Kitchen combat – culinary climate change

The thought of a dangerously warming planet with a population growing to 10 billion by 2100 has many people worried. How will we cope?

In his book, Climate Wars, Gwynne Dyer says,

The first and most important impact of climate change on human civilisation will be an acute and permanent crisis of food supply.

Eating regularly is a non-negotiable activity and countries that cannot feed their people are unlikely to be 'reasonable' about it.

People point to the 2011 Arab Spring as evidence that this is already happening.

This adds urgency and purpose to an examination of my own activities. What are my food habits? How do they contribute to climate change and global food prices?

As a food exporter, Australia will be one of the lucky countries, nevertheless food prices at home will be affected by global prices. 

A University of Chicago study found that carnivores generate an additional 1.5 tonnes of CO2 per year compared with vegetarians. I know that the world average carbon emissions are 6 tonnes per person per year and that this is too high. Saving of 1.5 tonnes will make a big impact on my personal goal of 5 tonnes.

Monica Merkes from La Trobe University observes that Australians eat more meat now than ten years ago (108.7 kg vs 111.8 kg pa) whereas American meat consumption is falling. 

Our household doesn't eat a lot of meat, but in January we decided to go vegetarian for a month. It was fun and interesting to make vegetables the centrepiece of every meal. In February, meat and fish returned to our dining table, but at a reduced level.

Then in April we learned that a friend has advanced cancer and he adopted an organic vegan diet as part of a plan to boost his immune system. We are providing him with an organic vegan meal every week.

Without the carbon footprint of dairy products, vegan diets have even lower carbon emissions than vegetarian diets. Organic foods avoid chemicals and pesticides, and they are usually grown locally so they have fewer carbon miles.

Where are we now in our household food consumption? I see that we're moving along a trajectory towards a diet with lower carbon emissions. We haven't arrived at a final place, but we're a long way from where we began.

For many people, Meatless Monday, is an easy first step towards healthy eating that also has a lower carbon footprint. Give it a try.

You could try this main meal dish that we ate last night.

Cauliflower Pasta

Cauliflower Pasta (serves 4)

1 onion
1/2 eggplant (or other vegetable, this is just what I had on hand)
Garlic (as much as you like, we like a lot)
1/2 cauliflower (or more or less, depends on size)
1 tin chopped tomatoes
Basil (or any combination of basil, oregano, thyme, rosemary, sage)
400-500g short pasta
Olive oil (a good drizzle)
Grated cheese (parmesan or pizza mix, or anything you like)

1. Slice onion and garlic. Chop eggplant. Cook in frypan with a good drizzle of olive oil.
2. Add chopped cauliflower stalks.
3. After a few minutes add the tin of tomatoes and herbs. Cover and cook 10 minutes.
4. Chop the cauliflower in flowerets. Add to pan, cover and cook 10-15 minutes.
5. Cook pasta till al dente. That should take about 10 minutes, so it is ready about the same time as the cauliflower.
6. Serve and sprinkle with cheese. Garnish with olives, if you like.

This dish is nice if there is more cauliflower than pasta. It's not like pasta with a tomato-cauliflower sauce. Cauliflower is the hero of this dish!

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News of the day on the Transformations menu tab. 

Marine reserves. Australia announced the world's largest network of marine reserves that will ring the country and cover more than 3 million square kilometres of waters to protect reefs and marine life. The marine reserves will include key waters such as the Coral Sea and pygmy blue whale habitats off the southern coast of Western Australia. Source: Sydney Morning Herald.

Basketball feels the impact of climate change

I can't resist sharing Joe Romm's delight in the teams playing in the American NBA final where Heat comes up against Thunder. He calls it the First All-Weather NBA Final: Heat Vs. Thunder.

Given the poor track record of Florida, home of the Miami Heat, on addressing climate change it's hard to back Heat in this NBA final.

However, Romm notes that Oklahoma, home to Oklahoma City Thunder, has its own climatic ironies.

