By most accounts, 2020 has been a rough year for the planet. It was the warmest year on record, just barely exceeding the record set in 2016 by less than a tenth of a degree according to NASA’s analysis.
Earth’s global average surface temperature in 2020 tied with 2016 as the warmest year on record, according to an analysis by NASA.
Continuing the planet’s long-term warming trend, the year’s globally averaged temperature was 1.84 degrees Fahrenheit (1.02 degrees Celsius) warmer than the baseline 1951-1980 mean, according to scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York. 2020 edged out 2016 by a very small amount, within the margin of error of the analysis, making the years effectively tied for the warmest year on record.
“The last seven years have been the warmest seven years on record, typifying the ongoing and dramatic warming trend,” said GISS Director Gavin Schmidt. “Whether one year is a record or not is not really that important – the important things are long-term trends. With these trends, and as the human impact on the climate increases, we have to expect that records will continue to be broken.”
The melting of ice across the planet is accelerating at a record rate, with the melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets speeding up the fastest, research has found.
The rate of loss is now in line with the worst-case scenarios of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the world’s leading authority on the climate, according to a paper published on Monday in the journal The Cryosphere.
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About 28tn tonnes of ice was lost between 1994 and 2017, which the authors of the paper calculate would be enough to put an ice sheet 100 metres thick across the UK. About two thirds of the ice loss was caused by the warming of the atmosphere, with about a third caused by the warming of the seas.
Activists with “Fridays for Future” display a prop demanding climate action on December 11, 2020 in Hamburg, Germany. (Photo: Axel Heimken/picture alliance via Getty Images)
Youth activists around the world kicked off the new year Friday with a fresh round of #ClimateStrike actions and demands that 2021 be the year policymakers take sufficiently bold action to address the climate emergency.
Many of the pleas included the hashtag #ClimateStrikeOnline, as the coronavirus crisis has forced many “school strike for climate” events to be virtual.
“2021 must be the year that we finally wake up to the climate crisis,” tweeted Sydney-based activist Patsy Islam-Parsons, noting that it was her 69th week of Fridays for Future actions.
“It must be the year we take real action instead of continuing to repeat meaningless words and empty promises,” she wrote.
Greta Thunberg, who catalyzed the worldwide Fridays for Future movement, shared her signature Skolstrejk för Klimatet placard in a Friday tweet and said, “New year, same crisis.”
The Swedish teen’s message was mirrored in a tweet from Leah Namugerwa of Uganda, who wrote: “This is week 99 #schoolstrike4climate in Uganda. The struggle continues…”
Other climate activists added their hopes for the new year on social media as well.
Dominique Palmer, a climate justice activist and member of the U.K. Student Climate Network, put the sweeping changes needed to address the climate emergency in the context of the global efforts that emerged to contain the spread of Covid-19.
“This year has shown that urgent action in times of a crisis is possible, and now more than ever is the time to push for a green recovery,” Palmer tweeted, pointing to a need for a system that “fundamentally restructures the economy for a habitable future.”
In an op-ed published Thursday at the Guardian, Greenpeace U.K. executive director John Sauven also addressed the simultaneous crises. He wrote, in part:
[W]hile the pandemic was raging, so was the climate emergency, like two horror films overlapping. We saw record-breaking wildfires engulf the West Coast of the U.S., a record number of powerful Atlantic storms, the Arctic ice failing to freeze in late October, and deadly floods hitting countries from Italy to Indonesia. We got a glimpse of a chaotic world battered by multiple crises, each making the other worse, and it was terrifying.
Exceptional as the calamities of 2020 may seem, they could be just a taste of what’s to come unless we change direction.
“It’s clear,” wrote Sauven, “that nothing short of a complete transformation of our economy and society can save us from climate breakdown.” He continued:
This is why sliding back to the old normal is not an option. Unless we stop oil firms drilling for more oil, food giants destroying rainforests, and destructive fishing depleting our seas, the worst isn’t over—it’s just begun. Ending the pandemic is only half the job—we must also start something new and better. We must create new green jobs, invest in communities, and tackle the hardship faced by many at the same time. And 2021 is the year to do it.
That call for change was also captured in a New Year’s Eve tweet from Thunberg.
“May 2021 be the year of awakening and real bold change,” wrote Thunberg. “And let’s all continue the never-ending fight for the living planet.”
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We must “shift from an economy that is extractive and exploitative to one that regenerates and repairs,” the new report says.byAndrea Germanos, staff writer
“Over the past four years, we have cared for one another,” said Greenpeace USA campaigns director James Mumm. “Now, we must come together to ensure that Joe Biden and the new Congress care for us, and to see that everyone—no matter their race or where they come from—has what they need to thrive.” (Photo: Michael Nagle/Greenpeace)
The “just, green, and peaceful future we deserve is possible and together we can build the power to manifest it.”
