Andreu Escrivà has a degree in Environmental Sciences and one of the leading communicators in our country on climate change. In his book It is not too late, he gives us the keys to better understand the implications of climate change and, above all, not to throw in the towel in the face of the enormous challenge we face.
We spoke with him about mitigating and adapting to climate change, the Greta Thunberg phenomenon, nuclear energy, meat consumption, the price of airplanes and many other issues that today, more than ever, are very topical.
In your book you are optimistic (the same title is): we still have time. However, and knowing as well as you know the data and predictions on climate change, it seems very difficult to look at the future with good eyes. How do you do it?
We must learn to value the role of uncertainty, which, when we talk about climate, is often seen as something negative. However, I believe that the uncertainty is also positive: for example, when I published the book three years ago I had no element to predict that in 2019 climate change would be at the forefront of the media, public and political agenda.
What I am saying is that the future is not closed: that we can hope that springs that we cannot imagine now will be activated and that they will put us in motion. The spring can be a Swedish girl with Asperger syndrome, or suffer three hurricanes in a row, or suffer brutal droughts and floods in eastern Spain. Those springs exist and cause changes. It’s not that they make me 100% optimistic, but they do have some hope.
In addition, we have to work with the elements that we already have. We don’t have to sit around waiting for something to come to our rescue: we already have many tools and a brutal capacity to bring about enormous changes, both individually and collectively.
We must not be defeatists, we can only say that we have lost the game when we have really lost it, and fortunately this is not about winning or losing : it is about achieving goals or not, and we must fight to achieve them.
Speaking of objectives… about a year ago an IPCC report recommended us to be more demanding and try not to exceed the 1.5 ° C barrier with respect to pre-industrial levels. Is it realistic to achieve this goal? And the 2 ° C?
As things are, I think it is very difficult to stay below a grade and a half. The Paris Agreement took place at a very particular time, in 2015 Trump was not there, Bolsonaro was not, there was Brexit or all this authoritarian wave of border closure that is being experienced around the world. In a way it is a “Who can save himself.”
That does not mean that there are no tools on the table to be able to achieve these objectives, and that we know what to do, what happens is that it is very complicated, it requires a brutal, global and immediate effort, and also modifying many areas of our life.
However, I think you shouldn’t be obsessed with the grade and a half or two grades. These are consensus figures that have a huge amount of scientific data behind them, but what scares me is that people perceive that, as it is very difficult to stay below two degrees, and since we have already crossed that line red … well, all is lost, so it is not worth acting. That’s what really worries me.
But then … did we forget about 2 ° C?
The fundamental problem with the two degrees, and that is a bit scary, honestly, is that we are supposed to lose control from there. Imagine that you are driving a car downhill. Right now, if we squeezed the brake fully, we would surely hit ourselves, we would have a whiplash on the neck, a serious contusion, but in any case we have time to hit the brakes. But the problem is that if we do not apply the brake now, if we exceed those two degrees, it could happen that, even if we apply the brake, it is already unable to stop the car.
Returning to climate change: now, more or less, we have it under control and it all depends on what we emit. But if we go beyond two degrees – approximately, it is a fuzzy border – then we will no longer have control. Once the melting of Greenland or the permafrost is activated, or a change of regime takes place in the tropical humid forests, mechanisms will be unleashed with global consequences that we will no longer be able to stop. That will roll like a ball that will get bigger and bigger.
I always do a football simile, because people understand it very well that way. The two grades, or what we have eleven or twelve years to stop climate change, is like the mathematical decline: there comes a time when the team has already declined mathematically, and although it wins the rest of the league games 10-0, he will go down to the second division for sure, mathematically it is impossible to save himself.
It is not that in 2030 the world will end, surely we will continue as now … a little worse, but more or less like now. The problem will be that we will be in mathematical descent, and although we are in the first division, in a few years we will descend to second yes or yes.
But I trust, and that is the message that I try to convey in the book, that we are able to activate many more springs in time than I was talking about before, that make the two degrees seem realistic. I do not want to fall into the self-fulfilling prophecy and say that it is impossible not to exceed the barrier of two degrees. Because then, as it is impossible, because it doesn’t matter anymore, we act as if we were going to surpass them … and that’s when we really surpass them.