Insured losses due to thunderstorms and tornadoes in the U.S. in 2011 dollars. Data and image from Property Claims Service, Munich Re.

With climate change, no one's a winner.

UPDATE: Heat beat Thunder 4:1 in best of 7.

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News of the day on the Transformations menu tab.

A better lithium ion battery, Nanophosphate EXT, delivers 20 percent more power, works at temperatures as low as -30°C and as high as 60°C, and should be just as easy as current batteries to manufacture. It can be air-cooled, saving cost and weight. Source: Scientific American.

Wuthering Heights – love is not a rational activity

Our enduring love affair with oil means that pain and punishment don't diminish our affection for the beloved. Even catastrophes like the Gulf oil spill haven't dented our passionate dependency on oil.

It's hard to comprehend this kind of irrational behaviour. Science has its logical explanations, but no one has shone a better light on irrational love than Emily Bronte in Wuthering Heights where destructive forces are unleashed when Cathy and Heathcliffe can't be together. This kind of love is a force of nature not to be argued with. It makes absolute sense on an emotional level, and, after all, love is not a rational activity. 

It seems that we'll put up with a lot of abuse from oil and still keep loving it, but that is not the case with nuclear. When nuclear treats us badly, we're outa there! Japan closed 50 nuclear power stations after the Fukushima disaster. And half way around the world, Germany pulled the plug on its nuclear plants, closing eight immediately and phasing the remainder out by 2022.

Given the destructive force of carbon emissions, we better hope that our love affair with oil tapers off into a cooler and more pragmatic business relationship, similar to our feelings for nuclear.

If we think back, perhaps we can see some signs that this is happening. Cars have lost their place as fetish objects in popular culture. Increasingly, young people are choosing not to drive at all. In the US, the percentage of people younger than 35 without a driver’s license has risen to 26% in the past decade.

Our new fetish objects are mobile phones, ipods, ipads and e-books. They are all powered by electricity.

Perhaps we see emerging signs of love for renewables in growing affection for solar power, the teddy bear of renewables, and appreciation of wind generators for their majestic beauty.

Let's hope this early affection flowers into full blown obsessive passion—a Cathy and Heathcliffe kind of love that let's nothing get in the way.

Kate Bush captured the wild irrationality of Cathy-and-Heathcliffe love in her song, Wuthering Heights. Check out this fabulous version by Hayley Westenra who can really sing!



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News of the day on the Transformations menu tab.

India takes up solar power. Karnataka Renewable Energy Development Ltd. (KREDL) has embarked upon a Public-Private-Partnersip project for a 1000 hectare solar park at Mannur village in Bijapur. KREDL has already commenced projects to generate 80 MW of solar power in Bijapur and Gulbarga districts, and is working on increasing solar power generation by 40 MW every year. 

Energy Slaves

You thought slavery was long gone? Well, not quite. When the energy used to sustain our lifestyles is converted to human power we find that the average American has 204 slaves, and even those egalitarian Australians have 130 each.

We don't notice our slaves and we sleep with easy consciences because our slaves are not human, they are 'energy slaves'—a term coined by American energy philosopher, Buckminster Fuller, in 1944.

The purpose behind the ‘energy slave’ concept is to understand how much human labour would be required to sustain a certain action, lifestyle, or culture in the absence of the highly concentrated fossil-­fuel energies available today.

For example, it would take 11 energy slaves peddling madly simply to power an ordinary toaster. In the absence of fossil fuels, the global economy in its entirety would need approximately 66 billion ‘energy slaves’ to sustain itself in its current form.

This makes us take a second look at our energy consumption and ask how sustainable it is. When coal, oil and gas are stranded assets, will human power replace some of the energy they produced for us? How well are we prepared for this? Will we cut back our overall energy consumption so we need less energy/fewer energy slaves, and will we have enough renewable energy in place so we don't have to default to human power for everything?

To illustrate energy slavery at work, the BBC program The Human Power Station powered a family home for a day entirely on bicycle power, using a rotating band of 100 cyclists to provide the energy.

