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Greta Thunberg Speech

Full text of Thunberg speech to Parliament:-

 

My name is Greta Thunberg. I am 16 years old. I come from Sweden. And I speak on behalf of future generations.

I know many of you don’t want to listen to us – you say we are just children. But we’re only repeating the message of the united climate science.

Many of you appear concerned that we are wasting valuable lesson time, but I assure you we will go back to school the moment you start listening to science and give us a future. Is that really too much to ask?

Greta Thunberg condemns UK's climate stance in speech to MPs

 

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In the year 2030 I will be 26 years old. My little sister Beata will be 23. Just like many of your own children or grandchildren. That is a great age, we have been told. When you have all of your life ahead of you. But I am not so sure it will be that great for us.

I was fortunate to be born in a time and place where everyone told us to dream big; I could become whatever I wanted to. I could live wherever I wanted to. People like me had everything we needed and more. Things our grandparents could not even dream of. We had everything we could ever wish for and yet now we may have nothing.

Now we probably don’t even have a future any more.

Because that future was sold so that a small number of people could make unimaginable amounts of money. It was stolen from us every time you said that the sky was the limit, and that you only live once.

 

You lied to us. You gave us false hope. You told us that the future was something to look forward to. And the saddest thing is that most children are not even aware of the fate that awaits us. We will not understand it until it’s too late. And yet we are the lucky ones. Those who will be affected the hardest are already suffering the consequences. But their voices are not heard.

Is my microphone on? Can you hear me?

Around the year 2030, 10 years 252 days and 10 hours away from now, we will be in a position where we set off an irreversible chain reaction beyond human control, that will most likely lead to the end of our civilisation as we know it. That is unless in that time, permanent and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society have taken place, including a reduction of CO2 emissions by at least 50%.

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And please note that these calculations are depending on inventions that have not yet been invented at scale, inventions that are supposed to clear the atmosphere of astronomical amounts of carbon dioxide.

Furthermore, these calculations do not include unforeseen tipping points and feedback loops like the extremely powerful methane gas escaping from rapidly thawing arctic permafrost.

Nor do these scientific calculations include already locked-in warming hidden by toxic air pollution. Nor the aspect of equity – or climate justice – clearly stated throughout the Paris agreement, which is absolutely necessary to make it work on a global scale.

We must also bear in mind that these are just calculations. Estimations. That means that these “points of no return” may occur a bit sooner or later than 2030. No one can know for sure. We can, however, be certain that they will occur approximately in these timeframes, because these calculations are not opinions or wild guesses.

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These projections are backed up by scientific facts, concluded by all nations through the IPCC. Nearly every single major national scientific body around the world unreservedly supports the work and findings of the IPCC.

Did you hear what I just said? Is my English OK? Is the microphone on? Because I’m beginning to wonder.

During the last six months I have travelled around Europe for hundreds of hours in trains, electric cars and buses, repeating these life-changing words over and over again. But no one seems to be talking about it, and nothing has changed. In fact, the emissions are still rising.

When I have been travelling around to speak in different countries, I am always offered help to write about the specific climate policies in specific countries. But that is not really necessary. Because the basic problem is the same everywhere. And the basic problem is that basically nothing is being done to halt – or even slow – climate and ecological breakdown, despite all the beautiful words and promises.

The UK is, however, very special. Not only for its mind-blowing historical carbon debt, but also for its current, very creative, carbon accounting.

Since 1990 the UK has achieved a 37% reduction of its territorial CO2 emissions, according to the Global Carbon Project. And that does sound very impressive. But these numbers do not include emissions from aviation, shipping and those associated with imports and exports. If these numbers are included the reduction is around 10% since 1990 – or an an average of 0.4% a year, according to Tyndall Manchester.

And the main reason for this reduction is not a consequence of climate policies, but rather a 2001 EU directive on air quality that essentially forced the UK to close down its very old and extremely dirty coal power plants and replace them with less dirty gas power stations. And switching from one disastrous energy source to a slightly less disastrous one will of course result in a lowering of emissions.

But perhaps the most dangerous misconception about the climate crisis is that we have to “lower” our emissions. Because that is far from enough. Our emissions have to stop if we are to stay below 1.5-2C of warming. The “lowering of emissions” is of course necessary but it is only the beginning of a fast process that must lead to a stop within a couple of decades, or less. And by “stop” I mean net zero – and then quickly on to negative figures. That rules out most of today’s politics.

