Where in the world are you?
Wellington, New Zealand What do you do in the world? I enjoy myself and take up space. I think a lot about climate change, so much so that I co-founded Social Climate with Nat. In one sentence, what is climate change? Climate change is the long term change of climate due to human activity, and the biggest challenge we'll face as a species. How does climate change affect your life? Climate change has a huge effect on my life. Firstly, I think about climate change and sustainability all the time. I put a lot of energy and time into it. Secondly, I consider climate change when making major life decisions, and I suspect I will do for the rest of my life. I don't think these things are inherently negative, they're just there. What do you feel you can do about it? I feel quite empowered! I feel so encouraged and excited by the people around me, active and doing good work already. Everyone has skills that they can contribute which I find so inspiring. My passion is food. To me, food is happiness, health and security. Food is also the source of our highest green house gas emissions as individuals*. I want to increase food sustainability and explore all the ways we can make a difference in climate change from the ground up. I feel like people are the answer, and that we can solve climate change by working together. Do you feel there is more you could do? If so, what is stopping you from doing those things? I feel like there is always more that I can do! What is stopping me right now? Hours in the day perhaps? What's your favourite Sunday afternoon activity? I like quiet Sunday afternoons. A cup of tea and working on sustainability projects/ideas is my jam. Do you remember how you first became active in climate change? Was there something specific that triggered you to act? How old were you then? How old are you now? I was about 16 or 17 years old when my chemistry teacher gave me a copy of 'An Inconvenient Truth' on DVD. I watched this at home and remember feeling so amazed and frustrated and scared all at once. I wanted to do something, something real. I didn't want to buy an eco light bulb. I'm 27 now and I have moments every few months where the enormity and urgency of climate change hits me. This is usually when I learn something new that allows me to comprehend climate change in a new way. *Based on stats for the average NZ household Where in the world are you?
Wellington, New Zealand What do you do in the world? Analyst helping drive large change. In one sentence, what is climate change? Each day, month, year will be a roll of the dice; with rising seas and a redistribution of water, food and prosperity, we will no longer be able to plan our own destiny. How does climate change affect your life? It stimulates anxiety and passion. What do you feel you can do about it? I'm positive that we can overcome the worst of climate change; it's not a technology problem but a people problem, and I can help to be the change we need. Do you feel there is more you could do? If so, what is stopping you from doing those things? Yes - a need to lead a balanced life in a world that isn't focused on climate change. What's your favourite Sunday afternoon activity? Exploring the hills. Extra for experts: Do you remember how you first became active in climate change? Was there something specific that triggered you to act? How old were you then? How old are you now? I was 16 and wanted to date a keen climate activist. It was the right thing for the wrong reason! I'm 25 now. Where in the world are you?
Wellington, NZ What do you do in the world? Environmental scientist and behaviour changer In one sentence, what is climate change? The response to human hubris and the belief that we can subjugate nature and the laws of thermodynamics by blindly following the fantasy of unlimited economic growth in a resource-constrained world. How does climate change affect your life? I am a coral reef scientist by training and my favourite things, namely marine creatures, are under threat of going extinct. This makes me unbelievably depressed, angry and sad especially seeing us biologists have warned of this happening for 20 years and totally foresaw it to be particularly bad in this year's El Niño. There is a new disorder recognised called 'pre-traumatic stress disorder' and it affects environmental and climate scientists who have foreseen this catastrophe but have been ignored or even vilified for it. What do you feel you can do about it? Continue to fight with my expertise as an environmental scientist and behaviour changer. I lead a global research project on how to change Behaviour Changers' behaviours. I believe that is one important step we need to make to create the systemic change that is needed. Do you feel there is more you could do? If so, what is stopping you from doing those things? I am flying a lot for my work and to date there aren't effective enough tools to make up for the importance of face-to-face workshops with Behaviour Changers. What's your favourite Sunday afternoon activity? Rambling around the South Coast in Wellington, or hanging out in the garden with my cats and chickens. If it's bad weather, playing games with friends. Extra for experts: Do you remember how you first became active in climate change? Was there something specific that triggered you to act? How old were you then? How old are you now? I always knew I wanted to be a marine biologist to save the ocean from human activity. I heard about global warming when I was about 13 in school and realised it was a massive threat to our environment. As soon as I started studying coral biology in 1996, I was confronted with issues around warming sea surface temperatures causing bleaching and the discovery of ocean acidification. Free space: write anything you like, nothing at all, or ask us a question Good luck with your work, I hope you will collect a million stories! Where in the world are you?
