Environmental Programming

SWINDON 105.5 weekly environmental progrmme: Birds and Bees. Fridays 2pm.

EARTH WEEK: Dedicated programming and environmental matters dicussed and profiled through a range of programming.

COP28 stands for the Conference of the Parties: a gathering of countries, to take action on the climate crisis. This year they are doing what’s called the GLOBAL STOCK TAKE, where they will assess how well they are doing in keeping up with their pledges made during the Paris Agreement of 2015, where countries agreed to try and limit warming to 1.5 degrees.

Current information shows that most countries are not on track to meet their commitments made.

There is a good deal of controversy around this year’s COP talks, because they are being held in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, one of the top 10 oil-producing nations. and the leader of the talks is Sultan Al Jaber, Chief Executive of the state-owned oil company. Some people are calling for a boycott of the talks because of this.

I.5 degrees might not sound like much, but even with just that amount of warming, extreme weather events will just continue to get worse and worse, harvests will be even poorer and there will be a heightened risk of food shortages. At just 2 degrees of warming we will also be affected by more frequent, more intense, and longer lasting heatwaves, as well as worse and more frequent flooding.

Right now there seems to be a growing consensus among climate scientists that we have passed the 1.5 limit and are heading for 2. Things are serious, so it is vital that communities start to act now.

The more conversations we can have about global warming, and the air plution in our towns and cities, and the water pollution in our rivers and seas, about loss of wildlife, and all these other adverse affects, the more likely it is that we can start to take real action to stop them.

We need to remind our listeners of how wonderful our planet is, how spectacular Nature is, and how we are a part of it, and not separate from it.

We are part of one giant web of life, human, animal and plant, here on planet earth.