Cara Augustenborg
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Cara goes to France Day 5: Occurrence becomes adventure

12/11/2021

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After meeting over 45 people in 4 days, you would think I had met everyone who was anyone when it came to French climate and agricultural policy, but they kept the best for last... 
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Laurence Tubiana and Cara Augustenborg at European Climate Foundation, Paris
The morning started with a meeting at European Climate Foundation (ECF) with Ms. Laurence Tubiana. In addition to being President of ECF, Ms. Tubiana is also a member of France’s High Climate Council and Chairperson of the French Development Agency in addition to having been ambassador in charge of COP21 and a key architect of the Paris Climate Agreement. Think of her a bit like “M” from James Bond – A classy, intelligent woman with glowing white hair that had me girl-crushing as soon as she curled up on her grey sofa talking climate policy.
I’ve admired European Climate Foundation for many years. Since 2008, they’ve used international philanthropic donations to work with over 500 organisations to develop climate solutions in Europe and activate political engagement and public awareness on climate change. Some of the great work coming out of my favourite Irish environmental NGOs is due to the support of ECF, so I was excited to let Ms. Tubiana know how far Ireland has come in going from climate laggard (half way) to leader thanks partially to ECF support.
There was no shortage of things to discuss with Ms. Tubiana. Working in the climate arena as an economist for as long as I have been alive, she is a fount of knowledge on everything from French agricultural policy to international climate negotiations. Our time together passed very quickly  as we immersed ourselves in conversation. Ms. Tubiana agreed with a number of other experts I’ve spoken to that awareness and interest in the climate issue in France has risen very quickly. While six years ago, you couldn’t even talk about emissions reductions in French agriculture, now there is an acceptance that those emissions must decrease along with emissions from transport and energy. As a result, the idea of regenerative agriculture is gaining traction here. 
As for what to focus on back in Ireland, Ms. Tubiana told me it was time to “bring the EU Green Deal home”. She warned that the challenge now will be in making sure the Deal is owned by society and that requires the need to communicate impending climate threats and solutions appropriately and to find allies in various sectors to dispute fake information. -Good advice for all of us working on climate action.  
Ms. Tubiana wasn’t the only powerhouse I got to meet on my last day in France. The last time I was in Paris was for COP21, there was no one more photographed than the “FaFa” of climate negotiations, Mr. Laurent Fabius. Prior to holding the Presidency for the 2015 climate negotiations, Mr. Fabius was the youngest ever Prime Minister of France at 37 years old in addition to holding several other political roles.  As a youthful 75 year old, he now serves as President of France’s Constitutional Council (i.e. Supreme Court) in addition to volunteering his renowned negotiation skills at UN climate conferences each year. Before arriving in France, I asked if there was a chance to meet Mr. Fabius, but I never expected him to agree. 
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Cara Augustenborg with Laurent Fabius at the Constitutional Council, France.
I was thrilled when I found out I was being granted 45 minutes with President Fabius in the gilded offices of the Constitutional Council. Even more so when we lost track of time and ended up chatting comfortably for an hour and a half instead! I’ve met a few major politicians in my life, and I’m used to them being distant and sometimes a bit patronising in my company, so I was completely disarmed when President Fabius was neither of those. Instead, I met a man who seemed to want to pass on everything he knew about international climate negotiations so that I could go on to create better impact in my work too. He was humble and passionate, sometimes impatient about the slow pace of progress on climate yet still hopeful. 
Mr. Fabuis emphasized how important civil society engagement has been in pushing COP negotiations to be more effective, and he gave me excellent advice about how we could better influence the next COP to be held in Egypt in November 2022. He was open to my criticisms of the process and, rather than being preachy or patronizing as I expected, we had what felt like a real conversation between peers. I left feeling inspired to work harder in my own efforts back home to “keep 1.5 alive”. 
I couldn’t complete a final day in Paris without yet another traditional fancy French lunch. This time, I was joined by researchers from France's National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE). The meeting gave me a chance to check everything I had heard previously on agricultural policy with experts in the field. As I summarized my findings, they smiled and said it was nice to hear an outsider’s perspective, which they felt was more positive than their view of always wanting more ambition. Maybe that’s the added value of bringing someone over from abroad to learn about your country’s work in a certain area. -While of course no country is doing enough yet to solve the global climate crisis, I can see the strengths of France’s efforts by comparing them to Ireland. I’ve also been able to give specific examples to the French experts I’ve met on where Ireland is achieving more compared to them, for example on how we are implementing carbon tax while they are still recovering from the yellow vest protests.
One interesting philosophical debate that came up over lunch was the concept of “land sharing” versus “land sparing” with respect to how we use land to address climate and biodiversity issues. It’s something I hadn’t put much thought into previously, yet an important topic when you look at the environmental measures in the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy. Often times, CAP environmental measures are geared toward setting aside land for conservation. However, in places like Europe, we simply don’t have enough land to set aside to completely fix environmental problems. Thus, a “land sharing” approach that encourages farmers to improve soil health and biodiversity while also growing food may be a more sensible CAP methodology in an EU context. This is something the researchers I spoke with think will become more prominent in the next CAP reform, especially as we develop better ways to measure environmental effects at the farm level. 
My last meeting of the day was held at the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI), founded by Ms. Laurence Tubiana in 2001. There, I met two researchers in agricultural science and policy and our conversations focused specifically on biogas. Prior to arriving in France, I read that France had nearly reached its target to build 1,000 biogas reactors in the country by 2020. As Ireland has only about 50 biogas reactors, I wanted to hear more about how France’s biogas efforts are progressing. During my travels this week, I’ve heard a few bad things about biogas reactors: They can leak and contaminate groundwater; they compete with food production if the wrong feedstocks are used; and they can negatively impact biodiversity by encouraging large scale monoculture production, to name a few. In my conversation with experts in this area, I realized it was a complicated situation in France. While biogas can be a useful part of a renewable energy transition, it has to be considered as part of the agricultural transition to more sustainable practices too. At the moment, the jury is still out in France on whether biogas will be considered as part of both sectors or just the energy sector, which may be less concerned about environmental issues beyond climate change. 
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After meetings with over 50 people in five days, I enjoyed my final debrief with the Ministry of European and Foreign Affairs over a Champagne Bellini in Café de Flore, made famous as the inspirational venue for philosophers like Jean-Paul Sartre. My two guides spent most of the meeting re-scheduling transport and hotels as my Saturday ferry was cancelled due to bad weather.

I’m delayed in Paris for another night. On one hand, this is the unfortunate cost of travel by sea. On the other, I’m quite happy to have a day to explore this magical city. It gives me a chance to see my favorite museum (Musee D’Orsay), having not been there since my late father first introduced me to it 20 years ago.
This week, I’ve felt like Cinderella at the ball. How many times in one’s life do we get the opportunity just to learn for the sake of learning on any topic of our choosing without any expectation of outputs or exams? I can’t say I’ve ever been presented with such a gift before, and I plan to make the most of all this new knowledge on my return to Ireland.  
​I’m particularly grateful to the French Embassy in Ireland for suggesting me to the Ministry of European and Foreign Affairs as a candidate for their remarkable “Future Leaders Invitation Programme” and to my hosts for the week -Pierre and George. The French are known for their sophistication, and these were two of the classiest I've ever had the pleasure of getting to know, leaving  no stone unturned in making me feel welcome and comfortable for my entire stay (while also making me laugh a lot in the process!). I hope this is just the beginning of collaboration and friendship with the people I met this week. 
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When I began blogging about this trip at the start of the week, it was simply as a way to keep all the meetings from merging in to one another. I wrote presuming no one would actually read them, so special thanks to those of you who wrote to tell me you were reading and enjoying my blogs each day, which kept me writing every night. 
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Until now, I hadn’t blogged in over two years, but in the words of Jean-Paul Sarte, “For an occurrence to become an adventure, it is necessary and sufficient for one to recount it.” Thank you all for helping this occurrence become a true adventure (of the mind and of my taste buds).

Keep fighting the good fight. All going well on the high seas, I’ll be back in Ireland to fight it with you once again by Monday morning!
​- Cara 
Read other blog posts from my trip here
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Cara goes to France Day 4 - From Fork to Farm

12/9/2021

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I started today meeting representatives from the Ministries of Agriculture and of European and Foreign Affairs. Aside from enjoying the great city views from their meeting rooms, it was also a good way to check my thoughts about what I’ve learned so far from my week in France. Both departments gave me more insight into specific details in the areas of climate and agricultural policy, which I’m hoping will develop into some kind of lessons Ireland can learn from the French experience. 
For lunch, I joined the Mayor of Paris’ 12th district, Mrs. Emmanuelle Pierre-Marie, at a local primary school. Mayor Pierre-Marie is a recently elected Green Party member bursting with passion and energy.

