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Hello curious people. I'm Professor Chris Turney, Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Research at the University of Technology Sydney, a climate and earth science researcher, Antarctic explorer and podcast host.

I'm here to answer your curious questions about climate change, tipping points, and the actions we can all take. This is Climate Curious.

The UTS community sent in some thought-provoking questions about climate that we want to tackle. Let's get started.

Is there a difference between climate change and global warming?

Now that is a great question. Back in the day, we used to talk about global warming an awful lot. This idea of human activity, the burning of fossil fuels, leading to carbon pollution and other greenhouse gases was driving warming of the planet. But in 2002, a political strategist wrote a famous memo during the presidency of George W Bush that basically said they should stop using global warming as a term and instead use climate change. And the idea was climate change was less emotional, that it was more controllable.

And sure enough, the politicians at the time started using that term and it caught on. But the reality is climate and change, which sounds like it's quite manageable and okay and change is good, right? Isn't actually the reality. We're driving extraordinary levels of global heating. Global warming is just not good enough anymore. It's global heating. The planet is heating up far above and beyond what is natural and we now have a major problem. 

What is a climate tipping point? Is there one that concerns you the most?

Ah it’s a curious concept, isn't it, and is one that seems quite alien to many of us. There's a fantastic book by Malcolm Gladwell on Tipping Points. But they're not just in society and culture.

The Earth system as a whole has a whole series of tipping points, but a tipping point, a nice way of describing it is really like this chair. If I lean back, up to a certain point, I can fall forwards again. I won't push myself too far, but if you go too far, you tip, and no amount of me pushing myself forward will bring the chair back.

And the climate system and the Earth’s system as a whole is a bit like that. There's a series of places around the world where parts of our system won't go back. So the Earth system has lots of these tipping points, and we know they exist because in the geological record, we've seen them happen before. 

So one example, and probably the one that worries me the most is the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. This is a huge body of ice. It contains enough water to raise global sea levels by around 3.5m. The problem is the West Antarctic Ice Sheet sits on the seabed. And so, as the oceans warm up unnaturally from all this carbon pollution we're putting into the atmosphere, that ice is melting.

And because it's on the seabed, it will keep melting until eventually it falls into the oceans and sea level rises, or at least a lot of that ice sheet will.

The question is just how much heating needs to happen for that ice sheet to melt? Where is the tipping point? And we don't know. But we think it could be anywhere from a global average temperature of one and a half to two degrees could be enough to actually tip the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and melt. That's frighteningly close to where we're heading at the moment.

We really have to watch out and we have to build resilience. We have to build planning and structures that can protect our society if and when these tipping points, like the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, take place.

What is the Anthropocene Epoch and are we in it now?

Oh gosh. Scientists have wrestled with this for centuries. At the very beginning, when they were looking at geological time periods, you might have heard of things like Cretaceous or Jurassic, Jurassic Park. They've wondered for a long time whether humanity had actually changed the planet, and it would change in a different way that actually it wouldn’t operate naturally. And that's the Anthropocene Epoch. This idea that humanity is a geological superpower and it's an incredibly complex question to answer, because some scientists, myself included, have argued that we're now in an Anthropocene Epoch. That if we were to magically disappear, the world would not return back to its natural state. 

Now, that's a very challenging concept, but it's the idea that the world is behaving unnaturally. It's no longer going to return to its natural state, but humanity's behaviour, its pollution, the way we live, the way we've modified the landscape will not return back. And so in the future, if some sort of alligator-like archeologist came along and was rummaging around in the landscape they would find remains buried in the ground that showed that we'd been here. 

It's still controversial, and it's not widely accepted, but it's now something that scientists are seriously wrestling with.

Where have we visited that has the most visible effects of climate change?

Look, I think one of the most sobering examples for me, and I think we've all had them, but for me, I was in the East Antarctic. I was on the ice sheet, which is the vast body of ice that has built up over millions of years. And when we were, there it was during the summer time, 24-hour daylight. And in spite of what should be freezing temperatures, it was actually above zero. And the ice sheet was melting in front of our very eyes. It was actually a torrent of water flowing off the ice sheet. So much so that actually we were almost trapped and we couldn't get out. And then shortly afterwards, we were on, on the ship just off the coast, and it started raining. It started raining in Antarctica. It just shouldn't be happening.

