Yesterday evening was the last of the seven episodes of Blue Planet 2 – I’ll miss it next week.
This closing episode addressed sideways on, if not completely head on, the fact that we are screwing the planet. It was a brave attempt which was partly successful. ‘There is hope’ appeared to be the message and that hope was based on the fact that we know that we are screwing up the planet and we’ve sorted out a few things in the past. Well, I’m not convinced that those are firm enough grounds for optimism. but this series went further than BBC Attenborough series usually go in pointing to the need for change and for that it must be applauded.
This time next week we will mostly have forgotten the fact that this week we were keen on saving the oceans and we’ll be settling down to a programme which is called the BBC Sports Personality of the Year which has rather little to do with the BBC (as sport features hardly at all in the BBC’s output these days), has rather little to do with sport and a lot to do with money and in which personalities will be desperately absent.
The favourite to win this year’s event is someone who earns a lot of money from punching other people in the face (and other places above the belt) and the second favourite is someone who uses up the planet’s resources at an incredible rate by driving around in circles.
Bring back the rotting whale carcass – it would be more edifying.
I tend to agree Mark.
And when there was a “call to action”, it was of the “if we all make changes in our personal lives that will solve the problem” variety.
One thing we do know is that asking people to make changes voluntarily, for the sake of the planet, is necessary but not sufficient to tackle the problem.
Whereas changing the law to put a tax on plastic bags (as much as anything to reduce the number eaten by albatross chicks and turtles) makes an immediate difference.
Another example of the BBC cravenly seeking to avoid upsetting its current paymaster?
Miles – I suspect it is more the BBC looking at what sells TV programmes in other parts of the world but it’s always difficult to judge motives.
I think it is rather harsh to describe the programme as craven. I certainly didn’t come away with the feeling that it was telling us that everything was going to be ok because we’ve managed to solve a few problems in the past. The message that I felt came from the examples of positive action/success was that it is surely worth trying to do something about the problems we face – an important message because it would be all too easy to conclude that the problem is just too big to solve and therefore its not even worth trying. The overall message was that the fate of the life in the oceans is very much in human hands.
The programme did not purport to be providing the solutions but it did include an American researcher stating that we need to switch from fossil fuels to renewable energy and the point was made that, if we don’t, Miami will probably end up beneath the waves – hardly a message that is calculated to ensure an anodyne offering that wont upset American programme buyers/watchers.
The programme could no doubt have been harder hitting or looked more into the kinds of policies that will need to be pursued by governments to reverse oceanic pollution, climate change, over-fishing and all the other problems (any of which could occupy a whole programme by itself) but it has certainly got people talking beyond the small conservation community and that can only be a good thing.
Jonathan,
“The programme did not purport to be providing the solutions but it did include an American researcher stating that we need to switch from fossil fuels to renewable energy and the point was made that, if we don’t, Miami will probably end up beneath the waves – hardly a message that is calculated to ensure an anodyne offering that wont upset American programme buyers/watchers.”
You are correct, but the point also included the statement, which was repeated and emphasised, that if we stop using fossil fuels, and switch to renewable energy, the problem would be solved. Unfortunately, that is not true: the increase in atmospheric greenhouse gases would remain, the world would continue to warm, and sea levels will continue to rise.
It is not true, either, that the problem would at least then stop getting worse. The feedback mechanisms in the Earth’s climate would continue to accelerate warming, but the rate of acceleration would decrease. That is all.
The programme exhibited a degree of optimism borne from an ignorance of the driving factors in climate change: we have initiated a process in which ONLY a reduction in total atmospheric greenhouse gasses can *cleanly* alleviate the problem, but REMOVING such gasses from our atmosphere is hellishly difficult (as in, very expensive) with our current technology. The alternative, of shrouding the Earth (with particulates) happens to be rather dangerous.
Perhaps god will lend a hand? A catastrophic volcanic explosion? The Sun goes into a prolonged quiet period? But then we starve… If you ask me, I think god is letting the side down…
I am perfectly aware that removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere is hellishly difficult – both in technical terms and in terms of getting people, companies and countries to make the changes that would give it a chance of happening. I agree that the proposed solution to climate change in the programme was very simplistic although to be fair to the person saying it, he did use a heavy metaphorical pair of inverted commas when he said “we just need to…” and, as I say, I don’t think the programme was aiming to show how climate change can be averted/reversed/slowed down which would take a programme (at least) in its own right, but rather to point out that it is one of a number of huge problems having a massive effect on the life in our seas.
