The name Greta Thunberg is polarising. To some, she is an upstart who has no idea what she is talking about and would do well to keep to herself. To others, she is a beacon of hope in a rather bleak environmental outlook for the world. In both cases, the 20-year-old Swedish activist has certainly made an impact on the way the world sees climate change. Her passionate pleas to the world’s elite have not fallen on deaf ears, and there are some beginnings of real change happening in parts of the world.
In this, her curation of scientists and storytellers, Thunberg turns her attention to the whole story, presenting the big picture thinking that has allowed her to climb to such giddy heights as addressing the Davos community and the UN. Using a simple and effective style, Thunberg addresses the history of the climate situation, some of the scientifically backed causes of climate itself, and where we can go from here in order to rectify (or at least slow down) the process.
Each section is prefaced by Thunberg herself, providing an overview and some of her erudite concepts about the information therein. She writes with confidence without being overbearing. In fact, from start to finish of the great tome that is The Climate Book there is none of the perceived grandiosity or bombastic exploitation of facts for her own purposes. Instead, there is a rational, reasoned, and highly convincing argument for the problems that the world is coping with. The increase in pressure in atmospheric conditions is directly linked to the extreme weather conditions so many countries around the world are facing. Even our own piece of paradise has been increasingly pummelled by this atmospheric weather, which has its origins in the state of the pressure systems created when more CO2 is in the atmosphere and the seas continue to rise in temperature year on year.
No doubt deniers of any kind of climate change (or its less palatable linguistic predecessor global warming) will rail against some of the more audacious claims of sea level rise and ocean current temperatures that will have cataclysmic effects on the global weather systems resulting in massive droughts and biblical storms, but the evidence and research that underpins these claims are sound.
Written in very accessible language, The Climate Book spells out the issues but is consciously careful not to provocate by being didactic about the next steps. It does not set an agenda other than for change but does have some suggestions about the need to consider the outcomes with more emphasis on the damage that outputs from manufacturing and production will have on the environment and the way we all can have small impacts on our own environment. Then, through public pressure, some of the larger materially driven companies of the world will be forced to make changes. It seems that even with both a physical and an existential crisis the most important driver of any change is money.
There is no doubt that something needs to change, whether or not it is through the incredible fortitude of a Swedish 20-year-old who could come through this whole process as a saviour for the world as we know it, or a martyr for her cause.
Reviewer: Chris Reed
Allen Lane