Politics – Page 2 – See Animals Wild

August 1, 2023August 1, 2023

The insanity of Rishi Sunak and his position – max out our oil and gas reserves

Despite all our promises, Rishi Sunak (the UK prime minister) has vowed to max out the UK fossil fuels reserves.

Now there are several stupid issues with this position.

We are an island nation – the melting of the ice caps will hit us hard, so reneging on our commitments is likely to hit us harder than most
He has at other times suggested that we can be leaders in the green transition – well not now (and there is far more money in the future than there is in oil in the north sea)
50% of carbon emissions come from road transport. It is likely that the vast majority of this will be electrified in the next couple of decades, which means that the world will need less oil by the time these fields start coming on like
He suggests that this is to allow us to drill our own oil and keep emissions down, yet our extraction emissions are actually far higher than much of the world.
He also suggested that by drilling our own oil it would bring down prices, yet only around 20% of this oil comes to the UK, and all of it is traded at the current world price so this will not relieve prices for home owners one bit.

He has also suggested that in some way, the war in Ukraine is what has required this move – only 4% of our oil came from Russia. As to Ukraine, while we may have imported some grain, we do not import any oil from there.

More insanely, Rishi Sunak suggested that this was an essential plank of our move to net zero. Unfortunately, he argues that it is cleaner because it causes less emissions to drill near the UK. This would be slightly true if our oil could be extracted with similar emissions to elsewhere, however, we cant. Once the oil is put in huge tankers, the carbon footprint per litre is so small it does not overcome the extra emissions for extraction.

There are some fears that this is signalling a swing right in politics after the loss of Boris Johnsons seat in the byelection that his resignation caused.

He has argued that this will help our move to net zero, but many Tory MP fear that this will simply lead to them loosing their seat at the next election. I think that this will lead to many problems, and shows that he really is not up to being PM at a time like this. It shows a lack of understanding of what the country needs – even suggesting that this will keep gas prices down in the 2050s is foolish – between now and then, every boiler in the country will fail, and should be replaced with a heat pump, which then wont need the oil or gas anyway.

He did pair this announcement with 2 more carbon usage and storage centres. However, it is thought that the new oil fields that he has announced will give roughly 500 million barrels of oil (about 80 billion litres). Put differently, the carbon dioxide released from a barrel of oil during its use, is roughly 426kg of carbon dioxide (for reference one litre of petrol used in your car emits around 2.3 kg of carbon dioxide directly, though these emissions would likely double if you include extraction refinement and transport of the petrol before it enters your car) which means that the carbon dioxide released by these licences is likely to be around 213000 mega (million) tonnes of carbon dioxide. For reference, our current emissions as a country is about 313 megatonnes a year, so this is huge.

This is not a positive step for the people of the UK, so I am not sure what he is doing it for – the oil and gas companies? While I recognize his reason is that he wants to make sure the UK has enough oil and gas to be fuel independent, if the transition is successful, much of this oil will have to end up as stranded assets, and it seems reasonable for oil and gas companies to demand their money back with large interest, when the government is forced to change its mind.

July 21, 2023July 19, 2023

We are all encouraged to cut our carbon footprint – so is ecotourism out?

There is a great deal of time in the media given over to cutting our carbon footprint. To be clear, this is essential – we need to cut our carbon footprint as much as we possibly can.

My family have recently bought an electric car (second hand) and this has probably reduced our emissions by 2.5 tonnes a year directly (let alone indirectly, which is often far higher – think of the carbon footprint of extracting refining and transporting the petrol from the earth to your car – usually easily doubling the carbon emissions coming out of the tail pipe).

While they cause much pollution, air travel allows support of wilderness like no time before, we must not lose it.

We are currently in talks of having a heat pump installed (I hope that this goes well) and perhaps having the same people install our solar panels and thermal solar panels (those who have been reading this blog for a long time will remember me getting them a long time ago, it has been bizarrely hard to find someone to install at a sensible price).

These moves probably combine to reduce our housing emissions to near zero – we have carbon neutral electricity as well a to reduce our gas use to zero.

So why do I run a website that is intended to simplify wild travel? It is simple! No one has yet found a model which pays locals for the wildlife that lives on the doorstep. Tourism is good at doing this. Now it is true that most wildlife is a significant distance away, which means that air travel is required. However, if as a country, we reduce our housing carbon footprint by 5+ tonnes each, per year (on average the emissions per person is around 5 tonnes per year, so for a family of 4 this is a reduction of about 25%) then a flight, preferably in cattle class and on a modern efficient plane, is not going to greatly increase our carbon footprint.

More important, if everyone in the west stops ecotourism trips, what benefit is there for locals in western Africa to retain their rainforest? A small number of visitors is likely to greatly increase the standard of living of remote communities, as well as giving incentive for thousands of square miles of rainforest to remain standing.

Carbon offset schemes are also a good idea, though much care must be taken in picking what to support (and often doing it directly is better). As this website grows, I hope to set up a scheme that does it properly. You should be looking for projects which will either reduce emissions (new green electricity generation, reforestation- with native crops, that will be left standing, and many more)

The fact of the matter is, that if all of us who are lucky enough to live in the west stop engaging in eco-travel, this removes the incentive for countries around the world to retain their wilderness and wildlife. Worse, ecotourism can give livelihoods in wild places all over the country which if removed, would require entire ecosystems to be cleared. We must be careful, and keep our carbon footprint for this travel low, but feeling smug about not flying will not keep rainforests standing, coral reefs intact, mangroves where they are and many many more

June 28, 2023June 23, 2023

Wolves are a natural part of almost every ecosystem in America, will they be allowed to return?

