On October 8 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a landmark report entitled Global Warming of 1.5 °C. The report highlighted the ongoing and imminent dangers of global warming and noted that “Limiting global warming to 1.5ºC would require rapid, far-reaching and unprecedented changes in all aspects of society.”

The House of Commons in Ottawa held an emergency debate yesterday on the topic of global warming. Today I rose pursuant to Standing Order 35 requesting an emergency debate also be held in the BC Legislature.

The Speaker granted my request.

Below I reproduce the videos and text of me both requesting the debate and subsequently participating in it. I also reproduce our accompanying media release.

Video: Standing Order 35 request for debate

Text: Standing Order 35 request for debate

A. Weaver: I rise pursuant to Standing Order 35 to make the following motion. By leave, I move that this House do now adjourn to discuss a matter of urgent public importance — namely, that in light of the recent IPCC special report on global warming and in light of the federal emergency debate on this subject which occurred yesterday, whether we as legislators are acting with sufficient urgency and demonstrating the appropriate leadership on preparing for and mitigating the escalating impacts of climate change on our province.

Video of speech

Text of speech

A. Weaver: Pursuant to the agreement regarding my application under Standing Order 35, I rise to move the following motion. By leave, I move:

[That this House do now adjourn to discuss a matter of urgent public importance, namely, that in light of the recent IPCC special report on global warming and in light of the Federal emergency debate on this subject which occurred yesterday, whether we as legislators are acting with sufficient urgency and demonstrating the appropriate leadership on preparing for and mitigating the escalating impacts of climate change on our province.]

Deputy Speaker: Please proceed.

A. Weaver: Thank you, hon. Speaker and Members of the Legislative Assembly, for allowing this emergency debate to take place. I note that my two colleagues in the B.C. Green Party and I will each have the floor for a few minutes, and we’ll divvy up the topics that we’d like to cover here. I’ll speak to my background in science. My colleague the MLA for Saanich North and the Islands will speak about our responsibility, and my colleague the MLA for Cowichan Valley will focus on opportunity and, where possible, hope.

This is the first week the Legislature has convened since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change special report was released. Three expert IPCC working groups issued a dire and urgent warning to governments around the world, including our own, arguing that we must immediately ramp up our efforts to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees or face serious and irreversible consequences.

I know a little bit about the IPCC, having serviced as a lead author in that regard for the last four international assessments, and it was a proud moment for me to see a former post-doc and PhD student serving on the recent panel’s committee report.

Over the last 150 years, Earth has made a transition from the past, when climate affected the evolution of human societies, to the present, in which humans are affecting the evolution of climate and weather. Today we are at a pivotal moment in human history. Our generation will be responsible for deciding what path the future climate will take. You and I, as elected officials, will either be complicit in allowing climate change to despoil our world or we can lead the way and choose a new future

As a climate scientist, a lead author on four previous IPCC assessments, I know that it is my moral responsibility to speak about climate change as clearly and accurately as possible. I do not aim to alarm but need to emphasize the severity of the threat that lies ahead, because it is so often underestimated.

The current state of B.C.’s climate and environment is not “the new normal,” as many have been saying. “Normal” implies a plateau and consistency. We are not facing a plateau. We are on the edge of a very steep downward trend, and I’m sad to say that this is just the beginning.

Over hundreds of millions of years, atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, together with global temperatures, dropped slowly as carbon was stored slowly in the sediments of the deep ocean and the great gas, oil and coal reserves of today were formed. Yet in a matter of just a few decades, the carbon drawn down over many tens of millions of years is being released back to the atmosphere. In a single generation, humans are taking atmospheric conditions back to that which existed during the age of the dinosaurs. The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere now far exceeds the natural range over the last million years, and it’s still rising quickly.

Metaphorically, we’re piling more blankets on an overheated planet. The hotter it gets, the more symptoms, if you will, humans will experience. If global emissions do not start to dramatically decline in the next few years, many millions of people, including British Columbians, will be at risk from heat waves, droughts, floods, storms and wildfires. Our coasts and cities will be threatened by a rising sea level. Many ecosystems, plants and animals will face widespread extinction, including most of the world’s coral reef systems.

This is not new information. Scientists have been raising concerns about what their data has been showing for years, for decades, for more than a century. In fact, in 1938, Guy Callendar made a presentation to the Royal Society of London that claimed (1) that humans had increased the amount of CO₂ in the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels, (2) that increased CO₂ could cause an increase in global temperatures and (3) that global temperatures were rising.

In the early 1800s, Jean-Baptiste Joseph Fourier was the very first to recognize that the atmosphere was essentially transparent to incoming radiation from the sun but was very effective at blocking outgoing radiation to the solar system, thereby creating a greenhouse effect. In the mid-1800s, John Tyndall, a British scientist, was the first to be able to determine that different greenhouse gases absorbed, preferentially, different wavelengths of infrared radiation.

In 1957, Roger Revelle and Hans Suess, from the University of California, warned that the oceans could not absorb the human emissions of carbon dioxide as fast as they were being produced. They stated, in their seminal work: “Human beings are now carrying out a large-scale geophysical experiment of a kind that could not have happened in the past nor be reproduced in the future…. We are returning, to the atmosphere and oceans, the concentrated organic carbon stored in sedimentary rocks over hundreds of millions of years.”