Do you think that the protest movements that have emerged around the world are going to help achieve these goals, are they those springs you are talking about?
Of course. I am very confident that human feedback loops are able to prevent physical feedback loops from kicking in. When I wrote the book three years ago, it was impossible to imagine a movement like the Youth for Climate movement or that the issue of meat would be as topical as it is right now. When I did the research for the book, it was difficult for me to find information about the relationship between diet and climate change in popular articles, and when I commented on it in the talks, many people were amazed … and yet now the debate on meat is everywhere.
And what do you think of the criticisms made of Greta Thunberg?
I think that the first thing for climate change to be approached responsibly is for it to be on the public agenda, and these mobilizations are achieving it , they are reaching many places that had not been reached and this is very positive. As I have already mentioned, a few years ago no one protested about the weather, we were just four geeks that no one took into account, and today the picture is totally different.
I think it will help, above all, to raise awareness and make people find out, but I think that, so that all this does not fall on deaf ears, the message must be accompanied by a lot of information and environmental education.
Recently, Greta Thunberg gave a very emotional speech in New York, and everything that could be read in the press that day referred to the most superficial or morbid part of the matter: “Greta looked like this” “Greta less” “Greta more “… It turns out that a report on the terrifying sea level rise had also been presented that same day, and suddenly we began to fixate on only the most sensational side of the matter.
It is true that a small part is also empowered by herself, it is a very personal discourse, always said with all the respect and admiration of someone who is capable of leading such a movement, and even more so at 16 years old, but I am concerned that in the end Let’s end up paying more attention to “Greta has said this or Greta has said the other” and forget her message, because she points it out herself: “Don’t look at what I say, read the scientists.”
But it seems inevitable to look at Greta, she is a girl who speaks in forums in front of world authorities without cutting a hair …
Exactly, Greta’s courage is the rush you get from seeing a girl scolding politicians, and that has a brutal emotional and human visual potential, we would all like to be there saying four things to these gentlemen. But the truth is that it caused a huge contradiction to see Greta on a US television program saying that we have to change and so on, while everyone was cheering her on as a leader.
Because it turns out that if all those people who were there cheering Greta do what he is telling them, then their way of life is going to end, especially those who are Americans. Greta is telling them to stop consuming so much energy, to eat what they eat, to take the car for everything and airplanes continuously, to buy technological devices three times a year … at the moment in which people realize what who is supporting and what it implies may have a rebound effect, and that is what worries me the most.
The danger of that speech that appeals to a generation of adults who have taken the future of young people and stolen their dreams is that it can make people feel very bad. For starters, around the world there are already millions of children who have had their dreams taken away, and without the need for climate change. And secondly, it scares me, and I hope I am wrong, that in this new phase of mobilizations, with this blaming of past generations, that rebound effect will occur, as I have already mentioned. If they blame you like the beast, you protect yourself and say “hey, I have enough with my problems so that you can tell me that I have stolen your future.”
The mobilizations are very good, but they must be accompanied by a lot of information, so that everyone understands how we got here, and above all avoiding blame.
With this blame … what happens is that many people feel attacked and think that it is unfair to hold the individual responsible for a problem that has a much more global and complex dimension, what do you think is the best strategy to inform and raise awareness about climate change in a rigorous way and without sweetening reality, but without people feeling rejection?
In the end, communication goes a long way from the receiver understanding that the sender is one of their own. Those of us who are dedicated to communicating environmental issues have always seen us as a kind of priests that we told them that they would burn in hell if they did not do this or that.
People have to understand that whatever is done is valuable, that you do not have to do everything well or we suspend you. We cannot be examiners watching so that everyone gets a ten, and furthermore, if they don’t get a ten, the planet goes to hell … that is a very heavy load on the shoulders. If they tell you a lot of things that are very difficult to carry out, that you are doing everything wrong, if you do not know where to start … at the end you get such great uneasiness and anguish that you do not know where to go. .
You need to feel conflicted and compelled to act and change, and it’s okay to feel frustrated… but feeling bad, discouraged, and guilty never leads to action. And my main goal is to get as many people into action as possible. I prefer that 70% of the Spanish population reduce their use of plastic to less than half, than that 5%, a small environmental elite, manage to completely eliminate plastic from their lives and do everything perfectly … Models frustrate people.
