Highlighted Article: The Next Environmental Crisis

From: Climate Etc.

By: Judith Curry

Date: October 22, 2021

The Next Environmental Crisis

"Are our current solutions only a short term fix?

On Monday November 15, I will be participating in an iaiLIVE debate on The Next Environmental Crisis. From the iai website:

The new clean energy economy, endorsed by governments and campaigners, promises to save usfrom environmental disaster. But worries are growing that we could be heading to a new future crisis.  In decades to come some argue we will be struggling to contain the huge environmental damage caused by billions of highly toxic and unrecyclable solar cells and car batteries, along with newly commissioned nuclear plants, while the internet itself, bitcoin mining included, consumes uncontrollable amounts of energy.

Are the problems of the environment even more challenging than we think? Will the new economy save us, or are the current technical solutions a short term fix? Is relentless consumption and growth itself to blame for our environmental issues?  Or can we rely on humanity’s ability to solve the next crisis that we may be in the process of causing now?

Cosmologist, astrophysicist, and Astronomer Royal Martin Rees, award winning economist and Professor of Environmental Economics Thomas Sterner, and controversial climatologist Judith Curry join us to ask if we’re heading towards a new environmental crisis." ...

The Next Environmental Crisis