Category Archives: Sustainability
Good grief: grappling with eco distress
The feature piece below appeared in this week’s Business Post Magazine, under the heading ‘Distress signals from Earth: the new condition of ‘eco-grief’. This is a subject that has long been close to my heart and no doubt for most … Continue reading
Can the farmer and the environmentalist really be friends?
The piece below ran in the Farming Independent in early September. It started out life as a rebuttal of a recent piece by a Findo columnist and dairy farmer, which did a lot of indignant huffing and puffing about an An … Continue reading
Overshooting ourselves in both feet
How much money have you got in your current account? What about your savings? Imagine if by now, you had already spent all your income for 2020, and you were forced to live on borrowings for the next four months. … Continue reading
Posted in Biodiversity, Global Warming, Sustainability
Tagged deforestation, Overshoot, plastic
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SUV fad puts us into fast lane towards climate breakdown
I’ll admit to having never been a big fan of SUVs. It’s fine if you’re one of a tiny handful of people who actually need a 4×4 in your trade, but there seems little reason for regular folk to be … Continue reading
Ecocide: the greatest crime against humanity and nature
It is extraordinary that ecocide is not formally recognised and codified as a crime under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. There are surely few greater crimes than the deliberate destruction of entire ecosystems, in many cases leading directly … Continue reading
Posted in Biodiversity, Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Sustainability
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Sweden points way towards a lower carbon future
My debut contribution to The Business Post was published in early July on the paper’s Comment page. In the last year or two the Business Post has significantly upped its coverage and focus on environmental topics (reporter, Daniel Murray did … Continue reading
Posted in Economics, Energy, Global Warming, Sustainability
Tagged Business Post, carbon tax, Kevin Anderson, nuclear, Sweden
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Long day’s journey into the ecological abyss
My review of Mark O’Connell’s ‘Notes from an Apocalypse’ was published on Cassandra Voices in May. It’s an intriguing, engaging and often hilarious read, leavened with plenty of graveyard humour. If, like me, you’ve been staring into the fast-approaching ecological … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Psychology, Sustainability
Tagged Mark O'Connell, Preppers, Refugees
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Coronavirus an appetiser for what climate breakdown has in store
The piece below ran on Thejournal.ie in early May, and to my surprise, made quite an impact, with over 83,000 views, 142 online comments and thousands of tweets and reposts on social media. Thejournal.ie is now very much part of … Continue reading
Posted in Biodiversity, Global Warming, Habitat/Species, Pollution, Psychology, Sustainability
Tagged Coronavirus, Green Party, IPCC, pandemic, Paris Agreement, WMO
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Approaching the Precipice
My review of ‘The Precipice’ by moral philosopher, Toby Ord appeared in The Irish Times on May 1st. It’s an intriguing exercise, with Ord estimating humanity at having a one-in-six chance of becoming extinct by the end of this century. … Continue reading
Posted in Biodiversity, Global Warming, Sustainability
Tagged extinction, Nuclear war, The Precipice, Toby Ord
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Earth Day – 50 years later, and deeper in ecological debt
This is piece ran on Cassandra Voices on April 22nd, the 50th anniversary of the inaugural Earth Day in 1970: FIFTY years ago today, more than twenty million people took to the streets in towns and cities across the U.S. … Continue reading
Climate change making a tough situation worse in sub-Saharan Africa
Though it genuinely feels like a couple of years, it is in fact only a number of weeks since I returned from a working trip to Zambia towards the end of February. The main purpose of the visit was to … Continue reading
Posted in Agriculture, Global Warming, Sustainability
Tagged Africa, drought, Kariba Dam, Self Help Africa, Zambia
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Meat & dairy sector turns to chemical industry PR playbook
Below, my article as published on the investigative website, Desmog UK on October 4th. Ireland’s meat and dairy industries have been feeling the heat, both from a public turning increasingly towards vegetarian and vegan options as concern over the environmental … Continue reading
Posted in Agriculture, Agriculture, Global Warming, Irish Focus, Pollution, Sustainability
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Why you should take to the streets with your children
Below, my article as it appeared in the Irish Times on September 20th, to coincide with the Student March for climate, which saw some 20,000 take to the streets of Dublin, with thousands more joining protests in cities and towns … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Irish Focus, Media, Sustainability
Tagged Children's Strike, Extinction Rebellion, Greta Thunberg, OPEC
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The Story of the Decade – Media and Climate Change
Below, my piece as commissioned as one of a series of retrospective articles to mark the 10th anniversary of the Irishenvironment.com website, run by Bob Hernan. THIS TIME 10 years ago, the portents for real climate action seemed genuinely encouraging. … Continue reading
2029 – A letter from the future
We live in consequential times. “What we do over the next 10 years will determine the future of humanity for the next 10,000 years”, is how former UK chief scientific advisor Prof David King put it recently. There is no … Continue reading
Posted in Global Warming, Psychology, Sceptics, Sustainability
Tagged Arctic, heatwave, IPCC, Long Emergency, permafrost, Village Magazine
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