Sustainability at UTS

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 archaeologist 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 you 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. I 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 at the 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 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.

Hello curious people I'm Dr Emma Camp a marine biologist and the team leader of the future reef program at UTS and I'm here to answer your curious questions about coral climate change and the future of the Great Barrier Reef.

Our UTS community have sent in some thought-provoking questions to tackle. Let's get started.

What are the biggest threats to the Great Barrier Reef? Is it dying?

The Great Barrier Reef is under threat from lots of things. The biggest of these is climate change. So the oceans are becoming warmer more acidic and have low oxygen conditions. They're also being exposed to more frequent and intense storm activity. This is combined with local stresses such as changes in water quality that threaten the ability of corals to live and survive. Since the 1980s we've seen declining coral cover on the Great Barrier Reef, but importantly the reef's not dead. Some areas have been severely impacted and we are at a real risk of the reef looking different into the future, but hope's not lost yet.

What makes the Great Barrier Reef so unique?

What makes the Great Barrier Reef so unique is its size, how big it is, the fact that it's got so much biodiversity. It's made up of over 2,000 individual reefs. And so collectively this makes it a home to many marine creatures and just an amazing ecosystem on this planet.

We've all heard of the Great Barrier Reef. Are there other reefs, and do they face similar challenges?

There are other reefs around the world and although we know a lot about the Great Barrier Reef here in Australia because of its size and also because it's such an Australian icon. there are reefs around the world that also provide really important functions to communities where they're found. So, for example, they're found in the Caribbean, they're found around Africa, we find them around the Indo-Pacific. And these reefs like the Australian Great Barrier Reef provide important resources economic and social value.

Why are coral reefs so important for our oceans and marine life?

This is a great question. Coral reefs are so important because they cover less than 1% of the ocean floor but are home to over 25% of marine life. So reefs form this structure on the ocean floor that is crucial to support biodiversity and also has knock-on effects to the surrounding ecosystems, providing habitat sometimes for juvenile fish but also playing an important role in nutrient cycling as well.

What does the future look like for the Great Barrier Reef?

So the future looks uncertain for the Great Barrier Reef and a lot of predictions suggest that actually the reef will look very different, that we'll continue to lose coral cover and the reason for that is the severe rate of ocean warming that compromises the ability of corals to survive. So ultimately, we have to tackle climate change to change that narrative and try to ensure that there is a future for corals.

What activities are you and other scientists, communities and government doing to protect and regenerate the Great Barrier Reef?

A lot is happening at the moment. We are at a point where the risk to our reefs both here in Australia and globally is requiring everyone to come together to try and come up with innovative solutions to ultimately buy time for coral reefs while we tackle climate change. So I consider it like a toolbox of approaches that are being applied and this includes scientists governments, communities, industries, businesses coming together to try to work out how we can aid coral reefs. So some of the processes such as active intervention – how can we as individuals actively engage with the reef to boost its resilience – so things like coral propagation and planting assisted evolution, trying to remove stresses from the reef like crown of thorn starfish. These are all ways we can try and boost the resilience of the reef. But also we need to look at ways that we can actually finance these things sustainably and that's where businesses and industries come in to actually work collectively to try and secure a more promising future for the reef.

What's your favourite species of coral and why?

I get asked this question a lot and my favourite species of coral is one called acropora. It's a branching coral species. And the reason that I say this is my favourite species is that when I go into extreme systems where we wouldn't expect corals to particularly be able to survive things, like mangrove lagoons that are hot acidic, have low oxygen environments, we find these acropora often surviving there. And that's really surprising because we often think of these branching corals as being quite susceptible to stress. And so I like to think of the acropora as being an example of resilience and also of hope for reefs.

Just how big is the Great Barrier Reef?

The Great Barrier Reef is the size of Italy. It is a big structure visible from space made up of over 2,000 individual coral reefs.

What can I do to protect and care for the Great Barrier Reef?

This is such a great question because even if you've never seen a reef, you don't live near a reef, your actions impact reefs around the world. The biggest threat to our coral reefs is changing climate. So any actions that we can take as individuals to reduce our impact on the planet. So reusing driving our car less,  taking action, making sure we vote for people that care about the environment. All of these actions can make us connected to the reef and ultimately help shape the future of the reef and the environment as a whole. 

Is the crown-of-thorns starfish still as big of a threat as it used to be?

So crown of thorns are still a threat to the reef particularly in areas where there is poor water quality, and this can lead to them rapidly increasing in numbers. But there's been a lot of effort to try and improve the water quality management onto the reef. And also the marine park authority have an effort to cull and remove crown of thorn starfish when there are these outbreaks to stop them taking over the reef. So at the moment some really good management programs in place to try and reduce this threat to the reef.