I personally don’t think the programme was excessively optimistic and came away from it with a deep sense of depression about what a shitty mess we have got ourselves and the rest of life on earth into.
I don’t think there was any suggestion that the solving of any of the problems presented is in any way easy but I think that showing that some people are trying and in some instances succeeding to make a difference with regards to some of the problems (even if only at a local scale) was an important message. Some degree of optimism – at least the sense that it is worth trying to do something, is surely necessary, otherwise we all just say what the heck, jump on the next plane and fly off to admire the coral while there’s still some left.
PS the point I was trying to make when referring to the comments about switching from fossil fuels was not that they had neatly encapsulated the solution to climate change but that if the programme makers were simply trying to avoid offending anyone they could have just left that out altogether
I am intrigued about your comment here. If we stop pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, it’s levels will go down as it is assimilated by plants in photosynthesis. I have always assumed that photosynthesis in plankton uses carbonic acid, however I realise I know nothing of the fate of CO2 once absorbed into the oceans, beyond what is taught in general chemistry at schools. I presume that there are large numbers of people involved in modelling the interchange between atmospheric and oceanic gasses.
Off course the fate of CO2 is nothing to do with the fate of methane or other gasses. My question is therefore are you relying on a particular atmospheric or oceanic model?
Hello Gerard,
“I am intrigued about your comment here. If we stop pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, it’s levels will go down as it is assimilated by plants in photosynthesis.”
Carbon Dioxide is a very long-lived gas in the atmosphere. It would take millions of years for photosynthesis alone to bring CO2 back to the levels of temperature equilibrium the Earth experienced allowing modern human civilisation to develop (Homo Sapiens are just 400,000 years old).
(Absorption by the ocean and weathering of rocks would be quicker, but still take tens of thousands of years.)
Think how long it took the Earth, using photosynthesis, to lock away the carbon we have released in just the last 150 years (oil, coal and peat). That is how long it would take photosynthesis alone to lower CO2 levels again!
Other natural cycles/events (not photosynthesis) control periodic ice ages… These are long-term solar, orbital and axial orientation cycles. Then there are plate tectonics, the odd asteroid and volcanism to consider.
Carbon Dioxide’s current levels alone will continue to warm the planet.
What is worse, is that the *current* levels of Carbon Dioxide will continue to (a) extend the dry periods of tropical rain forests, increasing the risk of forest fires turning carbon sinks into an overnight carbon sources, thus INCREASING CO2 levels, (b) melt the northern ice cap, decreasing Earth’s albedo, and thus INCREASING solar forcing, and (c) melt the tundra, thus increasing the release of Methane and INCREASING Greenhouse gases.
(There is also the issue of releasing Methane from oceanic clathrates and boiling off more oceanic CO2 with warming seas!)
So it is NOT enough to simply stop releasing more Carbon Dioxide: we need to dramatically reduce atmospheric greenhouse gases if we want modern human civilisation, at anything like its current concentration, to survive.
Current levels of atmospheric Carbon Dioxide will continue to warm the planet because these other feedback mechanisms (see above) have been triggered which simply continue that process.
Blue Planet was far too simplistic and optimistic. In fact, I think it was quite misleading on this point.
The current levels of CO2 are 400 parts per million. The last time Earth had those concentrations of atmospheric CO2 were about 3 million years ago, and the Earth was a hotter place, then, than it is now.
This is because there is always a phase-lag (hysteresis) in such complex coupled systems. The Earth’s temperature does not react instantaneously to increases in CO2 levels. It takes time to warm up and reach its new temperature equilibrium.
So even without all the other feedback mechanisms we have triggered, the Earth will continue to warm with just the current levels of CO2. Add in the feedback mechanisms, and the picture get much worse.
How about reading this from Yale:
[“If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on Earth is adapted… CO2 will need to be reduced… to at most 350 ppm,” Columbia University climate guru James Hansen has said. We sailed past that target in about 1990, and it will take a gargantuan effort to turn back the clock.]
https://e360.yale.edu/features/how-the-world-passed-a-carbon-threshold-400ppm-and-why-it-matters
That was NOT the message from Blue Planet:-(
Gerard….