​I particularly enjoyed our lunchtime discussion about how she plans to transform her district over the next five years to make it more pedestrian friendly.  
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Mayor Emmanuelle Pierre-Marie with Cara Augustenborg
Currently, cars and motorcycles represent just 12% of the transport in the area but take up 50% of the public space. Mayor Pierre-Marie has been engaging widely with residents to create far more pedestrian areas. In fact, most of the schools plan to pedestrianize the streets outside their front doors over the next few years to make them safer for children. 
Mayor Pierre-Marie is also responsible for logistics of all the schools in her district and serving healthy lunches is a big part of that responsibility. Over 9,000 students in the district are served hot lunches daily thanks to the efforts of approximately 150 canteen staff across the district. Over 70% of the food served is either organic, locally produced or certified as sustainable in some way, and the students are served a vegetarian meal at least one day a week. Once a year, all the students weigh their leftovers before disposing of them in a compost bin so that the school can track food waste and educate students more on the importance of reducing it. The schools also survey the students annually to improve the menu but always insist on serving a green vegetable as part of every meal. 
I enjoyed my school lunch of chicken noodle soup, mushy peas, ham and baguette with flan for dessert, all served on a stainless steal tray that weighs less than a plastic tray and doesn’t require the hassle and weight of extra plates. This means both kids and staff don’t have to lift as much and can clean up faster, in addition to reducing plastic use. I was thrilled at the end of my tour when Mayor Pierre-Marie sent me away with two of these beautiful trays to bring back to Ireland. I’m hoping someone in my life might love me enough someday to bring me breakfast in bed on them. They can also double as a bullet proof vest!
Joking aside, the trays and the school visit inspired me to revisit the issue of school dinners in Ireland. In 2015, Ireland’s Green Party developed a great policy proposal to bring hot school dinners to every school child in the country at a cost of EUR 350 million and create hundreds of local jobs in the process. Political pundits said it was a well-researched, rock-solid proposal but yet it has gone nowhere yet to my knowledge. At the school I visited in Paris, children get one hour to eat a hot organic lunch and another hour afterwards to play. My 11 year old gets 10 minutes to eat a packed lunch at her desk in silence. If the children talk during lunch, they don’t finish their food on time so they are discouraged from doing so. This has always bothered me as I feel it creates an unhealthy relationship with food to make kids eat quickly in silence, but I’ve always felt like a lonely voice and been dismissed repeatedly at parent-teacher meetings for raising this. 
During my visit to this Parisian school, I couldn’t help but feel my frustration bubbling once again as French students happily chatted amongst themselves over local, organic food and I thought about my kid back home and wondered “​why can’t we have nice things like this”? As the school’s Principal pointed out to me, if we want the next generation to make smart consumption choices, we have to start educating them and teaching healthy habits in school now. We have so far to go in Ireland in this respect and a growing childhood obesity crisis in the meantime.  
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After that dose of inspiration from my school dinner, I headed from "fork to farm" 200km west of Paris to the Pays de la Loire region of France to visit a 150 hectare dairy farm that is part of France’s Low Carbon Farm Initiative. Part of me felt that this might be a bit of an oxymoron because cows can’t help but emit lots of carbon, but after several hours exploring every nook and cranny of Ghislain and Charlotte de Viron’s Low Carbon Farm, I’m convinced. 
Ghislain and Charlotte are originally from Belgium but moved to France in 2001 to avail of the lower prices for entering farming before dairy quotas were abolished. Both came from farming backgrounds. Ghislain told me he was first inspired to look at his farm’s carbon footprint 15 years ago when he saw an airline magazine claiming airplanes emitted less carbon than cows. He was offended by this because he always felt he did his best to ensure his farming practices were sensitive to environmental issues. Ghislain and Charlotte became part of France’s Low Carbon Dairy Farm initiative when it was launched as a pilot project of 4,000 farms in 2013, funded in part by the EU. The initiative has since become an industry led, voluntary programme of over 14,000 farms (approximately 25% of France’s dairy farms). Farmers involved in the initiative pay about EUR 800 for a sustainability audit from a trained Cniel representative and then take on various voluntary initiatives over time to reduce their environmental impact. This includes measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve water and air quality,  and enhance biodiversity. The audit uses a life cycle approach so the environmental impacts of imported products like feedstocks and fertilisers are also included in the assessment. Why can’t we have these nice things?
Ghislain took us on a tour of his whole farm, pointing out every detail of his practices, including the wide variety of feed his cows eat (spelt, sorghum, sileage, etc.); his fields of clover, rye grass, corn and other species; and his impressive rooftop solar array producing 290,000 kWh of electricity and grossing EUR 10-15,000/year! Why can’t we have these nice things?
Ghislain was honest about the challenges of low carbon farming – particularly the use of about 2% of soya as a feed stock for his cows. He’s doing his best to minimise use of this South American import while also giving the right nutrition to his herd to ensure their milk meets requirements to produce Emmental cheese. He’s hoping soya alternatives continue to develop so he can move away from it entirely. In the meantime, he produces most of the fodder on site (150 tonnes of cereals) to feed his 110 cows that he milks year round, producing 1,000,000 litres of milk annually. Through his current lower carbon farming practices, Ghislain believes he has reduced his carbon footprint by 20% already and has plans to go further. My heart sang when Ghislain pointed out to me that the lower lifetime of methane in the atmosphere (approximately 12 years compared to carbon dioxide’s lifetime of hundreds of years) presents a great opportunity to address climate change faster if we prioritize methane’s reduction. Why can’t we have these nice things (and nice attitudes!)?  
I was joined on my farm tour by two representatives of the dairy industry group, Cniel, who lead the Low Carbon Farm Initiative. They explained that the French dairy sector has already reduced emissions by 20% between 1990 and 2005 and aims to reduce by a further 20% between now and 2030. Why can’t we have these nice things?

​While just 25% of dairy farms are part of the Low Carbon Farm Initiative now, Cniel aims to increase this to 50% by 2025. They stress that all the actions they encourage farmers to take to become low carbon actually improve the profits of the farms in addition to lowering greenhouse gas emissions. Ghislain confirmed that his profits continue to increase as he applies low carbon practices due in large part to reduced input costs. All agreed that their main obstacles to getting other farmers to join the initiative were related to farmers already being too overworked to have the time to reflect and engage on the topic; the initial cost of getting an on farm assessment (approximately 800 euro); and the challenge of communicating the benefits of low carbon farming to farmers. These all seem like obstacles that are easily overcome and make me feel confident they will reach their targets within this decade. 
As night fell in the Sarthe, I said good bye to new farming friends feeling hopeful and grateful that there were farmers like Ghislain and Charlotte in the world who recognize their role as “climate solvers”.  

​The truth is, we can have all these nice things from school dinners to low(er) carbon farms, if we think they are important enough to keep asking for them. 
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If I were a Green Party member, I’d ask my elected representatives to dust off their School Dinners policy and make it happen. If I were a farmer, I’d ask my farming association to get moving on a plan to help me reduce emissions by 30% over the next decade. I’m neither of those things, but I’ll keep asking anyway in the hopes that, if enough of us do, something might stick. 
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Tomorrow, I finish my official tour of France in meetings with some outstanding leaders in climate policy. I've got butterflies in my stomach at the thought of them, but I’ll leave their names as “une belle surprise” until then.
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A demain, keep fighting the good fight!
-Cara 
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Cara goes to France Day 3 - Science and soils and seeds, Oh My!

