Carbon-based Extinction, Petro-industry Radicals Sabotaged the Global Climate Summit

by Brian T. Lynch, MSW

The global climate summit this year ended with a whimper. This year's president of the COP28 summit was Sultan Al-Jaber, who is the UAE's environment minister, and the CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company. At the conference, he said that in coming to the climate conference, he was "... not signing up to any discussion that is alarmist."

The former President of Ireland, Mary Robinson, asked him if he would lead on phasing out fossil fuels. His response:

"...there is no science out there, or no scenario out there, that says the phase-out of fossil fuels is what's going to achieve 1.5 [degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels]"

Al Jaber's statement is either an intentional distortion or an admission of great ignorance. Anyone with responsibility for policy decisions about climate change knows that too little CO2 in the atmosphere would cause the planet to freeze, and too much would cause the oceans to boil. Carbon dioxide is not the most potent greenhouse gas, but at 0.04% of the air we breathe, it is by far the most common. Methane, for comparison, makes up 0.00017% of the atmosphere. Very small changes in CO2 concentrations have big climate consequences. 

While Carbon dioxide is a small component of Earth's atmosphere, small changes in its atmospheric concentrations have played a leading role in the past five mass extinction events. 

Ordovician Mass Extinction

Carbon dioxide played a central part in the first extinction event on Earth, 630 million years ago. Neoprotozoa in the ocean evolved an ability to use energy from sunlight to bind carbon atoms together to make sugar (food). The first plants! Photosynthesis made them hugely successful. Their growth was unchecked. They captured vast amounts of CO2 from the air, filled the atmosphere with oxygen, and formed a thick layer of biomass over the surface water. The biomass blocked sunlight from directly warming the ocean waters and the drop in CO2 caused global temperatures to freeze. This caused most of the oceans to freeze and deprived it of oxygen. Eighty percent of all life in the ocean became extinct.

Devonian Mass Extinction

Carbon dioxide played a significant role in Earth's second extinction event (or geologically quick series of events) 440 to 460 million years ago when the Earth's climate became unstable and switched quickly between cooling and warming events. Eighty-six percent of all life on earth died off.

Permian Mass Extinction 

Carbon dioxide played a significant role in Earth's third and largest extinction when a very prolonged and massive area of volcanic eruptions in an area half the size of the United States (in Pangea) caused acid rain and pumped huge amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere, heating up the earth and killing 96% of all life on earth.

Triassic-Jurassic Mass Extinction

Carbon dioxide played a major role in Earth's fourth extinction after another atmospheric carbon dioxide spike. Global warming started again, with scientists speculating it lasted eight million years and killed 76% of all living things on Earth.

Cretaceous-Tertiary (or the K-T) Mass Extinction

The fifth major extinction event may have been triggered when a giant asteroid smashed into the earth 65 million years ago. The initial impact caused a blanket of dust and smoke that blocked out all sunlight, killing plant life and starving the most herbivores. But CO2 levels also rose from the global conflagration of the earth's forests following the asteroid's impact.  A very hot climate followed the "asteroid winter" and lasted for thousands of years. Eventually, an atmospheric balance of CO2 returned and ushered in the longest period of temperate climate in Earth's history. It is during this period of climate stability that humans first evolved. 

   

Holocene Mass Extinction (today)

Sultan Al Jaber and most of us may not know or don't believe that the sixth great extinction is unfolding right now. It is called the Holocene extinction. It is an ongoing extinction of the Earth's flora and fauna due to human activities. This is the sixth mass extinction since the existence of Earth in 450 billion years, and an increase of carbon dioxide in the air is again playing a major role. The sixth mass extinction is driven entirely by human activity that includes many factors such as: 

• Increased atmospheric Carbon dioxide due mostly to the burning of ancient fossil fuels 
• Deforestation and the rapid loss of habitat 
• The global spread of toxic (forever) chemicals
• The depletion or degradation of water resources and aquifers 

Every mass extinction event in the past had natural causes over which we would not have any control if it happened again today. But the Holocene Extinction is of our own making. Therefore, we do have the ability to blunt its impact or even reverse course if we change our behaviors. Many people I talk to can't imagine that people's behavior can have a global impact on such a huge planet. But then all of us living today find it impossible to imagine eight billion people sharing the earth's resources at the same time. There have never been nearly so many people alive at one time. The collective actions or inaction of eight billion people can and does have a global impact for the first time in history. 

The COP28 Climate Summit was a real opportunity for the world to come up with global solutions. Instead, it was captured by the petroleum extremists for whom maintaining profits for the rich is the first priority.