“My question is therefore are you relying on a particular atmospheric or oceanic model?”
No, but I am familiar with the UPGAMP and ECMWF modellers, but they rather rely on me because I (helped) produce observational data from space, which they need to match.
The way I hear it the message that Florida will be wiped out if fossil fuels are not reduced has done nothing but inspire their fellow Americans to buy more SUVs and trucks and rev them extra hard It is not for nothing that one of the most popular video clips on the interwebs is of Bugs Bunny cutting Florida off.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiTM2HQ0g98
Of course we in the UK had the message a month ago that East Anglia could be wiped out and the Thames Barrier overtopped and I turned the central heating up a notch and went and turned the car over for twenty minutes too.
Agreed Mark!
For most of us there are only three sports that matter ( four if you include Mark) Football ( club more than country) Cricket ( country first) and Rugby, both codes (again country first).
nice bit of fence sitting with regards to the rugby question 🙂
The Anthropocene – we are all going to be celebrities for ever in the geological record.
Before the age of floating plastic rubbish, the oceans were full of other trash – seafaring islands of timber, some of which were so large they supported growing vegetation and stowaway wildlife. These islands were created by rivers around the world ripping out chunks of riparian woodland and dumping them adrift.
There is little or no such coastal habitat left for this to happen now. The only way we know about the prevalence of these events is from the hundreds of entries in old sailing ships’ logs describing near misses with these floating hazards.
UInfortunately I am a pessimist.
Above all else I would never have believed that an ignoramus backward idiot – Trump could EVER have led the western world. When the world cries out for ideas to solve the problems resulting from the actions of mankind, well I have to pinch myself. The reality of what is happening in the US (read ECOWATCH) is not appreciated by us outside of the States.
As for the fate of wildlife it seems almost inevitable that thast there will not be space in our crowded world and only the wildlife classed as “vermin” ie that can live with us will survive.
Incidentally how is it that we send our plastic to be recycled and 8 million tons finds its way into the sea, is it put on ships then dumped in the middle of the ocean?
Ben,
I tend to agree with you…
Regarding plastic pollution of the seas, five nations either routinely dump their waste, or allow it to ‘escape’, into the ocean, all from Asia: China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.
See…
https://oceanconservancy.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/full-report-stemming-the.pdf
This report also claims to list the top ten main offenders (all Asian or African):
http://www.worldatlas.com/articles/countries-putting-the-most-plastic-waste-into-the-oceans.html
Keith/Ben – that list is very interesting and I wasn’t fully aware of it before. Of course, those plastics are made all over the place.
Well, China is going to be doing its bit to cut back on it. For a start they are stopping plastics imports, which is going to cause a landfill crisis in the UK as we send our plastic to China, and insist that other nations deal with their own plastics rather than sending them all to China to be dealt with.
https://futurism.com/china-is-enacting-a-plastic-waste-import-ban/
And here is what our Mister Gove has said about this oncoming crisis:
“I don’t know what impact it will have. It is … something to which – I will be completely honest – I have not given it sufficient thought.”
Our Environment Secretary, ladies and gentlemen.
I agree, Ben and Mark. I want to be hopeful, but it’s getting less possible.
This might have been said before, but I can’t understand why David A., who must have as much influence as anyone in the conservation world, has only fairly recently spoken out on dangers which have been coming for many years. In my view, he’s too nice.
As someone who hates sportshows, I can assure you that the BBC still carries a plethora of schedule monopolizing, simultaneously broadcast on BBC1 and 2, mind numbingly boring, sodding sport. I would be willing to give up all plastics, completely, if the BBC would promise to get rid of the sport. I’ll still cut back on the plastics, as I have been doing already, but I doubt the BBC will cut back on the damn eternally over-running sports broadcasts.
Remove all the plarstic from your telly, computer, ‘phone, banknotes,whatever – and see if they still work
Some nitpicking(?) points on Blue Planet: the Apocalypse.
Terrestrial melting ice is not the main/sole cause of sea level rises: it is estimated that melting terrestrial ice would contribute about half of the sea level rise, the other half comes from the thermal expansion of the oceans.
