Footprint Autumn Edition - 1 Environmentalists
1
Note from your Editor in Chief The theme of the first edition of Footprint Magazine this year is ‘Environmentalists’. The word ‘environmentalist’, when looked up in a dictionary, means ‘a person who is concerned with protecting and preserving the natural environment’. I believe that every single one of us, at least everyone reading this magazine, is an environmentalist. You don’t have to be a Greta, you don’t have to be a David, the first, very simple step, is to care, to ‘be concerned’. Therefore, I have chosen the article ‘You’ by Clara Grosz to be the first article of this edition. ‘You’, rather than telling us to simply “turn of lights when you leave a room”, and “stop using plastic bottles”, is an inspiring article on the changes we need to make to our mindsets to become true environmentalists, and leave our own footprint on environmentalism. I strongly urge everyone to read this. In light of Black History Month, I have prioritized articles about black environmentalists. Following the article ‘You’, are articles on 3 black women: Vanessa Nakate, Isatou Ceesay and Wangari Maathi. The 3 are from different generations, different backgrounds and have achieved widely different things, but all 3 are united in that they are black women who have had a huge impact on environmentalism on both local and international scales. Although David Attenborough and Greta Thunberg are definitively the most famous environmentalists of our time, I have decided to move their articles to the back of this edition. Both of their contributions to environmentalism are undeniable – Attenborough revolutionised public opinion on the natural world, and Thunberg has mobilised almost an entire generation – however this edition is about recognising the work of environmentalists who have been in the shadows. One such surprising environmentalist is J.R.R Tolkein. I was both excited and surprised when the writer Keira Cumming proposed writing about him to me, suggesting that she would link his most famous novels – the Lord of the Rings series – to his work as an environmentalist. The article is very interesting and is a particularly good read if you are a fan of the Lord of the Rings series! So, rather than scrolling straight to the end, or even to names who you recognise, I urge you all to read articles on those whose names you do not recognise.
Caroline Utermann – Editor in Chief
2
Index
4 – You – Clara Grosz 6 – Vanessa Nakate – Aria Watts 8 – Isatou Ceesay – Amelia Mathur 10 – Wangari Maathi – Lucie Price 11 – JRR Tolkein – Keira Cumming 13 – Annalena Baerbock – Vita Rottenberg 15 – Gail Bradbrook – Ria Patel 16 – John Muir – Anushree Gupta 17 – Greta Thunberg – Charlotte Fox 19 – Julia Hill – Sienna Parekh 20 – Luisa Neubauer - Anushree Bhattacharjee 21 – Theodore Roosevelt – Omika Sharma 22 – Leilani Münter – Anaya Popat 23 – Amory Lovins – Noura Ohlmeyer 25 – David Attenborough – Anika Chaterjee
Politician Activist Entrepreneur Other
3
You What does it take to be an environmentalist? Wikipedia states that an environmentalist is considered a supporter of the environmental movement, "a political and ethical movement that seeks to improve and protect the quality of the natural environment through changes to environmentally harmful human activities". If you're looking for a checklist, you've come to the wrong place. Being an environmentalist isn't so much about what you do, but rather your mindset. In the present day, the greatest threat to our shared environment is the climate emergency. Global average temperatures are increasing due to the Enhanced Greenhouse Effect: in less than 150 years, Earth has warmed by at least 0.8℃, while sea levels have risen by 22 cm. The effects of this are not to be downplayed: sea-level rise, desertification, more frequent natural disasters and the melting of the Arctic will put 1 million species at risk of extinction and pose a "death sentence" for many low-lying island states and large parts of sub-Saharan Africa by 2050. I firmly believe that there is a 'click' moment to be had about the state of the planet — a moment where one realises that the climate underpins all life on Earth. Indeed, the climate crisis is undoubtedly the greatest threat that both civilisation and the natural world have ever faced. I cry about the state of the planet regularly. For the majority of people reading this, this will sound weird, unfamiliar, and silly. But when compared with the facts – that the United Nations says we have 12 years to avoid condemning ourself irreversibly to catastrophe and that we are amidst the world's sixth mass extinction – my response, termed 'ecological grief' by Extinction Rebellion, seems understandable, rational even. It is a combination of the loss, distress and rage caused by climate change and ecological decline, and fundamentally, the lack of an adequate governmental response – not personal guilt.
Extinction Rebellion student protests
As I previously wrote for Footprint regarding some schools' negative view of the school strikes, personal accountability plays an essential role in promoting concepts of responsibility and minimising one's carbon footprint. However, the impact of most individuals is statistically minute when compared to global corporations endorsed by governments. Here is where the second click moment occurs. Having done almost everything I could to minimise my impact, such as: going vegetarian and organic, swapping to plastic-free cosmetics, changing our energy providers, giving up Amazon, etcetera, etcetera…nothing had changed. Because, as Naomi Klein writes in This Changes Everything, "our economic system and our planetary system are at war". The actions we take as consumers cannot override the fact that we carry them out within a fundamentally flawed framework: a deregulated capitalist society built upon the exploitation of both planet and people. If there's one thing an environmentalist is, it is anti-capitalist. Indeed, the recent Department for Education guidance for schools not to use material that is critical of capitalism is symptomatic of the extent to which
4
those in government are willing to go to protect their economic orthodoxy. It would prevent the 10-point pledge by world leaders "to halt the destruction of planet Earth" from being taught in schools, as it uses the phrases "unsustainable production and consumption" and the need "to transform and reform our economic and financial sectors". 'Eco grief' must, therefore galvanise us to action. It is an ironically delicate tipping point historically misjudged by environmentalists: too much doom and gloom and most of us shut off emotionally; too little, and we continue with 'business as usual'. But a Goldilocks’ zone may help us to (quite literally) take to the streets and demand better. Outward facing action such as writing to MPs, staging campaigns, signing petitions, taking part in non-violent civil disobedience will give the current political system the shock it needs. Fundamentally, an environmentalist is someone who demands better. Every crisis presents the possibility of transformation. This one is no different. We are at a critical point in the history of the planet now is the moment to act.
