Iowa State faculty: “It takes a village” for climate care
June 5, 2017
Last week, President Trump withdrew the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accord. There’s a lot of conversation about the impacts of doing so – on diplomacy, the economy, even on the U.S. commitment to a cleaner environment.
We spoke with Iowa State faculty about climate care around Iowa and what the withdrawal from the accord means for them.
Index:
I. Why care about climate care?
II. What was the accord for?
III. Making a sustainable economy
IV. “Winning” at clean living
I. Why care about climate care?
President Trump said during his withdrawal announcement that if the Paris Agreement were implemented in full, with total compliance from all nations, a study found it would reduce celsius temperature by 0.2 percent by the year 2100.
Trump said this was a “tiny, tiny” amount. But for Gene Takle, a researcher at Iowa State who focuses on climate change and its impact on agriculture, any decrease is positive.
“It’s the alternative, if we don’t it will rise by several degrees,” Takle said. “Yes, it’s a tiny amount, but it’s a decline, not an increase. [Trump’s is] an absurd statement.”
Takle contributes to the National Climate Assessment, a document mandated under the Bush Administration done every four years to inform the government on the impacts of climate change on the U.S., and was at the 2012 Copenhagen meeting that set the global temperature benchmark.
When climate care comes under discussion, one number seems to be repeated over and over: a warming temperature of 2 degrees celsius.
That benchmark, which is based off of pre-industrial levels, was used in the Paris Climate Accord, and it was noted that those 2 degrees would have a substantial impact. At the time, the global average temperature was already 1 degree above pre-industrial levels.
The accord also noted that even if each country met its pledge the world was still expected to pass that number.
Despite that, the agreement adds a loftier goal: to limit the increase to 1.5 degrees celsius. This was important for island nations, which would be devastated by the rise in sea level that comes from a 2 degree global increase, NPR reported at the time.
Takle said that average temperature, based on patterns of the past forty years and economic development, could actually rise between 3-6 degrees Celsius if nothing is done differently.
“We have a global problem of increased air temp, rising sea levels, and we know what to do to slow that down and eventually stop it,” Takle said.
Forty years is a long time, but it’s about as many as the accord is projecting forward. Many of the climate goals listed were set for mid-century.
Merry Rankin, director of sustainability at Iowa State University, said climate impacts not just the environment, but social and economic behaviors as well.
“We are starting to see environmental refugees,” Rankin said.
She explained environmental refugees are people from places that experience climate changes that affect their livelihood or living style.
“Initially folks think of environmental components,” Rankin said. “This isn’t just an environmental component.”
Even if it begins with changes in vegetation, those plants could be part of products or product processes that are part of an economy’s livelihood, and change things such as as what animals can be raised there. It can also impact insect control when hard freezes don’t come to the same areas — Iowa has seen this in recent years with gnat populations.
Another potential impact comes when areas now have to adjust infrastructure, whether its in how things are built or in their daily comfort, in the effort to cool the area.
Rankin said the importance there is in real-world impacts on the economy — if you’re paying for air conditioning, you aren’t spending that money on something else. It also has impacts on behavior. Rankin said research looked into changing sleep patterns due to changing climate, and the research on the importance of sleep is already extensive.
II. What was the accord for?
The U.S. entered into the Paris Climate Accord under the Obama administration, who particularly supported how the agreement was structured to evolve over time, with evaluations every five years.
All of this was set to begin in 2020, when countries would present a long-term plan and begin to reduce their emissions. In the meantime, countries would prepare for the switch to cleaner energy. As a developed nation, the U.S. would be part of the group providing $100 billion a year to help developing countries switch to green energy.
“There was a lot of excitement about that, that finally the nations of the world had come to an agreement, including the US,” Takle said. “The U.S. said ‘yes, we’re willing to take leadership on this.'”
That leadership meant stronger limitations and higher goals for the U.S. in limiting emissions and leading the switch to clean energy through research and funding.
Joining in the Paris Climate Accord was a diplomatic move, as anything is when international relations are in play. Climate is a global issue, and diplomacy was written into the accord. It had frequent language for “parties cooperating” on education, training, public awareness and participation, access to information and “enhancing action on adaptation.”
“You achieve these goals by working together, to share ideas and resources, and in the process regain new jobs and new customers,” Takle said. “It’s one of these things you build trust, you build dialogue with other nations.”
Rankin also said that in any effort, including climate care and sustainability, the saying ‘it takes a village’ applies.
“Anything is going to be stronger among a team. That’s not to say you can’t make a difference on your own. Great teams have been created through individual efforts. We can have the responsibility to be a role model,” Rankin said.
By leaving the Paris Climate Accord, the U.S. moved from among the 195 to join two other outsiders: Syria (in the middle of a civil war) and Nicaragua, which said the accord didn’t go far enough.