Melting sea ice contributes a very small amount, because the salinity of sea ice and sea water differ, and the molecular structure slightly differs…
There were three important feedback mechanisms which were ignored in the consideration of the issue of sea level rise and climate change. These are all happening independently, but in parallel:
A warming Earth extends tropical dry periods, leading to increased rainforest fires. A significant carbon sink can be turned overnight into a significant carbon dump. Net result: a step change increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide.
A warming Earth melts the permafrost, releasing trapped methane. Net result: a step change increase in atmospheric methane.
A warming Earth melts the Arctic ice cap, decreasing Earth’s albedo. Net result: a step change increase in solar forcing.
Quite how marine plankton (algae) will respond to warming seas, and how that response may then effect the Earth’s atmosphere, is rather beyond me… I think we can take it that marine plankton (algae) will respond.
Then there are other feedback mechanisms in a warming world, such as changes in ocean currents which have strong climatic feedback, changes in atmospheric jet streams which also have dramatic climatic feedback, changes in soil and ocean chemistry – also having strong climatic feedback…
The changes in cloud cover are complex: low level clouds have a negative feedback (cooling) while high level clouds have a positive feedback (warming). But the models which best reflect observations suggest that a warming Earth increases low-level water vapour *circulation*, thus increasing the dissipation of low-level clouds, thereby indicating a weak, but positive, feedback.
The worrying thing is that we have set all these processes off, and they then have a life of their own which is difficult to arrest…
A further positive feedback which occurred to me when watching the programme is that the reaction dissolving coral and sea shells by acidic water gives off carbon dioxide which will dissolve in the water making it yet more acidic. It seems probable to me at least that this could be a significant effect around reefs.
Exactly.
Sea water trend is towards neutrality – but it is still alkaline at ~pH 8.1. Do shells etc dissolve in alkaline water?
The conservation message was more pointed than usual from the BBC and about time too. I think it’s necessary to highlight success stories. People will believe there’s no point making an effort if the cause is futile.
Anthony Joshua is a rare thing in boxing and a role model to boot. I think he’s one of the most inspiring sportsmen we have produced in years. As for that jumped up little **** Lewis Hamilton, the less said the better.
And you’re right, Mark, the BBC SPOTY has bugger all to do with personality. Charisma is a quality that sport is decidedly devoid of.
There are some charismatic sports men and women but charisma is not what wins them titles and medals. You are right that the Sports Personality of the Year show is nothing to do with personality but simply success and it is therefore quite pointless. If someone has won the gold medal in their sport why do they need an extra award on top? The same applies, only more so to sporting knighthoods, OBEs etc.
I’m sure some football player has charisma, assuming Charisma is the name of his girlfriend.
The level of ignorance about plastic pollution and its causes is astonishing. There is a 38 Degrees petition which states:
‘We have a plastic problem so huge it’s being called a “planetary crisis”. [1] Plastic is choking our oceans and littering our beaches. [2] But there’s a simple solution: bring back bottle deposits. [3]
All it needs is Environment Minister Michael Gove to commit to rolling out a bottle deposit scheme across the UK.’
We already recycle plastic bottles.
1. Who is going to take every plastic container/bottle back to its original retailer to get their deposit back?
2. What is the retailer going to do other than recycle them?
3. How does that stop the main culprits from dumping plastic into the oceans?
I realise I am setting myself up for a billion dislikes here but ho hum here goes. The BBC is the mouthpiece of the establishment and off the sitting political party and DA is firmly part of that. His god like status has always mystified me. It is looked on as sacrilege to criticise him in any way but given his status he could do an awful lot more to highlight the many, many problems that afflict our plant . Personally I don’t find his or the BBC’s token gestures worthy of praise.
The photography and production are of course wonderful.
Agree with you about the sports however Mark , and boxing – it should be banned.
All this talk about feedback, well when the ice goes, the feedback mechanism that controls global temperatures goes too. The whole system is in equilibrium as long as there is ice, the melting of which absorbs energy from the global average temperature (about 300 J/g). As we heat the atmosphere the energy goes up but for every ton of ice that melts 300 mJ of that heat is absorbed into the water, and the temperature, therefore remains roughly constant. Frightening, isn’t it?
This episode should have started on Easter Island as an example of what happens when people “poison their own well.” In my opinion DA was quite clear about some of the problems and tried to put out an apolitical solution, which obviously fails. Short of a global revolution there is no solution and the likes of Trump are basically preparing themselves for the storm to come, when the ice caps have gone.