Panicking, preaching and heedless - COP26’s ambitious aims for net zero by 2050

Net zero, two words met with an eye roll and existentialism. A simple concept the idea of net zero is to produce less carbon than we take out of the atmosphere, I mean we are taught at a very young age no to be greedy. Yet here we are, some of us panicking, some of us preaching, some of us heedless and a lot of us all three. Conference of the Parties — or COP — celebrated its 26th year in Glasgow last month, that’s right the big wigs have met 26 times to try and solve the inevitable negligence of human progression. Conference 26’s biggest focus was for countries to come with ambitious 2030 Nationally Determined Contributions that align with meeting net zero by the middle of the century as well as developed countries keeping to their $100 billion climate finance pledge. 2015’s Paris Agreement, a signature move that saw every country involved agree to keep the rise in mean global temperature “well below two degrees” and preferably 1.5 degrees, was heavy stuff. The 1.5 degree threshold hopes to minimise the impacts of a future dystopia, acting as a last stint reduction not a reclamation, we can’t reclaim what we have already lost. It turns out the NDC’s laid out in Paris could not quite keep up with the aforementioned “well below two degrees” plan. And so, here we are, on a toasty-warm Earth holding ice blocks to the sun only for them to melt and for us to hopelessly sip at the doleful puddle in our hands. What are we doing, Australia showed up to COP26 with next to no actual policies in place, which means our official carbon cuts are the same ones put in place by Tony Abbot pre-Paris Agreement. Whatever stance you take on the climate change argument that is not the best look for Australia, make a decision, do we douse the fire with reform or stand around it arguing while it burns ever brighter. Politics aside, the planet is warming up and it may feel like the issue is out of your hands, it is not, the little things matter — they always do. You don’t have to be Greta Thunburg, perpetually preaching, in the same sense you don’t have to be captious, irritatingly indifferent. Just try your best, walk when you can, turn your lights off when you leave a room, recycle, it may seem worthless but a tree can only grow if a seed is planted. Kasper Johansen is a journalist at the Harvey-Waroona Reporter