The climate emergency is also a refugee emergency
More and more extreme weather events, and resulting food and water scarcity, mean more people displaced, fuelling a growing refugee crisis. In February of this year, Kayly Ober of Refugees International stated that:
“The latest report from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) paints a grim picture: the magnitude of existing and coming climate change impacts is much larger than previously acknowledged and is already contributing to displacement and humanitarian crises around the world.
The IPCC’s scientists found with high confidence that climate and weather extremes are driving displacement of people in all regions of the globe. They are also confident that in the mid- to long-term, displacement will increase with intensification of heavy precipitation and associated flooding, tropical cyclones, drought and—increasingly—sea level rise.”
How is this related to plastic?
The IPCC have stated that climate change is unequivocally driven by human action. And the plastic crisis is part of the problem. Plastic production uses vast quantities of fossil fuels as raw materials and to power the manufacturing process, and then at end of life (often after only one use) releases vast quantities of greenhouse gases when it is incinerated. And whilst it is better than landfill or incineration, even the process of recycling uses fossil fuels and emits greenhouse gases.
According to CIEL:
“If plastic production and use grow as currently planned, by 2030, these [greenhouse gas] emissions could reach 1.34 gigatons per year—equivalent to the emissions released by more than 295 new 500-megawatt coal-fired power plants. By 2050, the cumulation of these greenhouse gas emissions from plastic could reach over 56 gigatons—10–13 percent of the entire remaining carbon budget.”
What we need to do is to produce less, use less, and re-use what we have.
The theme for this year’s Refugee Week is ‘healing’, so let’s all do what we can to welcome those who have been displaced, to start to heal our wider communities and this planet we call home.
Find out More on the UN Refugee Website: https://www.unrefugees.org.uk/