I wrote this as a long social media post, but those sorts of posts get lost, so capturing it into a blog and making it look prettier. We are having a break from The Know Show and Climate Courage over the next two weeks, but I wanted to make sure you saw some significant news or thought leadership articles released this week.
First is this article by Günther Thallinger, board member of Allianz SE – one of the world’s largest insurance companies – Climate, Risk, Insurance: The Future of Capitalism | LinkedIn.
This is worth a read, but here’s a few highlights.
“These extreme weather phenomena drive direct physical risks to all categories of human-owned assets—land, houses, roads, power lines, railways, ports, and factories. Heat and water destroy capital. Flooded homes lose value. Overheated cities become uninhabitable. Entire asset classes are degrading in real time, which translates to loss of value, business interruption, and market devaluation on a systemic level.
“This is not a one-off market adjustment. This is a systemic risk that threatens the very foundation of the financial sector. If insurance is no longer available, other financial services become unavailable too. A house that cannot be insured cannot be mortgaged. No bank will issue loans for uninsurable property. Credit markets freeze. This is a climate-induced credit crunch.
Further down in the blog he says: “At that point, risk cannot be transferred (no insurance), risk cannot be absorbed (no public capacity), and risk cannot be adapted to (physical limits exceeded). That means no more mortgages, no new real estate development, no long-term investment, no financial stability. The financial sector as we know it ceases to function. And with it, capitalism as we know it ceases to be viable.”
This is an issue Dr David Ko and Richard Busellato discuss on Climate Courage regularly. It’s critical we understand it and if you’re not following insurance industry and risk experts, this is a good time to start – especially if you have a home, car, investments, pension, or any future ambitions really.
The article obviously resonated, and the Guardian picked up the piece here Climate crisis on track to destroy capitalism, warns top insurer.
The average person will be 40% poorer in a 4°C world
But here’s another article that got my attention this week. Apparently, the average person will be 40% poorer if the world warms by 4°C. Really? The average person will be dead.
Honestly, I sometimes wonder how people who understand the economy continue to struggle to see the bigger picture. Everything from here is exponential.
Examples of impacts to come
I mean just methane released from melting permafrost as heating escalates will be disastrous. And remember methane is 100 times more potent than CO2 in the short term.
Or the mountain glaciers. We’ve lost 40% of ice from mountain glaciers in the last two decades (specifically in Europe) and they will be gone well before 2°C, or maybe they’ll struggle on until 2.5°C! Beyond that? Tell ‘em they’re dreaming.
When the glacier run-off is gone for people, agriculture, and all living beings in the path of these mighty ice flows, un-liveability follows. That’s billions when looking at the Himalayas.
But let’s look at some other examples. According to scientists, we lose 90% of corals at 1.5°C, and 99% at 2°C. We’re already at 1.6°C and it’s well on the way – Great Barrier Reef & Ningaloo Simultaneously Hit With ‘Heartbreaking’ Coral Bleaching.
No corals mean life in the oceans collapse, the acidification of the ocean goes into overdrive, the billions who rely on it are dead OR on your doorstep in their millions, if not billions, seeking refuge. Based on how we respond to refugees now, with much smaller numbers on the move, war, savagery and suffering are guaranteed. This is just one piece of the bigger story.
Food security crisis
On the land, our food is also at risk, which will only escalate. This includes the meat we eat, the agriculture we rely on, coffee, chocolate, beer, etc… that’ll all be long before 4°C of warming.
One example getting attention in the news is honeybees are dying at an alarming rate, and beekeepers are experiencing the “worst bee loss in recorded history.” Oh don’t worry, we’ll invent mini-bee robots, that’ll solve it. NO IT WON’T!!
If we lose the bees, crop losses accelerate, bigger ecosystem impacts unravel and collapse, extinction, etc, etc, etc Honeybees Are Dying At An Alarming Rate As Beekeepers Experience “Worst Bee Loss In Recorded History”
Another real-time example. Queensland has lost nearly 150,000 cows and sheep in the recent floods, which is devastating for the farmers, but equally, anyone who buys or relies on meat from Australia will see prices skyrocket – Experts warn meat prices could rise as QLD flooding wipes out cattle | news.com.au.
