Getting Real about Climate Change:

Simple and Practical Steps

Introduction
Current discourse on climate change among progressives often pivots
around two themes, depending on where they stand on the spectrum:
Spiritual progressives (including many Buddhist teachers) say that to
stop climate change we need a spiritual awakening of humanity, the
enlightenment of all beings, the emergence of a divine humanity.
Political progressives say that we need to change the whole political
economy, to replace capitalism with a new social and economic system.
Granted that both these goals are desirable, are they realistic solutions
to the immediate climate crisis? This seems improbable:
Humanity is unlikely to undergo a dramatic spiritual rebirth in the
short time left to us, while ever more nations seek to embark on the path
of economic development by burning fossil fuels.
Transformations in our social and economic system are likely to
occur gradually and to require a long stretch of time for their impact to
be felt.
However, we face a situation of utmost urgency:
Urgent because of what is at stake: mass extinctions; famines,
droughts floods, and epidemics; traumatic ethnic, religious, and crossborder strife; the loss of human civilization.
Urgent because the window of opportunity is closing: we have at best
only 20 or 30 years left to reduce carbon emissions by 80 percent; even
better, to be on the safe side, we should aim at 100 percent reduction by
2040. And we are moving in that direction far too slowly, if at all.
To emerge intact, weve got to get real. Spiritual people and progressives
in particular have got to be practical and realistic. So what can we do that is
simple, practical, and realisticthough by no means easy?

I. To abstain from all evil (application of the stick)

1. Impose a moratorium on fossil fuel extraction: no more auctioning
of public lands, off-shore drilling, mountaintop mining; keep it in the
ground, in the hills, and in the seas
2. Rescind subsidies to fossil fuel corporations1
3. Impose a carbon tax to ensure environmental costs are built into the
market price of carbon;2 distribute the revenue to the public
4. Reject trade agreements that allow corporations to prevail over
sovereign governments3
5. Reject mega pipelines: though Keystone XL is gone, other pipelines
are being built within the country
6. Prohibit oil trains (train bombs), a danger to communities along
the routes
7. Shift away from model of industrial agriculture responsible for 30
32% of global emissions4
1

As of July 2014, Oil Change International estimates the total value of U.S.
subsidies to the fossil fuel industry at $37.5 billion annually, including international
finance. This does not include military, health, climate, or local pollution costs. These
subsidies have increased dramatically as U.S. oil and gas production has increased.
(http://priceofoil.org/fossil-fuel-subsidies/)
2
Fossil fuel companies are benefitting from global subsidies of $5.3 trillion a year,
equivalent to $10m a minute every day, according to a startling new estimate by the
International Monetary Fund. The vast sum is largely due to polluters not paying the
costs imposed on governments by the burning of coal, oil and gas. These include the
harm caused to local populations by air pollution as well as to people across the globe
affected by the floods, droughts and storms being driven by climate change. Nicholas
Stern of London School of Economics said that even the IMFs vast subsidy figure was
a significant underestimate: A more complete estimate of the costs due to climate
change would show the implicit subsidies for fossil fuels are much bigger even than this
report suggests. (The Guardian, 18 May 2015)
3
The Trans-Pacific Partnership would offer new rights to big polluters, including
the right to sue governments in private trade courts over laws and policies that
corporations allege reduce their profits. (Ilana Solomon, Sierra Club's Responsible
Trade Program). For more on TPP see
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNsHAHQh4Es.
4
The most potentially devastating impacts of industrial modes of agricultural
production stem from their contribution to increased greenhouse gas emissions.
Together, field-level practices represent about 15% of total human-made greenhouse
gas emissions. Other processes requiring considerable amounts of energy result in an
additional 15-17% of total man-made GGEs attributable to food systems. Hence

II.

To cultivate the good (offering carrots)

1. Provide subsidies and low-interest loans to clean, renewable
energy projects
2. Finance refurbishing of old buildings to make them energy-efficient
3. Promote mass production of electric and hybrid cars
4. Develop more and better public transit to replace private cars
5. Promote agro-ecological models to replace industrial agriculture5
6. Shift to more climate friendly diets (plant-based over meats)6

III.

