Has your attitude changed 7 yes, it has. I watch the science and i see things now on bbc news its hardtalk. Get worse and worse and i see the predictions coming true and time running out so for me, hello, and welcome to hardtalk. Every year itjust gets tougher. Im shaun ley. Time is running out. If we dont act fast when you say time starts to run and radically, it will out, what do you mean, become too late to limit can you quantify that . The effects of Global Warming. Its a sort of thing sure, look, i chaired you hear from campaigners trying to wake up the world. The Copenhagen Climate Council back in 2009 when we were hoping tim flannery isnt like that. For a global agreement. That was just about the last time the australian scientist is an optimist we could have achieved a good and absolutely convinced, he says, that we can shift from a outcome just by cutting emissions. Carbon emitting to a carbon absorbing economy. 00 01 31,360 2147483051 37 30,396 hope for mankind or 2147483051 37 30,396 4294966103 13 29,430 just so much hot air . Today, we know we have to do two very difficult things at once if you want to achieve that same end and that is to cut those emissions hard and fast and to draw very large volumes of Greenhouse Gas out of the atmosphere. If we fail to do that, 20 years from now, even that option will be off the table and then i dont know where we go for solutions. Youve said that youve kind of slightly given up trying to persuade every climate sceptic you meet to change their minds a instead you focus on in particular working with business to try and get them to create the changes. One of the reasons you helped to found the Copenhagen Climate Council. Some are concerned, though, certainly those who regard themselves as environmentalists, that the focus on growth in our economies is one of the problems standing in the way of tackling Climate Change. In a sense, business is geared up for Something Different and its not complementary with the ambition you want to achieve in mitigating the effects of Global Warming. Look, i dont believe thats true. I measure success by the gigaton, right . Last year, our emissions went up byi. 7 . We added 3. 5 parts per million of c02 to the atmosphere, the highest on record over the last 12 months and that is failure for me. If the economy does or doesnt grow, im not looking at that, im looking at a different set of diggers. You say you are looking at a different set but doesnt one inform the other . Let me put you what wells griffith, who was advising the Trump Administration on International Energy and climate, said in katowice in poland last december, where they had that big meeting, he said, we strongly believe no country should have to sacrifice their Economic Prosperity or Energy Security in pursuit of environmental sustainability. In other words, thats the direct clash between nationalism, if you like, the National Self interest, making America Great again, it could any other country we are talking about, and the wider interests of the Global Economy and the global environment. Look, that is just wrong. What we need, actually, is a whole new energy sector. We need a whole new sector to draw c02 down out of the atmosphere. We need to transform almost every industrial process that were in charge of. That will mean growth. You say yourself its wrong, but you were writing on the Copenhagen Climate Council website when it set up, every revolution, from wood to coal and coal to oil and oil to renewables, profits have increased. Thats just the way the world is. Thats right, and thats what i believe. So to try and hold that back and say it is going to destroy our economy to do this. Even if that growth is contributing to the problems the climate is experiencing, its accelerating those problems. No, no. If you grow the old economy, you will destroy the climate, right . If we grow a new clean economy and in the next 30 years ago from carbon emitting to a carbon absorbing economy, we will grow the economy and hopefully head off the worst of the climate crisis. See, between 1980 and 2000, according to the intergovernmental science policy platform on biodiversity and Ecosystem Services back in may of this year, it published its report under the aegis of the un, it said 100 million hectares of Tropical Forest were lost, mainly from cattle ranchoing, in south america, Palm Oil Plantations in South East Asia contributed to the decline. Meanwhile, the population has gone up. International trade has increased 10 times over since 1970. To feed, clothe and give energy to this burgeoning world, forests have been cleared at huge rates, especially in tropical asia. Isnt that tension part of the problem here . You may have this very desirable ambition for a Global Economy but were stuck with the one weve got and we are also trying to deal with the effects of Climate Change. The reality is in this world, we will need to use the existing economy to build a new one. So every time you build a wind turbine or you manufacture a solar panel, youre going to be using dirty energy at the moment. So part of the cost of the transition will be a growth in this dirty old economy. In terms of food, and you talk particularly about cattle grazing and the destruction of rainforests, i mean, that is truly the old economy and the reason that that is growing as it is is because we are not exacting a