Info, news & views for anyone interested in biodiversity conservation and good environmental decision making
“So why, in the 45 years since, has there been so little action in response? Why do we condemn today’s children and future generations to live on a dangerous and hostile planet?…
…The answer, we argue, rests on a prevailing assumption organised by corporate and political elites: that endless economic growth fuelled by fossil energy is so fundamental and commonsensical it cannot be questioned.”
Christopher Wright et al, The Conversation
In this issue of Dbytes
1. The Acclimatisation Society was driven by misguided ideals about ‘fixing nature’ in Australia
2. A resilient world is built on humility
3. Exceeding 1.5°C global warming could trigger multiple climate tipping points
4. WMO and WHO launch ClimaHealth portal
5. Academia on social media
6. Unfinished business: Market-based instruments under the Alberta Land Stewardship Act
7. ‘8 Billion Day’ is on 15 November 2022: Briefing Note
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1. The Acclimatisation Society was driven by misguided ideals about ‘fixing nature’ in Australia
his year’s State of the Environment report showed there are now more foreign plant species in Australia than native ones. Worse, the number of threatened animals has risen eight per cent since 2016, the report said, with more extinctions expected. So how did Australia get here? Climate change and habitat loss have played a huge role in the problem. So have invasive species. Closely connected to their proliferation in Australia is a group called the Acclimatisation Society.It was a gathering of white settlers who wanted nature’s bounty to thrive in Australia.The problem is it did. Far too much.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-04/acclimatisation-society-introduced-species-history-listen/101588262
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2. A resilient world is built on humility
A resilient world would acknowledge our dependence on the ecosystems that support us, allow us to appreciate the limits of our mastery, accept we have much to learn, and ensure our people are well educated about resilience and our interconnection with the biosphere.
https://sustainabilitybites.home.blog/2022/11/08/a-resilient-world-is-built-on-humility/
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3. Exceeding 1.5°C global warming could trigger multiple climate tipping points
Climate tipping points are conditions beyond which changes in a part of the climate system become self-perpetuating. These changes may lead to abrupt, irreversible, and dangerous impacts with serious implications for humanity. Armstrong McKay et al. present an updated assessment of the most important climate tipping elements and their potential tipping points, including their temperature thresholds, time scales, and impacts. Their analysis indicates that even global warming of 1°C, a threshold that we already have passed, puts us at risk by triggering some tipping points. This finding provides a compelling reason to limit additional warming as much as possible.
Exceeding 1.5°C global warming could trigger multiple climate tipping points | Science
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4. WMO and WHO launch ClimaHealth portal
The first global knowledge platform dedicated to climate and health – ClimaHealth.info – has been launched by the World Meteorological Organization and World Health Organization Joint Office on climate and health, with support from the Wellcome Trust. It is in response to growing calls for actionable information to protect people from the health risks of climate change and other environmental hazards. Climate and health are inextricably linked. Climate change, extreme weather events and environmental degradation have a fundamental impact on human health and well-being. More people than ever before are exposed to increased risk, from poor water and air quality to infectious disease transmission to heat stress.
WMO and WHO launch ClimaHealth portal | World Meteorological Organization
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5. Academia on social media
“Twitter is different. It is outward facing and hyper connected – whenever I felt alone or excluded in my local discipline or institutional networks, I always felt welcomed and connected on Twitter. It helped me grow my blog audience, found me new collaborators and new ideas. It kept me up to date with local and global news and events. I’m an ecologist, but I’m also a person, and Twitter kept me connected with all the communities that I felt connected to, however indirectly – academic twitter, ecology twitter, ag twitter, landcare twitter, insect twitter, nature twitter, Australian twitter, climate twitter, conservation twitter, journalism twitter, writing twitter, politics twitter, history twitter, the list goes on… I feel really sad to see what is happening…I never thought I’d be so emotionally invested in a social media platform!”
Academia on social media – Ecology is not a dirty word
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6. Unfinished business: Market-based instruments under the Alberta Land Stewardship Act
In the first decade of the twenty-first century the Canadian province of Alberta was enjoying vigorous economic and demographic growth. To address concerns with cumulative impacts on the landscape and rising user conflicts the provincial government introduced a policy that articulated the need for regional planning and the greater use of market-based instruments to incent land stewardship. This was followed by enabling legislation called the Alberta Land Stewardship Act (ALSA). The policy instruments of conservation easements, conservation offsets, and transfer of development credits were identified as being of special interest and were enabled by ALSA. We review the development of policy for each of these instruments subsequent to the legislation and suggest that implementation has faltered in marked departure from the initial enthusiasm for the policy direction.
Unfinished business: Market-based instruments under the Alberta Land Stewardship Act – ScienceDirect
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7. ‘8 Billion Day’ is on 15 November 2022: Briefing Note
The United Nations predicts 15 November 2022 to be the day that the world population reaches eight billion. To mark this important milestone and to aid well-informed discussion, Sustainable Population Australia (SPA) has released a new Briefing Note: “8 Billion Day facts and myths”
https://population.org.au/media-releases/8-billion-day-briefing-note/?twclid=2-6u0juf07v2zamayx0s636b0df
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About Dbytes
Dbytes is a weekly eNewsletter presenting news and views on biodiversity conservation and environmental decision science. ‘D’ stands for ‘Decision’ and refers to all the ingredients that go into good, fair and just decision-making in relation to the environment.
From 2007-2018 Dbytes was supported by a variety of research networks and primarily the Centre of Excellence for Environmental Decisions (CEED). From 2019 Dbytes is being produced by David Salt (Ywords). Dbytes is supported by the Global Water Forum.
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