12/8/2021

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We’re not in Paris anymore, Toto! Today, I woke up in Montpellier after an exciting high speed train journey last night with my two amazing guides. Following a quick visit to Montpellier's main plaza, we headed off by tram to Agropolis International to meet those responsible for the famous “4 pour 1000” soil initiative launched at COP21 in 2015. I remember the moment at the Paris climate conference when this initiative was brought to the world’s attention. At the time, I was skeptical as to whether “4 pour 1000” was green genius or green washing, so this week, I asked to meet the scientists behind it to find out for myself. 
While “4 per 1000” may sound more like a diet yogurt than science, the idea of the initiative is to increase the carbon content in soil globally by 0.4% per year. By doing so, we could offset all the carbon dioxide emissions we currently burn to the atmosphere. Theoretically, this is possible. If you consider climate change as a giant, global math problem, soil carbon could help to balance the equation.  
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Our soil can hold 2-3 times more carbon than the atmosphere in the form of organic material. Greater carbon content helps soils to not only mitigate against climate change but also to retain water, reduce erosion and adapt to drought and climate change better, thus providing us with more food. 
I was impressed with the explanation given to me by Dr. Paul Luu, Executive Secretary of the 4 pour 1000 initiative and Director of Agropolis International (also our incredible host for the day). Dr. Luu did his PhD research in Sri Lanka studying agroforestry and is passionate about agroecology and botany. His teams’ approach was a welcoming blend of science, agriculture, policy and pragmatism with a strong focus on improving soil carbon in the global South, which have many natural “hotspots” for carbon storage potential and biodiversity richness. The initiative has grown to more than 672 signatories based in 50 different since its launch in 2015, demonstrating its success in capturing public and academic attention.  
What I liked most about the 4 per 1000 concept is that it is not a one-size-fits-all idea. There are many ways we can increase the carbon content of soil, including many type of farming practices. From conservation and regenerative agriculture to agroforestry, every effort to be less reliant on chemical inputs and use local resources is a win. The United Nations has defined 13 principles for agroecology, but many of them could be applied to our own back gardens or parks too, like using local compost and natural, organic fertilizers. 
Ironically, I recently helped Diageo (Guinness) judge the sustainability category for their annual malted barley awards, and I was struck by how many farmers applied with great initiatives to improve the soil carbon on their farms. Unfortunately, only one applicant could win the award and receive recognition for all that hard work, which made me a bit sad as almost all of the applicants deserved to have their stories told. It struck me today how something like a “4 per 1000” label or affiliation could give good farmers kind of endorsement they deserve. There are a lot of different ways such an initiative could help to raise awareness about the importance of soil health and its role in helping with climate change, but with so few staff and such limited budget, it’s difficult to know where “4 pour 1000” should focus their energy to make the most impact. 
I have the same dilemma in my own climate work, sending me into panic a few times a week when the climate problem seems so vast that it’s hard to know where best to focus efforts to make a difference. I’m hoping this trip will provide me with some new insights answer that question. Already I can see that by meeting so many exceptionally talented people in a variety of areas, I’m more able to see how my own strengths can compliment others’ and build on existing work. Maybe that’s the point of the whole trip, but I’m still nowhere near finding the answer. Time for a food break...
After lengthy discussions with the several institutional representatives involved in 4 pour 1000, Dr. Luu took us to one of his favorite local restaurants for what was my best traditional French lunch yet. Local, seasonal wine and food is an absolute passion for the French, and I couldn’t help but get caught up in the excitement gushing from my colleagues over every decision about what touched our precious palates. 
Fun facts I learned about sparkling water over lunch: Perrier sells a version with smaller bubbles (“fines bulles”) to appeal to those who find the bubbles in their original flavour too big! Even more fun fact - The city of Paris has free sparkling water fountains in parks so that everyone in Paris has the #RightToSparklingWater (plastic free, bien sur)!
Fortunately, we walked off some of that lunch over a tour of CRNI’s Ecotron facility, where Scientific Director Alexandru Milcu explained the centre’s role in simulating real world and future climatic conditions to see how different plant species and soil organisms respond to a variety of conditions. It’s a one of a kind, impressive facility that allows us to see how nature might adapt to climate change or to help us understand more about the environmental conditions in past climates. Alex was particularly excited about the research they hope to undertake soon on basalt waste powder from the mining sector as a possible amendment that could help store much more carbon in soil and help us achieve that “4 pour 1000” goal in some parts of the world.
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From there, we headed to the ARCAD platform – a new research facility that stores and studies hundreds of varieties of seeds for cultivated food and energy crops used in the Mediterranean and tropical regions. This research allows us to understand what plant varieties will provide the most nutrition and resilience in a changing climate. It was exciting to be one of the first guests at the facility and see the state-of-the-art technology used to store and analyze seeds. 
The surprise seed of the tour for me was Fonio, an ancient grain grown in West Africa that’s high in iron and contains all 20 amino acids (rare for a non-animal based product). It’s something I’ve never heard of but will be looking out for in the future as a healthier substitute for rice. 
As I write, I’m back on the train to Paris, traveling at over 300 km per hour, hoping for a good nights’ sleep before more learning (and eating) tomorrow, including meetings with Government officials, lunch at one of Paris’ famous school canteens, and a trip to a dairy farm in case I was missing the sites (and smells) of home.  My guide has brought out the whiskey and Christmas lights for our train table again, and it already feels like today was just a dream of “science and soil and seeds, oh my!”. 
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A demain, keep fighting the good fight!
-Cara

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Cara goes to France Day 2 - Grandeur, peasants, high councils and high speed

12/7/2021

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French Deputy Hubert Julien-Laferrier with Cara Augustenborg
My second day in France started in grandeur with a tour of the French Parliament at the Palais Bourbon and a meeting with Parliamentarian Hubert Julien-Laferrier (member of the Generation Ecologie party).

​It was impossible not to be impressed with such a salubrious venue, especially the stunning library, and Deputy Laferrier gave me some interesting insights into climate politics and public awareness of climate change in France.  
Another traditional Parisian lunch was enjoyed at the Federation Nationale des Syndicats d’Exploitants Agricoles (FNSEA) – basically the French equivalent of our Irish Farmers Association but with very fancy food! I was surprised how knowledgeable my hosts were about the climate crisis and how their farming members seem to understand agriculture’s essential role in contributing to climate action. Through our conversation, it seemed French farmers consider themselves to be “the victims, the culprits and the solvers” of climate change, and there has been a shift in awareness and acceptance of the need for climate action among the farming community. The last few years of extreme weather events in France (both droughts and flooding) seem to have catalyzed more effort among French farmers to try to adapt their farming practices to climate change. In turn, that’s also helping them to see the need to mitigate against climate change even more. There are definitely lessons to be learned from this experience that can be applied to Ireland’s farming community as they begin to become climate change “solvers” too. 
One thing many Irish and French farmers have in common is getting a poor price for their products as “dirtier”, imported foods are cheaper for consumers to buy. In France, on average, the farmer gets EUR 6 of every EUR 100 that a householder spends on food! The rest go to so-called “middle men”. It’s a topic I find myself getting increasingly frustrated about and not understanding why we can’t reduce the profit margins of “middle-men” to give farmers a fair price for food or even slap a sin tax on products that contribute significantly to things like rainforest destruction, climate change, water pollution, etc. That would make “greener” products the cheaper option without encouraging a race to the bottom on price. I am sure trade agreements and food poverty issues make this more complicated than I am stating, but I’d love to see a politician or two prioritize this issue so that farmers had the economic incentive to produce food in a more sustainable way. 
After lunch, I headed on to the  Confederation Paysanne, which directly translates as “Peasants Confederation” but it’s an older way of describing farmers or “those who work the land” in France. Confederation Paysanne sees farming as a social and ecological profession and has some innovative ideas for how to transform the food system, including looking at national food provision in the same way we view health care as a kind of State managed resource. It’s definitely a concept worth reflecting on as a means of modelling national food security. They also encourage the need for more men and women to become employed in farming as we transition to more sustainable farming practices, which is an interesting way of ensuring a just transition that protects agricultural employment. 
I finished the day with the Secretariat of France’s High Climate Council, which is the equivalent of Ireland’s Climate Change Advisory Council. Since they are a relatively new body and I am a relatively new member of Ireland’s Council, we had a lot in common and a great discussion about ways of working and the challenges of setting carbon budgets and conducting annual reviews of Government climate policy. I have a feeling it may be the start of a beautiful friendship as we try to maximize the impact of our respective Councils on climate policy. The French High Climate Council is heavily involved in trying to create an international network of all climate councils so we can learn from each other in developing independent advice on climate policy. 
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After my final meeting of the day, I jumped on a high speed TGV train from Paris to Montpellier, traveling 750km in just 3.5 hours, reaching speeds of 350km/hr! It would have taken me 8 hours to do the same journey by car. It definitely now ranks as my favorite form of travel, made even better by my guide’s wise decision to bring snacks, whiskey and Christmas lights for our table! 

Tomorrow, I get back to my roots with a tour of various agricultural research endeavours around Montpellier in the rain.
Until then, stay dry and keep fighting the good fight!
-Cara
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Cara goes to France - Day 1: Urban farming, Smart food and French climate policy

12/6/2021

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PictureParis' Deputy Mayor Audrey Pulvar with Cara Augustenborg at Le Paysan Urban.
​My first day in France with their Future Leaders Invitation Programme was a whirlwind, beginning with a tour of an urban farm and the Smart Food Paris incubation hub alongside Deputy Mayor Audrey Pulvar – TV journalist turned activist turned politician with a passion for sustainable food systems (and one of my new heroes). 

Le Paysan Urbain is one of 238 urban farms supported by the City of Paris, producing a wide array of microgreens using fully sustainable methods, including an impressive greenhouse with sustainably heated water circulated through the seed tables to keep them warm year round. 