I have realized that it is necessary to start from two bases: the first, as I have said, is never to blame, and the second to show myself human and with contradictions. For me it is more effective to put yourself on the level of the people, but it is because I am, I am not a perfect being preaching from a pulpit but a human being with contradictions, and I must recognize them.
For example, I have a car. It is true that in the city I hardly ever use it, I go to work by bike or by bus. But hey, there are days when I’m in a hurry and I get the car out. And sometimes I also take planes, I have been avoiding them for three years, but in a few days I will have to get on one to go to Brussels for a work issue that I don’t have time to get to by train. People value coherence, but also contradictions, that is, that you try to be consistent with what you preach but that you also recognize your limitations and do not hide them.
When you count your own day-to-day conflicts and your contradictions, people feel identified and your message reaches more.
With this that you have commented on airplanes … there are more and more people who reduce their flights for environmental reasons, but that is undoubtedly one of the most difficult decisions to carry out. There are many environmentally conscious people who cycle to work, buy local products, reduce the use of plastic, etc., but who are not able to give up airplanes, what do you think of this option?
It is a very interesting topic. The plane is not only a means of transport, it is a safe conduct to pleasure, leisure, personal fulfillment, or to post photos on Instagram, which is what travel is worth lately. Giving up airplanes is what costs the most by far.
The problem is that we are talking about something aspirational, something that fulfills you, or that they have sold you that fulfills you as a person. It is also cheap, and there are atrocities like those of those two English friends who met for a coffee in Malaga because it was cheaper for them to stay there than to go by train to a midpoint between their two cities.
When we talk about reducing transport by plane, we are playing with “you are cutting off the possibility of being myself”: it is an attack on freedom, individuality and identity. Why? Because we have built a world, which is also going very fast, in which traveling – to many places, very far away and very exotic – is part of who we are and our identity.
I believe that the solution, which is the most difficult and which I am reflecting on a lot now, lies in the need for a change in the set of values of our society. This is very complicated, but it can be done, for example there is a Swedish newspaper that as a policy has stopped including advertisements for cheap flights on its pages, because in the end everything around us is reinforcing that idea of traveling very far and very cheap.
I believe that together we all have to try to reflect on the background of these values, and to generate and promote values of closeness, of knowledge of our territory and its people, of traveling slowly. Obviously, if someone is very excited to go to New York or Bali, nobody can stop them, but the first thing is that the price reflects it, I want the kerosene to pay taxes, it cannot be that you can go for 500 euros to the other end of the world. The fact is that the plane ticket should not be worth that, you think how far you can go with 500 euros of gasoline … not to Japan, of course.
But if you use that argument, you could say that raising the price is not legal because then flying would be a luxury only available to some elites …
Therein lies the heart of the question … the answer that the body asks of me is not at all popular, because we would talk about rationing, quotas. Imagine that each citizen has a carbon budget, for example they can blow up three tons of carbon a year. And these quotas are not interchangeable, that is, the rich cannot buy them from the poor.
If you can’t fly because you don’t have money or you don’t feel like it, then that fee is lost, but a rich man won’t buy it to fly more times. But, of course, it is a very controversial proposal, you can imagine … they have called me a Stalinist and everything when I have proposed it.
It is true that raising prices would only allow the rich to fly, just like putting a tax on meat … but it is necessary to assume that the price of airplanes does not reflect their real cost. Flying for 15 euros, and that would have to be very clear, it is impossible. You have a huge, state-of-the-art device that consumes a huge amount of fuel, that needs terrible logistics at airports, that transports you for 15 euros to 3,000 kilometers and that has cost you less than the taxi … Do we not see anything strange How much does the taxi cost us more to get to the airport than the plane ticket?
And when they say that if we raise taxes the rich will be able to fly more … the rich can already do more of everything . The rich will always have more power. They are going to buy the best electric cars, they are going to eat the best meat, they are going to fly wherever they want, they are going to have the most energy efficient houses… basically this is a kind of mental excuse. The rich are already rich and the world is already unequal, what must be attacked is inequality. The important thing about this question that you raise is not the airplanes, but that the world is unequal, and a lot. And with climate change it will be even more so.
