Make Mitigation, Adaptation or Removals Your Job and Purpose!

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The rate of global warming has tripled since 1982. It’s unsustainable, and change must come through three different approaches:

1. 𝗠𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗴𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 = increasingly making it less worse

We need to reduce our carbon output. This means changes in manufacturing, products, transportation, and distribution.

The necessary big decisions are not made by Joe Average at home, they need to come from governments in Washington, DC, Brussels, Paris, etc., and also from the top floors of multinational companies. Policy changes matter, even though they sometimes lag behind front-line progress. If we don’t reduce our carbon output, though, efforts to remove carbon from the atmosphere will be in vain. Joe Average can help a bit, too.

2. 𝗔𝗱𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 = adjust our lives to the new normal

As effects on our life by climate change become more and more problematic, we need to prepare our infrastructure and livelihoods to make life sustainable even when more extreme weather effects hit more frequently. It means finding ways to withstand hotter temperatures, dry spells, more rain, and will eventually even affect how and where we grow what kind of food.

Many companies will develop new products to augment human capabilities. Some of it will happen almost by accident, as people simply adapt to changes in their environments. The uncomfortable truth is that this adaptation will be costly for all of us.

3. 𝗥𝗲𝗺𝗼𝘃𝗮𝗹 = stopping and ultimately turning back climate change

The most important goal of combating climate change is reaching net-zero, where all carbon emissions are offset by removal processes. This is the point in time when warming will almost instantly stop. Without reaching net-zero, the warming will simply continue forever, running us into more and more problems.

After we have reached net-zero it will be necessary to reduce the amount of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere by using more and more removals. This will be the time when we actually remove the garbage that humans have created since 1850.

𝗔𝗱𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 will be unavoidable, some areas on planet earth feel this already in 2024. Unless we succeed with 𝗺𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗴𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻, 𝗿𝗲𝗺𝗼𝘃𝗮𝗹 will always be a losing effort because there is no way that we can scale removals so much that they will be able to counteract the current emissions. There is a chance in our lifetimes that we reach a point where carbon dioxide removal can begin to heal the damage done.

We didn’t get our planet into the perils of climate change overnight. Getting back to the safe zone, to where things should be, will also take time. If we attack climate change early and decisively, we can get there.

Let’s get started, now! Please consider moving your personal time and focus to one of these three approaches: Mitigation, adaptation, or removals. We need you there!