There’s something freeing about ending the workday and shutting off that professional part of your brain — or so we’ve heard. It’s not exactly our experience at The Narwhal, but many of us also wouldn’t have it any other way.

When your job involves reading, writing and sharing stories of the natural world, you can’t help but find glimpses of it all around you: whether in interacting with nature — The Narwhal team loves a good walk (and more rugged adventures that we won’t get into here, but do in our members newsletter) — or reading about it. 

Over a year of ups and downs in really every way possible, many of us found comfort and entertainment in books and, at times, gravitated toward titles that touch on the topics we cover at The Narwhal.

From toiling in vineyards to unearthing ancient Celtic wisdom on the natural world, these stories captivated us, and were a reminder of why we are so lucky to do what we do.

From our bookshelves to yours, here are a few books we read in 2025.

Wine 

By Meg Bernhard 

American indie press Bloomsbury bills its Object Lessons series as “a book series about the hidden lives of ordinary things.” In her entry on one of humanity’s most beloved libations, journalist Meg Bernhard pens a beautiful, personal meditation on wine and the complex cultural, social and environmental issues underpinning her favourite drink. Framed through her experiences being introduced to wine in her 20s and then working on vineyards in Spain, where she came to appreciate wine as both an agricultural product and an art form, Bernhard offers a fresh and surprisingly moving account of a centuries-old beverage. Weaving seamlessly between the intimate — detailing her family’s relationship to alcohol and the women winemakers who helped develop her palate — and systemic — exploring sexism in the wine industry, migrant agricultural work and the effects of climate change — Bernhard manages to combine memoir, travel writing and journalistic reportage to produce a book that is anything but a stuffy treatise on tasting notes and point scales (it may actually make you rethink the former). It’s the perfect gift for the wine lover in your life who cares about complicating the narrative and good writing. 

-Paloma Pacheco, assistant editor

To Speak for the Trees

By Diana Beresford-Kroeger

Orphaned at a young age, Diana Beresford-Kroeger was raised by her bachelor uncle, whose vast library — and quiet evenings spent reading beside him — formed her school years in County Cork, Ireland. She spent summers with her great aunt and uncle in the Lisheens Valley, learning the language of trees and their fundamental role in our existence, even after so much of Ireland’s forests were logged by the Brits. To Speak for the Trees follows these summers working with her Celtic elders and the earth, gleaning an incredible depth of knowledge from both. It continues as she marries this understanding with academic scientific study to become a highly recognized author, botanist and biochemist, now based outside Ottawa, and a leader in climate change solutions; if each person planted a tree a year for the next six years, we could heal the Earth, she simply notes. She closes the book with the Ogham script, the alphabet of the old Irish language with each letter corresponding to a tree — their essential role in our lives intrinsically written. It’s a retelling of ancient wisdom for a new audience that desperately needs to hear it.

-Elaine Anselmi, bureau chief

Black Bear

By Trina Moyles

Through all of Yukon-based journalist Trina Moyles’ reporting (some of it for The Narwhal), her deep connection to both rural and remote areas and the people and animals that live in them shines through. Black Bear, in a way, explains the roots of that empathy. Moyles grew up in northwestern Alberta in Peace Country, where growing up as a young girl, bears were an ever-present part of reality. But they weren’t the only threat Moyles — and other young women — learned to live with. “Our coming of age in a resource town in northern Alberta would require different survival strategies,” she writes. “I would learn how to fawn and please, but also how to physically fend off an attack and defuse threats — not only from bears, but from boys and men.” Her memoir is a beautiful tangle of interconnected narratives. To learn to survive as a young woman in a “hard-drinking resource town,” Moyles signed up for a self-defence course — taught by a conservation officer with a black belt in karate who had worked for the government to set leg snares for bears. But Moyles doesn’t focus on childhood alone. The book is about “coexistence with bears in the boreal forest,” and a reflection on what she learned from her dad, a bear biologist, along the way. Come for the bears, but stay for the heart-wrenching and personal story.

-Sharon J. Riley, managing editor

The One-straw Revolution

By Masanobu Fukuoka

A microbiologist and plant pathologist, Masanobu Fukuoka (1913-2008) turned away from “modern” agriculture in 1937 and looked instead to nature, learning how to grow food by mimicking natural processes using a method he called shizen nōhō (自然農法) — “Do-Nothing” farming. His 1975 manifesto is a practical guide to farming techniques and principles that helped spur movements like permaculture and regenerative agriculture — and it’s also a philosophical treatise on aligning ourselves to the rhythms of the land. Interspersed between chapters on rice cultivation, how to help soil regenerate its microbiome and the perils of large-scale commercial farming, Fukuoka offers moments of commentary on why he believes a return to nature is necessary. “Human beings are the only animals who have to work,” he writes, “and I think this is the most ridiculous thing in the world.” Instead, he suggests by attuning ourselves to the land to harvest only what we need to live, we are “simply doing what needs to be done.”

-Matt Simmons, reporter

We’re suing the RCMP to fight for press freedom

In November 2021, photojournalist Amber Bracken was arrested by the RCMP while on assignment for The Narwhal. So we launched a lawsuit to take a stand for press freedom. Now, we’re in the middle of our trial.

Gliff 

By Ali Smith

What begins with an homage to fairy tales — siblings named Briar and Rose are abandoned in a cottage by their mother and her boyfriend, and left to fend for themselves — evolves into a strange and lovely story about humanity and collective resistance. The title, Gliff, comes from a Scottish word for a fleeting glance or moment, and is also the name Rose gives to a horse she finds in a pasture behind the house. The siblings exist on the margins of a world like our own — everyone is absorbed in their phones and ruled by algorithms — but the sinister aspects of technological dependence and state surveillance have been cranked up a notch; by the end you’ll want to throw your phone in a lake. Ali Smith has an abiding and empathetic interest in outsiders, and an unparalleled facility for pleasurable wordplay; her sentences romp across vast green fields of meaning, offering an essential template for examining a troubled world clearly — and without losing hope. 

-Michelle Cyca, bureau chief

Pests: How Humans Create Animal Villains

By Bethany Brookshire

Bethany Brookshire offers a thoughtful and engaging exploration of the relationships human beings have with the creatures that share our world, whether we want them to or not. What makes an animal a pest? Why are some venerated as wildlife and others pampered as pets? In most cases, those categorizations “aren’t about the animals themselves, they’re about us,” Brookshire writes. From pigeons to pachyderms — yes, some elephants are considered pests! — each chapter examines the histories, misconceptions and contradictions we hold about the animals we love to hate. You’ll learn at least as much about human nature and culture as you will about the critters we’ve branded as vermin for insisting on existing in the spaces we’ve claimed as our own.

