Category: The Wider Debate

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Greenwashing’s new distant cousin

by Clara Nack

“Act Responsibly Even when You Don’t.” Next to this ambiguous slogan, two young models in jeans are lolling about, promoting Diesel’s Green Label, the brands’ sustainable line. And this is what follows: “Go crazy and at the same time treat the planet with our responsible pieces from the Fall Winter 2020 collection”. Sustainability and shopping the new arrivals of each and every season – how “consciously” and “responsibly” sourced they may be – does that match? On another rather urgent note: I still needed Christmas presents when I read this.

Screenshot Diesel Jeans

Googling “sustainable gifts” will return all sorts of attractive results that labels have not only given the Christmas coat of paint, but also a supposedly green one. And in 2020, sustainability as an incentive to buy has had other suits made to measure. There is the #supportyourlocals hashtag, with which online retailers such as Amazon and Zalando are luring me to buy, buy, buy and feel good about it. It’s Christmas after all and everyone should share a piece of the cake. Continue reading Greenwashing’s new distant cousin

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Kein Fortschritt ohne Risiko

von Joana Kollert 

Neulich bin ich zum ersten Mal in einem autonomen Fahrzeug gefahren. Das HOCHBAHN-Forschungsprojekt HEAT testet die Eignung des ersten automatisiert fahrenden Kleinbusses im Hamburger Straßenverkehr. Jede*r kann sich die HEAT-App herunterladen und kostenlos mitfahren. Die Vorstellung, im unbemannten Kleinbus durch die Hamburger HafenCity zu cruisen fand ich aufregend und ein wenig beängstigend. Die Realität war aber harmlos und reichlich unspektakulärer: gemeinsam mit zwei HOCHBAHN Angestellten und einem weiteren Fahrgast tuckelten wir gemächlich über eine Strecke von 800m, von denen wir nur die ersten 100m autonom fuhren, bevor ein Falschparker die manuelle Übernahme erzwang.

Der HEAT Kleinbus in der Hamburger Hafenctiy.

Continue reading Kein Fortschritt ohne Risiko

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How to talk about climate change – a collection of thoughts and helpful input for non-experts

by Fenja De Silva-Schmidt

When did you talk about climate change the last time? And when did you do so with family and friends? Results from our surveys show that on the one hand, the amount of people talking about climate change in their daily lives is rising steadily (see Guenther et al. 2020, in German), but on the other hand, a significant share of people never touch the topic in their conversations. For many, it is a somewhat awkward topic, leading to conversations about guilt and depressing visions for our future.

Rising share of conversations about climate change in daily life, source: Down to Earth data 2015/2019.

rising share of climate change conversations 2015-2019

In this post, I’ll summarize why it is a good idea to talk about climate change, even if you are not a climate expert, and which strategies mostly lead to a constructive conversation. Continue reading How to talk about climate change – a collection of thoughts and helpful input for non-experts

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After Lunch Posts: Talking Climate Change with Hans von Storch

by Michael Brüggemann

One of the many privileges of holding a Professorship at the University of Hamburg and being involved in the Cluster of Excellence, which unites researchers from different disciplines around the issue of climate change (see CLICCS website ), is that you have the opportunity to meet and have lunch with highly inspiring and thought-provoking people such as Hans von Storch.

Hans von Storch captured by Raimond Spekking (via Wikimedia Commons)

Continue reading After Lunch Posts: Talking Climate Change with Hans von Storch

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A Short Personal Guide to Climate Change Conversations

by Eduardo Alastrué de Asenjo

As natural scientists, we hopefully learn multiple concepts about uncertainty throughout our education and research, and, at some point, the time will come when we need to put them into practice. This post comes from the necessity of a first approach to assemble some of the multiple guidelines and recommendations that we receive regarding climate change communication. I am not referring particularly to the topic of communication in newspapers or TV, but to a much more mundane request. In this case, my goal is to have a structured set of rules or steps that a natural scientist working on climate change can follow when trying to address a day-to-day conversation on the topic.

Picture taken from Pexels. Author: Oleg Magni

Continue reading A Short Personal Guide to Climate Change Conversations

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Is the Corona Crisis good or bad for the climate?

by Joana Kollert 

A few days ago, at the end of March, it snowed! Having never experienced snow this late in Hamburg and with the knowledge that 2019 was the second warmest year on record after 2016, my first thought was: this must be the direct cooling effect due to the COVID-19 induced industrial shutdown.

I felt a strange sense of righteousness, as if all climate change skeptics and politicians could now no longer deny the link between economic growth and global warming. This is of course an extremely oversimplified analysis; it is impossible to link two unexpected snow days in Hamburg with a global slowing down in industrial production . Moreover, climate change is a statistically significant variation in “average weather” over a period of 30 years, such that we cannot make any scientifically sound connections between a decrease in greenhouse gas emissions lasting but a few months and global warming.

Nevertheless, the economic shutdown has led to some directly observable environmental benefits.

Continue reading Is the Corona Crisis good or bad for the climate?

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What would you miss the most?

Interactive visual arts project on climate change consequences

by Fenja De Silva-Schmidt

During my research stay in Stellenbosch, South Africa, I came across an interesting arts project on climate change, which was installed during the cultural festival “Woordfees”.

A note on the wall invites onlookers to participate: to illustrate or write about what or who they would miss the most if our climate completely collapsed. Another note asked to describe fond memories of nature.

interactive art project on climate change

All around, people posted little notes and drawings, all of which gave interesting insights into their perceptions of climate change, especially their fears.

Continue reading What would you miss the most?

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Bist du CO2 Expert*in? Wie klimaschädlich unser Essen wirklich ist

von Felicitas Vach

Wir haben die Wahl. Immer. Heutzutage haben wir wahrscheinlich sogar so viel Auswahl zwischen verschiedenen Lebensmitteln, wie noch niemals zuvor. Supermarkt oder Bio-Laden, Discounter oder Wochenmarkt. Auch im Winter finden wir dort tropische Früchte und reifes Obst oder verschiedenste Käsesorten und Fleisch zu günstigen Preisen.

Aber welchen Preis zahlen wir wirklich für unsere Einkäufe? Nicht die Euros, die an der Kasse bezahlt werden, sind die eigentliche Währung, sondern Kilogramm. Kilogramm an CO2, die durch den Anbau, die Herstellung und den Transport unserer täglichen Lebensmittel der Welt und ihrem Klima schaden.

Achtest du bei deinen Einkäufen auf ihren Ursprung und Inhaltsstoffe? Weißt du, welches die Klimasünder in deinem Einkaufswagen sind oder wie du sie ersetzen könntest? Continue reading Bist du CO2 Expert*in? Wie klimaschädlich unser Essen wirklich ist

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New Post series: “Climate Change in Pop Culture” – Part 1: YA Novels

by Fenja De Silva-Schmidt

As climate change has become a topic intersecting many domains of our lives, it is hardly surprising that it has also made its way into pop culture. In a series of short posts, we are going to present examples of novels, songs and films dealing with the topic of climate change.

Part 1: Young adult novels

reading girl

Young adult (YA) novels are a special genre of fiction, written for readers from 12 to 18 years of age, but also read by many adults (as this article describes, half of the readers are adults). Continue reading New Post series: “Climate Change in Pop Culture” – Part 1: YA Novels