Denial of the Anthropocene takes urgency away from the climate – 03/09/2024 – Marcelo Leite

Experts from the International Union of Geological Sciences have decided that it is not yet the case to designate a new stage in Earth’s history, the Anthropocene. The technocratic decision contrasts with the general perception that something portentous is affecting the globe.

Earth science people research and think under the umbrella of the immensity of geological time. The planet is 4.5 billion years old; the Universe, 13.7 billion. From this perspective, ending the Holocene (current era) after a mere 11,000 years may seem hasty.

Leaving aside technical reasons for refusal, due to lack of competence to judge them, it is worth saying that the decision came at a bad time. The Anthropocene, a category indicative of the profound impact of human activity on the Earth, offers a powerful symbol to boost the fight against the climate crisis.

For those who doubt that we are leaving a deep mark on the history of the planet: in the last 250 years, the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide (CO_two), the main greenhouse gas, increased by 50%, from 280 parts per million (ppm) to more than 420 ppm.

The burning of fossil fuels and forests released around 1.5 trillion tons of CO_two in the air, thickening the blanket that increases the temperature on the surface and in the oceans. With the records set in 2023, on November 17th we surpassed the 2ºC mark above the pre-industrial era for the first time.

Considering the average of several decades and not the daily record, as climatologists recommend, the atmosphere is 1.17ºC above what was previously normal. Dangerously close to the 1.5-2ºC recommended as a safety limit in the Paris Agreement (2015).

Little has been done since then to mitigate global warming. CO2 emissions, thermometer readings and the occurrence of extreme events continue to rise – such as the current devastating floods in Acre and similar droughts in Roraima, the origin of widespread forest fires in the second case.

The Brazilian government, after Lula’s election and Marina Silva’s return to the Ministry of the Environment, even managed to reverse the trend of deforestation in the Amazon. But it appears powerless in the face of a worse disaster caused by agribusiness in the cerrado.

Worse still, it puts the pedal to the metal at Petrobras. The excuse is to use oil income to make the energy transition, for which, however, there is no detailed and feasible plan.

Consider the contrast with the European Union (EU), which is considering holding oil companies to account for disastrous climate change. Or with the Joe Biden government’s decision, in January, to freeze in the US the expansion of licenses to export liquefied natural gas, another driver of the greenhouse effect.

Both initiatives may, it is true, retreat in the face of political upheavals with the victory of right-wing parties. The EU finds itself under pressure from farmers uprising against rising fuel prices and environmental demands. In the USA, the election of denialist Donald Trump is becoming increasingly likely.

Lula aims for global leadership in the green wave for the climate, but his oil developmentism in the 1950s could erode his protagonism at COP30 in Belém do Pará, at the end of 2025. His camaraderie with violent autocrats based in fossil deposits such as Maduro, Putin and Mohammed bin Salman.

Both national and international scenarios do not bode well for the climate crisis. The thermostat controlling the energy transition appears to be broken, and one of the symptoms is the rejection of the Anthropocene – but it will still come back to haunt us.

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