The issue of quotas is very controversial so … with what more realistic measures could this rise in taxes on the price of air flights be accompanied?
I would personally do a mixed strategy, which would focus especially on journeys of less than two hours , in fact this is something that is already being raised in many forums: for example, it does not make sense that there are flights from Paris to Brussels. Or, at least, that there are so many flights, there may be one or two for a stopover, but they are cities that are next door.
I also believe that useless work flights must be cut and new technologies must be used more to organize videoconferences and avoid many of these trips.
At the same time, it is necessary to give options, for example making the trains cheaper and promoting the medium-distance ones. We should have a low-carbon public transport network so that everyone can move with the least possible impact , eliminate, as I have said, useless trips, and connect all this with what I was telling you before a radical change in our set of values. Reaching a new conception of slowness as something positive, replacing extreme productivity and our mania of filling our environment with a thousand things and activities. Everything has to be slowed down, and when we do we will see how some options that now seem impossible to us begin to be more feasible.
Perhaps the crux of the matter is that the fight against climate change can also be an opportunity to live better, right? For example creating green jobs or making our cities more livable …
Of course, this touches on a fundamental issue which is the co-benefits. If you reduce the emission of fossil fuels in cities, it turns out that, in addition, you are improving their air quality dramatically, which causes many premature deaths a year. If you remove the boilers, you reduce the combustion cars, the entry of cruise ships, -which in Barcelona for example that is a huge problem-… because you are also improving people’s lives.
Or if you put trees to capture CO2 and there is dry deposition of pollutants, because at the same time you are improving the landscape of the city, you are creating spaces to play, to walk, to meet, to read … human spaces where you can live.
The pedestrianization of cities, for example … it is not just because of the fumes, it allows you to recover public space, that is something that people do not pay much attention to, but it turns out that the electric car, in the end, occupies like the others, it is occupying public space. Ultimately, it is important that we understand that what we do about climate change also has many associated benefits that are not only the reduction of emissions.
You have it very clear, but many people put their hands to the head with the restrictions on the use of the car …
I believe that we are capable of adapting to everything. With the anti-smoking law there were also many complaints, but now no one conceives that you can smoke on a train or in a hospital. There are measures that are initially perceived as negative and costly, but then we understand that they can change our lives for the better.
People have gotten used to the roll that is eating a traffic jam, or double-parking to drop off the child at school, be aware of the fine, that if the car from behind whistles, then at full speed to work with the tongue outside … I think that’s worse than other options, really.
The key is to understand that leaving the car is improving your life: my life is better when I come to work without a car, because I can’t stand traffic jams, I don’t have to go super pending and I go reading or sleeping on the train quietly. Or it is better because I go by bike or walk and so I exercise and I feel good. There are people who say that they go to the gym by car because they have little time … it takes me about an hour to walk to work, but if I do it at a good pace, I no longer need to go to the gym and I save time and money for there … in the end the key is to understand that our life will be better if we do not travel to travel, if we stop using the car in the city, if we eat better and stop eating so much meat and so much processed …
Most of the people who take the car in the city do not do it to harm the environment or to pollute, but because they understand that it is better or more comfortable. So what you have to do is make using the car more uncomfortable, and that the alternatives are more comfortable . Maybe life would be better for us if we had a direct bus to work, or pedestrian streets and safe school roads so that children could walk to school.
Let’s go now with energy … how do you see the energy scenario in a few years?
We must get rid of coal as soon as possible and boost renewables, and I think we are already underway. In addition, you have to make a plan, rather than energy efficiency, savings. Many times we talk about efficiency but what we have to do, above all, is to save in gross numbers: that energy consumption goes down, it is not about us being more efficient by consuming the same, it is that we have to consume less.
And another controversial issue … do you see it feasible to achieve an energy model that dispenses with nuclear energy in the medium term?
There is an article out there that says that you cannot be an environmentalist if you are not in favor of nuclear energy … well, to begin with, nobody is going to tell me what can or cannot be defended to be an environmentalist.