By Clara Grosz
5
Vanessa Nakate Vanessa Nakate is a 23-year-old Ugandan Climate Justice activist who began her activism in December 2018. She was becoming increasingly concerned about the unusually high temperatures in Uganda, so, inspired by Greta Thunberg’s strikes outside the Swedish Parliament, she began a solitary strike against inaction on the climate crisis outside the Parliament of Uganda in January 2019. She continued to strike alone for several months until other young people began to respond to her calls on social media and joined her protests. In particular, she tried to draw attention to the plight of the Congolese rainforests which were, and still are, being deforested at a severe rate. She then founded the ‘Youth for Future Africa’ and the ‘Rise Up Movement’ (Africa based), which lectures students on climate change and plants trees. Apart from organising protests, she equips schools with solar lighting and more efficient stoves. Nakate is especially concerned with the Climate Crisis’ implications for Uganda due to its particular vulnerability. Nakate explained in an interview that Uganda heavily depends on agriculture, making most of the population dependant on agriculture too. Uganda is often afflicted by heavy floods that destroy people’s farms, as well as damaged by severe droughts in the dry season. This increases the price of food, meaning those who are less wealthy will go hungry. Nakate says, “It will only be the most privileged who will be able to buy food. And they are the biggest emitters in our countries, the ones who will be able to survive the crisis of food”. She sums up the plight of many in the Global South: “Literally, in my country, a lack of rain means starvation and death for the less privileged.”. Uganda is facing other effects of Climate Change too: shifts in the spread of diseases such as malaria, soil erosion and land degradation. The threat to soil stability is particularly relevant to Uganda (and Tanzania, Kenya, Burundi and Rwanda) as they share Lake Victoria, the largest of the African Great Lakes and the largest tropical lake in the world at approximately 60,000km2. The surrounding areas are at high risk of flooding as well as a great amount of potential suffering if water levels drop. Nakate’s biggest controversy was being infamously cropped out of a photo with Greta Thunberg and three other Caucasian female climate activists at the 2019 World Economic Forum in Davos. She accused the multiple news outlets who had cropped her out, of racism- this was not accepted or apologised for by the outlets. While it is important to call out racism and discrimination in any context, this is particularly relevant when addressing the climate crisis. Voices from the Global South must not be excluded, but amplified, especially when talking about the climate crisis. Vanessa Nakate has argued that the climate change debate often ignores voices from developing countries. This is particularly problematic as they often bear the brunt of the fallout caused by more industrialised nations. This analysis is often avoided, and Western media outlets generally fail to cover catastrophic climate events in the Global South; Nakate says, “the world was so focused on the California fires… when California was burning, communities in Africa were flooding- but where was the attention?”. People of colour can often be especially at risk from the Climate Crisis. They may live in poorer, more dangerous areas, such as when black Americans were disproportionately affected by Hurricane Katrina, as well as the fact that pollution from oil and gas facilities disproportionately affects African Americans. They
6
may also live in developing countries which have a greater dependence on agriculture for sustenance, or in countries without the wealth and infrastructure to adapt and combat the crisis. Vanessa Nakate is a pioneering climate activist who deserves greater recognition. The infamous controversy where she was cropped out of a photo with Greta Thunberg is an important reminder of exclusion within public policy spaces and the urgent need to pay greater attention to indigenous climate activists and activists of colour. By Aria Banerjee Watts
7
Isatou Ceesay Isatou Ceesay is a Gambian activist and social entrepreneur, dubbed the Queen of recycling. She initiated a recycling movement in 1998 called ‘One Plastic Bag’ throughout Gambia. Despite much resistance, the movement is still thriving today. She has travelled all over the country, educating women on how to recycle plastic waste into sellable products for a source income. Ceesay has singlehandedly changed thousands of women’s lives while also helping the environment. However, her life and work have not always been as respected and valued as it is today.
Isatou Ceesay, social entrepreneur and ‘Queen of recycling’
After her father died, Ceesay was forced to drop out of school at a young age, as her mother needed her to work to bring money into the home. This is far from unusual; in Gambia, an estimated 75 per cent of children do not have access to a proper education. But Isatou Ceesay was a bright girl; at 20, she sold the cow she had inherited from her father and used the money to attend the Gambia Technical Training Institute in the capital city of Banjul, to train as a secretary. After returning home, she became a volunteer with the US Peace Corps, seeing this as a chance to get more training while helping her community. It was through the Peace Corps that Ceesay learned about the possibilities of recycling waste, knowledge that would change her life and many others. After learning that up to 95% of the world’s ocean plastic pollution is thought to come from Africa or Asia, and after seeing all the waste and rubbish that polluted her village, she decided to do something about it. She convinced five other women to join her, and together they collected plastic bags and upcycled them into purses. This was met with lots of anger and disgust, particularly from men who thought women belonged at home, not collecting rubbish to make money. But Ceesay seldom let anything stop her from learning or taking action. Within a year, her community’s recycling project had grown to 50 women and she named it the N’jau Recycling and Income Generation Group (NRIGG). Ceesay believed in what she was doing; she loved helping others and relished a challenge. Her actions have set off a chain reaction of upcycling, with many people in Gambia learning about plastic pollution and its impact on the environment. Despite adversity and mockery, she has managed to help so many families and clean up the village, encouraging others to follow route and think of ideas for reusing other types of waste. They turned food waste into compost for their vegetable plots, sold scrap metal, turned bike tyres into jewellery, and crafted colourful bags from old rice sacks. Today, Ceesay works with more than 11,000 people and NRIGG is based in four separate communities across Gambia. Not only has she had a huge impact on the environment, but she has managed to empower women all over Gambia through education and perseverance.