carbon price on undesirable practices. So we need to make those changes. These are. The Carbon Market hasnt worked. No, it hasnt worked. It must work in future because that gas thats sitting over our heads now, driving this exceptionally hot summer day in europe and driving heatwaves around the world, that gas is not going anywhere unless we get it out. A quarter of it will sit there effectively forever, by human standards, unless we draw it down. The only way of drawing it down is by exacting a carbon price. And is the technology there to do what you want to do at this stage or are we still developing the technology . Thats the great question. I mean, no one can say which technologies will work at the gigaton scale. We have some small industries, groups like Carbon Engineering that, for example, make biofuels out of atmospheric c02. Maybe some forestry, maybe some, what ive very keen on is seaweed farming. We can see the solutions in embryo there but it will be sometime before we know which of those are going to be effective, Cost Effective and effective in drawing down c02. Its difficult, is it, to appreciate the point youre making about the difficulty of predicting this technology. In a sense, you went through this when you are for the argument for Geothermal Power as a way of actually Generating Energy without the price of adding to the emissions, and the money was spent and was invested in a mine, that mine collapsed because of an explosion and effectively the investment was lost. Thats right and look, if i could say there, the thing that i didnt see and i was wrong about and a lot of the world didnt see was the power of the manufacturing process to drive costs out of production and so solar and wind, which are both manufacturing based new Energy Solutions have really killed everything else, including geothermal, so my little superannuation nest egg there was unfortunately lost through that. But it hasnt put you off thinking there are solutions, that we just have to be prepared, perhaps to invest in lots of things simultaneously, to see which one works. Thats right, no one can see the future. We know what the outcome has to be but we cant yet see clearly the pathway yet. This is part of the problem, isnt it . We have had it to a certain extent expressed sceptically by, for instant, one British Government minister who said people in this country have given up on experts, they dont trust them. Its a global problem, isnt it, and in part its because the dire warnings never quite comes to pass as they are supposed to pass and, you know, thats good news but it somewhat discredits the people have issued those warnings. Look, i would just say people doubt the dire warnings, look at what is happening around you today. Heatwave records being broken across the world. In australia, were looking at having the hottest winter in south eastern australia on record. Here in europe, youve broken numerous records. The warnings are coming true. What we need is action. We need to see this transition of the economy really start gathering pace in the next few years, otherwise we will miss the chance. Why isnt that action forthcoming then . Why is it theres a mismatch between what the public says it accepts and i think the lowy, very respected survey, the Lowy Institute poll, the most recent annual one in australia, found 60 of people say Global Warming is a serious and pressing oblong, we should take steps now but when it came to the federal election in 2019, the voters comprehensively rejected the oppositions labor pa rtys proposal which was to tackle it by reducing emissions by 45 by 2030. It lost badly. Its primary vote was down at a time when it was expected to walk in. The winning governments primary vote was down too, to be fair, but this is part of the trend where we are seeing government or potential Prime Minister is putting themselves forward without effective policy and this is dangerous. What i dont understand, and perhaps you can help us because you run the countrys climate organisation, the federal governments organisation, until it was abolished by the Abbott Government because it was sceptical about the arguments for man made Climate Change, why is it that voters can say, 0n the one hand we think something must be done, yes, we think its bad, yes its going to affect us, but vote the opposite way . The reason for that in my view is that we are not bringing the whole community along with us. What we are saying is, we want change, people in the cities, those aware of the issues want change and yet you coalminers out there in the regions, you will have to look after yourself in future. We havent had governments come in with comprehensive structural adjustment policies up as seen in germany. In germany, the transition has been pretty flawless and not a single coalminer has lost theirjob. In australia, we havent had that sense of social responsibility thats let us bring everyone people along. Social responsibility is one thing but its easy to have when you are not bearing the cost. One of the economic models that looked at the proposal from the Opposition Labor Party in the run up to the federal election in this spring suggested that cost would be about us 181 million. 