The fact that we are speaking of “lowering” instead of “stopping” emissions is perhaps the greatest force behind the continuing business as usual. The UK’s active current support of new exploitation of fossil fuels – for example, the UK shale gas fracking industry, the expansion of its North Sea oil and gas fields, the expansion of airports as well as the planning permission for a brand new coal mine – is beyond absurd.

This ongoing irresponsible behaviour will no doubt be remembered in history as one of the greatest failures of humankind.

People always tell me and the other millions of school strikers that we should be proud of ourselves for what we have accomplished. But the only thing that we need to look at is the emission curve. And I’m sorry, but it’s still rising. That curve is the only thing we should look at.

Every time we make a decision we should ask ourselves; how will this decision affect that curve? We should no longer measure our wealth and success in the graph that shows economic growth, but in the curve that shows the emissions of greenhouse gases. We should no longer only ask: “Have we got enough money to go through with this?” but also: “Have we got enough of the carbon budget to spare to go through with this?” That should and must become the centre of our new currency.

Many people say that we don’t have any solutions to the climate crisis. And they are right. Because how could we? How do you “solve” the greatest crisis that humanity has ever faced? How do you “solve” a war? How do you “solve” going to the moon for the first time? How do you “solve” inventing new inventions?

The climate crisis is both the easiest and the hardest issue we have ever faced. The easiest because we know what we must do. We must stop the emissions of greenhouse gases. The hardest because our current economics are still totally dependent on burning fossil fuels, and thereby destroying ecosystems in order to create everlasting economic growth.

“So, exactly how do we solve that?” you ask us – the schoolchildren striking for the climate.

And we say: “No one knows for sure. But we have to stop burning fossil fuels and restore nature and many other things that we may not have quite figured out yet.”

Then you say: “That’s not an answer!”

So we say: “We have to start treating the crisis like a crisis – and act even if we don’t have all the solutions.”

“That’s still not an answer,” you say.

Then we start talking about circular economy and rewilding nature and the need for a just transition. Then you don’t understand what we are talking about.

We say that all those solutions needed are not known to anyone and therefore we must unite behind the science and find them together along the way. But you do not listen to that. Because those answers are for solving a crisis that most of you don’t even fully understand. Or don’t want to understand.

You don’t listen to the science because you are only interested in solutions that will enable you to carry on like before. Like now. And those answers don’t exist any more. Because you did not act in time.

Avoiding climate breakdown will require cathedral thinking. We must lay the foundation while we may not know exactly how to build the ceiling.

Sometimes we just simply have to find a way. The moment we decide to fulfil something, we can do anything. And I’m sure that the moment we start behaving as if we were in an emergency, we can avoid climate and ecological catastrophe. Humans are very adaptable: we can still fix this. But the opportunity to do so will not last for long. We must start today. We have no more excuses.

We children are not sacrificing our education and our childhood for you to tell us what you consider is politically possible in the society that you have created. We have not taken to the streets for you to take selfies with us, and tell us that you really admire what we do.

We children are doing this to wake the adults up. We children are doing this for you to put your differences aside and start acting as you would in a crisis. We children are doing this because we want our hopes and dreams back.

I hope my microphone was on. I hope you could all hear me.

 

All available at Hansard or Gruwniad

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/23/greta-thunberg-full-speech-to-mps-you-did-not-act-in-time

I was with her until she got to the point where she basically said “I’ve no idea how to fix this or what to do and I have no suggestions or any kind of concrete call to action  - but we must treat it as a crisis and fix it”

 

err..okay. 

Besides the 2030 deadline is bollocks. It’s too late to stop climate change already. We could have done it a couple of decades ago probably. 30-40 years ago for sure. But not now. Now we just need to live with the consequences. 

She is 16, expecting her to have the answers is a bit of a stretch!

Emissions are not going to stop. You can't realistically tell people in China or in Africa they aren't entitled to try to get what people in the west have because it causes carbon emissions and so climate change. They aren't going to listen. We are going to have to do what is politically feasible, see what the impacts of raising temperatures are (nobody really knows what they will be or how it will play out) and try to deal with it as best we can. 