Wellington, New Zealand What do you do in the world? I am a scientist. I do research on the climate system, and teach at a university. I am also a husband, a father, a brother, an uncle and I spend a good part of my time with family, and doing things around our home. In one sentence, what is climate change? Climate change is the biggest threat humanity has ever faced. How does climate change affect your life? It shapes my thinking, in my daily life, in my work, and in my communications with the public and with policy makers. What do you feel you can do about it? I can make changes in my daily life, to drive less and cycle or use public transport more, reduce energy use in my home, reuse, and recycle. I have recently started offsetting my air travel using the Ekos carbon offsetting service. I also communicate with my elected representatives in Government asking for more ambition in terms of policy to reduce emissions and to facilitate the transition away from fossil fuels. Finally, I teach students about the realities of climate change and communicate with the public at large as much as I can, through the traditional media, via social media, and by speaking at public meetings. Do you feel there is more you could do? If so, what is stopping you from doing those things? Always! My lifestyle could have a lower carbon footprint than it does, but the way our society is set up, this is not easy. I am pushing for political changes to make it easier for all of us to generate electricity renewably, to travel via electric vehicles, etc. We do not yet have solar panels on our roof at home, nor do we yet drive an electric vehicle, and these are mostly cost issues. They are both on the agenda, though! What's your favourite Sunday afternoon activity? Pottering around in the garden, or walking on the beach. Extra for experts: Do you remember how you first became active in climate change? Was there something specific that triggered you to act? How old were you then? How old are you now? My research has gradually drifted in the direction of climate change over the years, from thinking about shorter-term weather variations. I did some early work on climate change for NZ in 1990, but it was when I became involved as a contributor to the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) process in the late 1990s that I really started to realise the urgency of the issue - and that was nearly 20 years ago! I was around 40 then, and I'm 59 now. Free space: write anything you like, nothing at all, or ask us a question Climate change is unlike any issue any of us has faced before. Human civilisations have developed over the past several thousand years, during a period when the sea level has remained static and the climate hasn't really changed systematically on the global scale. So we have become used to the idea that we can live right by the coast and we can grow our food where we've always grown it. But those certainties are now gone, and it's hard work to really take that on board and respond to it. Plus, climate change affects all peoples and countries of the world, and effective action involves all countries - something that has never happened to us before. Finding ways to get us all talking and agreeing is almost as big a challenge as climate change itself! It is clear to me that climate change will transform our lives over the rest of this century and beyond. I worry for the next generation and the one after that - the worst-case future is bleak indeed, with widespread hunger and water shortages, forced migration, conflict, and many deaths. Like Syria and the Mediterranean migrant crisis times 1000, almost everywhere. Because of the way greenhouse gases (especially carbon dioxide) build up in the atmosphere, we now have very little time to act to avoid that future – but avoid it we can. We have had 10,000 years of climate stability. Our actions in this century and the last will shape the climate system for the 10,000 years to come. Let us make the future as benign as we can by working as hard as we can over the next 10-20 years to really put a stop to the greenhouse gas emissions we now know are driving climate change. Where in the world are you? Wellington, New Zealand What do you do in the world? Engineer by day, Social Climate co-founder by night and weekend. In one sentence, what is climate change? Changes in global average weather due to greenhouse gas emissions related to human activities. How does climate change affect your life? Changes where I want to put my energy and attention. There's obviously all the bad stuff, but there are some definite upsides too. It's great to be able to put time into something I care about, and it's let me stretch myself and take risks I probably wouldn't have done otherwise. Plus I've met some great people since getting involved. What do you feel you can do about it? Play with different solutions, make small changes in my own life, and find ways to work with the people around me to create more good. Do you feel there is more you could do? If so, what is stopping you from doing those things? Time, and a skills gap. I'd love to spend more of my time working on climate change - imagine how different the world would be if everyone could spend 5% of their time understanding and implementing solutions! I'm also still trying to figure out what value I can add in this space so feeling like I'd love more skills that paid the bills. What's your favourite Sunday afternoon activity? Working on Social Climate - either on reflection walks in the fabulous Wellington bush, or inside with my laptop and a tea. Do you remember how you first became active in climate change? Was there something specific that triggered you to act? How old were you then? How old are you now? Yep, I attended one of the public consultation meetings last year about New Zealand's emissions reduction targets (for the Paris Conference) and listened to the friction-filled interaction and frustration in the cold school hall. I've been aware of and concerned about climate change since high school, but I guess I'd always assumed that 'others' were going to solve this problem. I came away feeling like whatever was happening was happening too slow, and I wanted to be part of the conversation and solution. After that, I read a lot of stuff about the state of the climate - not a happy read - and remember going to work feeling like someone had died and everyone was ignoring it. I'm 28 now. Want to help us collect one million stories about climate change?
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