What is coral bleaching?

We can think of corals as a factory and then the microscopic algae as the solar panels that give that factory its energy and then the bacteria and the viruses are the workers that move things around and they all work in harmony when the environment is good. But when things like temperature become too high that partnership breaks down and actually the algae then leaves the coral and so the coral turns white. And it's not dead at this point but because the algae is left we can see the white skeleton underneath. Hence we say the coral's bleached. And if you think about that factory analogy when we lose the solar panels when we lose those algo cells the animal is basically starving. It has a short period of time that it can survive. And if the stress doesn't go then the coral will eventually die. But if the stress does start to go or become less then they can actually reacquire the algae and begin to recover and function again.

What does a healthy reef look like?

A healthy coral reef will have a diversity of corals, but it'll also have a diversity of life on it from the really microscopic um bacteria that we cannot see all the way up to the apex predators like sharks. And so we want to have that biodiverse ecosystem there to support a healthy functioning reef system. 

How do I positively interact with the reef?

If you get the opportunity, go visit the reef because that gives you the opportunity to fall in love with this amazing ecosystem and see firsthand how important reefs are – not only for marine life, but for communities around the world. If you are lucky enough to visit a reef, do your research. Go with people that um care about the reef, companies that are sustainable, that are ensuring practices that that don't harm the reef, but also your individual actions. So make sure that you're not touching the reef, you don't take anything but your memories with you and ensure that if any um creatures come by if you're lucky enough to see a shark um just give it some space. Um it's not going to bother you and you get to see and be a part of their magical underwater world. 

That was all the questions for today I hope you learned something new If you'd like to dive deeper into my research and the search for super corals to build more resilient reefs scroll down and check out the links in the description below. Until next time stay curious.

Hello curious people. I'm Dr Alex Baumber, a sustainability researcher and academic at UTS.

This is Sustainability Curious. Let's get started.

Do my everyday choices really make a difference and which ones matter most?

Yeah, that's a really good question. I think there's lots of things you can do in your everyday life. From the products that you decide to buy and thinking carefully about that through to the energy that you use in your home.

For example, you can buy more energy efficient appliances, or you might be in a position to put solar panels or batteries in your home or switch to an electric car. All of those things can add up to making a really big impact. But I'm also a big believer that it's not just about individuals, and we really need to think also about good government policy, ethical business practices and, great design that can all contribute to helping people to make those decisions in their everyday lives.

When a company says their product is green, how can I tell a product is green and it's not just marketing?

So this problem of greenwashing, as it sometimes gets called, can be a really big issue. I think the trick here is to look for reputable sources of information. So maybe government labels around energy efficiency or water efficiency that that have that verification. Or, reputable non-government organisations like the Forest Stewardship Council or the Marine Stewardship Council for seafood products can be a really good guide to to what's reliable and what's not.

Are individuals being asked to do too much compared to big organisations and industries?

I think I would say yes and no to that one. It really depends which industries you're talking about. I think there's some industries, like the energy sector, where they've had to make really big transitions, and you've seen this huge uptake in renewable energy, which has been driven by government policy and regulation. Also, I work in the farming sector where you do see those regulatory pressures come through. 

But then I think there's other industries maybe like fashion, where there's not much of that pressure happening, and you get this idea of fast fashion where people buy things and throw them away really quickly and buy more. And there's not a lot of, of pressure on those industries to change. The pressure is more on, on individuals to make different choices and, and maybe recycle or reuse. So I think, yeah, it really depends. But I guess my view is I'd like to see a little do more across all of those areas, more pressure on the industries and the businesses to, to do more, but also more awareness amongst individuals about the choices they're making.

Is there an industry where you see the biggest opportunity for sustainable change?

Well, I'd probably give two answers to that. I think energy jumps out because there's such an opportunity that a huge impact, and it's perhaps the area where we really need to make the biggest transition, shifting away from from the use of fossil fuels towards renewable energy.

But one that's perhaps closer to my heart is the agriculture sector. There's really huge opportunities for win wins in that space where you can actually change the way you manage the land, improve the productivity of your farming enterprise, but also increase the soil carbon level. And that sucks carbon out of the atmosphere, helps to mitigate climate change.

And then it also helps to make the land more resilient and sustainable for the farming enterprise as well.

Can sustainability be solved through science alone?

Well, I initially trained as a scientist, so I definitely have a soft spot for science. But over time I've actually shifted away more into the social science and the policy space. So I'm very much of the view that it takes all of these different fields and more. So, business law, design, health, all of these different disciplines working together is really where we can make a huge difference around sustainability.