That said, my fundamental problem with nuclear is the same as with all large power generation infrastructures, because I think we should move towards a much more decentralized energy production system. In other words, there were many small power plants producing energy, and that self-consumption had a more relevant role. In this way, the source of power generation would be very close to the point where it is consumed.
That allows you to have much more control, and it is also more democratic in the sense that there would be a lot of small producers and therefore energy policies and prices will not depend on the decisions of a few companies: the energy oligopoly that does so much damage to our system. In this sense, large thermal power plants do not differ much from nuclear power plants, because what these large power plants often do is block the emergence of renewables.
In any case, I don’t think we can afford to shut down all the nuclear power plants at once, we must be aware that right now they provide a good part of the electricity we consume and that at this moment they do not produce CO2 . I say right now , because we must not lose sight of the fact that uranium mining produces CO2, the construction of a plant produces CO2, the management of waste produces CO2 and, of course, the dismantling of a plant produces CO2.
We cannot suddenly close the nuclear power plants, which are producing a good part of our energy without greenhouse gas emissions, because they would have to be replaced by coal or natural gas, we still do not have the capacity to replace them with renewables. Now: is the future nuclear? Not for me. The future is renewable and, as I said before, energy saving in gross numbers.
For me, nuclear energy is a crutch : at this moment it serves us, it would be outrageous to throw the crutch now and lean on our foot in a cast, but I hope that a not too distant future will come in which, between the contribution of renewables and the drop in consumption, we are able to do without nuclear power.
Another recent IPCC report tells us about the important relationship between soil and climate change and how it can go from being a source to a sink, a topic that you also address in your book. There is a lot of discussion about what would be the optimal model of agriculture to feed the world and reduce emissions, what do you think? Organic farming, traditional farming, both…?
Agriculture that generates the least possible impact on the environment. There are crops that can be interesting that are ultra-intensive, and others are better approached under the paradigm of organic farming. I like to talk more about agroecology, which in the end is to insert agriculture into the natural cycles of carbon, nitrogen, etc., and take advantage of the inertia of nature itself to obtain better yields.
At a global level, I believe that it is necessary to reduce the consumption of calories and animal protein , and reduce the percentage of fertilizers and pesticides. Some are needed, of course, but many times when we eat, to a certain extent we are eating oil, because a lot of energy is consumed to make fertilizers. In addition, crops must be managed in a way that emits less, for example in rice cultivation stagnant water emits a lot of methane.
Then there is the issue of transporting food from one part of the world to another, personally I think that has an expiration date. Remember that the ecological seal is one thing and the carbon footprint is another, sometimes an ecological product can come to you from the other side of the planet, or come more laminated than a conventional one . Sometimes it is better to buy in bulk and in neighborhood stores, which usually bring the genre from nearby producers, even if they do not have the ecological seal.
Besides, food waste also contributes to the impact on climate change, right?
Yes, Western countries need to rethink their agri-food system, although there is already a strategy against food waste, it should be further strengthened. The food system is not only an environmental issue, we also speak of a system of inequality, a lot of food is wasted in the world. There are many people who say that without intensifying to the beast we cannot produce enough for everyone … Food is already produced, and a lot, what happens is that much of it is wasted or is destined for animal consumption.
We must reduce the consumption of animal protein – also beware of fishing and aquaculture – and on the issue of livestock, because I believe that there is a part of extensive livestock that does have a role and a meaning, and that helps in part of the maintenance of certain ecosystems. What happens is that in Spain we are highly conditioned by the CAP (common agricultural policy), which has very different priorities from environmental ones.
The problem is not having goats in the mountains, the problem is that in the US and in Europe we have kilometers and square kilometers of warehouses with cows and pigs eating feed made with soy grown in Argentina. I think you have to be very careful with simplistic messages: “stop eating meat to save the planet.” Well, it’s not that easy. If we all stopped eating meat, we would need many more hectares planted to meet our nutritional needs … the matter is very complex.
So, shouldn’t you stop eating meat?
This is what I was telling you, it is not so simple, although it is clear that you have to reduce consumption. I believe, for example, that there should be more nutritionists in public hospitals to help us define our diet. If we are saying that we must eat less meat, we need professionals to tell us how we should eat correctly to follow these guidelines, and that the agri-food change reaches all levels.