-Shannon Waters, reporter

Nerve: A Personal Journey Through the Science of Fear

By Eva Holland 

What does it look like to face your biggest fears? And why do our brains get so scared? These are some of the questions that Whitehorse-based journalist and writer Eva Holland answers through her book Nerve. Eva’s willingness to let you into her brain as she navigates her mother’s death and how it connects to her crippling fear of heights makes for an incredible read. As do her efforts to overcome that fear, including from the tops of mountains. Like any good journalist (and one who has written for The Narwhal before), Eva digs into the facts and presents the science behind fear, making a compelling case for why we need fear in our lives and how to navigate it.

-Lindsay Sample, bureau chief 

The Best of The Raven

By Russ Rutter and Dan Strickland

While visiting Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario this year, I discovered a real gem of environmental science writing. The park’s newsletter, The Raven, has been published fairly regularly since 1960, and The Friends of Algonquin Park has produced anthologies of the newsletter’s best issues. I devoured these anthologies in 2025, drawn in by the accessible science writing, but also by the natural and cultural history captured by these archival newsletters. Read as a whole, they document a changing ecosystem, covering, for example, the collapse of Algonquin’s deer population in the mid-20th century. The newsletters also describe the shifting ways humans have engaged with nature in the park; I was intrigued to learn that before those deer disappeared, they would congregate on the shoulder of Highway 60 and eat from the hands of park visitors. These Raven anthologies are a great read for any lover of Algonquin Park. As for my next discovery, I was recently tipped off to the existence of The Crow, a parody of The Raven produced by park employees in the 1970s and available to view at the Algonquin archives!

-Will Pearson, assistant editor

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

On a late afternoon in early October, Anja Hutgens and Hans Kirschbaum walk out of their home at the edge of an expansive field dotted with black Angus cows in B.C.’s south Peace River region. They herd their two dogs into the back of their pickup truck and drive up the long, steep dirt driveway that takes them into a world they used to love but now barely recognize.

After the ascent from the bucolic valley bottom, Kirschbaum guides the truck onto an industrial gravel road. Soon the couple passes by a natural gas processing plant, where a spire of flame shoots out of a tall flare stack. Beyond that lies a cavernous industrial water pit, filled with water from the nearby Pine River. And beyond that, a deforested patch of land dominated by two giant steel containers painted a Mediterranean blue and filled to near capacity with a menacing brew of rust-coloured wastewater. Strips of colourful plastic flagging hang above the containers, known as C-rings, to warn ducks and geese to stay out. Birds would quickly die in the stuff. Cows would perish drinking it.

At the entrance to the clearing, the natural gas company operating in the immediate region, Crew Energy, has posted a sign emblazoned with the internationally recognized radiation warning symbol. Beside the symbol is another sign saying that “NORM” may be in the neighbourhood.

The unassuming acronym, Hutgens matter-of-factly explains, stands for naturally occurring radioactive materials. But there is nothing natural about radioactive elements including radium, thallium and selenium suddenly appearing on the threshold of Hutgens and Kirschbaum’s home and ranch. Something brought those potentially dangerous contaminants to their doorstep, and that something is the natural gas industry.

Contaminated fracking wastewater fills two C-rings at the top of the hill above Penalty Ranch. Photo: Jayce Hawkins / The Narwhal

Hutgens and Kirschbaum have been here before and know what to look for. They walk up to a spongy piece of industrial cloth lying at the base of one of the C-rings. The cloth is there to absorb any wastewater that may spill as trucks offload it into the tanks. 

Hutgens pulls a small device about the size of a cellphone out of her coat pocket and turns it on. It’s a Geiger counter, which detects radiation. She lowers it until it almost touches the cloth. Instantly, clicks begin to emanate from the counter as radioactive particles interact with gas inside the counter’s chamber. 

It doesn’t take long for the counter to record 100 clicks per minute, at which point an alarm goes off. But the clicks just keep coming, before topping out at 170 counts per minute, meaning the radiation level here is much higher than the normal, naturally occurring background radiation that surrounds us at low levels from sources such as the sun. 

Hutgens and Kirschbaum have repeatedly asked Crew Energy and the BC Oil and Gas Commission to test the water inside the C-rings as well as the accumulated muck at the bottom of them, but they say the company has refused, leading the couple to take matters into their own hands so they know what they’re up against.

Anja Hutgens holds a Geiger counter, which detects radiation, above a piece of cloth placed along a C-ring to collect spilled wastewater. Soon, an alarm starts to sound. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

Anja Hutgens and Hans Kirschbaum rely on a Geiger counter to get an idea of what’s in the wastewater in the C-rings by their property because they say the company that owns them refuses to reveal any information. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

After turning the Geiger counter off, Hutgens and Kirschbaum return to the pickup truck, which is parked just in front of a metal grid known as a cattle guard that’s intended to keep their cows from wandering onto the site.

“We’re not against the gas industry,” Hutgens says. “I mean, we all need those resources. We all depend on it as well. But there need to be boundaries. And first of all, we must protect our water resources, which is the most important thing of all.”

Water is everything to ranchers and B.C.’s natural gas industry

Water is everything to the Peace River region’s ranchers and farmers. But it’s also everything to the region’s natural gas industry. And as that industry rapidly expands its water-intensive fracking operations, people like Hutgens and Kirschbaum fear their critical water sources could dry up or become poisoned.

During fracking, tremendous volumes of water, sand and chemicals are pumped at extreme pressure into rock formations deep below ground. The earthquake-inducing force at which all that water is pumped busts open or fractures the rock, allowing trapped oil and gas to be released. But much of the pumped water then flows back to the surface, contaminated with whatever it has come into contact with underground. Typically, it is so salty that it would be lethal to all aquatic life if it was piped into a stream. Other contaminants typically include trace metals, chemicals and hydrocarbons. And yes, sometimes, radioactive materials. 

Anja Hutgens isn’t against the natural gas industry, but she wants it to respect water resources. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

Hans Kirschbaum’s father bought Penalty Ranch 40 years ago, back when there was much less industrial activity in the Peace River region. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

The amount of wastewater being generated by the fracking industry is dizzying. In just the immediate vicinity, there are as many as 21 C-rings belonging to Crew Energy, each capable of holding 5,000 cubic metres of wastewater — enough to fill two Olympic-sized swimming pools. If just a fraction of that water spilled or seeped into the ground at the wrong place, the consequences could be devastating for their ranch. 

And Crew Energy is just one of many companies operating in the region. Other companies — including Ovintiv (formerly Encana), Shell and Canadian Natural Resources — have even bigger operations, producing greater volumes of wastewater. 