Here is a wonderful 3-minute clip showing the mighty effort made by 80 cyclists to provide enough power while Dad took a shower.



The producers found that one of the biggest problems was feeding the cyclists. It appeared that you would use more energy feeding them than the energy they produced. Also, many of the cyclists were so exhausted that they were unable to walk for days.

If this was your household, you'd have a major incentive to use less power! Maybe you'd look at communities that live without electricity to find how they do it. Although the Amish use oil for tractors, they don't use electricity in their homes. Does our future hold a return to more human-powered work?

If you'd like to watch the whole The Human Power Station program (1 hour) it is here.



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Here's the latest news on the Transformation tab.

In Europe, coal's share of electricity generation has declined from 39% to 26% over the past 20 years. Of the 120 coal fired power plants proposed in Europe in 2007, none have been brought to the construction stage. In 2011, clean energy accounted for 71% of the new electricity capacity in the European Union, while another 22% was natural gas-fired generation.  Source: Compass.

Climatology 101

In the strongly contested ground of climate science, don't fall for fake Climatology 101 written by lobbyists with connections to the mining industry. 

When the Australian scientist Ian Plimer, a geology professor and mineralogist with no background in climate science, wrote a general interest book, How to get expelled from school: a guide to climate change for pupils, parents and punters (2011), he framed it around 101 questions as a reference to university courses like Climatology 101, in a effort to pretend that his work was university-standard .

Not so. Plimer's book is of dubious quality and full of inaccurate and misleading information based on false premises.

Teachers and scientists were outraged when a right wing lobby group (Institute for Public Affairs) arranged for free copies of the book to be sent to schools. In response, the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency has prepared a set of correct responses to the 101 questions in Plimer's book by drawing on climate scientists and science communicators from CSIRO, the Bureau of Meteorology, the University of Queensland and the University of Melbourne, who helped review the document and provide feedback.

They say,

Many of the questions and answers in Professor Plimer’s book are misleading and are based on inaccurate or selective interpretation of the science. The answers and comments provided in this document are intended to provide clear and accurate answers to Professor Plimer’s questions. The answers are based on up-to-date peer reviewed science, and have been reviewed by a number of Australian climate scientists.

You can download the excellent booklet, Accurate Answers to Professor Plimer's 101 Climate Questions, here and read a Crikey article about it, here.

With large and powerful vested interests eager to spread misinformation about climate change, readers will do well to follow the advice of teachers and use trusted sources of information— scientists whose work passes peer review.

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Here's the latest news on the Transformation tab.

Hydrovolt power generators work in canals to generate 20MW power. Tens of thousands of miles of irrigation, flood management or transport canals can be tapped for hydrokinetic power using  Hydrovolt  generators.  Countries with extensive canals include the U.S., India, Pakistan, China, Australia and Brazil. Source: Grist.

After Pearl Harbour

Following my comments yesterday about the disparity between the catastrophic potential of climate change and the mild words and actions even of those who accept the science, I was interested to see David Spratt address the same topic,

After Pearl Harbor, the US government told Detroit to stop manufacturing automobiles for private use, and start building tanks and other war materiel. Automobile production was 162,000 in 1941 and zero in 1942. Tank production was <300 in 1940 and 25,000 by 1942.

When the US does act decisively on climate, the government will tell the private sector to stop burning coal and start getting power from renewables within one year, and they will do it because it feasible. The US can't solve the climate crisis unilaterally, so we will pay for China to go solar in exchange for shutting down its coal mines (the two nations control 40% of the worlds coal reserves), just as we couldn't win the war alone, and paid the Soviet Union to keep the second front open.

Our agenda must aim for that level of action, nothing short of it is sufficient, and the details will not be worked out beforehand. Our present agenda, focused on US domestic emissions and anything-is-better-than-nothing, has more in common with the pre-war policies of isolationism and appeasement.

Hear! Hear!