Also, it is already being done, it is necessary to put taxes on ultra-processed foods and with a lot of sugar. In the end, the same thing happens again: those who eat more processed foods and sugar are the most disadvantaged classes. If you want to promote a healthier diet with a lower carbon footprint, with more fresh fruit, local legumes, etc., then they have to cost less. Healthy food cannot be a luxury only available to the wealthy classes.
It is a very complex issue, now there is a lot of talk about the meat issue, but there are no magic recipes. It is not to stop eating meat and that’s it. There are people who tell me: “Hey, I’m going to stop eating meat, how many planes can I take?” That is the rebound effect. The question is not to do something and be able to do more of something else , the question is to save in total. If people stop eating meat to be able to go to Thailand, we are in the same.
We are going to continue talking about other measures that can be taken to combat climate change. About forests, is it better to plant trees or restore peatlands?
That is another key question. Forests are in everyone’s imagination as they capture a lot of CO2, so many have to be planted. Well … not always, it will be necessary to see in each ecosystem if it is better to plant trees, or if it is preferable to leave it as it is and that nature takes its course … It must be borne in mind that there are not only forests, it is also necessary to restore marshes , humid areas, inland lagoons … there are a lot of ecosystems with much more capacity to absorb and fix CO2. In any case, the restoration and regeneration of ecosystems are very powerful tools and should be on the political agenda when we talk about mitigating climate change.
By the way, we must mitigate climate change, but also adapt, right?
Absolutely. Apart from doing everything that needs to be done to reduce emissions, Spain has to start preparing. We are in a very coastal country, with many very steep slopes, with scarcity of water and some very large cities in very hot areas (Valencia, Seville, Zaragoza…). Climate change is going to affect us, a lot. We have to start thinking very seriously about adapting to heat waves, extreme weather events, rising sea levels, etc.
There are still many misconceptions and hoaxes circulating about climate change … which are, in your view, the most dangerous?
I think we have gone from the climate change denial phase to the solutions denial, and that is more dangerous. In the end, the evidence that climate change exists is something that falls by its own weight, people already perceive it, the problem is that the denial of solutions is what prevents us from taking action.
For example: “It is because four politicians decide this and it is the companies that broadcast the most, because it does not matter if I do something.” It does not matter. You do not have to bear all the responsibility, but it does not matter, what each person does individually counts. If you emit five tons more or less of CO2 from one year to the next, that adds up, and a lot.
Another misconception that still persists: “It’s that changes are cyclical.” I always give the example: of course, meteorites have also collided with the earth, like the one that killed the dinosaurs. But if now we had the threat of a meteorite shock, you wouldn’t say: “Oh, nothing’s wrong, as has happened before …” You wouldn’t think that, but you’d hurry to try to deflect it somehow.
There is another perception that I consider dangerous, it is techno-optimism: “They will invent something.” Well, no, there is not and there will never be a single, magical and technological solution that solves all the problems derived from climate change. We just talked at length about this: there is no one-size-fits-all solution, be it energy or agriculture or whatever it is that fixes it all. That magical “something they will invent” thought doesn’t help or make sense either.
Other misinformation: “We put some screens out there so the sun doesn’t hit us and that’s it.” No, we can barely begin to understand how climate change works, if we put in sulfur particles, or mirrors, or whatever, the result would be that we would change the climate and the cure could be worse than the disease.
We have talked a lot, and about many aspects related to climate change … with what message would you like the people who have read the entire interview to stay?
That you don’t have to make excuses, you don’t have to say that “If only I do it and no one else, it won’t do any good …”. It all adds up , and what you have to think is that, when you get ready to do something, surely someone is already doing it before you, you will not be the first, so you will be another one and you will be contributing.
Imagine that Greta Thunberg would have thought: “Why demonstrate at the door of Parliament, if no one else is doing it.” Well look, someone had to be the spring or switch that triggered the change. And this is true for mobilizations, but also for changes in daily life. If you do something, maybe a friend notices, and starts to do the same. We must always think that everything we contribute is valuable.
In addition, we must not see the fight against climate change as a series of sacrifices and resignations, as I have already said, everything we do will also have other collateral benefits that will improve our lives.