And it's not just disciplinary knowledge or expert knowledge. It's also about that drawing on that local knowledge, indigenous knowledges and, practice based knowledges from all sorts of people who aren't academics in their ivory tower. So yeah, it really takes all of these things.

Who drives sustainable change the most? Governments, industry, communities or individuals?

Well, I think this is really an all of the above kind of answer, but if I had to pick one, I'd probably say communities, because I think communities have the power to influence all of those other areas as well.

So really, governments ultimately answer to their community, and it's the community that puts pressure on government and tells our politicians what we'd like to see. Communities also put pressure on businesses and tell them what kind of products and services and how they should be delivered. And also communities put pressure on individuals and a lot of sustainable change really happens through the changing of social norms that that influences the individual, everyday decisions that people make.

What are the trade offs between environmental goals and economic realities when designing sustainable solutions?

Well, I think if you zoom out and look at the big picture over the long term, there really isn't a trade off because you need to have a healthy environment in order to have a healthy economy and vice versa.

But in the short term, and at the local scale, you do find that there are trade offs. And sometimes that's because the new sustainable solutions that are emerging might be more expensive to start with. But over time they might actually come down and be more competitive.

And we've seen that with solar panels, for example, which, you know, 15 years ago were much more expensive than fossil fuels. But we've managed to bring down the the production costs through technology improvements and production and installation improvements. But I also think the other factor that comes into it is that we don't always fully cost the impacts of some of the unsustainable things that we do at the moment.

So, for example, with fossil fuels for energy, we don't fully factor in the cost of the climate change that comes with that. And if you did actually do that calculation, we had to pay the full costs associated with using those, those fossil fuels. You'd find that the economics are quite different to the way they appear today.

Why can unconventional or grassroots approaches be so powerful?

Well, there's probably two different elements to that one. I think the unconventional is really important because you need people who challenge existing ways of doing things and think outside the box.

Otherwise you're just going to continue to to implement things the way we've been doing them before or make very small incremental changes. So you really need those creative thinkers who can see what doesn't currently exist.

I think the grass roots side of things is related, but it also really draws on the benefit of that local knowledge and that deep understanding of a particular context that people have.

And I guess a good example from my own research of that is, around rural communities and farming communities. And the way the land care movement sprung up in the 1980s from that really close connection between people on the land, working the land, producing food and fibre.

And environmental conservation, people who are interested in how we can improve the health of the landscape. 

And it's a great example of where those two things were able to be brought together, rather than the conflict that we sometimes see when we try to trade off production systems versus environment.

What do people mean when they talk about social license?

So social licence is really based on an analogy with a regulatory licence. The kind of regulatory licence you might need to start a new mine or a factory, but instead it says, look, what if it's the surrounding community that really needs to give this social licence?

So you need to convince the people who live in that space and interact with it the opportunity to tell you whether what you're doing is acceptable or not. And that requires companies to think and act in a different way instead of just going to the government and and trying to get a licence from them, they actually have to really interact with the local community and talk about things like who's going to be at the costs of this activity, who's going to, receive the benefits. Do we think that those are distributed fairly? Is this a legitimate activity? Are the actors who are carrying it out legitimate in the community as well. So it's really a big trust building exercise. And we've seen this play out in lots of different sectors in Australia.

So mining and forestry, a couple of great examples, but also things that can actually have an environmental benefit like wind farms. If you don't get the social licence story right, you might actually jeopardise the environmental benefits that you're trying to achieve.

How can innovation, policy and collaboration help turn climate goals into practical action?

Well, this one really goes to the heart of the research that I do. I do a lot of research in the agricultural sector. So I guess that's my, my go to place, where you seen a lot of really great innovation around things like carbon farming, where that involves people changing their farming practices to increase carbon levels in the soil and the vegetation. There's been a really great level of, of policy innovation.

Australia's been a real leader, and other countries are starting to look at what Australia's been doing in that space to try to create the right incentives, but also to give farmers particular methods and guidance on what they can do, and then set up a verification system to make sure these these benefits are actually real.

But I think you see it in other sectors as well, particularly energy, where you've seen, we've got the technological side of things with things like solar and wind, but you really need the right policy environment to get those things rolled out and incentivise them within the system. And then, of course, along the way, that creates a whole bunch of different challenges where the collaboration comes in between the industry sector, the government, and, and individual consumers and people putting solar panels on their roofs and things like that, to to really think about the how the whole system can come together to deliver that sustainable transition. 

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