My (climate change communication) wishes for 2019

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Climate change has been present a lot in the national and international media landscapes this past year, even more than before, it seems.

So much that sometimes one felt overwhelmed to keep up with all the news. Nevertheless, the Special Report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change entitled Global Warming of 1.5°C has probably been the most present in the media as it highlights the short time-scale available for action to mitigate global warming and contain its consequences. Finland seems to be willing to accelerate the pace at which it will implement measures to fight against climate change and a task force published last week a report with their recommendations. Meanwhile in my home country Switzerland, legislators could not agree on a amended law on carbon dioxide emissions proposed by the government in order to respect the country's engagement in the Paris Agreement signed by 195 countries on 12 December 2015. (In the mean time the Trump administration has announced that the United Sates of America will withdraw from the Agreement.) Also this month, the 24th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP24) in Poland adopted rules that will enter into force in 2020 aiming at following the implementation of the Paris Agreement. And finally, while all this is important and everyone should contribute to reduction of greenhouse gases emissions, a study says that "just 100 companies [are] responsible for 71% of global emissions". Therefore, as consumers benefiting from the work and products of these companies, we might have to focus our efforts there to have a large impact.

This is only a small selection of all the international and national news that caught my attention. As I am getting ready for a Christmas break with my family, I am pretty sure that some topics related to climate change will pop up in the discussions. As always I will try to explain what I know as factually as possible, hoping that I will be able to convey a clear and understandable message to them. I also hope that their questions or remarks will help me to understand how to improve the way I communicate about this topic with non-experts as to improve my science communication.

This makes me think about misconceptions that some media might convey to them (sometimes voluntarily, most of the time by accident), which is why I have listed hereafter a few of my wishes when it comes to the climate change conversation next year and in the years to come:

  • As Megan Collins pointed out on Twitter last year, let's stop talking about believing in climate change. Let's rather talk about understanding it. Unfortunately there is still a lot of work to do 1.5 year later as the expression "believing in climate change" is still widely used in the media.
  • On a similar note, let's stop providing platforms to climate change deniers in order to offer a "balanced debate". The BBC recognized their mistake in the coverage of climate change by providing an equal air time to people representing of 97% of the scientific community on one side and to a marginal group of individuals on the other side.
    This gives the public a distorted impression that the issue is still dividing the scientific community in halves, which it is not! It is still possible to offer a debate (without deniers) about the best ways to mitigate the effects of climate change, which policies are the most effective, and how to push for an international collaborative effort, for instance.
  • Also let's make clear to everyone that the +1.5 or +2°C warming that is often discussed by policymakers is a global average. This means that some places might not warm much, while some places will warm much more than 2°C and - guess what - this will be the case in the polar regions! This will accelerate the melting of ice at high latitudes which contributes to the rise of sea level and even to the acceleration of global warming.
     
  • Just to make sure, while I mention the melting of polar ice: When people argue that melting ice will not rise the sea level because when ice melts in a glass of water it does not raise the level of water, they forget that a lot of the melting ice is not already in the water but on solid land, like in Greenland and Antarctica. The comedian Jon Stuart demonstrated this with humor in 2014 when he was still hosting The Daily Show (the full segment was on the People's Climate March).
     
  • Finally, something that is fundamental to keep in mind is that when one hears the phrase "the future of the planet": It refers to humans and not to the actual planet. I got reminded of this when I came across this tweet: While this is factually correct, this is really splitting hairs! Steve Milloy know exactly that DeFazio meant life on this planet (in particular human life). If our planet might indeed survive with higher levels of CO2 compared to the past and present, this is definitely not the case for us, humans (and by extension all life on this planet), for a variety of reasons. Let's make this clear when we talk about climate change and mention less the planet and more the humans living on it!
Let me know in the comments if you can think of any climate misconception that pops up often in conversations with your family and friends and how you respond to them. This said, I wish a nice holiday season to all the readers and I'm looking forward to 2019 for more science and science communication!

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