8
NRIGG at work, recycling plastic into bags
By Amelia Mathur
9
Wangari Maathai Wangari Maathai (1940-2011) was a Kenyan politician and environmental activist who became the first Black African woman to win a Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. She was the founder of the Green Belt Movement – often labelled just ‘GBM’ – which aims to empower women by getting them to grow trees. This increases the resources available to them whilst helping to conserve the environment- vital in some rural parts of Africa where there is widespread use of unsustainable farming practices. Maathai achieved both a Bachelor’s and Master’s in Biology in the US as part of the Kennedy Airlifts that gave East African students the opportunity to go and study in the US, as well as a Ph.D. from the University of Nairobi in 1971. Earning this PhD meant that Wangari Maathai effectively became the first woman in either East or Central Africa to earn a doctorate. She then taught in the Department of Veterinary Anatomy at the University of Nairobi after graduating, and after just 6 years became chair of the department. Despite the fact this was not always well-received, Maathai did not shy from breaking traditional gender roles in her work. While working with the National Council of Women in Kenya, Maathai developed the idea that village women could improve the environment by planting trees to provide a fuel source for themselves and to slow the processes of deforestation. The Green Belt Movement, an organisation she founded in 1977, planted approximately 30 million trees by the early 21st century. Leaders of the Green Belt Movement established the Pan-African Green Belt Network in 1986 in order to educate world leaders about conservation. As a result of the movement’s activism, similar initiatives were initiated in other African countries, including Tanzania, Ethiopia and Zimbabwe. In addition to her environmental conservation work, Maathai was also an advocate for human rights, AIDS prevention, and women’s issues, often spoking at UN General Assembly. She was elected to Kenya’s National Assembly in 2002, having gained 98% of the vote, and in 2003 she was appointed assistant minister of environment, natural resources, and wildlife. When she won the Nobel Prize in 2004, the committee commended her “holistic approach to sustainable development that embraces democracy, human rights, and women’s rights in particular”. Though the Nobel Peace Prize is the most famous of her awards, Wangari Maathai has won countless others, notably the Right Livelihood Award (1884), which she received for her action in reforesting Kenya, and the Indira Gandhi Peace Prize (2006) which commends individuals or organisation for their efforts toward promoting international peace, development through using scientific discoveries for the greater good of humanity. Maathai has also published two books and an autobiography, and frequently contributed to international publications such as the Los Angeles Times and the Guardian. By Lucie Price
10
JRR Tolkien Renowned for his work as an author and as the creator of the fantastical tales detailed in The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien’s work as an environmentalist has widely remained undiscussed. Born in South Africa in 1892 before moving to England while still quite young, his writings of the Shire show his longing for Sarehole and the farmer’s mill - one of the places he grew up in before being orphaned at the age of 12 and moving to urban Birmingham. The steelworks and blast furnaces of the West Midlands are said to have inspired his descriptions of Mordor and its industrial wastelands, allowing us an insight into his negative view of cities and industrial areas. Tolkien was eventually sent to the Somme during the First World War. 24 years old at the time, he acted as a communications liaison between officers in the field. 1.5 million soldiers had been slain by the end of the offensive, and, of his club from school, all but Tolkien and one other friend had been killed in action. This served to form his belief that industrialisation creates different classes of people and therefore conflict, which would correspond to the scale of the divides. The recurring theme throughout his books is that of nature and her defenders being attacked and ravaged by the harsh industry and its advocates. Orcs destroy the woods; wizards mutate pure creatures; and even the dwarves, who are portrayed as good, unleash a devil of some kind by mining greedily. Between Tolkien’s orphaning in 1904 and the publishing of The Lord of the Rings in 1954, great changes had affected the world. These included cars and combustion engines in all aspects of life; two world wars that had seen mechanical mass warfare beyond any Mordor as pictured in the Lord of the scale previously dreamt possible, with the tally of the dead nearing Rings films one hundred million; the destruction of natural land and harvesting of resources in order to perpetuate this combat; and the nuclear bomb. He, like W G Hoskins, was horrified by the immense amount of land taken up by aerodromes during the war, and Tolkien critic, Paul Kocher, stated the Middle-earth was meant to represent Earth itself in the past when primeval forests still existed and the wholeness that it now lost. Tolkien detailed the destructive impact of industrialisation in Sauron’s dead land of Mordor - aptly named the ‘Black Land’ in the The Shire as pictured in the Lord of the Elvish tongue of Sindarin, mirroring the term ‘Black Country’ for the Rings films Midlands, where he grew up. He felt that there was a general decline in nature, and worried that despite being able to counter evil and destruction, it would be impossible to reconstruct the nature lost to such forces. Saruman’s Isengard is yet another example of an “industrial hell”, as described by English scholar Charles A Huttar, producing weapons and machinery, forged using trees as fuel. It therefore stands for the exact opposite of the harmony of the land expressed between the Hobbits of the Shire, with Saruman violating the land in order to gain power.