For 40 years, a natural spring has been the primary source of drinking water at Penalty Ranch, which was purchased by Kirschbaum’s father 40 years ago after he journeyed to northeast B.C. from his home in Bavaria, Germany. The spring is also an essential water source for the couple’s 300 head of thirsty cattle. 

Hutgens and Kirschbaum’s greatest fear is that the industrial activity at the top of the hill above their ranch will lead to the contamination of their water.

In July, Crew Energy received permits from the BC Oil and Gas Commission to dramatically increase the amount of wastewater stored near the ranch. The company’s plan involves building two massive wastewater pits and retiring all but eight of its C-rings. 

Each pit would require excavating holes deep into the earth. The pits would then be lined with three layers of thick industrial plastic and filled with up to 60,000 cubic metres of wastewater each. If the pits proceed, it will mean that eventually Crew Energy can store enough wastewater — potentially radioactive — to fill 64 Olympic-sized swimming pools close to the ranch and Worth Marsh, a body of water that may be the spring’s water source.

Anja Hutgens gives reporter Ben Parfitt a tour of Penalty Ranch. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

In an effort to stop this plan from moving forward, Hutgens and Kirschbaum appealed to the quasi-judicial Oil and Gas Appeal Tribunal to rescind the permits. A video hearing was held earlier this month and the couple expects a ruling by the early new year.

In documents filed with the tribunal, Crew Energy said digging the pits will ultimately save it millions of dollars because it will no longer have to truck its wastewater to dispersed C-rings. 

But Hutgens and Kirschbaum say the pits pose a danger far greater than the C-rings. They’re bigger and they’re sunk into the earth. If the pits leak — as similar pits have — the highly toxic water will enter the ground deep below the surface, where it can more readily contaminate aquifers that feed springs. 

“Our biggest worry is our natural spring, our water situation. If we were to lose that, or it became contaminated, it would simply be devastating to our business. I do not see how we could get over that,” Hutgens says, as a gust of wind whips her thick mop of hair about.

Underscoring her concerns, just a short distance away, one of the couple’s cows tilts its head into a pipe to drink the spring water trickling down to the field from the wooded slope above. 

Hans Kirschbaum (left), Anja Hutgens and reporter Ben Parfitt discuss the impacts the natural gas industry is having on agricultural lands. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

B.C. oil and gas versus cattle and crops

When farming and fossil fuel interests butt heads, oil and gas almost always trumps cattle and crops. And the stakes just keep getting higher. The more wells the industry drills and fracks, the more water it uses. The more water it uses, the more wastewater it generates — waste that is rarely if ever treated because it is so toxic.

Much of natural gas development, as previously reported in The Narwhal, now occurs directly on farms or agricultural leases that farmers hold on Crown or publicly owned lands. Significantly, many of those lands are in B.C.’s Agricultural Land Reserve. 

When the reserve was created in 1973, it was hailed as one of the most progressive pieces of farm-protecting legislation in the world. It was designed to bring an end to the steady erosion of farmland in the province, which was then losing about 6,000 to 7,000 hectares each year to other land uses, particularly urban development.

A cow drinks natural spring water at the Penalty Ranch. The spring lies between the ranch and heavily contaminated wastewater storage sites. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

Penalty Ranch is home to 300 head of thirsty cow, which rely on spring water that could be contaminated by encroaching natural gas operations. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

But despite the reserve, fossil fuel industry development continues to erode the farmland base in the energy-rich northeast corner of the province.  

“The development of the energy sector has exceeded the capacity of the current regulatory environment to protect farmland,” concluded a committee appointed by Agriculture Minister Lana Popham to examine threats posed to the reserve. 

The committee, chaired by former independent MLA Vicki Huntington, went on to note in its 2018 report that unrelenting energy industry incursions on farmlands in northeast B.C. were making it “increasingly difficult for many farmers and ranches to effectively use their land.”  

The committee called on the government to ensure that provincial agencies like the BC Oil and Gas Commission worked more closely with the B.C. Ministry of Agriculture to help the province’s “increasingly besieged agricultural sector.”

Oil and Gas Appeal Tribunal has sided with industry in the past

Hutgens and Kirschbaum must now wait to see what the tribunal does in response to their pleas, but they know their chances of success are not good.

Penalty Ranch obtained agricultural leases from the B.C. Ministry of Forests decades ago allowing it to graze its cattle on some of the same Crown or publicly owned lands where Crew Energy later set up operations.

In 2016, alarmed by the company’s encroaching operations, Hutgens and Kirschbaum filed an appeal with the tribunal, asking it to rescind Crew Energy’s permits from the BC Oil and Gas Commission allowing it to clear two patches of land in preparation for drilling and fracking five new gas wells. 

They lost that appeal but were back before the tribunal again a year later fighting another Crew Energy plan to build three more gas well pads and drill and frack another 22 gas wells. Some of that drilling and fracking would run under Worth Marsh, according to Crew Energy’s diagrams.

Hans Kirschbaum (left), Anja Hutgens and Ben Parfitt watch the ranchers’ cattle graze on land that could be compromised by nearby industrial development. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

Hutgens and Kirschbaum were concerned that drilling and fracking could disrupt and contaminate water flows from Worth Marsh — in turn harming their spring.

But the tribunal ultimately dismissed the couple’s appeals because the lands owned outright by Penalty Ranch were not directly impacted by the proposed industrial activities, only its agricultural leases were.

The couple also argued Crew could easily move elsewhere as the company had rights to drill and frack over a wide area of land. Already 10 pipelines, 50 gas wells, 12 C-rings and one large freshwater storage pit was located on lands leased by Penalty Ranch. 

But once again, the tribunal was not swayed.

Crew Energy refuses to reveal information about toxic waste

In documents filed with the tribunal, Crew Energy said the toxic water entering the pits following the fracking process will “undergo a filtration and separation process” before being pumped in.

But when The Narwhal emailed Paul Dever, Crew Energy’s vice-president, to ask about the company’s treatment plans, he refused to answer any questions and declined an interview request.

Questions included: where does Crew Energy take radioactive waste for disposal? Where does the company truck any of the muck that accumulates at the bottom of such pits? And what does Crew plan to do should one or both pits fail?

Crew Energy refused to answer questions about how it handles toxic waste in its C-rings and how it will handle such waste from its proposed pits. Photo: Jayce Hawkins / The Narwhal

“Crew Energy Inc. adheres to legislative and regulatory requirements regarding its operations in British Columbia, as regulated by the British Columbia Oil and Gas Commission,” Dever said in a brief email.