“It fails to live up to our environmental ideals,” Trump said of the accord. “In order to fulfill my solemn duty to protect America and its citizens, the United States will withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord, but begin negotiations to re-enter either the Paris Accord or an entirely new transaction, with terms that are fair to the United States, its businesses, its people, its taxpayers.”
Takle said taking something 195 countries have agreed to, saying you disagree and asking for a new agreement was “not a good way to negotiate.”
“They’re not going to agree to something we propose,” Takle said. In the meantime, the U.S. would have to take steps on its own to set goals for emissions and climate care.
III. Making a sustainable economy
Rankin said she felt it is always better to look at future challenges proactively, rather than reactively, and to limit making additions to future challenges. One way the U.S. can set its own standards for climate care is in clean or renewable energy.
“Looking at all the options that are in front of us is very important,” Rankin said. “There are reasons why we haven’t been able to move to renewable energy. It has a huge economic impact that has to be addressed.”
The Wind Production Tax Credit is one example of tax incentives to stimulate growth within clean energy industries in the U.S. Takle said that credit led to research and technical development in solar and wind energy.
“It’s stimulated efficiency in wind turbines and in manufacturing, to the point wind turbines are competitive with coal… and people want to buy it,” Takle said.
Takle listed Google, Microsoft, General Motors and WalMart as having made public statements to prefer to buy wind energy.
“Companies are making their preferences known,” Takle said. “They can power their industry completely off of wind. That means we should be providing those kinds of industries for the future.”
Trump said part of the reason for the withdrawal was the accord was unfair to Americans and would hurt manufacturing and industrial industries, along with coal and oil industries. He said his job was to represent citizens from Pittsburgh, not Paris.
“We’re not gonna have more factories in Pittsburgh, we’re not gonna build steel factories. That city has transformed,” Takle said. “He ought to be supporting the high-tech industries, not steel-mills. They’re long gone, and they’re not going back. It’s a move that’s totally out of touch with economic development.”
IV. “Winning” at clean living
Trump said despite withdrawing from the accord, “The United States under the Trump administration will be the cleanest. We’ll have the cleanest air, cleanest water, we’ll be environmentally friendly.”
Some states aren’t waiting for federal action on climate change, and are taking it upon themselves.
“I don’t see that the world is stopping, that the climate research and addressing climate change is stopping,” Takle said. “I think it’s given it a new burst of enthusiasm. I think it’s really important that we see states like California, New York and Massachusetts stepping up and saying ‘if the federal government won’t do it, we will… we’ll set our own policies.’
“Regretably, I think its going to mean that some parts of the country that are now stuck in a coal and oil economy are just going to mire in that economy.”
A single state’s actions can’t solve everything, Takle said. But many states have bigger economies than some of the countries in the Paris Accord.
“If a single state reduces its emissions, its not going to be a major contributer. But a country like Belguim, Lithuania, their emissions are far less than the state of California. California has already reduced their emissions remarkably, it is acting as if it is a country on it’s own,” Takle said.
In Iowa, and particularly at Iowa State, researchers, such as Sri Sritharan in civil, construction and environmental engineering, are looking into increasing turbine heights and the security and upkeep of wind farms.
“Wind Energy is now the nation’s biggest renewable source of energy, which is also true for Iowa,” Sritharan said in an email. “Continuing to install wind power will provide Iowa and the nation with increased energy security and greater energy independence.”
This growth will also add more jobs, especially for U.S. manufacturing, and provide economic value to rural America. Today, there are over 100,000 employees in the wind energy sector in the U.S., with 8,000 of them located in Iowa, Sritharan said.
Higher wind towers can reach higher, more consistent and more powerful winds. This would affect the entire nation, not just Iowa, because it would make wind turbines more economical for states without much lower-atmosphere wind.
“There will be an increase in power production if we can get an extra 20 or 30 meters on our turbines,” Takle said. “That’s the kind of research that should be supported, so we can figure out how we can more efficiently increase.”
It’s not just clean energy, but also sustainability efforts that are part of climate care.
“Most people I talk with at the University see that sustainability is the way of the future, whether it’s agriculture or manufacturing or efficiency,” Takle said. “Recycling, reusing, this is the way of the future. Students are looking for these kind of jobs. These are areas that are going to provide long-term jobs.”
Rankin said that studies done among incoming students ask about the importance of a campus that participates in sustainability efforts. Last year the number was more than half of students who considered it a priority, a big increase from just four years before.
“The act of being thoughtful and considering alternatives is an important component in a sustainable future,” Rankin said. “People who feel disconnected from choosing energy sources or building construction can still have impact in the day to day.”
Rankin’s motto is to do what you can “in your own time and space.” Each reused plastic fork, refillable bottle or reusable grocery bag makes a difference.
“The majority of folks are doing something,” Rankin said. “We want to be nurturing those habits.
“Each one of us has a stake in this.”
You can view the Paris Climate Accord as a pdf the bottom of this NPR article.