11
Readers during the ‘60s and ‘70s found an escape through Tolkien’s work, inspiring longing, and nostalgia for the life before the ‘divisive lust’ caused worldwide conflict. However, the sense of drive throughout the books removed any allowance for pure escapism, making it relatable to readers in rise of counterculture movements. In 1971, a group of environmental activists sailed to the Amchitka nuclear exclusion zone with a copy of The Lord of the Rings upon their boat, The Greenpeace. In Robert Hunter’s book The Greenpeace to Amchitka: An Environmental Odyssey, he recounts the protest effort and the journey to the nuclear test sites : “We are on our way to the dread dark land of Mordor, and Amchitka is Mount Doom … somehow we have to hurl the Ring of Power into the fire and bring down the whole kingdom of the Dark Lord.” As you can see, the tales of the idyllic pastoral Shire and the industrial hells of Isengard and Mordor inspired many, including some of the most prominent figureheads of the movement. Pink Floyd, Black Sabbath, Genesis, and Led Zeppelin all wrote songs based on or involving references to Tolkien’s mystical world. As noted by Paul H Kocher, Tolkien was an environmentalist “long before such attitudes became fashionable” and his warning of the world to come and his staunchly pro-environmentalist arguments are evident throughout his novels and have inspired hundreds of thousands, if not millions. We only have to read the chapter The Scouring of the Shire to hear his urgent calls to arms; to rouse people to take action in their area and he forever changed the environmentalist movement by providing the fuel for the inaugural environmental protest efforts and the counter-culture movements. By Keira Cumming
12
Annalena Baerbock
Annalena Baerbock is one of the most important and influential Green Party politicians in Germany today. As chairwoman of the Alliance 90, more commonly known as ‘The Greens’, Baerbock is a leading figure in the German environmental movement. In 2013, she was elected to Germany’s parliament, the Bundestag, and was re-elected to serve her second term in 2017. Unlike in the UK, Germany’s Green Party are a significant political force, with 67 seats in the Bundestag out of 709, whereas in the UK this is only 1 out of 650. Baerbock was instrumental in campaigning and raising awareness for the need for Germany to switch to renewable energy sources as part of the ‘Energiewende’ (energy transition). In the summer of 2020, she fought for Germany to phase out all usage of coal by 2030, rather than the originally planned 2038, which was unfortunately voted against. One of her fundamental ideas is that the environment and the economy are interlinked. She also believes that Germany must take a greater responsibility when facing the global challenges of climate change, whilst shifting its focus from economics towards more people and climate orientated policies. Baerbock also fights against further investment in fossil fuels, especially German investment in international coal power plants, as well as against the extraction of known fossil fuel reserves. Additionally, she recognises the importance of supporting international climate protection efforts and holds the government accountable when they fail to deliver on such promises.
Baerbock with a sign reading ‘Stop Coal Save the Climate’ However, her environmental record is not without controversy. As a consequence of the 2011 nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, Germany decided to phase out nuclear power from its energy supply, in a move that is supported by Baerbock. This phase is achieved through the decommissioning of Germany’s nuclear reactors. In 2011, Germany produced around 25% of its electricity in nuclear power plants but by 2019 this had fallen to 12%. She cites the dangerous and environmentally polluting issue of the feasibility of storing radioactive nuclear waste as one of the reasons for her opposition to nuclear energy. However, some environmentalists argue that by prematurely phasing out nuclear power before renewable technology is advanced and widespread enough, Germany is increasing its reliance on fossil fuels, which will now take longer to phase out. They believe that risk of nuclear accidents, and the associated issues with storage, pose less threat to the environment than an extended dependence on fossil fuels. This is demonstrated by the fact that there is growing public resistance to the building of new wind farms and that not enough electrical
13
power lines have been built to facilitate the transfer of energy from Germany’s coastal areas to areas of high demand – which both hamper Germany’s diversification to more renewable sources of energy. However, there can be no doubt that Baerbock is a significant driver of the environmental movement. Hopes are held by many that in the future she could even be the first Green party chancellor of Germany and play a crucial role in the fight against climate change. By Vita Rottenberg
14
Gail Bradbrook
Gail Marie Bradbrook is a key figure in environmental activism, co-founding the environmental movement ‘Extinction Rebellion’ along with Roger Hallam. Her interest in environmental activism began at a young age, and by 14 her passion for animal rights led her to become a vegan and join the Green Party. Bradbrook has involved herself in various campaigning groups in the past, which includes her voluntary position as the director of Transition Stroud from 2010 to 2013. They organised an anti-fracking protest and took various actions like marches and naked protests, opposing the building of a local incinerator and roadblocks in Merrywalks, Stroud. Not only was she determined to make a difference in the environmental movement, Bradbrook had campaigned as part of many other social justice groups including antiglobalisation and occupy democracy movements. In 2015 Bradbrook set up the group ‘Compassionate Revolution’ with George Barda, following a discussion of the idea in