Comox Valley citizens participated in 24 Hours of Realty, the worldwide climate action this week | Dan Vie photo
Comox Valley climate activists join 1,700 discussion events worldwide
While former U.S. Vice President kicked off a worldwide discussion about the climate crisis at Vanderbilt University yesterday, Gore-trained climate activist Will Cole-Hamilton provided a similar keynote presentation for close to 100 people at the Comox United Church Hall.
Cole-Hamilton spoke about global progress in developing solar and wind technologies to replace fossil fuels, how the City of Courtenay has addressed climate change and why growing public sentiment expressed in climate marches are so important.
And he brought the topic down to a personal level. Recalling a recent conversation with one of his young children, Cole-Hamilton had trouble keeping his own emotions in check.
Comox Valley Youth Environmental Action has scheduled another Climate Strike for 1 p.m. Nov. 29 at Courtenay’s Simms Park
When his young daughter announced she never planned to have children, Cole-Hamilton asked why. “Because it’s not fair to bring kids into a world that’s not safe,” she said.
Celia Laval, of the Comox Valley Unitarian Fellowship, a co-organizer of the event, which was one of 1,700 same-day presentations in 75 countries called 24 Hours of Reality: Climate Truth in Action, also acknowledged the seriousness of the issue.
“This is a heavy topic,” she said. “And I’m glad I don’t have to face it alone.”
After Cole-Hamilton’s presentation, participants broke into small groups to discuss the climate crisis and share the practical steps that individuals and neighbourhoods can take to reduce the human impact on climate change.
CLIMATE CRISIS PRESENTATION
Cole-Hamilton started his presentation showing an aerial photo of the Puntledge Road and highway bypass area of Courtenay during the 2014 flood, a rain event that climate scientists predict will become more frequent in the future.
And he showed an old photo of the formerly robust Comox Glacier. Experts now believe that all Vancouver Island glaciers will disappear within 20 years.
But Cole-Hamilton moved on to good news. Many nations have pledged to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2050 at the Paris Accord. China and India have generated half or more of their new energy from solar and wind. In the last five years, solar energy jobs have grown six times faster than the overall economy.
In Canada, Cole-Hamilton said, there are now more clean energy jobs than exist in Alberta’s tar sands oil patch.
Cole-Hamilton, who also serves as an elected Courtenay councillor, said he’s proud of how the city is addressing climate change. That includes new electric vehicle charging stations, a ban on single-use plastic bags and declaring a climate emergency.
He said the city’s revision of its Official Community Plan, which is underway, will consider climate change “every step of the way.” The city’s consultants say Courtenay will be the first Canadian city to put the climate crisis at the core of its planning.
WHY JOIN THE CLIMATE MARCH?
More than 3,000 people — nearly five percent of the Comox Valley population — joined 800,000 other Canadians on Sept. 27 in climate marches to demand that governments at all levels do more to reduce human impacts on climate change.
Cole-Hamiltion told the audience that such public displays of public sentiment are more important than people might realize.
When large numbers of people show their support, it gives local governments social license to take positive actions. He noted that all Comox Valley councils and the regional board all declared climate emergencies after the march.
And, he said strong showings are also seen by businesses and other institutions, and they give everyone the strength of conviction to talk about the climate crisis.
“If we continue to grow climate marches, we will change our community,” he said.
WHAT PEOPLE ARE DOING
At the end of the evening, people from the small group discussions talked about the practical actions they are taking to create issue awareness and reduce their carbon footprint.
Those actions ranged from creating more community gardens, to consuming less (Nov. 29 is Buy Nothing Day), supporting local farmers, pledge to have a zero waste Christmas and supporting such local organizations as Project Watershed and Lush Valley.
The list will be posted on the Facebook pages for Comox Valley Unitarian Fellowship and Comox Valley Nurses for Health Environment.
The Comox Valley Nurses for Health and the Environment also co-sponsored the event.
WHAT TO SAY TO YOUR CLIMATE DENIER FRIENDS
The website Skeptical Science has made a list of the 197 most common myths about global warming and climate change and how you, as a climate activist, can respond to each of them.
Get the list here … cue cards not available.
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Covid and climate change are connected The Elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about is there are just too many people in the world . One of the biggest polluters in the world is the destruction of the amazon forests in south America. The animals are getting crowded together because they are being forced into smaller areas and having closer contact with humans that’s where virus jump from animals to humans Electric cars are not going to get us out of this actually it will create more destruction of pristine areas in 3rd world countries to extract the minerals they need to make these silly cars . People are clever but we are clueless everything we do will have an impact the . Let nature take its course
As said before, the Baby Boomer generation has not done a great job, on our environment ,but things have improved in the past decades with lower auto emissions and improved fuel economy, more energy efficient buildings and public transport.
I agree with Ross-it will take some time, many ,many generations before fossil fuel is replaced.
We live in a world with 7.7 billon people. Canadians need to our part, but at what cost to our standard of living and at what debt to future generations?
A young lady from Norway lectured the UN and our Country on climate change. Norway is also in the oil export business and exports more oil per capita than Canadians . There is a bit of smoke and mirrors in paying to pollute, and carbon taxes.
There is no quick solution to climate change causes. Slow and steady-no more hysteria, please.
Actually Greta Thurnberg is from Sweden – not Norway.
And Sweden plans on being a completely oil free economy by 2020.
You might make arguments that hydro and nuclear power have other down-sides, but a claim of smoke and mirrors is not one of them.
Sweden’s numbers are impressive. Oil free by 2030 in any Industrialized country is very unlikely.
Interesting that Sweden burns their garbage to produce energy. Sweden buries 1% of their waste.
Waste to energy projects in BC are discouraged ,as are Hydro projects, such as site C.
How likely would BC consider a Nuclear power plant?
We are not Sweden.
Linda, in my view, slow and steady spells a human disaster within just one or two generations. If you take the most pessimistic scientific predictions, we’re already past the point of reversing the most harmful effects. What we need now to save our species are bold leaders taking bold actions. A consortium has developed nuclear power plants that produce zero toxic waste. The nuclear plants in use today are all old 1960/70s technology. Nuclear today can be safer for us and our planet than all fossil fuels.
Great work by Councilor Will, Celia, Helen, May, Heather, Kasia, Joan, and all the others from the supportiing organizations. Onward and upward for the cause of our time, of the ages. It is so gratifying and motivating to see\
the enthusiams and modeling of action, we all know it is past time, we all know we can do more, and we will.
Cheers to all for an enthusiastic carry forward for action.! And thanks George for the write up and your continued support!
The model that Al Gore has brought is inspired by his Generation investment company.
If you read Rees’s articles you will have an understanding that it is nearly impossible to replace fossil fuels with alternative power.
We need to power down , like giving up on most industry and cars. Sure , create as much alternative energy as we can but we desparateley need to cut back on consumption. Cars are a huge disposable consumer item. Each car takes he energy of 1000’s of led lights, electric diesel, gas or whatever. Figure it out: it takes 15,000 watts ( about 25-50hp). 1500 / 7 watt bulb = roughly at least 2000 bulbs.
Put money into mass transit and local agriculture. Dream of utopia. Do cars, airplanes, and industrial agriculture fit into your vision of utopia ?
Mine is: gardens in every front yard. Paved roads are for transit and emergency vehicles only. Bicycles, trains , busses, scooters, velomobiles and skate boards on narrow paths and trails. Flowers trees where roads used to be.