167,000 jobs. Now, its not really surprising, is it, people who work in those industries look at those warnings and say, actually, of course, i care about the planet, i care about my children and grandchildren but right now, i care about having food on the table, paying the bills and paying mortgage and its somebody elses problem, not mine to sacrifice myjob, to solve this problem. Ive seen this firsthand, ive met coalminers whove said to me, im working in a coal mine, i got two children, am i doing the right thing . And of course, i say to them your first responsibility is to put bread on the table for your family and thats why we as a society need to move Forward Together with this and create new industries and its not as if this is difficult in queensland. You can see, i work with groups who want to do innovative a marvellous new things in these areas. Getting Government Support to do it is really tough and i dont understand that. Isnt part of the problem is that it doesnt matter if australia gets its house in order, or europe for that matter . The statistics suggest nearly half the Greenhouse Gas emissions come from just three countries, india, the United States and china so the rest of the world can do it its bit and that is not going to change. Well, the argument is just because i see things being done wrong, i will do wrong things as well and that makes for a great world. That is totally wrong. We all need to do our bit, otherwise how do people have confidence that we all will act . Every country needs to do its proportion of the share. 193 countries, you are quite right, most of the emissions come from three but why should those three disproportionate burden . Surely this is a collective issue. They should share the disproportionate burden because they are generating most of it. They should bear the proportion which relates to their contribution to the problem, right . And their contribution is the biggest right now. Its large, exactly, so they should do that but that doesnt mean australia should do nothing. Were the 15th largest emitter capita, we are a large emitter if you look at it in that way, and we need to do whats right. I mentioned Antonio Guterres at the start of this interview. He is trying to get countries to come along in september with very specific. He says. I want to hear about how were going to stop increasing emissions by 2020, and dramatically reduce emissions to reach net zero by mid century. We had the Outgoing British Prime Minister making a promise much the same. Theresa may said the uk will hit net zero emissions by 2050. It is easy to say these things and their predictions. Its very hard to deliver on them. It is, and the delivery will be down to industry. You recently saw Andrew Mackenzie from bhp recently say this is a crisis, we need emergency action. Ive lived through 20 years of Climate Action where we have not moved the dial a centimetre. Were still headed towards catastrophe. We need something new. So, if i was the Prime Minister of this country, what i would be doing is getting all of the industries together, saying, im watching you all, youre all scared to move first because you dont want to lose your advantage. How will we move together collectively . Give me your pledges so that i can take them to the un and show that we are actually going to lead. Because when Companies Make pledges, particularly short term ones, they tend to stand by them. And what about governments . There are some interesting remarks from zhou dadi, a member of chinas National Expert panel, on Climate Change last summer, where he said china is the number one emitter of Greenhouse Gases. We hold our hands up, so china will take more action internationally to combat Climate Change. He then said china had already reduced emissions intensity relative to gdp by 44 , which is quite handy because he promised to get it down by 45 i think by next year. So he said our studies suggests it is very likely we can achieve this target before 2025. In other words, peak absolute Greenhouse Gas emissions by 2030, we can do it five years earlier. These are political statements. Do you believe them . Look, from china, i am encouraged by them. The big issue for china, as i understand at the moment, is the growth in the vehicle sector, you know, because the number of new cars coming online is huge. So, they seem to be making very Good Progress with their electric vehicle manufacturing, and i am hopeful that they can do that by 2025. I mean, that will be the single biggest contribution to us actually achieving what we need to do stay below two degrees. I raised the question of whether you believe it. There are a lot of instances where we see the propaganda value of promising things, and often, its a bit like pledging when there is a national disaster. Governments pledge money, and then the money never actually appears. And i wonder if these promises are made and there is actually no objective way of measuring them how will we actually know whether were making the progress we think we are . How is even our poor old mr guterres going to know, even if he gets all his pledges in september . Look, no one can know the future, and as a scientist, i can say i can never believe anything until we see the figures on the table. So, when we start seeing those declines, that will be great. At the moment, were going in the wrong direction in a very bad way. I wanted to ask you about the book that you published a few months ago, that has just been released in paperback europe the first 100 