I couldn’t believe all the flavors bursting from these tiny greens! In addition to providing a community resource for education on nature and farming, the farm also hosts local composting facilities; grows hops for a local microbrewery; and allows nearby residents to access fresh, nutritious food at low/no cost. They also make an effort to employ people who are struggling to enter/re-enter the job market, be it refugees, single parents, etc. 

From the farm, Audrey  then took me to nearby Smart Food Paris incubation hub where I met three entrepreneurs born out of this initiative:
- Maximillien Ngyuyen of Excellent (plant-based) Burger with no crappy chemicals or imported soya in his burgers like the usual meat alternatives. It had my taste buds completely fooled!
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ExcllentBurger.com
- And the two passionate designers behind Somalte -Tasty, nutritious edible bowls perfect for festivals and other events where reusable food containers aren’t practical. The bowls are made from hops residues from local microbreweries so they’re also a great example of putting circular economy and zero waste principals into practice. PS: They’re crowdfunding to upscale their enterprise at the moment, if you’ve got some spare dosh to invest!

It struck me that Ireland could really use an equivalent organisation that puts national, sustainable food security at the heart of its ethos as opposed to our entirely export led focus on food production. 
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Somalte.com
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One common thread across all these initiatives was a need for more sustainable packaging. It’s a major issue for food products that need controlled humidity, protection from damage, and attractive packaging options with no easy solutions yet. (That’s a hint for budding Irish product designers, by the way.) I thought the vegetable based plastic was a good alternative, but today I learned the GM-based ingredients usually travel from the USA to Asia for processing and then back to Europe for sale. I also thought the reusable bamboo and composable containers were a good alternative to plastic but it turns out they are full of sealant chemicals that can end up in our foods. As Kermit said: “It ain’t easy being green”. 
After eating my way through Smart Food Paris, I then stuffed myself further with a traditional French lunch and chat with Le Monde’s agricultural journalist, Mathilde Gerard, followed by meetings at France Strategie and the Ministre de la Transition Ecologique – All in an effort to gain further understanding of France’s climate and agricultural policies. 
As a country that is truly passionate about food, there is a lot to learn in France that is applicable to Ireland’s journey to a more sustainable food system, but today I’m struck by how much we have in common. Both the people of Ireland and France have come a long way in recent years in understanding the climate and biodiversity challenge, and both countries have made significant leaps in environmental ambition over the last couple of years in particular. 
Both have struggled with the challenge of implementing taxes on carbon pollution in the past, but both have improved their approach to citizen participation in policy development via Citizens Assemblies, which have driven much more interesting climate and environmental legislation recently. Both countries now face the challenge of implementing these new policies and laws at a pace that aligns with the urgency of the climate crisis, while also ensuring a just transition for those employed or dependent on high-carbon industries. 
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Yellow vest protest 2018 (Source: NPR)
In many ways, Ireland could have an easier job of doing this than France, even though France has been better at meeting EU climate targets historically.  As a society with many more diverse industrial players, “bringing everyone along” in France may be more difficult, but it’s hopeful and inspirational to see how hard the people I met today are trying to make it happen in many different ways. 
I continue my  Parisian exploration tomorrow with meetings with representatives from political parties and farmers’ unions along with members of France’s High Climate Council, which I’m expecting to be directly relevant to my work on Ireland’s own Climate Change Advisory Council. At the end of tomorrow, I head off to Montpellier by super fast train to spend day three getting back to my roots with some intensive agricultural research. My brain is already swimming with ideas and my notebook is nearly full. I might possibly explode from either mental inspiration or all the lovely food! 
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"kill me now" profiterole
Stay tuned for more tasty treats from France and keep fighting the good fight!
-Cara

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Bon voyage: France by ferry

12/4/2021

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This week, I'm heading to France on behalf of the French Ministry for European and Foreign Affairs "Future Leaders Invitation Programme". Each year, the French Ministry invites 75 people from around the world to France to give future leaders from the political world and civil society the opportunity to spend time in France to hold high-level meetings relating to their interests. I'm told I'm one of only 11 Irish people to receive this prestigious trip in the 50 years the French Government have been running this programme. -Minister Paschal Donohoe and Senator Lynn Ruane being two of Ireland's more notable past recipients. 

I've asked to spend the week meeting France's most successful climate policy professionals and learning about some of their innovative programmes, particularly in the areas of food and agriculture, which I feel we can learn a lot from in Ireland. I'll be blogging about those (socially distant) meetings throughout the week so more on that later.

In the meantime, I'm writing from Stena Line's Rosslare to Cherbourg ferry in an effort to keep my carbon footprint as low as possible for this trip. For those that doubt the climate benefit of going over land and sea versus flying, I've done the math for this trip (because that's just how nerdy I am), and it turns out that I've saved a considerable about of CO2 compared to flying even with the added distance:

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While the greenhouse gas emissions from a relatively short trip like this pale in comparison to a round trip, economy class transatlantic flight (1,700 kg per person return), I've nonetheless more than halved my emissions by choosing to travel by ferry instead of plane. To put this in a financial perspective, generally, when I do have to fly for some reason, I make a donation to my favourite climate charity (Friends of the Earth) based on the social cost of the carbon emissions (approx. EUR 200 per tonne of CO2). In this case, I've saved EUR 50 in carbon by going overland instead of flying. If we actually paid a carbon tax on jet fuel (we don't, bizarrely), it would create greater price parity between flying and traveling overland and sea and create more of a business case for the slower route. 

Miraculously, my propensity for sea sickness has stayed at bay thanks to relatively calm seas, and I actually enjoyed the feeling of being rocked to sleep in my cabin and I woke feeling abnormally refreshed. I can't say I am missing airport security and being packed in a plane like cattle at all, and I'm getting a lot more work done (and Netflix binging) without any distractions during my time on the ship.

With many more ferry routes opening up between Ireland and France care of Brexit, I could see "slow travel" being a much more popular way to travel to our closest European neighbour. If Irish Rail could just get the train times to Rosslare aligned to the ferry departures (hint, hint), it would be a winning combination. There's also a need for the ferry companies to provide greater transparency about the emissions from their ships as those vary considerably based on boat design, number of passengers, goods on board, etc., and my calculations were based on relatively crude estimates rather than real numbers from the boat I am currently on. However, all we can do is our best, and I'm happy enough with my best for this particular trip. 

By the end of today, I'll be in beautiful Paris and looking forward to a jam packed itinerary for a whole week of precious learning. Stay tuned and keep fighting the good fight!

​-Cara



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Graduation Day: a dose of inspiration amid a climate crisis

9/2/2019

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On September 2nd, I was asked to give the graduation speech at University College Dublin for the Class of 2019 in Degrees in Architecture, Planning and Environmental Policy, Geography and Engineering Science & Structural Engineering. - No easy task when you're used to telling people bad news on climate change! Read my speech or listen to the audio below if you're craving a dose of inspiration amid a climate crisis...

Listen Here:

Or Read Here:

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​Graduates, Faculty, Parents, friends and relatives - Thank you for the invitation to speak to you, and congratulations to the graduating Class of 2019!

I was asked to speak to you today because of my role as a climate communicator, in which I spend most of my time telling the public how bad things will get if we don’t act to address climate change. So, I’m sure you can appreciate the irony I felt as a sort of “merchant of doom” being asked to inspire you as new graduates! You’re probably dreading my Al Gore impersonation explaining how our house is on fire, but actually, I’m not here to dwell on the climate crisis because for you, as graduates (particularly in the programmes represented here today). Right now, this crisis is an opportunity…

It’s true, the future could be bleak if we fail to act quickly. You’ve heard the media headline “we have 11 years to solve climate change” and that has terrified a lot of young people into thinking that in 11 years, we’re going to be underwater and starving. But what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change really said is that we have 11 years to reduce emissions by just under 50% to have a chance of staying below 1.5C of warming. What that means for you, is that the next 11 years of your career could and should be a time of radical change and disruption in the business-as-usual model. I am talking about a societal transformation in the same way we transitioned during the Industrial Revolution in the late 1700s to the early 1800s, when the invention of the internal combustion engine powered by fossil fuels allowed us to expand food production, improve public health and grow our global population to the incredible extent we see today. Now, we know that if we want to continue to thrive as a species, we need to evolve beyond fossil fuels, and You, as new graduates, can provide the skills to make that transition possible.  


When I was in secondary school and even as in third level studying biochemistry, we never learned about climate change, but YOU are coming out of an education system that has embedded the issue across the curriculum and therefore you’re bringing a modern, cutting edge perspective to an older work force that is desperately looking for solutions. And I have to say, fair play for getting here because I would have struggled in the Irish education system. First, you have the challenge of memorizing and regurgitating information to get to third level (including Irish!) only to have to switch gears once you get here to think critically in order to succeed.