‘No warning’ as Queensland flood livestock losses top 144,000 – Sheep Central.
But let’s think further than this event and look at the not-to-distant future as heating escalates. Australia experiences summer temperatures too hot for the livestock to survive, and then it gets hit again by floods of the scale seen in the past two weeks (or even higher levels of flooding). We would be looking at 100% mortality for the whole state? How far off is that?
You’re going vegan, whether you like it or not
Do you think you’ll still be able to enjoy burgers at your favorite fast-food restaurant when events like this hit multiple countries across the world at the same time or in the same year? Going vegan won’t be a choice when we hit that stage of the climate emergency, it will be the only food we have left… Although that also depends on droughts and extreme weather events in crop growing areas, which means massive food shortages are a certainty and it won’t just be in poor countries. It will have a global impact.
That is what we must be thinking about – where this all leads us. Why can’t economists do that? Why can’t our leaders?
Because the risk is well known. Check out this article in Carbon Brief, published in February 25. Mapped: How extreme weather is destroying crops around the world. It analysed media reports to create a map showing 100 cases of crops being destroyed by heat, drought, floods and other extremes in the years 2023-24. It is already happening and it will get worse.
Are you suffering from inflation in your country? Cost-of-living out of control? It’s because of this!
The cost-of-living crisis is the climate crisis
It’s not just wars, incompetent governments, rising authoritarianism, financial issues like massive debt, etc…, impacting us today. You’ve got to go wider to understand that the central driving force behind all of these elements (the polycrisis) IS the escalation of the climate crisis. It’s going to keep escalating too, even if we act at the scale required, because turning it around will take decades, centuries and for some issues, more than 1,000 years.
But we need to get started regardless, and we’re not doing that, not even close. We continue to exploit this world for all it has, continuing with business-as-usual, pushing us over the edge of a live-able and stable environment. If we don’t have a stable environment, we cannot have a stable civilisation. That is what is at risk now.
The first step is to accept where we are and then globally, come together and do everything possible to stop a 4°C world. Many believe 4°C is inevitable and I understand why they do. However, I don’t see it as inevitable (although we’re close now) and besides, we should at least try to ensure it isn’t the future we’re walking into – don’t you agree?
One thing we urgently need is more right brain thinkers leading us – that’s people who see the big picture and can see ahead, beyond the next quarter. Listen to Iain McGilchrist discuss why left-brain thinking is leading to western civilization’s collapse.
And here’s another beauty. The fabulous George Monbiot on the BBC with a Labour and Liberal politician and a young journalist. The journalist speaks about Just Stop Oil members exactly how George describes the problem with the mainstream media covering climate activists. It’s a real Don’t Look Up moment. And the politicians just come across as ignorant and smug.
When people ask me if I have an issue with the antics of Just Stop Oil and other groups like it, no I don’t. Look, it’s not how I go about things, BUT if you need to ask me that question, you have absolutely no idea how dire the situation is. Because if you did, you’d be throwing paint on the Mona Lisa too.
Just wait until the climate anarchists and ecoterrorists get to work, they’ll make Just Stop Oil look quaint! And they are coming, but they’re not left leaning, they’re right leaning, and I guarantee you, it’s going to get very violent.
Calling great leaders to step up
We need leaders with vision, courage, integrity, stamina and benevolence to lead us into this challenging future, because the years and decades ahead are going to be hard. The buffoons leading far too many countries around the world are not going to get us through this – they’re going to make it worse. They already are.
My friends, please, rise up, speak up, show up, and join the fight for a liveable future for all life on this planet in whatever way makes sense to you. Action is the path out of despair after all.
None of us can sit back now. None of us can be silent. We must rise and fight for our children and grandchildren’s future. We owe them that.
Cheers
Andrea
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