Dever did not expand on what those requirements were. But a scientific review of fracking operations released by a panel of experts in June 2019 found that radioactive material can accumulate in tanks and pits at fracking operations and B.C.’s regulations governing potentially radioactive waste in such pits is not as rigorous as it could be.

After reviewing wastewater pits at several fracking operations across B.C., the panel characterized the risk of leaks from containment ponds as “moderate to high.” 

Two experts interviewed for the review told the panel’s three scientists that “they were not aware of any studies on NORM in B.C., and that generally there is a lack of water quality data in B.C.,” especially data on NORM concentrations.

The review also found that companies themselves are responsible for identifying radioactive waste in their fracking operations and that there are no wastewater treatment facilities for radioactive water in B.C.

The panel was also told that there are virtually no searchable provincial records detailing where radioactive wastes originating in the province are sent.

Wastewater pits have failed before

Seven years ago, pits very similar to the ones Crew Energy plans to build leaked, resulting in a massive cleanup effort. The failure occurred just north of Beryl Prairie, a farming enclave about a two-hour drive from Penalty Ranch, where Talisman Energy managed four wastewater pits.

The leaks in one pit likely began in January 2013. But it was almost six months before Talisman Energy reported it to the BC Oil and Gas Commission. In the meantime, toxins flowed unchecked from the pit to the earth and groundwater below. Leaks were subsequently discovered at a second pit. As reported in The Narwhal, the contaminants initially discovered at the pit sites included arsenic, barium, cadmium, lithium and lead.

Shortly after the environmental disaster began, Talisman sold its operations in the region to Progress Energy Canada, a subsidiary of the giant state-owned Malaysian corporation, Petronas. 

Documents obtained by The Narwhal show the company that coordinated the cleanup, Secure Energy, had the muck at the bottom of the pits tested and the results confirmed the presence of radioactive radium, thorium and uranium at levels that are dangerous to people. 

This presented the company with a huge dilemma: how was it to get rid of all that radioactive waste — initially 15,000 cubic metres, or enough to fill six Olympic-sized swimming pools, according to correspondences between Secure Energy and the province.

Reporter Ben Parfitt looks onto a wastewater pit owned by Petronas, one of many natural gas companies operating in the Peace River region. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

Secure Energy tried unsuccessfully to get the Ministry of Environment to allow the muck to be pumped into a hole in the earth at a distant “disposal well” near Fort Nelson, 500 kilometres away from the pits. But disposal wells are designed to take contaminated water, not muck, and certainly not radioactive muck. The ministry declined the application.

Ultimately, Progress Energy paid for the contaminated muck to be trucked across two provincial borders to an underground salt cavern disposal facility near Unity, Sask., owned and operated by Tervita Corporation.

Tervita also owns the sprawling Silverberry Landfill — about a 45-minute drive north of Fort St. John — which received thousands of cubic metres of contaminated soils from the pits.

The Narwhal filed 11 questions with Tervita Corporation, including what fees it charges companies to drop off radioactive wastes, how much waste trucks typically deliver at a time and how waste deliveries and disposals are tracked.

But, like Crew Energy, Tervita declined to directly answer a single question.

“We take pride in responsibly managing all aspects of our business to ensure compliance with relevant environmental and safety legislation, regulations and standards,” Kelly Sansom, Tervita’s communications manager, said in an email.

Petronas owns two giant wastewater pits near the rural community of Beryl Prairie. The pits are just down the road from similar pits that failed in 2013, triggering a massive cleanup. Photo: Jayce Hawkins / The Narwhal

The costs to clean up the failed pits has never been disclosed.

But based on a previous report by The Narwhal — which detailed initial cleanup costs at another wastewater pit suspected of leaking and contaminating groundwater and soil — the cost to truck away the wastewater alone would have been in the millions of dollars. 

If companies go bankrupt, taxpayers could end up on the hook for covering some or all of the cleanup costs. 

And getting rid of the contaminated water would have been only the beginning of a laborious process involving excavating and trucking away contaminated soils, disposing of the pits’ contaminated liners and moving all the radioactive mud far, far away.

Progress Energy has now installed four much larger wastewater pits just four kilometres east of Beryl Prairie, where all signs of the environmental calamity have been wiped away. All that remains there now is a recently graded field, populated with patches of wild grasses and weeds. 

Fracking radiation ‘(literally) off the charts’: BC Oil and Gas Commission

The BC Oil and Gas Commission has long known that the shale rock formations natural gas companies typically drill into and frack can be hotspots for radiation.

According to an email obtained by The Narwhal, the commission’s senior petroleum geologist wrote to staff in 2016 to say that some of those formations “would be expected to have NORMs” at concentrations that were “(literally) off the charts.”  

Despite this, the commission does not require fracking companies to test for the presence of radioactive materials and there is no requirement for companies that do testing to submit the results to the commission.

Karen Hosford, an environmental consultant who has worked in the mining industry for companies like Teck Resources and who assisted Hutgens and Kirschbaum in preparing their appeal, calls the lack of testing requirements “crazy.” 

Crew Energy plans to replace several of its C-rings with wastewater pits, which some people say are more likely to cause serious environmental damage if they fail. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

It was that lack of a commitment that led Hutgens and Kirschbaum to ask Crew Energy if they could collect their own samples for analysis. But the company denied the request, Hosford said.

“Basically, there’s no onus on the company to do anything. They hide behind the regulator, and the regulator protects them,” Hosford told The Narwhal.

If the wastewater pits are dug near Penalty Ranch, both Crew Energy and the commission say there will be additional safeguards in place to prevent leaks. Instead of only two liners in the pits — as was the case at the environmental disaster at Beryl Prairie — there will be three.  

But that’s cold comfort to Hutgens and Kirschbaum. If two liners can fail, so can three.

Calls for Crew Energy to pay penalty in event of failure

When Kirschbaum’s father, Karl, bought Penalty Ranch, he learned the previous owner had picked the name in honour of a tradition at the ranch. If a ranch hand did something dumb like failing to latch a gate, they had to hoe a garden or muck out a horse stall as a penalty at the end of the day.

Kirschbaum doesn’t want the pits. But if they do go in, he says Crew Energy should pay a penalty of sorts if things go wrong.

Penalty Ranch’s name was inspired by a tradition at the site: if you make a mistake, you pay for it. Hans Kirschbaum would like natural gas companies to follow that same rule. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

Ranchers have raised cattle at Penalty Ranch for decades. Encroaching natural gas operations put that tradition at risk. Photo: Matt Miles / The Narwhal

If the first and second liners in the pits start to leak, Kirschbaum thinks the company should have to immediately absorb the costs associated with swiftly draining all of the water and muck out of the pits before the third layer and last line of defence fails as well. “The pit should be emptied and liner one and liner two fixed,” Kirschbaum says.