This moment “calls us to be visionary in our pursuit to people—not corporations or wealthy elites—at the heart of governance and public life.” —James Mumm, Greenpeace USA
So declares Greenpeace USA’s new “Just Recovery Agenda.” Released Tuesday and packed with more than 100 sweeping policy recommendations for President-elect Joe Biden and members of the next U.S. Congress to embrace, the visionary document plots out a path for erecting new systems that no longer put corporate greed above the public and planet’s well-being.
“Going back to normal is not an option,” the report bluntly states, because what “we knew as ‘normal’ was a crisis.” The coronavirus crisis has thrown that truism into relief, says Greenpeace, but the worsening climate and ecological crises and deep inequality have long made the case for a bold transformation of the dominant economic system.
With post-pandemic policies now being charting out—and a new presidential administration just months away—Greenpeace says it’s crystal clear now is the time for pivotal change.
“The policy choices we make in this disruptive moment will shape the path forward for millions of people—the Covid-19 crisis and clarion call for racial justice in 2020 must mark a turning point for federal policy-making,” the report urges.
Greenpeace USA campaigns director James Mumm put the new report in the context of former Biden’s victory over President Donald Trump.
“We the people have chosen Joe Biden, who will arrive in the White House with a forceful mandate to lead our recovery from Covid-19, address the climate crisis, advance racial justice, and build an economy that puts people first,” Mumm said in a statement.
“Over the past four years, we have cared for one another,” he continued. “Now, we must come together to ensure that Joe Biden and the new Congress care for us, and to see that everyone—no matter their race or where they come from—has what they need to thrive.”
The report expands on what that means by pointing to “dignified work, healthcare, education, housing, clean air and water, healthy food, and more.” In this new work, says Greenpeace, the world must “shift from an economy that is extractive and exploitative to one that regenerates and repairs.”
Centering all the prescriptions—which range from boosting voting rights to expanding renewable energy—are values of equity, community justice, freedom, compassion, and creativity.
Actions demanded of federal lawmakers include establishing a federal minimum wage of $15 per hour; strengthening the National Environmental Policy Act; enacting and enforcing new antitrust standards to curb corporate power; “passing bold and just recovery legislation in line with the THRIVE Agenda to lay the groundwork for a Green New Deal and world beyond fossil fuels”; enacting the pro-democracy the For The People Act of 2019; banning permits for new or expansions of existing factory farms; “enacting The BREATHE Act to police brutality and racial injustice by investing in Black communities and re-imagining community safety”; and enacting a ban on deep sea mining.
“As we look to recover from the interlocking crises we face as a nation,” said Mumm, “it’s time to use the tools and power of the federal government to solve problems rather than exacerbate them.”
“This moment calls us to be bold and advance solutions at the scale science and justice demand,” he continued. “It calls us to be holistic and navigate out of multiple crises at once. And it calls us to be visionary in our pursuit to people—not corporations or wealthy elites—at the heart of governance and public life.”
Make no mistake—the “us” Mumm refers to really means all of us.
“Telling our story will not be the job of a single, appointed messenger, be it a politician, celebrity, CEO, or activist,” says the report. “That responsibility lies with everyone who believes in the vision of a better world.”
“Together we will build a movement broad, inclusive, and powerful enough to deliver the future our communities need and deserve,” it states. “Together we will rewrite the rules of society.”
Leaders are happy to set targets for decades ahead, but flinch when immediate action is needed, she says
Greta Thunberg has blasted politicians as hypocrites and international climate summits as empty words and greenwash. Until humanity admits it has failed to tackle the climate crisis and begins treating it as an emergency like the coronavirus pandemic, society will be unable to stop global heating, she said.
In an interview with the Guardian, Thunberg said leaders were happy to set targets for decades into the future, but flinched when immediate action to cut emissions was needed. She said there was not a politician on the planet promising the climate action required: “If only,” said the teenager, who will turn 18 in January.
But she is inspired by the millions of students who have taken up the school strike she began by herself in Sweden 116 weeks ago. Since then she has addressed the UN and become the world’s most prominent climate campaigner. She also has hope: “We can treat a crisis like a crisis, as we have seen because of the coronavirus. Treating the climate crisis like a crisis – that could change everything overnight.”
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“So the first thing we need to do is understand we are in an emergency [and] admit the fact that we have failed – humanity collectively has failed – because you can’t solve a crisis that you don’t understand,” Thunberg said.
