Wildlife, biodiversity and climate
A habitable climate depends on wildlife and biodiversity, because:
- Climate is a consequence of biodiversity and biodiversity is everything that ecosystems represent to life on Earth;
- A stable climate and therefore, a habitable Earth, depends on stabilising ecosystems; and
- Animals are the only mechanism that can do that.
As wildlife declines, we are breaking down biodiversity structure and losing energy (in the form of carbon) out of food chains and into the atmosphere and ocean. This way, climate and our food security are inextricably linked. We’re not only stripping soils of the material needed to feed us, we’re also introducing chaotic free energy into our atmosphere and causing huge fluctuations in the weather. The latter makes it harder for us to know when, where and how to feed ourselves.
Climate change: fossil fuels v. wildlife
Climate change has always been the symptom of biodiversity loss … that’s to say, the breakdown of the complex connectivity between lifeforms that allows Earth to flex in response to changing conditions.
Only recently have we created artificial climate change by mining carbon buried deep underground by animals millions of years ago. The animals that did that are no longer around and today’s animals, that would be busy moderating modern-day carbon, have populations that are heavily depleted.
We cannot engineer our way out of this crisis. We can only rebuild ecosystems rich in a diversity of animal life.
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Animal-driven processes many millions of years ago were responsible for storing the fossil carbon we dig up today. Those animals are long-since extinct. The wildlife that remains today is managing carbon cycles we need for today’s fertile soils, food and clean water. ‘Climate’ is the consequence of healthy ecosystems. Can biodiversity save us from climate change? No. Planting trees and restoring ‘nature’ cannot be the solution to climate change. The only solution is reducing dependence on fossil carbon.
When the sum of the parts is greater than the whole
Let’s be sensible. Fossil carbon was laid down over millions of years, whereas current global biodiversity is momentary. So, there is no way imaginable that one can offset the other.
Countries heading to COP26 are already making wildly exaggerated suggestions about what’s possible. According to The Guardian Australia, Australia’s plan uses carbon capture figures for soil and forests that experts say ‘go far beyond upper bounds of what peer-reviewed science suggests is possible‘. And this is at a time when soil carbon processes and agricultural viability are already in free fall.
Countries heading to COP26 are carrying fistfuls of paperwork that show the potential for climate mitigation using nature-based solutions. The problem, says Oxfam, is there is not enough land in the world to realise all the ambitions added together.
Nature-based solutions and biodiversity alone, won’t solve climate problems
It is a fact that erosion of natural values the world-over are contributing to systemic climate problems. But stable climate has always been a consequence of biodiversity health. That’s not the same as pumping huge amounts of fossil carbon into the atmosphere from underground.
According to the IPBES, climate and biodiversity are ‘two sides of the same coin’. But I think they’ll come to regret that statement. Governments are already trading one for the other, when in fact, they are two parts of an integrated and complex system. But they are also completely separate in terms of what we do about the causes.
- Climate change is caused by burning fossil fuels and further collapses biodiversity.
- Biodiversity collapse is caused by killing animals and further collapses climate stability.
Replanting forests, restoring wetlands and rebuilding wildlife populations is essential for our food, water and health. The not inconsequential outcome of that, is the survival of humanity. If we do this, maybe up to a third of 2030 carbon reduction targets could be met. If that’s true, we have to do it but we cannot afford to be complacent about our fossil fuel use either.
Nature isn’t big enough for save us from climate change
When it comes to governments’ climate pledges, the sum of the parts is greater than the whole. So, unless we plan a wilding project on Mars soon, nature isn’t big enough.
Can biodiversity alone save us from climate change? Very unlikely. There is no equation that balances the ability of nature to absorb our consumption of fossil fuels at current rates.