million years, mercifully at only 313 pages. You describe europe not so much as a continent, but as an appendix jutting out into the atlantic ocean. Yet, from what you say, it is an appendix with quite a lot in it of learning for us now. What is it about europes experience and its experience of Climate Change, dramatic Climate Change before, that informs your thinking now . Well, look, europe has been a crossroads of the world. It has been where asia, africa and north america have met over the millennia. It has always been invigorated by things from outside coming in. Its climate has changed dramatically over time, but what we see in the current era is that were seeing a change of such a large scale, it is hard to find an analogy to it in the previous fossil record, and of such speed. Its happening 30 times faster than the melting of the ice at the end of the last ice age. So in any agenda, anything thats moving big and fast, it goes to the top of the agenda. So Climate Change is big and its moving very fast. Much more than in the past. I think what we can say is, yes, europe will adjust. But the fragility of the human cultures that are there, and the individual species that make up europe today, are really at stake. Because many of the critics of the emergency that some say we are now experiencing on Climate Change say the globe has experienced two or three degrees temperature rises in the past. It has adapted to them. It has not been easy, necessarily, but it has adapted to them. There is no reason to think the earth cant adapt once again. What you are saying is that that process, its as if someone has speeded up time this time around. Itsjust very big and very fast moving. And you and i know, if were crossing a road and youre getting a toy a boy on a bicycle coming towards you slowly, its no big deal, right, we can get around it. If youve got a huge semi coming towards you at 100mph, you know you better get out of the way. And thats what the current climate process is. And the sceptics, quite frankly, they need to stop threatening my children. They need to get out of the way so that we can get some solutions in place. When you say threatening your children, you mean because they are standing in the way of progress . Yes, theyre standing in the way of progress. They are threatening their own children, as well. And i wont tolerate that. Yes. And you talk to people all the time. You are known as one of australias best communicators, certainly one of its most experienced communicators of turning complex scientific ideas into terms understandable for the layman i speak as a layman. What is it that theyre not seeing . I dont know. I speak to them and its as if theyre barracking in a football match. Its not as if its a real world problem. And theyre blind to the reality of the situation in ways i cant comprehend. So i do just ask them, just get out of the way. Let me get on with giving my children a better future. You know, we can do without your obstruction. In your book you write that, even if the aspirations of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change are realised, europes coastline will alter, some cities will be lost to rising seas. If the nations of the world fail to honour the pledges they made in paris, the world could return to pleistocene conditions, the ones where we saw that temperature rie, and europes agricultural productivity would then be imperilled just a bit. So, it is notjust about the change in the environment. It is the change in the species population, as well. Thats right, yeah. Youve got to think of europe as an appendix of africa, really, in some ways, and of asia. Things come into europe as climates change. You had hippopotamuses in the thames 100,000 years ago, you know, and those changes will continue. But the thing that worries me is the crops. You look at whats happened in northern germany with extreme weather events and the impact on crops, you see it around the world. I mean, ourfood security is at stake here, and our political stability. Your book illustrates very intriguingly some of that bestiary that existed in europe a few millennia ago, and there are still those connections. The pig nosed and other turtles in australia were once living here in the uk. You have supported the woolly mammoth revival project that could revive the mammoth on this continent. Why . Im an adventurer. I think this is a wonderful adventure to be on. But even more than the woolly mammoth, the thing i would love to see back here is the straight tusked elephant. You know, because the european straight tusked elephant, basically its a hybrid. But its ancestral species still exists in west africa, the west african forest elephant. Africas going to have 4 billion people in 80 years time. Where will the space be for elephants and lions . Europe will have a stable or lower population. Maybe we need to think about creating space for megafauna in europe. And this and the real wilding as well as large tracts of land. Were trying to recapture something that has already been lost. Are we slightly deluding ourselves when we think that somehow we can re wild the environment and that will solve our problems . I have just been down and seen what Charlie Burrell is doing down there on his 300,000 acres, and its miraculous. He is bringing back biodiversity. At the same time, hes creating economic stability, and that is so needed. And in a way, thats we need the new paradigms, as its expressed in that way, to succeed. 