the early hours of the morning, from 1am to 5am outside Parliament Square. The group later morphed into ‘Rising Up!’ which eventually turned into ‘Extinction Rebellion’. In 2016, Bradbrook embarked on a psychedelic retreat to Costa Rica in the hope that she would find some clarity in her work. The experience caused her to change her approach to campaigning as she considered new tactics that would help her to achieve this change. After having returned from Costa Rica, she soon met Roger Hallam and together they set up the organisation ‘Extinction Rebellion’. The group have often faced criticism due to their radical methodology of demand attention but Bradbrook defends their actions by displaying her dedication to the cause, “I am willing to risk being jailed because I can’t see any other way of making the changes that are so necessary in the world at the minute”. Gail Bradbrook aims to raise awareness of the dangers that have been caused as a result of anthropogenic climate change and, consequently, believes that only the use of civil disobedience on a large scale can cause this change. She discovered that non-violent or drastic tactics are overshadowed by violent actions, but it is vital to have both in order to gain support and make change simultaneously. Bradbrook, like many other Extinction Rebellion members, believes breaking the law is the key to succeeding as it forces the government’s hand. The group have compared themselves to Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jrfigures who also broke the law to enforce change. As a group, Extinction Rebellion have made several attempts to demand attention from the government and fight for the changing of our attitude towards climate change. They even occupied the headquarters of Green Peace, accusing the non-governmental organisation of becoming too much of an establishment and not doing enough to tackle the issues at hand. In their early stages they held a mock funeral for the planet and used bridge blockades. Along with their critics, their number of supporters have also risen. In April 2019, over 1,130 protestors were arrested in London alone for causing public disruption. Gail Bradbrook has gained a considerable amount of attention for climate change, not only in London, but globally, with 45 countries involved and over 650 groups (as of April 2019). She has been a huge influence in the process of battling climate change. By Ria Patel
John Muir
15
John Muir was an influential botanist, philosopher and author who advocated for the preservation of the wilderness in North America. His work was fundamental to the establishment of the Sequoia and Yosemite national parks in California. Born in 1838 in Dunbar, Scotland, Muir and his family emigrated to Wisconsin, where he later attended University. Despite having developed an interest in mechanical engineering throughout his studies, this passion was diminished in 1867, when he suffered from a severe industrial accident which damaged his eye. He later abandoned engineering and devoted more of his time to nature and writing. Muir wrote many accounts of his excursions in book form, for instance, A thousand mile walk to the gulf, (1916), which narrates his hike from the Midwest to the Gulf of Mexico. This pivotal turn in his life inspired him to sculpt new understandings and connections with nature by investing more time in America’s forests and glaciers within Nevada, Utah and Alaska. These excursions formed the basis of Muir’s articles on the formation and erosion of glaciers, within which he developed the theories which have been instrumental to modern understanding of this study. An activist for the conservation of the environment, in 1876 Muir wrote and protested for the government to implement policies and rights for forestsin the US. He thus became the central figure of the debate. John Muir believed that the forest and its resources should be off-limits to everyone regardless of the potential economic gains which could be derived from energy extraction. This view opposed that held by many environmentalists at the time, whom argued the forests’ resources should be evenly distributed. Muir’s argument for preserving the environment as a whole entity was also at odds with the beliefs of many government officials. Notwithstanding the forces at play, in a grand victory the Yosemite and Sequoia parks were labelled off limits to industrial interests. During John’s time as an environmentalist, he founded many institutions and organizations, one being the Sierra Club. Erected in 1892, it allowed Muir and his peers to freely express their concerns about the environment, leading to the production of papers and magazines like ‘The Sierra Club Bulletin’. Most notable amongst the club’s successes was swinging public and congressional opinion towards the conservation of 13 parks which, despite Congress’s initial vote to label off limits to commercial exploitation, had been ceded to external business influence. This controversy only heightened his motivation to establish more parks such as the Grand Canyon national park- currently one of the top most visited US attractions. Muir died peacefully in 1914 in California. Yet his legacy as an influential figure in the composition and preservation of national parks in the US lives on. These parks, to this day, are conserved and appreciated by many people. Honours have been created to celebrate Muir, for example John Muir Day on the 21st of April, and the John Muir award (which I have personally participated in), permit the youth to study John Muir’s life, as well as ensure the continuation of his legacy of conservation. His teachings and beliefs about nature continue to resonate with many people to this day, especially at times where climatic disasters are evermore threatening. ‘In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks’ - John Muir By Anushree Gupta
Greta Thunberg
16
Greta Thunberg is a 17-year-old Swedish environmentalist activist aiming to solve climate change.
