Christopher Michel
How many polar bears is a conference worth ?
Written by Florian Sandhäger
We work in a town with a green mayor , a state with a green prime minister , and a country that aims to effectively eliminate carbon emissions by 2050 . While political decisions play an important part , the success of such ambitious goals critically depends on the choices of individuals . In our private lives , many of us are aware of the problem and sometimes even act accordingly : should we buy fruit that has been shipped from South America ? Should we take the car or go by bike ? Should we use solar or fossil power ? Yet , I have seldom seen scientists consider environmental factors in their professional decisions . In my personal life , I try to avoid flying when possible . Yet , in the last couple of years , I have been to North America twice for science .
Is that problematic ? There are not that many scientists , after all , and even if all of them spent more time in airplane than in the lab , it wouldn ’ t affect the climate much . But everyone has a job , every job results in greenhouse gas emission to some degree – and all the earth can take from each of us to ensure a stable climate is 2 tons of
CO 2 per year , which is about equal to two thirds of a single return flight for one person from Stuttgart to Chicago [ 1 ]. Or eating 300 kg of beef . Or two tons of Tofu . Or ten tons of potatoes [ 2 ]. Currently , the average person living in Germany emits about 9 tons of
CO 2 per year , more than four times the sustainable amount [ 3 ]. For us , as scientists , it is likely that a large part of our yearly emissions stems from our scientific activities , and most probably more than the two tons each of us should be emitting .
Every human is equal ! Therefore , it should be our goal that every human has equal rights to emit carbon dioxide , and , to keep the climate stable , actually stays below the 2-ton boundary . This requires major sacrifices – apart from radical changes in our personal lives we have to stop traveling to conferences , using big and energyintensive machines , and probably even heating our offices . This radical solution immediately solves the climate problem . But is it a good solution ? I , for several reasons , do not think so . Firstly , it is extremely demanding . Everyone would have to change their lives dramatically and give up a lot of fun and many opportunities . Secondly , even if some people are willing to make these sacrifices , they will be perceived as insane fundamentalists by the rest of the world . The bigger the gap between them and everyone else , the less likely they are to ever convince anyone to make a change themselves . And people not willing to go all the way might be discouraged to take even small steps if they cannot expect any recognition for it – they would still be irresponsible annihilators of the climate after all .
Most importantly , this solution only looks at one side of the equation : whatever we do has not only costs , but also benefits . Emission rights should probably not be distributed equally between everyone and every activity – some activities with large benefits might be allowed much greater emissions . It is tempting to assume that science is so beneficial that the costs practically don ’ t matter : Science is important . Science might give us the progress needed to achieve a sustainable way of life in the future . Science can help the sick and the old , which is certainly more important than buying cars or a vacation in the Maldives . But many things are important , and not all science is equally so . I ’ d take a bet that there are plenty of scientific activities that actually have fewer benefits than any individual exotic vacation that , hopefully , at least makes everyone involved a bit happier .
In order to justly assign emission rights , we have to try to accurately estimate all of the costs and benefits of
10 | NEUROMAG | May 2017