Climate change

'I wouldn’t be here if you were a climate denier'. This was William Skeaping, spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion (ER), talking to Toby Young on The Spectator podcast. That statement tells us much about the environmental pressure group’s tactics and strategy. It also reveals that, in the battle behind the climate war, Extinction Rebellion has already won. ‘Deny’ these ‘truths’ and we will simply refuse to talk to you. You will be nothing to us. That's the message from ER. Skeaping’s words were a neat framing of his movement’s preconditions for engaging in debate.

I was five years old when the world first ended. That was in 2000, the year that a United Nations official predicted 11 years before that entire nations would be wiped out by rising sea levels. Since then, I have survived the Arctic melting on at least six separate occasions (2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2018), to say nothing of the geopolitical chaos that followed the oil shortages of 2015. As of last year, my troubles have been worsened by the complete submersion of the Maldives, which has narrowed my holiday options. This week, as I ventured into London to shop for a woolly jumper and flippers ahead of next year’s 'Siberianisation' of England and disappearance of the Arctic, I was surprised to be confronted with a street full of lively campers with placards.

This year’s Nobel Prize for the silliest piece of scientific research must go to something called the Climate Accountability Institute, for revealing to the world that 35 per cent of all global carbon and methane emissions since 1965 can be traced to just 20 global companies. This week they were named and shamed in the Guardian and revealed to be, er, 17 oil companies and three coal mining companies. Scandalously, they have been pumping all this carbon into the air for their own self-enrichment while the rest of us suffer.

I share Extinction Rebellion’s environmental concerns and I’ve previously joined their protests. My friends and colleagues fill their ranks. I even have a man-bun. But I can’t get behind their latest efforts to coax students to quit the classroom. Pre-empting this week’s disruption in London, Extinction Rebellion released a video recounting why student drop-outs, including marine biologists, gave up university for the movement. 'I left university because someone told me the truth about what was happening and I realised that I had a responsibility to act,' explains one former student. '(I left) because I am scared so many people I love are going to die and a masters won't stop that', says another. https://www.youtube.com/watch?

It is often said that Western culture worships youth. Yet this cult of youth worship has started to mutate into something a bit weirder, as it increasingly seems that ours is a society that now worships children. This year, for instance, has seen the rise to global ascendency of the 16-year-old Swede, Greta Thunberg. She has become the child-saint icon of the environmental movement, whose apocalyptic scorn is fawned over by liberal politicians and woke-conscious big business. Her teenage acolytes bunk school, with the blessing of their teachers, to raise awareness as to the plight of climate change. Elsewhere, we are told that it is imperative to hold a second Brexit referendum 'for the sake of the children' (and even, to make the point clearer, 'our children's children').

The Climate Apocalypse is upon us. More carbon monoxide has been discharged into the atmosphere in the last 50 years than in the whole of human history that went before. Carbon traps heat and the world is getting hotter. Heat holds water vapor and so rainfall is getting more frequent while heat waves last longer. Ice at the poles melts and coastal cities face inundation as sea levels rise. But the doom confidently predicted by many climate scientists around the world is being met by optimism among other scientists who are employing innovative technologies that may transform the debate and offer hope for us all. These technological breakthroughs will impact all aspects of climate change from carbon emissions to food production and all forms of energy.