You may have presumed that someone whose been asked to speak to you for your graduation has been successful in the Irish system  but – I love the visualisation of an ice-berg to describe my own career path, including my academic history – where the tiny bit of the ice-berg you see floating above the water has been my successes, and the enormous chunk you can’t see below the water has been my failures.



To give you an example of one of my own failures, in 2014, I was asked to stand for local election -knowing nothing about Irish politics and really identifying as a full-fledged scientist at the time. When I was asked, I actually felt like vomiting at the thought of having to knock on doors and ask for votes, which is exactly why I decided to do it – because you learn the most from the things that scare you to death (including giving this speech, actually).


For 6 months, I gave it my best shot – I spent EUR 5000 of my own money; I was stressed beyond belief trying to hold down a job, raise my 4 yr old and canvass in my spare time; I tested my marriage to the point of collapse; and after all of that – I lost the election by just 100 votes. I spent 6 months afterward starring at a wall wondering why the heck had I put myself and my family through that ordeal But two years later, I could tell you it was worth every penny and all the hardship because it was a 6 month crash course in Irish politics, media training, and understanding the pulse of my community, and that has put me on the career path I have today, which I adore. (I hope President Deeks heard that because I really love my job here!). Your careers going forward may also look like ice bergs. Honestly, I hope they do because the failures teach you so much and are just a way of putting you onto a different and exciting path.


My co-host on Newstalk, Ivan Yates, is just a little younger than my father, so it’s a bit like talking to my dad when I’m talking to him (don’t tell him I said that) and he’s often quite critical of your generation not being as hard working as ours. When I sat in your seat, I wanted to live the definition of success and the values I’d been taught by my parents – to have permanent job with a pension, be a homeowner, get married, have children, but then as I finished my education, the economy collapsed and all that was on offer was “the gig economy” and zero hour contracts – so I couldn’t live the life that my parents told me was successful. However, in that process of having to adapt to this uncertain world, I learned having a career just to buy stuff isn’t the most important thing for me. Autonomy, creativity, being allowed to speak my truth, and have more time to invest in raising my daughter – those are the things I value most. I hope, for you, that you can always put your own values at the front of your career and life choices and not be swayed away from them by others.

I can already see how your generation and those younger than you are less impressionable than mine maybe due to more access to information via the internet. I see how you respond to authenticity and can mobilize in seconds on an issue you care about through social media, and we’ve seen that in the climate strikes happening all over the world. I can see how you look for experiences rather than the acquisition of more stuff and aren’t defined by ownership of a house/car, by the over-consumption that threatens our planet.


I’ll give you one more personal story to illustrate my point about this moment of crisis as a moment opportunity for you. One hundred years ago, my family’s farm in County Kerry had no electricity. My Grandfather, who was a dairy farmer that never attended secondary school, built a water turbine and a wind turbine to power a single light bulb in their home before the national electrification program. One hundred years later, today, I am seeing new graduates finding ways, not to bring power farms in Ireland, but for farms, schools and homes to help power the whole country. As a country with a low manufacturing base, a high percentage of rural land, and a vast supply of renewable resources, the opportunities to innovate here as part of a global low-carbon transition are limitless.

And every discipline is needed in this transition: scientists, engineers, policy makers, designers, communicators, but particularly the disciplines represented in this room because everything needs to be redesigned to adapt and mitigate against a changing climate and address our biodiversity crisis. Transport, energy, cities, towns, villages, how people work/shop/eat – all have to be reconsidered. If you can’t see how your new careers are a part of this new low carbon revolution, please come talk to me because I guarantee you, there is a way. 


I’m not just talking about recycling at home, bringing your keep cup or cycling to work -because I get frustrated hearing the constant mantra of “the power of one” and “it starts with you”. Yes, individual responsibility and behavioral change is something we should all do to help, but I will quote the words of the journalist Bill McKibben when he came to Ireland a few years ago and said: “The best thing an individual can do to address this crisis is to stop being an individual”. That advice applies whether you are an activist or an employee – collectively, we need to look at our entire supply chains and our entire business models to figure out where we can transition quickly away from fossil fuels, inefficiency and waste. I am sure you guys are ready for that challenge. 


The writer and conservationist, Terry Tempest Williams, once said, “The eyes of the future are looking back at us and they are praying for us to see beyond our own time” When I look at all of you, I see a radically different future than today and it gives me enormous hope in the midst of a crisis. So go forth -fail, learn, collaborate, be authentic, be disruptive! I wish you the best of luck in being a significant part of this new Revolution.

Thank you.
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Leo's Dilemma - My take on Budget 2019 and the carbon tax debacle

10/11/2018

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Once upon a time, two members of a gang were arrested and imprisoned for committing a crime. Interrogated in separate cells with no means of communicating with each other, the prosecutors offered them each a choice to betray each other by testifying that the other committed the crime or to remain silent. 
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These were the possible outcomes of their choice:
  1. If both the prisoners betrayed each other, each of them would serve two years in prison.
  2. If one remained silent but the other testified against them, the silent one would serve three years in prison and the betrayer would be set free.
  3. If both remained silent, they would each serve one year in prison. 
Testifying against their fellow gang member offered a prisoner the potential for a greater reward (freedom) than cooperating with the other prisoner (1 year in prison each). However, if both testified against each other, they would both serve the maximum 2-year sentence.
This is a game theory called the “Prisoner’s Dilemma” and it’s been used since the 1950s to show why two individuals might not cooperate even when it’s in their collective interest to do so. It also explains why countries like Ireland refuse to curtail their greenhouse gas emissions as long as they think countries like China, the USA, or Argentina may not reduce theirs. Countries act with “rationale self-interest”, even if the penalty from not acting collectively (climate chaos) is far worse than the cost of action. 
This week, a similar dilemma dominated our politics. Bear with me and let’s call Prisoner 1 “Leo” and Prisoner 2 “The Early Birds”….

Leo is stuck in the Dail chamber, potentially facing life after the next election as a back-bencher (or worse) if he doesn’t do something amazing to combat the numerous political parties and independents encroaching on his space. The Early Birds are “people who get up early”, whom Leo claims to represent -aka employed tax payers and voters.  

Meet Leo (and his fetching socks)

Leo just met with the Government’s esteemed Climate Change Advisory Council who told him one of the best things he could do to address Ireland’s climate commitments was to support a carbon tax. Leo’s also aware that Ireland’s Citizen’s Assembly (100 people representing all of Irish society) recommended that a carbon tax should be one of 13 measures implemented now to address climate change, and they said they were willing to pay more for fossil fuels to play their own role in addressing climate change.
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Even a modest carbon tax scheduled to increase slowly over time would give businesses and consumers confidence that it makes economic sense to invest in low carbon technologies (like insulation and heat pumps) rather than continue to spend money on increasingly more expensive fossil fuels.

Such taxes can be designed so that a portion of revenue goes back to people to alleviate fuel poverty and invest in their household energy retrofit, along with investing the revenue in other emission reducing strategies. And there's nothing to stop Fine Gael from lowering USC while they implement a carbon tax, so people are taxed for consumption, rather than working. 
The Climate Advisory Council explained to Leo how Fine Gael could even win votes by implementing a carbon tax that gave money back to tax payers and encouraged people to reduce their fossil fuel consumption. Leo was buzzing so much after his meeting with the Climate Change Advisory Council he even made a catchy little video afterwards, promising great things to come from Fine Gael with respect to climate action (though his comms team didn’t take too kindly to my efforts to debunk it).  ​

Meet The Early Birds

The Early Birds have become surprisingly climate savvy lately. Now that the economy is up and running again, sustainability has become de rigueur and climate change is firmly back on the media agenda during their morning commutes. Traffic has gotten way worse too, so they’re in their cars even longer each day listening to news radio. 
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As a result, the Early Birds know Ireland is a self-confessed “laggard” in climate action and that the Government will continue to burn coal and extract peat until 2030. Despite Leo’s efforts to “keep the recovery going”, the Early Birds are still not flush with cash... 
While they understand the need for climate action and accept the idea that polluters should pay, the Early Birds resent the idea of any more tax on anything in their lives and feel Leo would be a hypocrite to impose a carbon tax on them as long as Moneypoint and Bord Na Mona keep burning. Leo's neglected to tell them that they'll be paying even more for our EU carbon fines from 2020 onward if we keep heading down this carbon-emitting pathway. 

