppm by 2035
Scientists: worst impacts likely
4. Trajectory: 550ppm by 2047
Decent human survival threatened
5. Action: now or never
We're in an Ecological Catastrophe.
However, it's not too late to calmly take emergency individual-collective action to change consumption and production, organising for political and economic system change away from growth & corporate crimes.
You already know that 20% of all species face extinction in the next few decades that's why you're taking whatever emergency individual action you can and striving for profound economic & political change, but did you realise at least 40% of Earth's plant species are threatened?
1. Researchers say there are still huge gaps in our knowledge about plants, the implication being it would seem that it is perfectly likely more than 40% face extinction.