To purify ones own mind

1. Promote contentment and simplicity, the basis for a steady-state
economy based on the principle of sufficiency, dedicated to
qualitative growth rather than endless production and consumption.7

agriculture is responsible for 3032% of GGEs. (UN Report: The Transformative

Potential of the Right to Food)
5 The Rodale Institute in Pennsylvania found that agroecological modes of
cultivation could sequester (capture) up to 2,000 lb of carbon per acre per year from
the atmosphere. By contrast, fields relying on chemical fertilizers lost into the
atmosphere almost 300 lb of carbon per acre per year. According to the publication
GRAIN, if traditional systems of mixed farming were adopted throughout the world,
about two thirds of the current excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would be
captured in 50 years.
6 The FAO estimated that the livestock sector was responsible for 18% of
greenhouse gas emissions measured in CO2 equivalent a larger share than transport.
Once livestock respiration and the loss of greenhouse gas reductions from
photosynthesis that are foregone by using large areas of land for grazing or feedcrops
are taken into account, livestock is found to be responsible for 51% of anthropogenic
greenhouse gas emissions.
7 Numerous studies have shown that once a certain standard of material wellbeing is reached, increased consumption does not significantly contribute to happiness.
Real happiness comes from human relationships, a sense of connection with other
people and the cosmos, a sense of meaning, and aesthetic and spiritual fulfillment. Yet
the modern economy, predicated on the premise that constant innovation, production,
and consumption are the keys to happiness, perpetuates the conditions that portend
eventual societal collapse.

2. Utilize wisdom, to understand the long-range and long-term

consequences of our actions, rooted in the subtle interconnections of
diverse chains of causality.8
3. Arouse a heart of compassion, extend loving concern to all people
everywhere, based on deep inner identification and affirmation of
human dignity.9
4. Advocate for justice, to establish social, economic, and political
institutions and laws, enabling everyone to unfold their potentials and
realize their aspirations.10

IV.

Benefit all sentient beings. How?

1. Vote: Though the political system is badly flawed, elections can make
a difference. Vote only for candidates who admit human-caused
climate change and are willing to act against it.

Long-range consequences means that the results of higher CO2 emissions

extend far beyond our immediate neighborhood. Causality is not restricted locally. All
regions in the world are intimately and intricately interconnected. Burning coal in China
can be a causal factor behind droughts in Africa, floods in Texas, failed monsoons in
India. Cattle cultivation in Texas contributes to the melting of the Arctic ice, the collapse
of ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica. Long-term consequences means that the
impact of carbon emissions persists for generations. It is said that it takes 30-40 years
a generationfor CO2 emissions to unfold their full potential, and increased emissions
are cumulative.
9 I would be a good doctor to the sick, a guide to those who have strayed from
the right path. I would be a light to those who wander in darkness. I would enable those
in poverty to discover hidden treasure. A bodhisattva should thus benefit all beings with
equal treatment, and bestow loving care on all beings alike. And why? Because if a
bodhisattva serves all beings, that is equal to serving the Buddhas dutifully. To hold all
beings in high esteem and render them respectful services, that is equal to revering and
serving the Tathagatas. (The Vows of Samantabhadra)
10 Climate justice is a social justice issue. Climate Justice is working at the
intersections of environmental degradation and the racial, social, and economic
inequities it perpetuates. As the climate falls apart, families, communities, and lives are
falling with it. Advocacy on behalf of the climate is advocacy on behalf of the billions of
people whose lives depend on a healthy planet. Fixing an interconnected world
demands interconnected movement; anyone who believes that all individuals deserve
basic human and civil rights should see the climate crisis as an imminent threat. (See
http://www.peacefuluprising.org/what-is-climate-justice; see too Mary Robinson
Foundation Climate Justice, http://www.mrfcj.org/).
8

2. Write and sign: Write letters to your representatives, senators, and

others. Call their offices and sign petitions and appeals to be sent to
them. Local action may be most effective.
3. MOM & POP: Move our money, protect our planet: divestment from
fossil fuel corporations & related firms.
4. Get moving: participate in marches and demonstrations to convey a
message to those in power. Get moving in another way: join a
movement to protect the climate: BCAN, 350, Climate Mobilization,
Greenpeace, The Next System Project.
5. Take direct action: to block climate-destroying projects, such as oil
rigs, pipe lines, fracking sites, etc. Beware of risks: long prison terms,
large fines.
(Prepared by Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi)

Useful Websites
Climate Progress
Desmog Blog
Inside Climate News
Climate Central
Climate Nexus
Climate Disruption Dispatches,
with Dahr Jamail (Truthout)