Countdown at COP26 represents a collaborative effort between TED and Future Stewards, aiming to highlight potential remedies for the climate crisis. Over the course of three evenings hosted at the Climate Action Hub, an array of speakers delved into the obstacles and, more importantly, the solutions that are within reach for all of us to pursue. All three sessions underscored the significant level of innovation, determination, and aspiration prevalent in the global community—attributes vital for advancing towards a world with net zero emissions.
Night three focused on nature and land, and featured a renowned ecosystem scientist, a carbon removal expert, the most celebrated science fiction author in the world, and an inspiring indigenous leader who has been on the frontlines of the battle against climate change.
Streamed live on Nov 6, 2021, the third session of Countdown at COP26 features: Jane Zelikova (Ecosystem scientist, on soil as carbon sink), Gabrielle Walker (Carbon removal thinker), Hongqiao Liu (Journalist and policy expert, on China and climate), Kim Stanley Robinson (Author of “The Ministry for the Future”), Nemonte Nenquimo (Indigenous leader from Ecuador) and Naima Penniman (Multidimensional artist).
Jane Zelikova, ecosystem scientist, on soil as carbon sink
We are losing our soils at an alarming rate, and with it we are losing its fertility. Without that soil, it’s going to be hard to feed close to 10 billion people in 2050. Having more carbon in soil, as carbon accumulates, soil can hold on to more water and more nutrients, building resilience that helps them protect them against a changing climate.
The great thing about carbon rich soils is that they help farmers and their crops to defend themselves to a changing climate. That is a huge win for the people that grow our food, a win for climate and a win for us. Let’s help our planet by looking down to the ground.
Gabrielle Walker, carbon removal thinker
Why do we need carbon removals? Isn’t it easier to stop putting carbon in the atmosphere in the first place. And the answer is: yes, of course it is. But the problem is we have left it too late and we can’t now do it fast enough. I have been working on climate change for 20 years and I was shocked when I found this out but the science is utterly clear: If we are going to have a fighting chance to stay at 1.5 degrees – the ‘safe limit’ – we have to have carbon removals. We need both reductions and removals.
And it looks like we’re going to need a lot. Carbon removals are our only chance, not only to stop the problem getting worse, but to make it better. Even 1.5 degrees is not actually safe. We’re not even there yet and we’re already experiencing the fires, the floods, the storms and the droughts. With carbon removals, we can take our historic emissions out of the air, clean up the mess we’ve made and give the world a chance to heal.
The people I talk to about carbon removals go one of two ways: they think of trees or big futuristic machines, nature versus tech, green versus chrome. This is not the right way to think about them, as the world is full of ways to store carbon. You can store it in trees, you can store in soils, in the ocean, in buildings, you can store it in rocks and deep underground. Everyone one of those approaches relies on some combination of natural resources and human ingenuity – we are going to need nature and technology.
I still find it astonishing that every single tree and plant on Earth has made its entire body directly from carbon in the air. They are incredible carbon capture machines and we are going to need a lot more of them. But we have to put trees in places where they foster biodiversity, where they don’t compete with food for land and where science and technology tell us they are likely to survive, even in the face of climate change.
Direct air capture involves massive electrical fans blowing a lot of air over a carbon capture device. It marries technology with geology, as you capture the CO2 and bury it deep underground. One carbon capture plant being designed in Texas aims to take one million tonnes of Co2 from the atmosphere every year.
Kim Stanley Robinson, author of The Ministry for the Future
What is a science fiction writer doing here at COP? Well, COP26 is a science fiction exercise. My science fiction is mainly looking at what is happening right now and putting that in the futuristic scenarios and pointing it out to people.
I can’t tell you [how people at a COP40 would look back at this COP], it’s too big to understand. This is my first COP and I’m overwhelmed. COP26, the meeting in itself is a success. The whole world is watching, the sense of intensity since IPCC report and since the pandemic, there is a rising sense we have got to do something and meetings like this are one of the best things we have to coordinate it worldwide.
This COP will go down in history and Glasgow will stick out, like Copenhagen, Kyoto and Paris. Glasgow will also stick out.
Nemonte Nenquimo, indigenous leader from Ecuador
I never went to university, the forest is my teacher. The Pikenanis, the wise, both women and men are our scientists. We as indigenous people are the ones whose eyes are open, we know what is happening. For the Waorani people, the forest is our home, it is our life, it is full of life, full of knowledge.
More than 25 per cent of the Earth’s surface is protected by Indigenous peoples. This includes nearly half of the world’s forests. The forest is our home, the forest gives us life, food, nourishment, spiritual connection. But the arrival of roads, the arrival of colonization, the arrival of evangelical missionaries, the arrival of oil companies, has destroyed our forest.
I have met other indigenous people who live in the north and were first contacted by colonization, invasions and roads. It is very sad. The forests in the Amazon continue to burn, the oil continues to spill, and the miners continue to enter our territory, stealing our gold and the colonizers continue to invade, in order to feed societies abroad. I want it to be known that this is directly harming us.
We are taking risks, not only for our children but for your children as well. For future generations. What we do, what we love, what we respect is not only for our people, the lives of Indigenous peoples, but your lives as well, the lives of the entire world we are living in. We want them to listen and wake up and decide that enough is enough. So that they no longer enter our territory to exploit and pollute. Mother earth is not waiting for us to save her, but to respect her. And we as Indigenous peoples expect the same.
Watch the third night’s event