Hutgens agrees. As dusk approaches and she and Kirschbaum prepare to leave Crew’s C-rings behind, it doesn’t take a Geiger counter to see that whether the fracking industry’s wastewater is stored in a pit dug into the earth or in tanks above ground, it is dangerous stuff.

“We love living in such a beautiful place,” Hutgens says. “But it’s heartbreaking to see how our once so quiet and natural ranch is turning into an industrial site. There has to be a bit more of a balance.”

And with that, she and Kirschbaum get back in their pickup truck and head home.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

Laura Laing can’t imagine how her family would run their cow-calf operation without their Mount Livingstone grazing allotment.

These native grasslands, nestled among the hills and peaks, with Cabin Ridge Mountain rising above the pastures, support a large percentage of the Plateau Cattle Company herd from early June to the beginning of October.

“Year after year, it’s been our best-producing pasture,” said Laing, who values the benefits of the native grass, clean water and open spaces in this area for her family’s herd.

This third-generation ranch west of Nanton, Alta., like many others in southwestern Alberta, relies on being able to graze its cattle in the Mount Livingstone Range. This breathtaking landscape has been vital to numerous beef operations for decades, and it’s unfathomable to Laing that this place could soon be changed beyond recognition.

But this could be a devastating reality for many ranchers on the Eastern Slopes of the Rocky Mountains if a proposed open-pit coal mine is given the green light this fall. This is becoming more likely due to a recent change in a 44-year-old policy on coal mining in Alberta.

“You really have to fight to stay in this industry,” Laing said. “We try not to get overly emotional about it because that makes you quite reactive…We say to ourselves, ‘how could this even be a thing?’ It’s disastrous to the landscape.”

Laura Laing says she can’t imagine how her family would run their cow-calf operation without their Mount Livingstone grazing allotment, now threatened by a coal mine proposal. Photo: Leah Hennel / The Narwhal

On June 1, the province of Alberta quietly revoked the Coal Policy, which had previously restricted coal mining exploration and development in areas considered environmentally sensitive. Enacted in 1976, this legislation had regulated coal mining over four categories of land. While former Category 1 lands in the Rockies are to remain protected, the provincial government stated, Category 2 lands are now open for coal development. The change came without a public consultation period.

The lifting of restrictions on Category 2 lands, covering 1.4 million hectares of land in the foothills and Rockies deemed moderately to highly environmentally sensitive, including the Mount Livingstone Range, is especially troubling to those who rely on these lands to pasture cattle. Until now, open-pit mines had been prohibited on Category 2 lands, and underground mines were only allowed if surface impacts were considered acceptable for the environment.

“They opened up a huge swath of land that historically Albertans have said needs to remain in its natural state and be available to multiple users, to now be available for what we call mountaintop removal mining,” said Bobbi Lambright, secretary of the Livingstone Landowners Group.

This type of mining, often used for surface mines in the Appalachian Mountains of the southeastern U.S., requires the removal of all vegetation and top soil, then explosives are used to blast all the rock above the coal seam to expose it. Waste rock is moved into massive piles, and the blasting is known to release toxic elements from the rock into the environment.

A mountaintop removal metallurgical coal mine, owned and operated by Teck Resources in B.C.’s Elk Valley. The Grassy Mountain Coal Project near Blairmore, Alta., would also be a mountaintop removal mine. Photo: Jayce Hawkins / The Narwhal

This comes as the Grassy Mountain Coal Project, just north of Blairmore, Alta. Australia’s Benga Mining Limited moves through the application process for its plans to develop an open-pit metallurgical coal mine with a production capacity of up to 4.5 million tonnes of coal per year, with a lifespan of 25 years. The Grassy Mountain project is located on the site of a former coal mine on Category 4 lands so was not protected under the Coal Policy, even before it was rescinded. Benga has sought provincial and federal approval for this mine since 2014, and a public hearing is scheduled to start in October.

Mines like these raise numerous concerns for Laing, with the impact on water quality at the top of her list, as well as loss of native grasslands and the spread of coal dust toxins in an area of extreme winds.

“We’re not anti-development at all, but you’re not going to put a mountain back, you’re not going to put the native grasses back and you’re definitely not going to revert it back to pasture land after. That’s just not going to happen,” she said. “For the general public, if they look west when they’re driving the Cowboy Trail, that landscape’s going to change.”

The original extent of Canada’s native prairie grasslands. Between 75 and 90 per cent of the grasslands have been eradicated. Map: Alicia Carvalho / The Narwhal

Potential for widespread impact across Oldman River watershed

The lack of public knowledge about both the rescission of the Coal Policy and the Grassy Mountain project alarms Laing, who said she only learned about these when notified by the mining company, not the provincial government. “Everybody we speak to in the area or in the community or public users up in our grazing allotments have no idea that this passed,” she said. “The public awareness has been very low, and I don’t think that that’s a coincidence.”

This comes in the midst of a difficult economic situation, when the impacts of COVID-19 are the latest challenges facing beef producers already concerned about the financial viability of their operations. “As producers we continue to feel pressures from all areas,” said Laing, who foresees many negative affects on her grazing allotment due to coal development, such as “stress on the animals from equipment, drilling, personnel, wildlife relocation (and) predation.”

John Smith and Laura Laing cross the Livingstone River. Ranchers are concerned about the potential impact of a new coal mine on water quality. Open-pit coal mining can increase levels of selenium in rivers, which can be toxic to fish populations and contaminate drinking water. Photo: Leah Hennel / The Narwhal

The Livingstone Landowners Group is among those raising concerns about the provincial government’s sudden shift in coal development policy. This organization represents ranchers, residents and businesses in the Livingstone Range and Porcupine Hills who want to see sustainable development and good land stewardship.

Development in formerly protected Category 2 lands, Lambright stated, could have many negative affects on its ecosystems. “It’s been designated through multiple land use plans as an area that’s got a lot of native prairie, it’s got a lot of unique habitats that support endangered and at-risk species.”

This would affect all users of the land, she continued, who currently work in what can be seen as a symbiotic relationship. “If you’ve got a cattle rancher using the land, his cattle are in there, they’re grazing the native grass, they’re mitigating potential future fire hazards, they’re providing food for people through their cattle and the grassland also supports things like reducing our carbon footprint.”

Grazing animals like cattle are an essential component of a healthy grasslands ecosystem. Less than 25 per cent of Canada’s grasslands remain intact. Photo: Leah Hennel / The Narwhal

In addition to those benefits, other public users make their living on this area through guiding, outfitting and tourism, as well as those who enjoy the land for fishing, hiking and hunting. “There’s a lot of uses of that land today that essentially would be eliminated or irrevocably changed if this coal mining were to go ahead.”

