Extreme weather around the world this week has been horrifying. India’s Capital Delhi hit record temperatures leading to many deaths from heatstroke.
There has been major flooding in China and Brazil
and Mexico is running out of water due to the extreme drought.
In Bangladesh 800 000 people were evacuated as cyclone Remal struck the coastline.
Slovenia and Venezuela have now lost all their glaciers.
A landslide in Papau New Guinea swept away 60 homes, burying the inhabitants and causing chaos in the area on Friday. It is not clear how many people died. The landslide was caused by extreme rainfall.
In Antarctica, a shocking study revealed warm water beneath the Thwaites Glacier, which some call the Doomsday Glacier, melts the glacier half a mile every year. The glacier is 80 miles across, the widest on Earth and its collapse would raise sea levels by 10 feet, threatening cities like London and Cardiff.
A Boeing 777 flight from London to Kuala Lumpur hit extreme turbulence resulting in unbelted passengers flying out of their seats, causing one death from a heart attack and many serious injuries. As the planet continues to heat we can expect more incidents like this. If you are planning on flying I would keep your seat belt on, but if you can go by train all the better!
England saw a record amount of rainfall in the 18 months to March. Some 1,695.9mm of rain fell from October 2022 to March 2024. This is the highest level for any 18-month period in England since comparable data began in 1836, according to analysis by the PA news agency of Met Office provisional statistics. It is causing big problems for farmers which will in turn increase food inflation.
These extreme weather events will keep getting worse and more frequent.
NASA Climate scientist Peter Kalmus tweeted “I wanted to point out two things which are dreadfully obvious to me, but apparently aren’t obvious to most people yet: This is still just very early stages of heat, and the heat is caused by the fossil fuel industry which is intentionally lying, distracting, and blocking action.”
David King, Chair of the Climate Crisis Advisory Group warned in the Guardian that “annual global GDP costs due to extreme weather events could rise towards 100% of global GDP around the end of the century.” Let that sink in. In just 70 years it could take all the money we have just to repair the damage done by extreme weather caused by climate change.
Now that the General Election has been called, one would expect the parties to compete to provide the best policies to combat this emergency, which will only worsen as we continue to burn fossil fuels.
So what have we heard so far from the big parties? The Conservatives have backtracked on all their previous Net Zero targets, slowing the transitions to electric vehicles and heat pumps, scrapping energy efficiency requirements, not using taxes to discourage flying and worst of all supporting new oil and gas in the North Sea. These policies all accelerate the time when climate chaos will cause the death of billions of people and end society as we know it.
Labour too have been backtracking on their Green commitments, so it will be interesting to see what is left when their manifesto is published. Starmer has pledged to create a new publicly owned energy company to invest in renewables, as well as a national wealth fund for investment in electric vehicle manufacturing, green steel, carbon capture and storage and other green technologies, with a British jobs bonus aimed at attracting more private investment in green companies in the UK’s industrial heartlands. A warm homes plan is intended to double current spending on home insulation. However Rachel Reeves has also pledged not to increase taxation, so it is not surprising people are asking how this will be funded. After scrapping their £28bn Green New Deal there are serious questions about how they will insulate our homes, improve our public transport and ensure that our homegrown wind and solar resources are developed at the speed and scale we urgently require.
Friends of the Earth have been comparing the party’s environment policies.
They scored each party out of 10 on 10 important issues, ranging from cutting carbon emissions and retrofitting homes to Nature and Green Energy. The overall scores out of 100 were
Conservatives 27
Labour 51
Lib Dems 68
Green Party 82.
The Green Party achieved the highest score, with full marks on categories including retrofitting the UK’s housing and protecting nature.
Lindy Stone, Coordinator of Sheffield Friends of the Earth said “‘We know that urgent climate and nature action is needed from the next government and we will be looking for strong commitments in the parties’ manifestos when they are published. There are huge opportunities in South Yorkshire in research and manufacturing as part of a just transition and we hope these industries will have the opportunity to contribute to swifter decarbonisation and nature recovery. ‘
Sheffield Heeley Green Party candidate Alexi Dimond said “We all know the Tories are toast! So at this election, you can vote with your conscience, for what you believe in.”
Green Party co-leader Adrian Ramsay said the analysis “underlines why it is so important to get more Green MPs elected to Parliament”.
“With Labour so far ahead in every single poll, it’s clear that Labour is set to form the next government. What is in doubt is Labour’s commitment to make the real changes needed,” he said, adding that Green MPs “want to be in Parliament to hold the new Government to account”.
Greenpeace is encouraging voters to Vote Climate. Your vote could be the most important thing you do for the environment this year. If you sign up to Vote Climate, Greenpeace will tell you the strongest vote for climate in your constituency.
The Tipping Point website has a tool to email all your candidates, print off posters for your window and find out about hustings. (local meetings where you can ask your candidates questions).
For everyone’s sake, Vote Climate on July 4th.
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Thank you very much for this Graham – a very frightening and topical round upCheersLinda
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