Let’s Play “The Politician’s Dilemma”

This week, Budget 2019 was upon us. -Instead of the prisoner’s dilemma, it’s a game called the politician’s dilemma where Leo is Santa Claus and the Early Birds are the excited little boys and girls. Paschal is Leo’s friendly elf, here to announce whose naughty or nice, and the Early Birds wish each other “Happy Budget Day” as they head to their breakfast meetings….
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A modest carbon tax (less than 3 cent a litre on petrol) is on the table -a lump of coal to many Early Birds who can’t get to work any other way than driving, but a treasure to those who felt would be a true test of Leo’s alleged commitment to addressing climate change. 

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Here’s how Leo’s Dilemma played out…

If Leo proposed a carbon tax in Budget 2019, Ireland would have moved one small step closer to addressing climate change and doffing the climate laggard hat (+1), but he risked alienating the Early Birds and finding himself on the back bench (or worse) after the next election (-1).

BUT, if Leo scraped the carbon tax (as he did), he’d only alienate a small percentage of environmentalists and economists, who already felt pretty alienated by Leo anyway (+/- 0). Sure, Ireland would maintain its reputation as a “climate laggard” (-1) and Leo would still look like hypocrite for his false bravado on climate leadership. However, scraping the carbon tax would be unlikely to impact how the Early Birds treat him at the next election (+1). Plus, if he throws the farmers a bone and gives them money to add some more beef cows to the herd (and more emissions to our atmosphere), he can recover any lost votes from potentially sore eco-warriors...  

Leo's decision to scrap the carbon tax at the 11th hour (and add some additional greenhouse gas emissions via agricultural subsidies) was made purely in rationale self interest to survive another election, just like the Prisoner's Dilemma predicts.
Let’s call a spade a spade. -Politics is driven by the desire for power, and what happens to the climate or future generations is largely irrelevant unless it provides a political advantage to maintain that power.
Pardon me for my cynicism, but I’m writing this from a week working in Brussels where I’ve watched this week’s climate media frenzy in Ireland from a distance. Between the dramatic urgency of the IPCC’s Special Report trying to keep additional warming under 1.5C to Denis Naughten’s resignation as the country's first Minister for Climate Action, it’s been a weird time to be away, but perhaps the outside perspective gives me clarity about the real motivations for Leo’s behavior. 
I choked up when I heard Prof. John Fitzgerald, ESRI economist and Chair of the Climate Advisory Council, on Newstalk Breakfast after the Budget was announced. Prof. Fitzgerald has argued for nearly 20 years that a carbon tax was a vital part of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

When asked on Newstalk if he would consider resigning his position since his advice had been ignored by the Government, Prof. Fitzgerald replied “I’ve been an economist with the ESRI for nearly two decades, so I’m used to being ignored”. Someone please explain to me why our Government ignores an esteemed economist they have paid for advice for nearly two decades… 
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I was equally upset when I saw Green Party TD Catherine Martin’s tweet in response to the budget. -The Green Party is the only political party who consistently defended the idea of a carbon tax at huge expense to their own “power”. They’ve heeded the advice of experts like Prof. Fitzgerald and Joe Curtain, putting long term societal benefit over short-term ambitions for power, but it hasn’t gotten them anywhere. 

Santa and his elves have said they're waiting for the advice from the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action to make any changes to carbon tax and that some day far far away there will be an incremental carbon tax established until 2030... 
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It seems there’s always a reason to wait to address climate change, despite the fact that it’s is more urgent than ever and Leo’s got less than 12 months to prove his climate action ambitions before an election is probably called.
Climate Advisory Council member and economist, Joe Curtain, said it best in this must read twitter thread, summarizing his frustration:
Yesterday was a catastrophic failure of the Irish political and administrative system, and of us, the citizens. If a small wealthy booming country can't adopt the absolute minimum climate measures, even to pretend to care, if this is the world we live in....the world is doomed.
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Photo credit: The Gloss Magazine, September 2018
Irish politics right now is driven purely by rationale self-interest, and we’re the prisoners caught playing that game with politicians in the lead up to the next election. The only way to change the game is to elect different people who prioritize societal benefits over their own personal ambition to stay in power. Let me know if you find any...  
Keep fighting the good fight!
​- Cara

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Good-Bye, Gasoline Blues

2/21/2018

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On February 8th, Ireland’s parliament voted 78 to 48 to end future off-shore oil and gas exploration in Irish waters. Their decision mirrors the governments of Costa Rica, Belize and France, who have all banned the exploration of fossil fuels in their waters.

Ireland’s Climate Emergency Measures Bill will provide for the amendment of the Petroleum and Other Minerals Development Act of 1960 to ensure national and global environmental considerations, (including the annual average global temperature and the monthly mean level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere) are considered when issuing licences, undertakings, and leases under the Act. 
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In doing so, the Bill will prohibit further exploration and drilling for new fossil fuel resources anywhere in Irish territorial waters as an emergency measure to address the high levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

For Valentine’s Day, I could think of no better topic to discuss with Newstalk’s Ivan Yates on our new “Down To Earth” radio slot than Ireland’s exciting systematic break up from fossil fuels! 
Listen to our podcast or read the blog for more of my own opinions on saying good-bye to off-shore oil and gas exploration in Ireland. 

​The Beginning of The End

New Politics has stirred up some radical changes in Ireland’s Parliament since the 2016 General Election: 
  • Last June, the Irish Government unanimously banned onshore hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, as the first private members’ bill to pass both Houses during the lifetime of this Government, joining France, Germany and Bulgaria in banning the practice on land. When the final stages of the bill to ban fracking were debated, amendments to extend the ban to offshore drilling were parked to achieve consensus.
  • In a 90 to 53 vote last February, the Dail approved legislation to drop coal, oil and gas investments from the €8 billion Irish Strategic Investment Fund through a Bill introduced by an Independent politician, Deputy Thomas Pringle, who credited new politics with advancing this historic legislation. If passed into law soon, Ireland will become the first country in the world to divest from fossil fuels.
  • And now, in a record breaking eight weeks, the Dail has agreed to send the Climate Emergency Measures Bill through Committee Stage scrutiny and potentially stop the government from issuing any new licenses for the exploration and extraction of fossil fuels in the State.
To put this in context, it took eight YEARS to secure Ireland’s climate legislation to require Government departments to simply report their activities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and eight months to get the fracking ban as far. Eight weeks is a miraculous achievement that puts Deputy Brid Smith of People Before Profit in this history books as the TD who led the Climate Emergency Bill through second stage post haste. 

​Leaders and Laggards

It’s not too surprising that People Before Profit, the Green Party, Labour, Sinn Fein, Social Democrats, and the Solidarity Alliance supported the Climate Emergency Measures Bill as it aligns generally with their ethe, but Fianna Fail’s 11th hour decision to support the Bill sends a significant message with respect to their new direction of travel.
Fianna Fail’s 2016 Election Manifesto was light on climate action and made no reference to oil and gas, but since then we’ve seen a “green lean” in their voting record and more engagement in environmental issues, including at their 2017 Ard Dheis where both myself and climate economist, Joseph Curtain, were invited to speak on climate issues. When I met Fianna Fail Leader Michael Martin at the Ard Dheis, he showed a lot of interest in air quality and told me climate change was a very popular issue among the younger Fianna Fail members in particular.
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Fianna Fail Leader, Micheal Martin, and I pictured at 2017 Ard Dheis with staff from Trocaire.
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In speaking in the Dail during the second stage hearing of the Climate Emergency Bill, Fianna Fail Environment Spokesperson TD Timmy Dooley leaned even further into the green by emphatically supporting the Bill, stating: 
“To continue business as usual is one of the greatest acts of moral negligence that we could commit”. 
It’s a good day for the planet when words that sound like they come from a Green Party manifesto start to make their way into traditional political parties!

The most surprising aspect of the Dail vote on the Climate Emergency Measures Bill was Fina Gael’s decision not to support the Bill even after Fianna Fail announced their own support. Even more surprising because Fina Gael’s decision came just weeks after Taoiseach Leo Varadkar admitted in European Parliament that his government’s response to climate change was inadequate, stating: 
“As far as I am concerned, we are a laggard. I am not proud of Ireland’s performance on climate change ... There are lots of things that we intend to do so that we can meet those targets.

​And it’s something that I am very committed to, and certainly, my generation of politicians is very committed to.”
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Even our “Independent” Minister for Climate Action, Denis Naughten, voted against the Climate Emergency Bill rather than lose his lovely cabinet seat. I know I shouldn’t be surprised by this in the nasty game of politics, but I genuinely hoped the likes of Naughten and Varadkar (also “MY generation of politicians”) would be better men and leaders than they appear.

​If you needed further evidence these guys are all talk and no real climate action, they’ve truly shown their cards on this one. 