On and on it goes, in the 1980s, with the National Academy of Sciences and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Said the Academy of Sciences: “We’re deeply concerned about the magnitude of environmental changes.” They noted: “We may get in trouble in ways that we have barely imagined.” The Environmental Protection Agency in the U.S. said this: “Agricultural conditions will be significantly altered, environmental and economic systems potentially disrupted, and political institutions stressed. Changes by the end of the 21st century could be catastrophic, taken in the context of today’s world. A soberness and a sense of urgency underlie our response to a greenhouse warming.”

This is not new scientific information, as I’ve said. What is new, however, is how urgent and how dire the scientific warnings have become. What’s remarkable, when you look at this issue compared to every other environmental issue out there, is that the people speaking loudest, strongest and most frequently are the scientists themselves — out of concern for the direction we are taking our planet.

In recent years, the consequences of rising carbon dioxide and temperatures have become painfully clear. We’re on target to take ocean surface acidity into a realm for which we have no comparison in the history of Earth. Coral beds that have been around for millions of years are going extinct on a widespread basis. In Canada, overall precipitation will increase, but it’ll come in fewer and more extreme events interspersed between longer periods of drought. There’ll be an increased risk of flooding and wildfire, and we’ve seen that in British Columbia two years in a row.

At the rate we’re going, we’re looking at between 20 and 50 percent of the world’s species, almost certainly including the iconic Fraser River sockeye and Canada’s polar bear, becoming committed to extinction this century. As temperatures warm, salmon will have increased mortality rates as they struggle through hot waters to their spawning grounds. In southern regions, streams will dry up.

Think for a moment about a massive crop failure, economic collapse and millions of climate refugees desperate for safer homes. Our growing consumption levels are unsustainable on an earth with finite resources, and the limit is clearly in view.

Think about whatever issue you care about most as an MLA in British Columbia — economic growth, affordability, health care, education, poverty, transportation, agriculture, reconciliation, child care, housing, resource development, fisheries, forestry, safety, security, prosperity, family. Every single one will be undermined and endangered by unmitigated climate change.

I know that this can sound scary, an overwhelming proposition. It’s a normal human reaction to resist change and instead try to preserve the status quo. But the IPCC report, the one released this last weekend, tells us exactly where this leads.

We need to start now to build a new way of life. It can be a shift that provides economic opportunities like this province has never seen. By tackling climate change seriously, with carefully designed policies, B.C.’s economy can grow in new ways. We can prosper in a time of crisis, but it requires us to be honest with ourselves. In your work and mine, it is important we keep the spotlight on the stark and alarming reality of climate change and not get lost in the everyday bustle or the fog of November’s rain.

The time for “yes but” arguments — yes, but other people emit more, or yes, but other industries are worse, or yes, but B.C. is small, and this is a global problem — has passed. We now need “yes and” arguments. Yes, other people emit more. Yes, other industries will always be worse. And yes, B.C. is small compared to the world, and yet, we will do our part. As much as we may wish, we don’t have jurisdiction over the world, but we have influence in B.C., where we live. That is what is important.

This is an all-of-government issue, so it needs to be an all-government solution — every ministry, every MLA, every riding, every sector. We need everyone to look at the area they have influence on and think about how they can make positive change in the context of a warming world.

As the IPCC special report makes painfully clear, we only have a few short years left to steer away from catastrophic climate change. Choosing to take action is a luxury set to expire; soon, we will be forced. We must not squander this opportunity.

Thank you, again, to everyone in this chamber for allowing this emergency debate to take place.

Media Release

Weaver to move motion on emergency debate on climate change
For immediate release
October 16, 2018

VICTORIA, B.C. – Andrew Weaver, leader of the B.C. Green Party, will move a motion in the B.C. Legislature to hold a one-hour emergency debate on climate change tonight in the B.C. Legislature at 5:30pm this evening. The B.C. Greens called for an emergency debate this morning, following a similar debate in the Parliament of Canada last night.

“It’s time for a whole-of-government approach to mitigating the effects of climate change,” said Weaver.

“The potential calamity caused by climate change is avoidable. By refusing to create a plan to facilitate a gradual, managed transition, Canada is missing out on economic opportunities, as well as the ability to leverage the transition to make life more affordable for people.

“Canadians are highly educated, innovative and entrepreneurial – we can do far better than the race-to-the-bottom raw commodity economics of yesteryear. Instead, we should be putting our full attention towards championing clean growth and the value-added low-carbon industries that will undoubtedly be the drivers of economic growth as the world comes together to meet our targets.”

Sonia Furstenau, Deputy Leader, urged the other Members of the Legislative Assembly to recognize the human impacts of climate change.

“Climate change is not only an environmental issue – it’s a human rights issue,” said Furstenau.

“The effects of climate change will hit the most disadvantaged in our society hardest and first. We are already facing a crisis of inequality, both within Canada and across the globe. Any compassionate government that purports to care about people’s wellbeing must take immediate action to meet our emissions reduction targets, as well as to assist communities to adapt to the effects of climate change that are already beginning to take hold. If we act with urgency, we can couple strong climate policies with an approach that will also improve the health and wellbeing of the people we serve.”

Implementing a climate plan to meet B.C.’s legislated emissions reductions targets is a key component of the B.C. Green Party Caucus’ Confidence and Supply Agreement with the B.C. NDP minority government. Weaver is working closely with the government towards introducing that plan, the Clean Growth Strategy, later this year.

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Media contact
Jillian Oliver, Press Secretary
+1 778-650-0597 | jillian.oliver@leg.bc.ca