The Sustainable Hour no 400

The science that is screaming out to us that we must stop burning fossil fuels. The scientists report that the destruction of Earth’s eco-systems and climate is reaching a point of no return. But do we listen? Or rather, why don’t we listen? Increasing amounts of CO2 emissions are still going into our atmosphere each year. When we started The Sustainable Hour in 2013, the world had just passed the 400 mark for how carbon we have burned and dumped in the atmosphere – 400 parts per million, ppm. We’re now at 419 ppm.

This is the background scenery for The Sustainable Hour no 400 where we are joined by Luke Taylor, who is director of the Sustainable Living Festival and a regular on our show at his time of the year, February being the month dedicated to the National Sustainable Living Festival.

Luke muses about the success and otherwise of both the Sustainable Living Festival and the climate movement in general. We learn about the impact that Covid has had on the last two festivals, and Luke informs us that another important festival anniversary will be achieved next February.

Scientists have been sounding the alarm bells on environmental breakdown for over 40 years, yet emissions and environmental degradation have continued to rise during this time. We talk with two scientists who believe it’s now of paramount importance that scientists demonstrate the severity of the crisis by organising and engaging in civil disobedience: Elena Gonzalez Egea and Kyle Topfer from the group Scientist Rebellion – a group of academics, researchers and scientists across all disciplines determined to engage in peaceful civil disobedience using non-violent direct action tactics to highlight government inaction on the climate and ecological crisis.

Elena from Scientist Rebellion Spain has a PhD in Astrophysics. She joined Scientist Rebellion at the end of 2020. Since then she has been arrested three times in climate actions.

Kyle Topfer from Scientist Rebellion Germany is an environmental scientist who specialises in environmental assessment for air, noise, contaminated land and renewable energy. He joined Scientist Rebellion at the beginning of 2021. Since then he has been arrested in climate actions twice.

In April 2022, as the IPCC global panel of climate scientists publish their next report, Scientist Rebellion aims to mobilise thousands of scientists worldwide to strike in order to highlight the severity of the present situation. A summary of the new IPCC report has been leaked, and you can see Scientist Rebellion’s analysis of it further down on this page.

The group has organised a series of online talks throughout February and March 2022: The Role of Scientists on a Planet in Crisis – these talks are dedicated to the climate and ecological emergency and what we can do about it.

In the last couple of weeks, news of Scientist Rebellion’s mobilisation and strikes in April has reached our shores and an Scientist Rebellion Australia has formed...