The potential impact on water quality is an area of great concern for both human health and the ecosystem, Lambright said. The element selenium can be released into water and soil as a result of open pit coal mining, and currently there is no known solution to wholly mitigate its impact once in a body of water.

This proved disastrous in B.C.’s Elk River Valley, after five coal strip mines operated by Teck Resources discharged selenium and other toxic chemicals into the river. In 2018, the company was fined $1.4 million for this selenium release, which was found to have caused a collapse of the local cutthroat trout population and the contamination of several private and community wells.

Availability of water is another issue. The Grassy Mountain project is near the headwaters of the Oldman River, a vital watershed for southern Alberta. More than 45 per cent of the province relies on this watershed, which is already facing considerable supply pressure due to natural flow reductions.

“There’s been no new licences that are supposed to be issued for water out of that watershed, and the water is fundamental to people’s livelihoods in all of these other areas,” Lambright said. “This level of intense mining would require a lot of water, and it’s a bit unclear at the moment how that need would be met.”

The Milky Way above the Livingstone Ridge. Photo: Leah Hennel / The Narwhal

A complex economic issue

When the provincial government announced the Coal Policy’s rescission this spring, officials said this decision would create new opportunities for investment as well as certainty for the coal industry.

“Rescinding the outdated Coal Policy in favour of modern oversight will help attract new investment for an important industry and protect jobs for Albertans,” said Sonya Savage, provincial energy minister, in a press release.

Even before the rescission of the coal policy opened up the possibility of new mines in the eastern slopes, the economic benefits of coal were being lauded. Benga Mining officials stated the Grassy Mountain mine would create approximately 400 full-time jobs when at peak production. With the current economic challenges increasing Alberta’s ongoing unemployment, some locals see this project as a positive move. Blair Painter, mayor of Crowsnest Pass — a town founded on mining — has expressed his support for new coal projects in the area. “This community is in desperate need of industry,” Painter stated in a letter in 2019.

Although the Alberta Energy Regulator will now approve coal projects individually, it’s worth noting that the Grassy Mountain project, as well as mines proposed in former Category 2 lands, will not mine the lower-quality thermal coal mined in other parts of the province for power generation. This is higher-quality metallurgical coal, which is used to make steel and in demand from international markets. Several other Australian companies have shown interest in mining metallurgical coal in Alberta.

John Smith and Laura Laing during the Plateau Cattle Company’s fall round-up on their Mount Livingstone grazing allotment, with Cabin Ridge Mountain in the distance. Laing says the Alberta government’s decision to open up coal mining on economic grounds is short-sighted. Photo: Leah Hennel / The Narwhal

Laing sees the government’s economic argument as short sighted, given that it isn’t Alberta’s energy industry that will ultimately benefit. “Some of [the Australian companies] privately own some of the mineral rights up there, so there’s zero royalties back to Alberta, and for the ones that are getting royalties, it’s pennies on the dollar.”

Lambright agrees, adding that jobs may not be as secure as hoped in the long run, due to the fickle nature of the coal market and the industry’s push towards cutting costs through automation. In the case of Grassy Mountain, Benga Mining’s owner, Australia’s Hancock Prospecting, is “a world leader in automating mining,” she said. For example, the company owns an iron ore mine in northern Australia that is in the process of automating all its trucks, and the mine is monitored from a control centre in Perth, on the other side of the country.

‘Our mountains are who we are’

Laing and other beef producers in southwestern Alberta are working to understand the scope of this policy shift and make the wider community aware of its potential impact on the Eastern Slopes. To help create awareness, local ranchers are collaborating with a film company to create a short film for social media that highlights the area and its history. Laing hopes the film will help to drive home the importance of this place to so many Albertans.

“Our mountains are who we are,” she said. “It’s really about coming together as a community to say, ‘our grass is disappearing, and this is our environment and our watershed. This is really a very big deal.’ ”

Laing says Alberta was built on agriculture. “Agriculture is the beacon in this economic recovery. Where’s the support for that?” she asked. Photo: Leah Hennel / The Narwhal

Laing would like the provincial government to consider the impact on agriculture in these development decisions, especially when it touts coal projects as necessary to Alberta’s post-pandemic recovery. “The province built its backbone on agriculture,” she said. “Agriculture is the beacon in this economic recovery. Where’s the support for that?”

It’s even more dire given that the loss of cattle producers in Western Canada often results in the loss of endangered native grassland, something that greatly concerns Laing from both a stewardship and business perspective.

“We don’t have somewhere else to go, and that will greatly reduce the sustainability of our operation. Where are we going to find grassland for over 155 pair that go up there for the summer months? So where’s the support to the cattle industry or the ranching operations when we’re selling out these native grasslands?”

Read more: Meet the people saving Canada’s native grasslands

Updated at 9:45 a.m. on Oct. 20, 2020 to remove a quote that implied Alberta’s coal would be shipped to Australia.

Updated at 10:00am on Feb. 9, 2021 to reflect the fact that the Grassy Mountain coal project is located almost entirely on category 4 lands and the application was underway before the Alberta government rescinded the 1976 coal policy.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

Late this summer, at least 12 counties in Manitoba declared a “state of agricultural emergency.” It was too dry.

In November, two Alberta counties declared “municipal agriculture disasters.” It was too wet.

And they weren’t the first in the province to point out the difficulties farmers are facing this year.

Persistent wet weather in the Leduc area prompted the local government there to declare an agricultural disaster in September. In August, Lac Ste. Anne county, northwest of Edmonton, declared a state of agricultural disaster for the second year in a row.

In Grande Prairie, which declared an agricultural disaster in early November, county officials said in a press release that between 40 and 60 per cent of crops were still in the fields. Early snowfall, they added, was “ending any chance of increasing the figures this season.” 

This sort of volatility in weather is only expected to increase, according to Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. The federal government agency warns on its website that droughts, floods and violent storms are all predicted to increase in frequency as a result of climate change.

All farmers face uncertainty, of course. The weather has never been guaranteed. But the level of uncertainty is predicted to increase dramatically.

In some counties, it’s starting to feel like weird weather is the new norm. 

Lac Ste. Anne County declared an agricultural disaster in 2016. And in 2018. And now this year.

A lightning storm over prairie fields. Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada expects increased droughts, heat waves, invasive species, pests, storms and floods to affect farmers in coming years due to climate change. Photo: Lucy Chian

“There’s still the hope that next year will be better,” Stacy Berry, an assistant agricultural manager with Lac Ste. Anne County, told The Narwhal.  