Why is it so hard to communicate the effects of climate change and make people care?

Gosh, that's a tough one, isn't it? It's this awful situation we face as humanity is putting more carbon pollution into the atmosphere, we're heating up the planet, we know we're heading into a place where humanity is really going to struggle. But this is a classic issue of urgent versus important. We all have challenges in our day-to-day lives. The cost of living, getting from A to B, just making ends meet. 

How do you get society to make the changes to minimise the impact of global heating? And that's the reality, sadly. Climate is changing and it's happening now. The actions we take now are just going to minimise the impact of that changing climate. And things are made so much worse now by this scale of misinformation and disinformation out there.

Misleading comments, whether intentional or not, are just confusing the issue even more and slowing down action. We all need to step back and actually make the changes needed to stop this awful challenge
that we all face. 

Do you think we have enough cross-collaboration to address global heating?

No, I don't. I think we need to do a lot more. No one discipline or idea is going to solve this mess. We're in a moment. We need people from industry, government, not-for-profits, universities, society as a whole, coming together, sparking off each other, using our different skills to innovate, to come up with those bite-sized solutions that will help us deal with this awful challenge that we face. So just one example here at the University of Technology Sydney is we have amazing teams working on all different aspects of the climate challenge.

A great example is the team working with microalgae, these tiny living organisms. But they're so effective – 40 times more effective at trapping carbon than trees. And the products that come from that can be used for all sorts of things, from making bioplastics, food to capturing carbon from the atmosphere and locking it away.

But that team has been able to do so much more by working with engineers, lawyers, business people to get that technology and idea out there to make a difference in the real world. And being a bit cheeky, if you want to learn more about the importance of bringing people together from all walks of life and expertise do try out my podcast series Unf*cking the Future.

How can entrepreneurship help address climate change?

There is an extraordinary opportunity here. We have to turn round the centuries-old fossil fuel global economy into something that is carbon neutral and climate neutral. And we need to do it in the next few decades. That's a breakneck speed. Entrepreneurs are going to be so important for delivering those new ideas and concepts and technologies out to the wider world as quickly as possible. So if you're an entrepreneur out there and you have an idea, this is your moment because the world needs these technologies and ideas and you're the ones to deliver it.

What is the role of universities in addressing climate change?

Universities have got such an important role to play. We've got brilliant people working on all sorts of issues, but we need to partner with you, with government, businesses, not-for-profits, our communities. By partnering together, we can come up with solutions that are so urgently needed, and we need to do it at speed and scale. So no matter where you are in the world, you will have a local university or hopefully something close to you, reach out to them. Find out how you can work together to bring those solutions out to where the world needs them.

What gives you the most hope that we can address global heating?

Look, I think if I'm honest, I think the youth of today. You can see this passion and drive, and it's actually affecting all the other generations. As a kid, as a teenager, we had those ideas as well, and it's realising that together as a community. People give me hope.

If you could change one policy today to help the climate, what would it be?

There's the elephant in the room, which is the trillions – yes, trillions – of dollars we spend each year on fossil fuel subsidies. We are spending a fortune, several trillion dollars a year, to destroy our future. Get rid of the subsidies and use that money to invest in renewables and building resilience in our communities to deal with global heating. It would be a game changer.

What’s something small, but impactful I can do to help address global heating?

Probably the single most impactful thing you can do is switch to a plant-based diet, or at least have a low-meat diet. The amount of carbon pollution that comes from that is so much less. In fact, a low meat diet alone is about half the amount of carbon pollution and other greenhouse gas emissions than a full heavy meat diet. And even if that's too difficult for you, just don't waste food. About a quarter of all the food that's produced in the world is wasted, and it accounts for nearly 10% of greenhouse gas emissions. So just don't waste food and reduce the amount of meat that you consume.

That was all the questions for today. I hope you learned something new. Until next time, stay curious.