I read that the last time CO2 levels were as high as they are today was 15 million years ago. Global temperatures were 5-10°F higher than they are today, the sea level was about 75-120 feet higher than today, there was no permanent sea ice cap in the Arctic and very little ice on Antarctica and Greenland.

The geological record suggests that the current acidification is potentially unparalleled in the last 300 million years of Earth history. Researchers say this is worse than during any of four of the major mass extinctions in history.

What is a proportional response to this situation? I don't think more bicycling and worm farms will do the job. As David McKay says,

If everyone does a little, only a little gets done.

David McKay, Sustainable Energy without the Hot Air

Just as the attack on Pearl Harbour brought a massive response, so it is inevitable that climate change will foster an all-out response at some point.

As individuals we can advocate for change and prepare ourselves by making adaptations ahead of the curve. See the Take Action tab above for things you can do.


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News of the day on the Transformations menu tab.

8 June 2012. Emirates Airlines' 2012 environmental report shows that in the year to March 31,  the Emirates fleet burned 22.5 percent less fuel (litres/passenger km) than the IATA global average as well as emitting 18 percent less fossil sourced carbon by the same metrics. Most of the advantage is due to having a younger, more fuel-efficient fleet. Source: Climate Spectator.

On our watch

A disaster is unfolding on our watch.

What is happening? Are the guards asleep on duty? Do they not believe their eyes? Are they afraid to call out? Are they shouting in the wrong language? Are we ignoring those that do call out? Are we confused because the leaders say it's bad, really bad, while doing nothing about it?

All of the above.

Many of us understand the calls, but we can't quite grasp the magnitude and urgency of the situation. We nod our heads and wait for our governments to show leadership. We're waiting to see what our fearless leaders do.

KC Golden urges us to stop waiting,

We need to stand tall – with both feet, whole hearts, and strong, explicit words – on the side of the truth.

KC Golden, Climate Solutions

In a similar vein, Kate Lovelady, Leader of the Ethical Society of St Louis, ruminates on the need to bring our carbon actions in line with our values when she asks what message she conveys when she flies to a conference instead of taking a train.  

Action is by far the most powerful communication.  Michelle Obama's White House vegetable garden replaces a thousand speeches about healthy food and active lifestyles.

So, how do we bring our words and actions in line with the real urgency of the situation?

Climate Solutions draws on this study to suggest that the tactical risks of talking explicitly about climate are overblown. Yes, it can be a “loser” as a “message,” but generally only when we talk like losers – when we internalize and reiterate our opponents’ bad frames. They find that focusing on climate is generally a “winner” when we:

• Invoke a strong sense of human agency and responsibility. We’re causing it. We should fix it.
• Foster engagement and efficacy. Futility is the enemy of responsibility, and it’s rampant in our political culture. But people remain hungry for solutions, and eager to participate. Pollyannish optimism? No. Can-do determination to build a better future? Definitely.
• Embed (don’t bury) climate in the challenge of freeing ourselves from fossil fuel dependence. Almost everyone at least suspects that fossil fuel dependence is a dead end, and feels victimized by the forces that perpetuate it. Climate solutions can free us!

KC Golden again,

• My primary point here is not:  “Talk more about climate because it’s not as bad of a message as you think.” My point is: Talk about climate because we must – because tackling it is a moral imperative, and we’ll never convince anyone of that if we keep dodging and weaving around it.

KC Golden, Climate Solutions

It's happening on OUR watch. We need to meet it head-on, hug the monster, and get on with the job of mobilising all our forces to head off catastrophe.

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New today on the Transformation page (see the tab up there?).

8 June 2012. Amazon deforestation is at a record low. Data from Brazil's National Institute for Space Research shows that 6,418 sq km of Amazon forest was stripped in the 12 months before 31 July 2011 – the smallest area since annual measurements started in 1988. Since the peak deforestation year of 2004, the rates of clearance have fallen by almost 75%. Most (81%) of Brazil's original forest remains – one of the highest levels of any country. Source: The Guardian.