Early Life Greta was born on 3rd January 2003 in Stockholm, Sweden to her opera singer mother and actor father. When Greta was young, she was diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome, which is now regarded as Autism Spectrum Disorder, meaning that she has abnormalities in social situations, but normal development in intelligence and speech. People with this disorder usually concentrate intensely on one idea, and in Greta’s case, this idea was climate change, which she first learnt about when she was eight years old. Soon after learning about it, she modified her own habits in a bid to reduce her own contribution to global warming – for example, becoming a vegan and refusing aeroplane travel, because both livestock and aeroplanes emit a large amount of greenhouse gases. Impacts on the world A few weeks before the Swedish election in September 2018, Greta encouraged lawmakers to address climate change by missing school to sit outside the Swedish parliament with a sign that read ‘Skolstrejk för Klimatet’, meaning School Strike for Climate. Although she was alone on the first day, Greta continued to strike for sveral consecutive days, each day joined by more and more people. After the Swedish election, she returned to school, but continued to miss lessons on Fridays to strike, which founded a movement called ‘Fridays for Future’. Achievements Greta’s actions inspired others to change their views and behaviour towards climate change. Many other students across the globe have held their own Fridays for Future strikes in countries including the UK, the USA, Canada, Belgium, France, Finland, Denmark, and the Netherlands. Greta’s influence gained international attention and she received lots of invitations to speak about climate change – for example, at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, at the European Parliament, and in front of the UK, the USA, Italy, and France’s legislatures. Greta’s speeches encouraged investors from the USA to donate roughly £500,000 to set up the Climate Emergency Fund. Controversy
Although Greta may have inspired millions of students and leaders worldwide, she has not pioneered specific policy changes. The ‘Greta Thunberg Effect’ is the belief that protests and complaints, especially via social media, will eventually bear the results that people want. On the other hand, some believe that protests and complaints, despite making people aware of the issue, are not really causing significant change. This has caused certain celebrities such as Jeremy Clarkson, the former Top Gear host, to say that Greta is “an idiot”, and that “going around saying we’re all going to die [is] not going to solve anything”. There is also much debate about whether Greta’s passion, often mistaken for aggression, is helping or hurting her cause. For example, in her UN climate speech, Greta repeatedly said, “How dare you!”, and many believe this to be crossing the line between attempting to gain sympathy and simply being rude. Most
17
national leaders believe it is their job to do only as much for the environment as is economically and politically reasonable, so they do not appreciate Greta criticizing their previous efforts. By Charlotte Fox
Julia Hill 18
Having received numerous highly prestigious awards, Julia ‘Butterfly’ Hill has become one of the most recognisable figures in environmental activism today. Born to a deeply religious family in 1973 and the daughter of a travelling Evangelical minister in Arkansas, Julia Hill has always allowed the concept of faith to play a large part in her life. But it wasn’t, until she suffered severe injuries after a car crash in 1996 that her passion for environmental activism was ignited. Following her accident, Hill had to undergo almost a year of intense physical and cognitive therapy before she could ‘normally’ walk and talk again. After travelling to California’s redwood forest following the accident, Hill states that she had a ‘spiritual epiphany’ and began to direct her energy towards joining the movement trying to save these ancient redwoods. Hill often credits the accident to her new enlightenment: "The steering wheel in my head, both figuratively and literally, steered me in a new direction in my life...As I recovered, I realized that my whole life had been out of balance...I had been obsessed by my career, success, and material things. The crash woke me up to the importance of the moment and doing whatever I could to make a positive impact on the future." It was her 1997 protest that brought about Hill’s record. For 738 days, Hill lived in the canopy of a redwood tree – whom she called Luna – to protest against the deforestation of California’s redwood forest by Pacific Lumber (one of California’s major logging and sawmills). For just over two years, Hill faced extreme weather, illness and numerous attempts by the authorities to bring her down; all while living on a 6-by-8-foot platform, sheltered by tarps in the canopy of Luna. Due to the international attention from Hill’s sit-in protest, in 1999 Pacific Lumber agreed to a settlement that preserved a 200-foot buffer zone around Luna and other old redwood trees, as well as this, a settlement of $50,000 was donated to California State university’s program for research into sustainable forestry. After her protest for Luna ended, Hill continued her journey of eco-activism: in 2002, she was arrested in Ecuador while protesting against the building of an oil pipeline which threatened the forests near the Andes. Most recently, Hill has set up a blog and website with life-coaching programmes while she considers her next ecological commitment. She has also set up a non-profit organisation called ‘circle of life’ which aims to connect people to nature through education and activism. Furthermore, Hill speaks regularly on university campuses and has addressed the united nations on numerous occasions. She is an amazing role model for all, and continues to stand on the front line in the battle against environmental degradation. By Sienna Parekh
Luisa Neubauer 19
Luisa Neubauer is a twenty-four-year-old German climate activist who organised one of the major school strikes in Germany, more commonly referred to as Friday’s for Future, and is a keen member of the German Green Party. At a young age, she has achieved a considerable amount and has contributed significantly to the Fridays for Future movement. She is often viewed as the German face of the movement and one of the main German climate activists. Neubauer’s path leading to environmental activism began after she graduated from her secondary education, when she worked for an ecological farm in England which is considered as being especially important in shaping the future of sustainable agriculture. Following this, she went on to study Geography at the University of Göttingen and completed her studies recently in 2020 with a bachelor’s degree. Luisa Neubauer has certainly had a great impact on environmentalism, especially through the Fridays For Future movement. Fridays For Future was a strike organised to convince policymakers and the government to reconsider and alter their policies in order to minimise their harmful impacts on the environment. Although the founder of this movement is Greta Thunberg, Neubauer is also recognised as one of the main leading figures, although she actively condemns comparisons with her and other notable environmentalists. She is also recognised for expanding the movement to gain as much support and spread as much awareness as possible. She does not see the strikes as doing any harm to anyone or directly affecting politics and believes that the movement is a sustainable and exciting educational experience. The Fridays for Future movement proved to be extremely successful; it grew from a few people, to 13,000,000 in just over a year across almost all countries, reaching people of all demographics and backgrounds. In January 2020, Neubauer was offered a position to sit on the energy board of the German multi-national automation company, Siemens. Neubauer passed up this opportunity claiming she would lose the ability to criticise Siemens. She explained, “If I were to take it up, I would be obliged to represent the company’s interests and could never be an independent critic of Siemens. That is not compatible with my role as (a) climate activist.”. As a result of this, she can continue her role as an environmentalist and create great change in the world, without being restricted on what she can say and who she can criticise. On the topic of criticism, Luisa Neubauer has received negative attention in the press and has been called out for hypocrisy for taking flights to different countries. Neubauer responded to this by saying that criticising her personal consumption forms a distraction from the more pressing and urgent political issues regarding our climate and the environment. At such a young age, Luisa Neubauer has truly achieved remarkable feats and has shared many successes such as the expansion of the Fridays for Future and her unfailing strive to make the future a better place. With her disingenuous passion paired with her calm and poised demeanour, Neubauer truly is a remarkable environmentalist.