But, she says, people “are starting to acknowledge that perhaps next year won’t be better.”

And if next year isn’t better, that means more crops left dead in fields, less feed supply for livestock and, as Berry points out, increasing mental strain on farmers themselves.

“The projections for the future of the impact of climate change on agriculture in the prairies are are really quite concerning,” Debra Davidson, a professor of environmental sociology in the Faculty of Agriculture, Life and Environmental Sciences at the University of Alberta, told The Narwhal. “We don’t in general appear to be prepared to transition our agricultural systems to be more climate resilient.” 

“That’s very concerning to me.”

Floods, droughts and pests

There have always been weather challenges for farmers, but increasingly the agriculture industry is recognizing that climate change will exacerbate the uncertainty of a sector so heavily reliant on the forecast.

“Numerous studies of the impact of climate change suggest that most regions of Canada are projected to warm during the next 60 years,” according to Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. “A changing climate can have both positive and negative impacts on agriculture.” The agency notes longer frost-free seasons and increased carbon sequestration in soil as potential benefits of a warming climate in Canada.

“A number of positives projections for prairie agriculture — based on the expectation that we’re going to have longer growing seasons and warmer temperatures and whatnot  — those projections of averages don’t account for the increased variability and extremes,” Davidson says. 

“We might have the occasional bonus crop, but that will be intermingled with deep droughts and severe weather damage,” she added. 

“Our farmers are going to struggle.” 

It’s not just a question of farmers’ livelihoods, of course — poor harvests also affect food supply.

A farmer examines soil in his fields during a drought. “We might have the occasional bonus crop, but that will be intermingled with deep droughts and severe weather damage,” says Debra Davidson of the effects of climate change on agriculture. Photo: Jasper Wilde

In a 2019 report out of the Council of Canadian Academies, agriculture and food was dubbed one of the 12 major areas facing risks from climate change that are “liable to lead to significant losses, damages, or disruptions in Canada over a 20-year timeframe.”

There are forecasted droughts, heat waves, invasive species, pests, storms and floods. Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada also warns of increasing livestock death, decreasing dairy cow output and reduced weight gain in beef cattle. 

“Climate variability will challenge the business model of farms by increasing the uncertainty associated with the range of future conditions a farmer can expect,” the Council of Canadian Academies report says. 

“Impacts of climate change on international markets are another source of uncertainty, with reductions in agricultural production in many developing countries likely to increase demand for Canadian agricultural exports.”

All of this points to increased uncertainty for farmers, who are increasingly left scrambling when agricultural emergencies are declared again and again.

‘Every single person was affected’

In Lac Ste. Anne, a rural county stretched along Highway 43 just northwest of Edmonton, the main change in weather this year has been the rain — hard, relentless, steady rain.

It was what Alberta’s provincial crop report describes as a “cooler than normal growing season” and a “challenging season.”

“We’d only get one or two days of no rain,” Berry says of this summer. “It was causing flooding and crop drowning, as well as an inability to get into the field to do anything.”

“Farms are in terrible shape.” 

And this, she says, applies to farms “pretty much across the board.” Crop farmers — wheat, barley, canola — face lower yields and lower-quality products. Livestock farmers don’t have sufficient feed supplies, and may face tough decisions about reducing herd sizes.

“I can confidently say that every single person was affected in some way by the adverse weather,” Berry says.

This is where the beets will stay for the winter. About half our acres will remain unharvested due to the frost. Feels a bit like a punch to the gut. Here's hoping they make for good fertilizer at least! #harvest19 #harvestfromhell pic.twitter.com/2O6dOEmyqt

— Todd Bergen-Henengouwen (@toddbh14) November 4, 2019

Berry, who is herself from an agricultural background, says the uncertainty is a major strain. She still helps her parents and brother out with harvest of their seed crops, but lately it’s been hard to plan.

 “I would get, you know, an hours notice, saying that they wanted to hit the fields and go,” she says. 

Rapidly changing forecasts and unseasonable weather, she added, mean “you can’t plan even days in advance.” You wait until it’s not raining and you go for it.

Berry has started to notice shifts in farmers’ behaviour as a result. Whatever they might believe about the causes of the changing climate, some are judging it prudent to be prepared. They’re converting crops back to pasture land, or investing in grain dryers.

“I think people are starting to see it as a pattern,” Berry says. And that means they’re starting to adjust.

A combine at harvest time. In Alberta, researchers found that farmers are adopting climate-mitigative practises, including zero-till techniques, conserving wetlands and installing solar panels — whether or not they believe in human-caused climate change. Photo: Robert Wiedemann

‘Just don’t call it climate change’

Scientists estimate that food systems are responsible for somewhere between 19 and 29 per cent of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, making farmers also prime candidates for greenhouse gas reduction and climate change mitigation — they shoulder a lot of responsibility, while also dealing with the repercussions.

According to a March 2019 paper called “Just don’t call it climate change: climate-skeptic farmer adoption of climate-mitigative practices,” published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, a “sizable proportion of farmers have already adopted climate-mitigative practices.”

Such already-adopted practises include improving the energy efficiency of farm buildings, zero-till techniques, conserving wetlands, introducing nitrogen fixers to grazing lands, planting trees and installing solar panels, among others.

“Every farmer has to make a living, [so] the bottom line necessarily factors in regardless of how ecologically conscious they are,” Davidson, lead author on the paper, says, noting that “many, many farmers have strong ecological values and use those values to guide their decision making.”

The study, based on a survey of farmers in Alberta, found that though they may be interested in conservation, many farmers did not agree with the consensus of climate scientists that climate change is driven by human activity. 

“Farmers are willing to comment upon what they see as some pretty significant changes in weather patterns in recent years that they haven’t seen in the past,” Davidson tells me. “They don’t necessarily attribute those changes to climate change.”

That, however, did not influence a farmer’s likelihood to adopt mitigation measures. 

“Those respondents expressing belief in anthropogenic climate change were no more likely to adopt mitigative practices than others,” the authors wrote, “and those who disagreed with the science of climate change were no less likely to do so.”

And so it seems that no matter what a person may believe about climate change, most were still taking steps that had the effect of mitigating emissions.

Tractors in a field at harvest time. It’s estimated that food systems are responsible for somewhere between 19 and 29 per cent of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Photo: Johny Goerend

‘Harvest from hell’

This year’s agricultural disaster declarations come at a time when the political debate around climate change is as heated as ever.

Climate change, Davidson says, “is a scientific issue and a livelihood issue and a social survival issue.” But now, particularly in parts of rural Alberta, it is often viewed more as a political issue.

“Where is that acute and also more troubling than in places like rural Alberta?” she asks. “We’ve got communities who really are quite vulnerable to the impact of climate change.” 

