Tackling consumption to tackle climate change

by Jason Hickel, The Guardian

When the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published their latest report in October, the message was stark: if the planet wants to avert dangerous climate breakdown, we need to cut emissions in half by 2030, and hit net zero by the middle of the century.

It would be difficult to overstate how dramatic this trajectory is. It represents a total and rapid reversal of our present direction as a civilization. We’ve built up a global energy infrastructure around fossil fuels over 200 years, and now we need to completely transform it in 30.

The only way to accomplish this feat is with coordinated government action on a massive scale. Proponents of the US’s Green New Deal idea have it right: we need to pump public investment into churning out solar panels, wind turbines and batteries at a historically unprecedented rate, reminiscent of the industrial retooling that enabled the allies to win the second world war.