By Anushree Bhattacharjee
Theodore Roosevelt
20
Whenever someone mentions Theodore Roosevelt, most people would think of the youngest president of the United States and his political career. However, the fact that he was an avid environmentalist and conservationist is sadly often glossed over. Throughout his years in office, he used his presidential power on many occasions to protect his country’s environment. From a young age he realised how essential restoring the environment would be, so used every opportunity he could to do so. While every other child was running around in the street or playing catch, Roosevelt was out on the hunt for specimens to collect and analyse in notebooks. His father, Roosevelt Sr., founded ‘The Roosevelt Museum of Natural History’, opened in 1867, where Theodore spent most of his childhood. He was especially eager to provide his own specimens and he even urged many of his friends to do the same. There was a certain spark in his mind which fuelled his curiosity and awareness of the environment. Many years later, Roosevelt founded the ‘Boone and crocket park’ in 1887, which was a momentous leap in making the sport of hunting less environmentally harmful. In fact, this club is North America’s longest running wildlife and habitat conservation organisation. Importantly, this organization advocated “fair chase” hunting to support habitat conservation. The club was named after Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett who were hunter-heroes. “Heroes” because they, like Roosevelt, realised the deadly consequences of overhunting. As well as this, Roosevelt used his position as President to set up more than 50 wildlife refuges. The first refuge that he created was the ‘Pelican Island Bird Reservation’ in 1903. After visiting th is island in Florida, he realised that the birds were at risk of absolute extinction, as their feathers were being ripped off for use in the fashion industry – in particular to design hats. After his visit, he immediately used his powers to create a refuge, and protect the birds. This shows how important it is that leaders use their power to protect the environment. Along with reserves, he also founded many national monuments, the most notable being the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon is a well-known natural landmark, but its makes it even more astonishing. Theodore Roosevelt always pushed to preserve the canyon, unlike the many who wanted to build improvements on it. Thankfully, he declared it to be a National Monument in 1908, ensuring that “this great wonder of nature remain as it now is. You cannot improve on it”. His famous words mean that to this day, it remains in a preserved state. The conservation legacy of Roosevelt is evident in the 230 million acres of public lands he helped establish. Notably, 150 million acres of these were national forests. These overwhelming figures show the extreme scale on which Roosevelt was able to make an impact. Not only was he a well accomplished president, militarist and writer, but he was arguably one of the most important environmentalists in history. "I recognize the right and duty of this generation to develop and use the natural resources of our land; but I do not recognize the right to waste them, or to rob, by wasteful use, the generations that come after us." – Theodore Roosevelt By Omika Sharma
Leilani Münter
21
Leilani Münter is an environmental activist and a top ten female professional race car driver in the world. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Biology at the University of California and specialised in ecology, behaviour and evolution whilst volunteering at a wildlife rescue centre. She has been a vegetarian for most of her life and became vegan in 2011. Leilani started racing quite late in her life after getting an opportunity to try out a car and her talent was luckily spotted by a scout. Leilani worked as a stunt double for Catherine Zeta-Jones and used the money she earned to pay for racing school. In her first race in 2001, Leilani finished fourth. Since then she has raced in many different series including: NASCAR weekly racing, ASA, NASCAR Elite Division, the ARCA Racing series and the Indy Pro. In 2004 she became increasingly popular due to qualifying 4th, which was the highest qualifying effort for a female driver at the track, and in 2007 she became the fourth woman in history to race in the Indy Pro Series. In 2010, Leilani made her Daytona debut after raising enough sponsorship from 6 environmental companies and drove the first ever 100% eco sponsored race car. Leilani raced in the Daytona ARCA race in 2014 in which she drove the ‘Go 100% renewable’ race car, run entirely on solar, wind and hydro power. In addition to all her racing success, Leilani’s commitment to raising awareness of environmental issues is truly inspiring. In 2007, she became the world’s first carbon neutral race car driver as she decided to adopt an acre of rainforest for every race, she took part in to offset her carbon footprint. Soon after, Leilani became an ambassador of the National Wildlife Federation and regularly travelled to Capitol Hill to speak with members about clean energy legislation. She was also interviewed on the BP oil spill in Mexico and visited Japan to talk about the dolphin trade and slaughter. In 2014, Leilani drove her Tesla model S, where she used the Tesla supercharger network, which meant she raced without using burning any oil whatsoever! She contacted Elon Musk (the owner of Tesla) to ask for a car without leather seats, and since then, Elon has used vegan leather in all Tesla cars. Leilani’s home too is built around environmental awareness; she has solar panels on her roof, a 550-gallon rainwater collection system, solar lighting and a vegetable garden. Her motto is: ‘Never underestimate a vegan hippie chick with a race car.’ By Anaya Popat
Amory Lovins 22