It is back in the 1940s that wolves were last resident in the Grand Canyon national park. This is why it was so exciting that a grey wolf is roaming the northern rim of the grand canyon.

Wolves are slowly repopulating their way across the USA

June 25, 2023June 22, 2023

Chris Packham was awarded £90,000, so?

I wonder what proportion of the country would recognize the name Chris Packham? He has been one of the lead presenters for the BBCs natural history unit for decades. Why is people like this important? Without people like this, all sorts of threats to our world, including things like climate change would be less well known in the public.

Photos taken at the rally after the People’s Walk for Wildlife, at Richmond Terrace, Whitehall, London on Saturday 22nd September 2018. Credit Gary Knight

These people are essential for disseminating information which might allow us to deal with these challenges without leaving a dystopian world to our children. Naturalists are important, as they give us the knowledge to deal with many problems far cheaper than any manmade solution.

June 23, 2023June 22, 2023

If the US beef industry is deploying tricks similar to fossil fuels and smoking to delay action, what should we do?

It is, unfortunately, a fact, that meat eaters create a significant extra quantity of carbon released into the air. How much? Well this varies from place to place, and product to product.

While many think that grass fed beef is good for the environment, the methane emissions swing this badly

There are an increasingly large number of people who are recognizing this issue. Now while some will argue that without the meat industry, much of the UK farmland would be built on, and that this would be disastrous for the environment are missing the point. We live on an island, and as such it is in our own best interests to make sure that the worlds ice sheets do not melt.

June 22, 2023June 21, 2023

Conservative corruption in the UK? £3.5 million donations linked to pollution and climate change denial

There have been many suggestions that the scientific consensus has not been reached, when it comes to climate change, either to its existence or humans effect on it,

The one debate on climate change, before the last election in the UK, and the Conservatives skipped it

May 29, 2023June 8, 2023

African forest elephants are now considered critically endangered, and African savannah elephants endangered, are the Asiatic elephants safe? And are we killing one of the few hopes humanity has? A guide to what remains

The African savannah elephant has declined by 60% over the last 50 years, and the African forest elephant has declined by 86% over the last 31 years.

So how close are these species to disappearing? There are currently 415,000african elephants in the wild, spread across 23 countries.

Unfortunately, their situation is highly different on different parts of the continent. Botswana still supports 130,000 Savanah elephants, while Tanzania lost 60% of their elephants between 2009 and 2014 (though some reserves till have healthy populations), one place hit particularly hard was the Selous which 40 years ago had over 150,000 and currently hosts 15,000 elephants.

While the African forest elephant was only recognized as a separate species in 2021 (there has been much argument about its status), what is not in question is its horrific decline in numbers. Indeed finding a web page that gives you an accurate figure is hard work, This may well because one does not exist. There has been horrific population declines over recent years, and the density is incredibly varied across its range.

Unfortunately one thing is clear, in areas of the Congo rainforest where elephants have lost, the forest does less well. There are many plant species which rely on elephants to carry their seeds from from where they are dropped. As such, without forest elephants we are likely to loose many species of trees – to the extent that it might threaten the survival of the Congo rainforest itself.

So how are Asiatic elephants doing? Unfortunately not great. There are 5 subspecies

First, the Indian elephant. This is the best known and most wide spread. Currently their Indian population is thought to be between 27,000 and 31,000, with between 10,000 and 14,000 across another 10 countries. While I am listing 4 subspecies these all look relatively similar.

Borneo elephant – the most positive estimate, suggests that there are 1500 remaining in the rainforests of Borneo

Sumatran elephant 2400-2800

Sri Lankan elephant 7500

Syrian elephant – this species was lost as much as 1000 years ago, and occupied the western most part of the Asiatic elephant range.

As such what is clear, is that while African elephant populations are falling fast there is time to check this decline. The Asiatic elephant populations are far more in danger.

May 28, 2023May 25, 2023

In the UK solar farms are wild havens, could this be repeated?

In the UK, it has been shown that at every solar farm looked at, there were more species, from insects such as butterflies, to mammals such as hares do well.

I would argue that these areas are not as good as reserves, but it is still a positive benefit. Indeed, it is conceivable that if wolves and bears returned to the UK, these sites could be fantastic for these animals.

Can solar farms not only supply our electricity, but also be essential habitat for many UK species

May 26, 2023May 24, 2023

Montana (and many other states) cannot be trusted to maintain sensible populations of grizzly bears or wolves, so why do they have control?

In 2020, Trump gave responsibility for managing wildlife populations back to the states. Now one might argue that this is the right thing to do, after all it is democracy, but is it?

Wolves are a natural part of the ecosystem in Montana, with a stronghold in the Rockies, but this was a population that lost its protection under Trump

Many of the states in the USA are horrifically gerrymandered, with some having a small minority overruling the great majority. There are many intentional ways that this is done (republicans have been very good at it over time – there are been 2 times in recent years where democrats got more votes but lost.

May 24, 2023May 22, 2023

Does the wolf belong in Germany? Not according to the CSU

The Christian Social Democrats believe that there is no place for wolves in Germany, and members of the party have called for their intentional extinction. Taking around 10% of the vote they are a small but relatively influential party – and given the way that elections work in Germany, coalitions are common. Unfortunately, coalitions will often give small parties an outsized voice, so this foolish position has the potential to become government policy faster than one would expect.