“Twill bring you gain, or perish on the seas”

To give them some credit, Fine Gael’s 2016 Manifesto clearly stated support for oil and gas exploration so they’re sticking to their word in that respect, even if they’re simultaneously contradicting their own National Policy Position to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by at least 80% (compared to 1990 levels) by 2050.

There's a small possibility Fine Gael’s unwavering support of oil and gas exploration is not driven by vested fossil fuel interests but rather a desire for energy sovereignty and some hope of economic benefit from potential new reserves, but every new extraction site threatens our U.N. Paris Agreement commitment to keep climate change under 2°C of warming. The climate science tells us to have a chance of staying under that 2°C limit, we must keep 80% of the world’s known fossil fuel reserves in the ground so there’s no point in looking for more oil and gas because we can’t burn it anyway. This conclusion by expert group Carbon Tracker has been endorsed by the International Energy Agency and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Research published by Oil Change International in 2016 also found that the oil and gas fields and coal mines that are already in production contain enough CO2 to carry us past the 2°C limit.

​The Climate Emergency Measures Bill recognises and legislates for this scientific reality that we must stop looking for more fossil fuel-based energy and is in line with Ireland’s climate and energy obligations as part of the EU and UN. Ireland’s national and international climate commitments require almost complete decarbonisation of the energy, transport and home-heating sectors by 2050.

A vote to support continued exploration of oil and gas is a vote that rejects climate science and turns a blind eye to our international commitments.  

Left in the dust

Even if we park the climate science and UN commitments for a moment and consider Fine Gael’s argument on the importance of oil and gas as an indigenous natural resource which enhances our national energy “security”, our paltry oil and gas reserves don’t contribute to any sense of national energy security. According to the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, 85 per cent of Irish energy is imported in 2016 at an annual cost of around €4.6 billion, with 91 per cent of this coming from fossil fuels so very little of our energy comes from Irish sources. We’re almost completely dependent on costly foreign imports.  Furthermore, there are no indications that any future gas finds in Irish waters are likely or economically viable. Corrib gas field project incurred losses of €2bn and Shell exited the project in 2017, after losing $900m.

The Corrib gas field currently meets 40% of our demand and this will increase to over 60% until the mid-2020s, but it's important to note that revenue from these gas supplies does not go to the Irish state and we pay the same as any other country would to purchase this gas. 
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IrishTimes.com
Exploration and extraction are dominated by major fossil fuel companies who sell their supplies at the market price with no discount or royality to us here in Ireland thanks to a deal made by Charlie Flanagan's government in 1989 which gave all the rights to our own oil and gas away. 
Despite this lack of benefits to the State, there are currently over 40 licenses granted for a range of fossil fuel, some of which have contracts up to the late 2020s. Any continued exploration and extraction of fossil fuels, if successful, locks Ireland into burning those fossil fuels when the State is already failing in its climate change commitments. The introduction of new gas sources would require the costly construction of new gas infrastructure which would remain in place for decades. New gas supplies also encourage increased gas usage by homes and businesses at a time when usage should be decreasing.

As part of its examination of the Onshore ‘Fracking Act’ in 2016, the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment produced a detailed report on fossil fuel supplies in Ireland, acknowledging that ‘further investment in exploitation of fossil fuels would in all likelihood reduce investment in sustainable sources of energy.’ It’s clear that a continued focus on oil and gas exploration, leaves us in the dust when it comes to the renewable energy transition we need to make. 

The Future Is Electric

Research by the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition shows that Ireland would be far better off investing in local renewables and warmer homes that use less fuel than looking for more oil and gas. Ireland has one of the highest levels of fossil fuel use in electricity generation in comparison with other European countries and disproportionality high electricity bills as a result . Real savings and benefits to Irish citizens arise where those is no purchase of fossil fuels, be that imported or indigenous, not to mention all the co-benefits of a healthier environment without the risks of drilling.

In 2016, renewable energy in Ireland reduced our national energy import bill by €342 million. Moving to a fossil fuel free energy grid based on Renewable sources has the capacity to create 100,000 jobs in Ireland. Real energy security comes in the form of clean, zero carbon, indigenous renewable resources, not fossil fuel sources with dangerous extraction processes and grave climate implications.

​Fossil fuel investment also now carries major financial risks. Financial analysts have highlighted the risks of fossil fuel assets becoming ‘stranded’ (worthless), a warning reiterated publicly by the Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney.
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Enacting the Climate Emergency Measures Bill would create further impetus in Ireland to drive more Renewable Energy development and decarbonize transport and energy. This would be a positive step not only in reducing our greenhouse gas emissions, but also in attracting companies like the big data centres looking for fossil-fuel free locations to set up premisis. In addition, it will be one of only a handful of laws like it internationally and thus a rallying call to others to act. 

Varadkar’s ambition to drop the “climate laggard” label could begin to be realized with no tangible cost to the Exchequer if only his party would agree to support the Climate Emergency Measures Bill.

But First...

​Perhaps I celebrated a bit prematurely when I heard the news that the Climate Emergency Measures Bill had passed second stage, but we get so few opportunities to celebrate victories in the environmental arena. 
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Not Here Not Anywhere protests outside Leinster House to support the Climate Emergency Measures Bill
​I was reminded by several colleagues after my happy dance that this was just one battle and the war is far from won. -The Bill could easily get stalled in Committee stage or watered down to a meaningless piece of paper. Climate Action and Environment Committee Chairperson, Fine Gael’s Hildegard Naughton, already hinted at this prospect during the Bill’s debate when she said pros and cons needed to be considered before legislation could be drawn up. 
If opponents have their way, climate change will drop to bottom of considerations in the Bill to squeeze a bit more oil money into their campaign coffers while they still can.
It’s important to note that the Bill will not disrupt Ireland’s current gas supply or jeopardise the energy demands of citizens and businesses in Ireland. The policy change proposed in the Bill will not ‘switch off’ any existing supplies and does not affect current exploration licences. Gas Networks Ireland have emphasised no new gas sources are required for Ireland to maintain its gas supply in the short, medium or long-term because Ireland is connected to the UK gas system and not reliant on natural gas exports from the Russian Federation but instead via Scotland from the North Sea and from continental Europe via England. Furthermore, the UK’s decision to exit the EU does not jeopardise gas flows to Ireland or Northern Ireland.

While the Bill can now proceed to Committee Stage, there are concerns the government could block the Bill at a later stage or water it down when amendments can be made to the wording. It’s critical that voters force their representatives to stick to the science and back the Bill as it stands as soon as possible to ensure it becomes a law that aligns with climate science and a sustainable Ireland.

You can make your voice heard on this issue by joining the newsletter at www.foe.ie.

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As always, keep fighting the good fight, and tune in to Newstalk FM on Wednesday's 6:45-7pm for more debate between Ivan Yates and I on the Down To Earth slot on the Hard Shoulder. 

-Cara

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Fly Me To The Moon

2/14/2018

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Growing up with a father who was an Air Force pilot and a mother who needed regular trips from the USA to her family in Ireland, I spent a lot of my childhood in airplanes. Perhaps I chose the environmental profession to make up somewhat for those sins of my past, but I’m still having a hard time letting go entirely of flying even though I know I should. 
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I look at my European colleagues with envy as they can travel most places in the relative comfort of a train while I find it difficult, living in Ireland, to travel entirely by land and sea. 
I found out recently that Newstalk Presenter, Ivan Yates, doesn’t fly himself. Exploring my own issues around aviation and environment seemed like an appropriate topic for our first chat as part of our exciting new weekly ‘Down To Earth’ slot on ‘The Hard Shoulder’.
Listen to our ten-minute chat here or read it about in much more detail in my Verdant Yank blog this week below. 

Is flying really so bad?

Airplanes emit particulates and gases, including carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, black carbon, oxides of nitrogen and sulfur, lead and water vapor while in flight, and as the popularity of air travel has increased, so too has the pollution. Even though there have been significant improvements in aircraft fuel efficiency, these improvements are eclipsed by the increase in air traffic volume. Since 1999, the number of people who fly globally has doubled and there are now 8.3 million people in the sky every single day! 
Back in 1999, the contribution of civil aircraft-in-flight to global CO2 emissions was estimated to be around 2%. Now it is closer to 3.5% and IPCC projections indicate aviation will contribute 5-15% of global human CO2 emissions by 2050 if action is not taken to reduce them. More than 82% of the world’s population has yet to ever set foot on an airplane and as the global middle class grows, the aviation sector is expected to grow in tandem with the number of commercial airplanes set to double in the next twenty years. 
Those numbers may not sound alarming, but the impact of air travel on a personal carbon footprint can be. Per passenger, a typical economy-class Dublin to New York round trip flight produces over 1.5 tonnes of CO2, 15% of the average Irish person’s carbon footprint of 12.8 tonnes, for just one trip. Figures released by Aer Lingus last March showed that Irish people fly on average almost seven times a year, so those flights can add up to a large carbon footprint for some people! And if you fly premium class over economy your impact is even worse because of the extra space you take up, with the carbon footprints of business class and first class three-times and nine-times higher than economy class, respectively. 
Not surprisingly, London is the most popular destination for flights leaving Ireland, costing us 0.15 tonnes of CO2 round trip. If we took the ferry and drove on our own instead, it we would emit double the CO2 because one person traveling in a 4-5 passenger car is really inefficient, but if we took the ferry and train to London, we’d expend 73% less CO2 than flying.