 

You don’t listen to the science because you are only interested in solutions that will enable you to carry on like before. Like now. And those answers don’t exist any more. Because you did not act in time.

 

This is the bit where she absolutely nails it. 

It's not up to her to solve this.  She doesn't have that power. She is asking those that do to do their damn jobs.

It's not up to her to solve this.  She doesn't have that power. She is asking those that do to do their damn jobs.

But, as others have been alluding to, that is a bit like saying its King Canute's job to hold back the tide so why doesn't he bloody get on with it. 

We can, and should, tinker around the edges a bit - but there is no way we're going to get the national support (let alone worldwide) to do anything that is really going to get close to what we need to do (short of effectively a scientific breakthrough).

Luckily, every single poster up to this point is wrong.  

Climate change is a progressive phenomenon.  We cannot easily reverse it but we can stop making it worse.  

To stop making it worse we have to make big cuts in carbon dioxide emissions fairly quickly.  

We have all the technology we need.  Even better, it is all proven and operating at commercial scale and deployed in many countries and many climates.  

That technology is CHEAPER than continuing with fossil fuel alternatives.  That’s right, electricity from Solar PV and wind farms is cheaper than electricity from fossil fuels.  Electric cars are cheaper over their life cycle, or even over five years 60,000 miles ownership, than petrol and diesel cars.  

It is already U.K. government policy to phase this all in by 2050.  It’s already a legally binding target.  

All Thunberg is saying is that we need to do it MUCH MORE QUICKLY.    And in turn, this was the message of the 5th quinquennial  IPCC report in November 2018.  A report that was commissioned by all the world’s governments, prepared by thousands of scientists and accepted by almost all the world’s governments.

The question to you all is quite literally - what are you waiting for? 

Go out and switch to renewable electricity now and it won’t cost you a penny extra.  

Go out and buy an electric car now and it will be cheaper than what you own already.  

Go out and buy LED lightbulbs and you will save money immediately.   

And so on ......

 

Go out and buy an electric car now and it will be cheaper than what you own already.  

Horse cock.

What comparable electric car will give me lower costs over the next 5 years than my 6 year old diesel?  I'm looking at a grand? in car tax and maybe £10k in diesel?

It doesn't come even close to making sense to scrap a perfectly usable car and replace it with something electric - either from an environmental or financial perspective.

@arbiter

Your 6 year old diesel has some serious depreciation coming, as nobody wants to buy a diesel anymore and it is going to be banned or taxed in a wide range of city centres.  From last week, it costs you £12 a day to drive it into the central London ULEZ. From 2021 that zone extends out to the North Circular.  Other cities are following suit.  

Leaving that aside, if you bought electric  then over the next five years you would incur zero car tax (saving £1,000) and about £1,800 in electric charging costs for the same mileage (saving £9,200).  You did not give a figure for maintenance but it would be about half, saving you maybe another £1,000 over five years.  You did not give a figure for insurance, but you could realistically expect to save 20%, saving you maybe another £500 over five years depending where you live.  

That is savings of £11,200 over five years, without even considering the additional accelerated depreciation on your diesel or the additional emissions taxes you might have to pay.   

Now go and look at second hand electric cars and tell me what you can get for the sale price of your six year-old diesel and a further £11,200.   I’m guessing you will say it doesn’t have enough range....but it certainly out-accelerates your diesel and is more fun to drive.  

 

@Abbeywell

AFAIK the only governments not to accept the IPCC report formally were the five or six countries not yet signed up to the Paris Accord.  However, I chose this way of putting it because  Trump, Bolsonaro, various Middle Easy autocrats and Putin all did a little fandango where they accepted it at a formal level but disputed it and denounced it politically.

Good speech

running a diesel is not just about carbon emissions. From a pollution and health perspective it is totally unacceptable. If you drive a diesel car (and to a much lesser extent a petrol car) you are harming people's health, and particularly small children's health. One day we will, I hope, look back at times when it was permissible for individuals to buy and to run vehicles with combustion engines with the same astonishment we now feel at the idea people used to be able to smoke in workplaces, restaurants and pubs.

I can't believe how the car lobby have got off so lightly. When will people realise that they are as poisonous as the tobacco lobby?