“It is widely understood that incremental change is a high-risk strategy. Those who take the opportunity to change do very well.” When you think of petrol cars what comes to mind? Large, bulky vehicles that emit greenhouse gases into our atmosphere, only speeding up the ongoing global issue of climate change? The Hypercar, developed by the physicist Amory Lovins in 1994, has completely revolutionised what we know about such vehicles today. The Hypercar is a carbon fibre hybrid (petrol and electric) machine bearing minimal weight. It has significantly less parts than a conventional car, travels 150-200 miles per gallon of fuel and emits a low level of greenhouse gases. In November 2007, Toyota unveiled a Hypercar model, a vehicle the same size as its green Prius but approximately a quarter of the weight of some Minis. This model emits only one third of the Prius’ greenhouse gas emissions while still traveling 100 miles per gallon! The main advantage of the Hypercar over cars which run on petrol, is that it does not need all the mechanical components found in a petrol car, because the wheels are driven by electric motors. Thus, a notable advantage the Hypercar has over electric cars, is that it does not need to lug around heavy batteries; it has a small engine or gas turbine to turn the fuel into electricity when necessary. Lovins demonstrated his passion for protecting the environment from a young age. While he went to Oxford in the 1970s, he helped set up Friends of the Earth – an environmental campaigning community. By the age of 28, Lovins figured out that the USA could phase out using fossil fuels at a profit rather than a cost meaning that by 2050, the USA could eliminate all oil use. Lovins’ discovery shaped his ideas on the Hypercar, allowing him to work by seeking the most energy efficient solution at each stage of its manufacture. Lovins once said: “Change is coming out of fear and the car makers are gazing into the abyss. It is widely understood that incremental change is a high-risk strategy. Those who will take the opportunity to change will do very well. We can save half the oil we use and the rest we can save with advanced biofuels.” “Incremental change” is when the process of programs and organisations develop over time through small alterations. In other words, Lovins was explaining how while concepts involving many little alterations can be both tricky and risky, they are fundamental for companies to reach a clear path to success. Lovins explained how he used incremental change when considering the design of the Hypercar. He stated that by taking the most energy efficient existing hybrid car and driving it carefully, its efficiency can be doubled. He went on to say that if you run the car on advanced biofuel (fuel that is produced directly or indirectly from organic material) then the car’s oil efficiency can be quadrupled. If you then give the car batteries that can be recharged when connected to an electric power source, you at least double the energy efficiency of the car once more. If all these improvements are accumulated, you would be down to roughly three percent of the oil per mile you were using to begin with. Lovins said that he never knew of a company that invested in energy that did not a profit. Lovins is now working with Pentagon, a company that spends nearly a third of its budget on moving army troops and equipment around. He said that if it invested in very energy-efficient goals in the same way as it did in GPS, chips and the internet, then the entire global energy landscape would definitively shift. The knock-on effect would transform car, plane and truck industries and Lovins estimates that this would be a $180 billion investment, or roughly what the UK spends on its health service in a year.
23
Amory Lovins is a great example of an environmental activist; he strives to constantly alter and improve his ideas for a future less reliant on fossil fuels by adapting on current technologies for the benefit of the environment. Do you think soon you will see more Hypercars on the streets? By Noura Ohlmeyer
David Attenborough
24
Sir David Attenborough is a highly acclaimed British naturalist and media personality; best known for his educational documentaries on nature, most notably the nine-part Life series. He appeared in his first television programme Zoo Quest in 1954, where for the first-time audiences witnessed a studio presentation compiled of footage of rare animals from live locations in the wild. He was born on the 8th of May 1926, in Isleworth, West London and was raised in Leicester, where his father was principal of the University College. Sir David went to Clare College, Cambridge (MA 1947) and began work in a publishing house in 1947. A few years later he joined the BBC and became a television producer. In 1954 the television programme Zoo Quest, which he produced with the reptile curator, Jack Lester, became very popular. In 1965, Sir David became controller of BBC 2, a new channel where he helped to launch the dramatic production of The Forsyte Saga and many landmark educational series’ such as The Ascent of Man and Kenneth Clark’s Civilisation. He was also instrumental in airing the comedy series Monty Python’s Flying Circus in 1969 which became a path breaking show and made stars out of comedians like Graham Chapman. Attenborough continued as BBC director of Programmes till 1972 and then resigned to become a freelance writer and producer of television series. In 1975 he filmed Back to Nature, where he met isolated tribes and showed the global unity in diversity of the human spirit. His programmes on anthropology and natural history are highly commended, the most notable being The Life series: Life on Earth (1979), Private Life of Plants(1995) and Life in Cold Blood(2008). Attenborough is thought to be one of the most well-travelled people in the world, having travelled 256,000 miles for the Life of Birds series alone. His programme The Blue Planet (2001) and State of the Planet (2000) are phenomenal programmes dealing with environmental issues such as global warming. Sir David won an Emmy award for his narration in the Blue Planet in 2017. Attenborough later narrated for Our Planet which streamed on Netflix in 2019. His BBC programme Climate Change - The Facts in the same year foretold of the great danger that the world faces if we do not act now on environmental issues, and how it could lead to the ultimate collapse of our society. Sir David Attenborough has become one of the key figures on environmental issues; his love of nature was recognised with a knighthood in 1985. He is the only director in the history of BAFTA to have won awards in all the eras of black and white, colour, HD and 3D filming. Many species that have been recently discovered have been named after him as a mark of respect for his contribution to the environment. Sir David Attenborough has changed the global perspective on climate issues immensely through both his passion for filmmaking and nature. By Anika Chatterjee
List of Writers and Editors
25
Writers Amelia Mathur Anaya Popat Anika Chatterjee Anushree Bhattach Anushree Gupta Aria Watts Charlotte Fox Clara Grosz Keira Cumming Noura Ohlmeyer Omika Sharma Ria Patel Sienna Parekh Lucie Price Vita Rottenberg
Editors Ria Patel Greta Large Emily Clark Anna Moulds Anoushka Chawla Nitya Kapadia Anika Chatterjee Mia Singer Karel Ohana Alina Halstenberg Amani Venkataram Anusha Roy
Editor in Chief Caroline Utermann
26