Street roots., May 15, 2015, Page 7, Image 7

Street Roots • May 15-21,2015
News
Page 7
A unique problem in need of a unique solution
Capitalism may hold the answer to climate change,
authors say, but we all can do our part to help
BY TOM WATSON
CONTRIBUTING WRITER
“Climate Shock;
The Economic
Consequences of
a Hotter Planet”
by Gernot Wagner
arid Martin L.
Weitzman
S
he rich will adapt. The poor will
suffer.”
That’s where we’re headed with
global warming, according to “Climate
Shock,” a welcome new addition to the
growing library of depressing but important
books about climate change.
Although that quote may seem too glib, •
it’s probably right on, and! appreciated such
a blunt reality check in a book by two
economists, Gernot Wagner from the
Environmental Defense Fund and Marty
Weitzman from Harvard University.
If you’re interested in learning more about
climate change and the options for dealing
with it, “Climate Shock” isn’t a bad place to
start. Naomi Klein’s “This Changes
Everything” is still the gold standard, but
“Climate Shock” is easier to read and much
shorter, only 155 pages of text. It also makes
new and useful points.
Many of us do want to know how we — the
whole world — can respond to climate change
so that poor people suffer less. Klein ,
emphasized that angle in her book (her
subtitle is “Capitalism vs. tile Climate”), and
this new book doesn’t dwell on economic
in eq u ality n e a rly as m u ch . B u t a re a d e r can
still use Wagner and Weitzman’s
observations to help determine the best
ways to take action, individually and
collectively. ,
First, the authors lay out the situation,
listing four factors that make climate change
the most difficult environmental and public
policy problem the planet has ever faced.
“It’s almost uniquelyglobal, uniquely long-"
term, uniquely irreversible, and uniquely
uncertain — certainly unique in the
combination of all four.” That sentence may/
have a few too many uniques, but this still,
helps explain why we’ve been so
unsuccessful addressing climate change so
DEEPER WATERS, from page 5
environment for mentoring, learning and
becoming a steward for environmental
protection, says Brown.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has
become one of Soul River Inc.’s, biggest
supporters, choosing it for a five-year
cooperative agreement in which it funds and
helps plan fishing trips and events.
This year most of Those funds are going
toward the trip to Alaska» but Brown is
scrambling to find new donors and adjust
the budget to cover all expenses for the trip.
Brian Lawler, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife
representative working with Brown, says
that with 80 percent of Americans living in
urban areas, programs like Brown’s are
helping to connect many people to nature?
who otherwise wouldn’t have access. That s
“planting a seed,” he says, that could grow
them into future environmental stewards
and conservationists. “Maybe they won’t
grow up to be ^biologist, but maybe they 11
grow up and love to fish,” he says, and that
far and why the odds are so long for beating
it.
Wagner and Weitzman then focus at
length on “geoengineering.” Proponents of
this concept claim that humans can prevent
the worst effects of climate change with a ,
technological fix.
The book’s main example of how
geoengineering might work, the natural
eruption of the Mount Pinatubo volcano in
the Philippines in 1991 pumped about 20
million tons of sulfur dioxide into the
stratosphere, resulting in a temporary
decrease of global temperatures by about 0.9.
degree Fahrenheit If something like this
could be done on purpose, at a relatively low
cost (globally speaking, and compared’with
the costs of increased climate change) of
under $10 billion a year, why not try it?- _
Like most, environmentally minded
scientists, economists included, Wagner and
Weitzman point out that geoengineering
should only be researched or attempted
extremely carefully because of all the
uncertainties and potential negative effects.
But we all certainly need to become z
knowledgeable about it, because eventually
the big-money corporations will push
hard for various geoengineering
* *
solutions. The unintended impacts of.
,
geoengineering Would Surety hit
♦
hardest those on the lowest rungs of/
♦
the economic ladder, just like climate .
change itself.
“Climate Shock” wraps up, as does
nearly every book about climate change, J
with a chapter about “what you can do.”
This one works better than most. The
authors start by saying we need to
| '
“Vote... Vote well... Vote for those who *
|
seek to look out for society at large,”
*
not to further an agenda. Simple, but
they nailed it. That’s exactly what it will
take, on a grand scale, for our society to
make a stand against climate change.
will help them understand that nature is ,
something we need to protect. |
In addition to learning how to fish, tie
flies, read the water and study the science
of nature, Brown says lie’s providing a space
for people to learn leadership skills and
most importantly, to heal.
• Mark Roberts met Brown at a fly-fishing
Meetup group Brown initiated four years
ago to bring local fishing enthusiasts
together. Now Roberts, a Vietnam War
vétéran, actively volunteers with Soul River
Inc. He says youth and veterans come back
from Soul River fishing trips “changed and
energized.”
He remembers a four-day rafting trip he
took with Brown and several other
professional guides on the Deschutes River.
Every,one of the youth who went along had
been involved in gangs, he says. “They were
all in challenging life situations, and I would
say the first half day on that trip, a lot of
them were pretty much like turtles, with
their heads pulled in,” he says. “But by,
We also need to do much more,-.of course,
and they describe that with flair, as well:
“Scream, protest, debate, negotiate, cajole,
tweet, use all the means at your disposal to
call for the scale of policy change needed to
match the magnitude of the climate
challenge. To use the economists’ logic of
comparative advantage, do what you do best:
Teachers, teach; students, study; community
leaders, lead.”
They end the book by concluding, “It’s
capitalism with all its innovative and
entrepreneurial powers that is our only hope
of steering clear of the looming climate
shock,” They lose me a little bit there, but I
guess economists need to believe that. If
capitalism can be used as a positive tool
while we scream, negotiate, cajole, etc., to
stop climate change, then let’s do it.:
We may not have a choice. Having just
celebrated the 45th Earth Day last month,
there’s really no.better time to think about
halfway through the first day, they were very
involved, they were very enthusiastic.”
He says it’s incredible to watch kids who
had very limited or no outdoor .experience |
before signing up for Soul River’s free
fishing' trips, grow quickly into
environmental stewards. “They’re all
becoming mentors, and, they’re all becoming
very educated and very skilled, not only with
fly fishing but with understanding the entire
environmental aspect of understanding
what’s around them, above the water, under
the water, and they’re changing their lives.”
In April, Brown stood before a group of
500 fly-fishing industry leaders giving him a
standing ovation at a conference in
Missoula, Mont. He had justaccepted a
2015 Breaking Barriers Award from Orvis,
an international fly fishing retailer. Senior
manager of Orvis Adventures, Simon
Perkins, said the company had received
numerous nominations for Brown. After
reading from so many people how Brown
was changing lives through fly fishing,
,LL j o n
w
I ' u a m Z
r eal c h a n g e n ew s
Perkins says it was easy to see that “Chad’s
story was truly exceptional.”
Since the summer of 2013, Brown has
taken groups of youth and veterans on
fishing trips along the Deschutes River and
up to the Olympic Peninsula. He’s also
conducted fly fishing workshops and
executed the fiist annual Celebration of
Wild Steelhead. The free reggae concert and
fly-fishing event attracted thousands of
people to North Portland’s Peninsula Park .
in 2014? Brown hopes this year’s celebration
on Sept. 13 will do the same. He plans to
give away fly-fishing kits to 200^children in
attendance.
“Whatever we are going through in life,
whatever our challenges, whatever our dark
places are,” Brown explains, “it runs deep
within all of us. And the river has a way of
connecting uS and helping us get through
that process, and getting us the answers
that we’re looking for.”
To learn more about Soul River Inc., and its
2015 events, visit soulriverinc.org.