So what can we do about it?

Personally, I don’t believe technology is going to get us out of this mess we call climate change, but in an effort to be objective and recognize that technology has some positive role in reducing emissions, here’s where the technological advancements in aviation may help reduce emissions:

Tomorrow's Tech

  • Fly lower and choose smaller plans – At the high altitudes (8-13km) flown by large jet airliners, emissions of nitrogen oxides are particularly effective in forming ozone and these have a greater global warming effect. Emissions from jet flights are substantially higher than turboprop flights– probably in part because of their lower cruising speeds and altitudes compared to jet airliners
  • The Future is Electric - Adding an electric drive to the airplane's nose wheel may improve fuel efficiency during ground handling or integrating an Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System (EMALS) which would act as a catapult for take-off on the airstrips. Some companies such as Airbus are currently researching this possibility because as a lot of fuel is used during take-off in comparison to cruising.
  • Biofuels – Some companies are researching biofuel technology for use in jet aircraft and some aircraft engines can already run on vegetable oil or ethanol. since 2008, there have been a number of jet airline test flights conducted using biofuels but this has global environmental and social risks with respect to deforestation and converting farmland used for food production for production of biofuels for the aviation industry instead.​
  • Hyperloop – My personal favourite tech option is to ditch the flying cattle cars altogether and save lots of travel stress stress via Elon Musk’s Hyperloop, which uses an electromagnetically levitated pod and electric motor to travel through a low-pressure tube underground tube at speeds of over 1000kph. 
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A Hyperloop could get from Dublin to London in 36 minutes or Dublin to Cork in 20 minutes. The Hyperloop wars have already begun and one company aims to deliver a fully operational Hyperloop system in the next three years. ​

Policy Drivers

Talking tech is fun, but climate change is such a wicked problem that it requires international and national policies to drive emissions down. The EU has had an Emissions Trading Scheme since 2012 which requires flights within the EEA to monitor, report and verify their emissions and trade carbon credits to allow a certain level of emissions from their flights annually. The system has contributed to reducing the carbon footprint of the aviation sector by more than 17 million tonnes per year to date (approximately 8% of EU aviation emissions), but some argue the price of carbon credits is still lower than it should be. 
In 2016, the United Nations’ ratified an agreement to control global warming emissions from international airline flights and established airlines’ carbon emissions in the year 2020 as the upper limit of what carriers are allowed to discharge in the future.  Airlines will be involved in an offsetting scheme whereby forest areas and carbon-reducing activities will be funded, costing about 2% of the industry’s annual revenues. The aim is to offset 80% of the emissions above 2020 levels through a voluntary system. 
Personally, I wouldn’t hold your breath for a global aviation emissions trading and offsetting system. Trading emissions in aviation is complicated by its transient nature: If an airplane is made in country 1, owned by country 2, leased to country 3, takes off from country 4, flies over countries 5, 6, and 7, and lands in country 8, who is responsible for its emissions? Add a further complication of tree-planting to try and offset those emissions and the math gets even more complicated and far less likely to comply with the science to effectively reduce emissions. 
There are other smaller policy decisions that could make a difference. The most novel of these is to end frequent flyer programmes. I you think about their very nature, frequent flyer programmes are designed to encourage more flying. Typically, employees get to use the miles they accumulate from business trips for personal use. This can amount to thousands of euros worth of free travel, encouraging families to fly more for personal holidays to avail of this benefit. Norway is one such country that has banned frequent flyer programmes due to competition laws, but large corporations who want to reduce their carbon footprints and be more sustainable could consider this as one of many ways to address the increasing impact of business flying. 
Undoubtedly, the low cost of air travel is increasing its popularity and subsequent emissions. It’s only marginally more expensive to fly from Dublin to Cork than take the train, despite emission being 70% higher. We don’t incorporate the true environmental cost of flying into our ticket prices. In fact, aviation is highly subsidised so ticket prices can be kept artificially low out of the wallets of tax payers. There should be a tax or levy attached to ticket prices based on how much carbon is emitted from the flight. This would make rail travel more competitive, something we badly need as rail services like night trains struggle to survive in Europe. 
I was surprised to discover there is already a levy attached to airline tickets in eight countries, including the United States, to fund health initiatives in the developing world, drugs for HIV, malaria and tuberculosis. The UNITAID solidarity levy is a supplementary charge ranges from US$1 for economy class to in excess of $30 for first class, depending on the price of the ticket. If eight countries have been able to attach that levy to tickets for the past 12 years and raise over EUR 2.5 billion without most of us ever knowing, it seems like it would be quite easy to do something similar to address their greenhouse gas emissions. 
Ironically, Ireland could lead on solving the emissions problem from aviation. Over 40% of aircraft are now leased, not owned, by airlines and Ireland retains over 20% of global aircraft leasing operators, thanks to some vision from Tony Ryan of Ryan Air in the 1990s and some cushy tax breaks enacted by our Government to encourage this industry in Ireland.  Fourteen of the top 15 global lessors have operations in Ireland, including the four big Chinese state-owned banks. If aviation wanted to get serious about emissions reductions, they could build it in to their leasing models and the Irish aviation leasing sector could drive this change.

Getting Personal

Unlike some of my colleagues, I try to steer away from conversations about “what we can do at home” to solve climate change. I know this is what the media love to talk about, but I find that topic a bit fluffy and inconsequential, putting the onus once again on the lowly citizen instead of the Government. Behavioral change is hard to enact and takes a long time to have any impact, and my analysis (to be posted in a subsequent blog) has shown me that even if I make radical changes in my personal life, I still don’t get my carbon footprint anywhere near what it should be until my Government decarbonizes our energy system. However, flying is one place where personal behavior can make a big dent. A round trip flight from Dublin to New York can easily consume as many emissions has heating an average European home for one whole year, so if you really want to know what you can do at home to stop climate change, cutting out the flights is definitely on the list.
And it’s going to get bumpier anyway! - A report published in the science journal Nature Climate Change forecasts that increasing CO2 levels will result in a significant increase in in-flight turbulence experienced by transatlantic airline flights by the middle of the 21st century. Even today, runways at places like Regan National Airport in Washington D.C. have occasionally been closed because they’ve gotten so hot they’ve actually melted a bit! With air travel getting more uncomfortable for a variety of reasons, land and sea-based travel is looking more appealing.

Several of my colleagues now refuse to fly and I am always fascinated by their stories of “slow travel”. Climate scientist, Keven Anderson, once told me how much great work he got done on a 3-week train journey from the UK to China and back and how so many Chinese people turned out to see this “strange English man who had travelled by land to their country”. 
I still fly for work sometimes because I can’t justify the extra days away from my daughter to take the slow route, but increasingly, I’m avoiding flying for personal reasons – much preferring to holiday on my beloved Inishbofin island as much as possible than anywhere else in the world! It’s a life goal of mine to take a boat to the USA instead of fly there for family visits, but I’ll have to find an effective solution to my propensity for sea sickness first!
It’s hard for those of us in Ireland to avoid flying altogether, but there are creative ways to reduce how much flying we do or off-set the emissions from that flying through a charitable donation to an organization working on climate action. My favourite creative solution comes from my friend Eoin who wanted to go on a climate communication trip to Canada but felt guilty about the emissions, so he went vegan for 6 months beforehand to offset. That’s the kind of out-of-the-box thinking that makes personal change interesting. 
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To find out how much your flying impacts climate change and how it compares to other transport options visit  www.carbonfootprint.com.

And as always, keep fighting the good fight!
-Cara

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P.S. My new #DownToEarth slot with Ivan Yates on Newstalk FM airs Wednesday's approximately 18:40 GMT on 106-108fm in Ireland or online at newstalk.com. You can listen back on podcast and read complementary blogs on The Verdant Yank each week. Coming up... "Good-bye, Gasoline Blues". I'm celebrating our recently Dail victory to ban oil and gas exploration in Irish waters!   
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