66 million years ago, around the time europes land bridge with africa disappeared and even that concept is one we find extraordinary to imagine now, that there was land directly connecting europe and africa and species were travelling backwards and forwards across it, that disappears under the sea. The world, you write, was far warmer than it is today, even allowing for what were experiencing right now. Are you optimistic that the earth can survive this experience . Look, the earths systems, really, are fundamentally regulated by bacteria and microorganisms, so its a robust system. But as you go higher up the food chain, you get to ever more vulnerable species. So the large species tend to turn over and be more vulnerable. The species that demand a lot from their environment, like humans, tend to be more vulnerable. So ive got no doubt the earths system will survive, but i really worry for our civilisation, and i worry for our biodiversity, in terms of the charismatic species that we see around us. So, those species could vanish if we dont take this more seriously, much sooner, and presumably there comes a point where we wont be able to prevent that. Thats right. How close is that . I think its between ten and 20 years from now. If we havent significantly greened our grid and brought in electric vehicles, and if we havent at least taken the first steps towards large scale carbon drawdown, i think at that point, i dont know what i will say to my children. At that point, as a scientist, im out of options. The planet survives. Do humans, in those circumstances . I imagine some humans would survive somewhere. But our civilisation, this great collective civilisation we have built, i struggle to see how it will survive, because the Resource Requirements for maintaining it arejust enormous, and you need stability to deliver those resources. Tim flannery, thank you very much for being with us on hardtalk. Its a pleasure, thank you. Hello. If youre in search of dry, settled, summer weather, well, im afraid you probably wont find it in this weather forecast. Certainly not while low pressure is in charge, and that is what we have in the heart of this swirl of cloud that you can see on our earlier satellite picture. This area of low pressure is going to drift its way eastwards across the British Isles over the next couple of days. It will provide some very heavy, thundery downpours. There will always be some spells of sunshine in between. So, many eastern parts of england and eastern scotland starting the day dry, but the showers already in the west will swing their way eastwards as the day wears on. Some of them will be heavy, some of them will be thundery, there could even be some localised disruption. You can see in between the showers, though, some spells of sunshine. It will be quite breezy in the south, light winds in the north, so across scotland, these showers will be pretty slow moving. Some locations could get a real deluge and temperatures ranging from 17 degrees in stornoway to 23 in london. Now, as we go through tuesday evening, many of the showers will fade, but some will continue through the night, particularly across western and Northern Areas and some of those showers could still be heavy and thundery. Temperatures generally between 11 and 1a degrees, it may getjust a bit cooler than that across some parts of Northern England and scotland, where the skies are clear and the winds are light. So, we go into wednesday and, really, its a game of spot the difference. Again, there will be some of these heavy downpours, most plentiful and heaviest across scotland where there could be some hail and thunder mixed in. Not as many showers down towards the south and those temperatures again between 17 and 23 degrees. Now, if you are looking for a drier day, thursday may fit the bill because our area of low pressure will start to drift away and you can just about make out this little bump in the isobars here. Thats a ridge of High Pressure trying to take charge of our weather. So, on thursday, there will be more in the way of dry weather and some spells of sunshine. Still the potential for one or two showers, particularly through scotland and Northern England. Temperatures, well, just a touch higher. The winds light as well, butjust behind me, down to the south west, you can see some wet weather gathering. That is the start of another very unsettled spell to take us into the weekend. Bands of rain driving northwards during friday and this area of low pressure taking up residence by saturday, bringing some showers or even some longer spells of rain. Some unusually brisk winds as well, so if you have plans for the weekend, its worth staying tuned to the forecast. This is the briefing im sally bundock. Our top story america mourns the victims of gun violence in ohio and texas. President trump announces he will visit el paso. North korea conducts its fourth weapons test in two weeks reports say its fired two unidentified missiles into the sea. Pakistan accuses india of playing a dangerous game after it strips the disputed region of kashmir of its special status. And us stock markets see their biggest daily fall since 2018, as the white house officially labels china
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