The car execs who faked the diesel emission results should be prosecuted for GBH in my opinion pour encourager les autos.

Heff and Dal - you are both missing the fact that my diesel car exists. 

What is the environmental cost of gathering the materials for my new electric car? Rare earths mined from all over, steel and aluminium produced and shipped all over and then the car produced and transported to me. The environmental impact of that is enormous compared to a fairly piddly mileage (5 or 6k pa?) in a pre-existing vehicle.   

My next car will probably be electric - I’m definitely sold on it as a longer term solution (in the absence of anything better coming along) and if / when we finally have to go to being a two car household the new car will probably be electric. But I am far from convinced that it makes any sense from a personal or global perspective to just start scrapping perfectly serviceable cars and replacing them with newly produced cars. Going to a second hand car could make financial sense on a personal level - but it does nothing for the environment if it just means my diesel is being scrapped and somebody else is getting a new electric to replace it. 

In the mean time I walk and use public transport as much as I can. That in reality probably has a much bigger impact than what car I drive. 

@arbiter

Agree about public transport.  

Alternative to owning / using diesel is not scrapping it but selling it.  Agree scrapping is a last resort and can only be done with government subsidy.  

Alternative to owning / using diesel is to sell it and buy electric.  Transaction costs aside, it would save you money.  

Arbiter nailing it here tbf. 

More broadly, the whole electric car industry (and renewable energy generally) is only made possible by fossil fuels in itself - they can't make the underlying tech needed without fossil fuels. 

There is *no* - repeat - *no* way to maintain current standards of living without fossil fuels. Unless the nuclear fusion breakthrough that has been promised "real soon now" for 60 years suddenly turns up. 

As long as it is politically impossible to accept that not only will developing countries not reach current middle-class Western standards of living, but that Western standards of living themselves are going to take a sharp dip as fossil fuels run out - there can't be any constructive action. 

Things like the rate of renewables growth etc sound great until you realize it is too small to make a difference and is dependent on fossil fuels anyway. To quote just one statistic I read somewhere, *all* the renewable energy capacity installed in the last several years (can't remember how many) worldwide only covers the *increase* in global energy usage since *2015*. If we'd just kept our energy consumption at 2015 levels, we needn't have bothered installing any renewable energy..

@struandirk

Key concept is Energy Return on Energy Invested.  Methods of calculating it vary.  

Hydro, Nuclear, Tidal have very good EROEI measured in the hundreds of times.  

Onshore wind, solar PV and offshore wind are alright, returning roughly twenty to forty times the energy input depending on the climate and geography.  

Conventional oil & gas varies hugely depending on geology but between twenty and eighty times BUT most of the "energy" recovered as oil or gas goes up the chimney or out the exhast pipe as waste heat.  

Fracking  and tar sands are hopeless.  

Since we cannot go on using oil and gas, we have to switch to wind and solar.  

 

Green parties need to recognise that nuclear power is part of the short term fix for this.   You cannot realistically put top priority to reducing emissions and oppose nuclear power - the German position on this is nuts.

Isn't this climate change scam just a means by which those who in previous generations would be denouncing the public as sinners, get to sound off and make themselves feel superior?

Science by no means settled, particularly the solar minimum

@Bernstein

Yes, the science is sufficiently settled to warrant taking strong, immediate action on it.  

Only cranks and pudniw merchants bother saying otherwise.  

The Heartland Institute, for those who don't know, is the lobbying group that the tobacco companies used in the 90s to unsuccessfully discredit the dangers of tobacco and second hand smoke.

The Heartland Institute: it seems they were also drafted in by Philip Morris to obfuscate regarding the science on the risks of secondhand smoke and lobby against smoking bans.

Clearly their credentials are impeccable for an undertaking of this nature Bernstein.

So just who is paying for little Heidi’s jaunts around the globe, hectoring anyone who will listen...?

Follow the money...

It’s pretty likely to originate folks with massive vested political and/or financial interests in de-stabilising the status quo.

Angry leftists, disorientated over the collapse of their Soviet God, desperate to find some other fantasy to lecture the world on

Since neither China or India will take the slightest notice of them , leftists are left baying at the moon

And Supes does his normal trope of ad hominem abuse against credentials, rather than dealing with argument 

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