All of this is tough for the business of agriculture, of course. But Berry points out it’s also hard on farmers personally. 

This year’s crop conditions have led industry leaders in the prairies to declare a “harvest from hell.” 

If this sounds familiar, it’s because farmers were saying the same thing in 2017. And 2016. Year after year of “harvests from hell” take a toll on farmers.

And it's over 2016 #harvestfromhell Next year we'll try rice pic.twitter.com/LMXvEXQive

— Glen Gray (@ggrayfarm) November 16, 2016

In Lac Ste. Ann County, Berry points out that an agricultural disaster has been declared three times in the last four years. 

“Recently,” she says, “it’s gotten a lot worse.”

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Calculating farming’s contribution to greenhouse gas emissions is difficult, but experts agree that feeding the world’s people has tremendous climate and environmental impacts. Estimates of global emissions from farms range widely. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency puts them at 24 per cent, including deforestation, making agriculture the second-largest emitter after heat and electricity.

Agriculture contributes to global warming in a number of ways. Methane and nitrous oxide, which are more potent than CO2 but remain in the atmosphere for shorter times, make up about 65 per cent of agricultural emissions. Methane comes mainly from cattle and nitrous oxide from fertilizers and wastes. According to the World Resources Institute, “Smaller sources include manure management, rice cultivation, field burning of crop residues, and fuel use on farms.” Net emissions are also created when forests and wetlands are cleared for farming, as these “carbon sinks” usually absorb and store more carbon than the farms that replace them. Transporting and processing agricultural products also contribute to global warming.

We need to eat. So what’s the answer? That obesity is epidemic in parts of the world while people starve elsewhere, and that an estimated one-third of food gets wasted, shows improving distribution and reducing waste are good places to start — but won’t be enough to significantly curtail agriculture’s contribution to climate change.

Reducing meat and animal-product consumption and production — especially beef — would cut emissions, but wouldn’t get us all the way.

Some suggest finding better ways to feed as many as nine billion people by 2050 means rethinking our agricultural systems. Industrial agriculture has made it possible to produce large amounts of food efficiently, but comes with problems, including pollution, reduced biodiversity, pesticide resistance and consequent increased chemical use, destruction of forests and wetlands, and human health issues such as antibiotic resistance. Soil loss and degradation, increased drought and flooding and changing growing patterns caused by climate change add to the complexity.

Some say the best fix is genetic modification — to produce more nutritious plants that can withstand pests and a changing climate. Others note that when humans try to improve on or override nature, the outcome is often not what was expected. And a U.S. National Academies of Science report concludes, “GMO crops have not, to date, increased actual yields.” Failing to recognize that everything in nature is interconnected has led to numerous unintended consequences, from DDT causing bird deaths and toxic buildup in the food chain to widespread antibiotic use facilitating the evolution of “superbugs”.

The growing field of agroecology — working with nature — is one solution. Many researchers argue it’s more efficient, less environmentally damaging and more equitable for farmers and local communities than industrial methods and GMOs.

The goal, writes University of California-Berkeley agroecology professor Miguel Altieri, “is to design an agroecosystem that mimics the structure and function of local natural ecosystems; that is, a system with high species diversity and a biologically active soil, one that promotes natural pest control, nutrient recycling and high soil cover to prevent resource losses.”

A study by the Rodale Institute, a research organization devoted to organic farming, concluded global adoption of agroecological practices such as “cover crops, compost, crop rotation and reduced tillage” could “sequester more carbon than is currently emitted.”

About 40 per cent of Earth’s land surface is used for agriculture, entailing massive geophysical alteration, so working with nature as much as possible to maintain or restore balance to natural systems makes sense. Agroecology appears to be a better way to feed humanity than doubling down on industrial agricultural, from many angles: reducing pollution and chemical use, enhancing rather than degrading soils, increasing biodiversity, protecting water, growing healthier food and creating more equitable food systems.

In This Changes Everything, Naomi Klein quotes former UN Rapporteur on the Right to Food Olivier De Schutter: “Today’s scientific evidence demonstrates that agroecological methods outperform the use of chemical fertilizers in boosting food production where the hungry live — especially in unfavourable environments.” He further notes, “agroecological projects have shown an average crop yield increase of 80% in 57 developing countries, with an average increase of 116% for all African projects.”

We are part of nature, so harming it hurts us. The planet provides resources to feed us. We must learn to use them sustainably.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Senior Editor Ian Hanington.

Learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org.

Image: Asian Development Bank/Flickr

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Will vegans save the world? Reading comments under climate change articles or watching the film Cowspiracy make it seem they’re the only ones who can. Cowspiracy boldly claims veganism is “the only way to sustainably and ethically live on this planet.” But, as with most issues, it’s complicated.

It’s true, though, that the environment and climate would benefit substantially if more people gave up or at least cut down on meat and animal products, especially in over-consuming Western societies. Animal agriculture produces huge amounts of greenhouse gas emissions, consumes massive volumes of water and causes a lot of pollution.

But getting a handle on the extent of environmental harm, as well as the differences between various agricultural methods and types of livestock, and balancing that with possible benefits of animal consumption and agriculture isn’t simple.

Estimates of how much animal agriculture adds to greenhouse gases range widely, from about 14 to more than 50 per cent of total global emissions. Agriculture exacerbates climate change in a number of ways. Clearing carbon sinks such as forests to grow or raise food can result in net greenhouse gas increases. Farming, especially on an industrial scale, also requires fossil fuel–burning machinery, as does processing and transporting agricultural products.

Determining the overall contribution is complicated by the fact that livestock agriculture accounts for about nine per cent of human-caused CO2 emissions but far greater amounts of other greenhouse gases, which are worse in many ways but less dangerous in others.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, livestock farming produces 65 per cent of human-related nitrous oxide, which has 296 times the global warming potential as CO2. It also contributes “37 per cent of all human-induced methane (23 times as warming as CO2), which is largely produced by the digestive system of ruminants, and 64 per cent of ammonia, which contributes significantly to acid rain.” But methane stays in the atmosphere for about 12 years, and nitrous oxide for about 114, while CO2 remains for thousands of years.

Emissions also vary by livestock. Pigs and poultry contribute about 10 per cent of global agricultural emissions but provide three times as much meat as cattle — which are responsible for about 40 per cent of emissions — and use less feed. Some plant agriculture also causes global warming. Wetland rice cultivation produces methane and nitrous oxide emissions, the latter because of nitrogen fertilizer use. Different agricultural methods also have varying effects on climate. And some people, such as the Inuit, have adapted to meat-based diets because fresh produce is scarce — and flying it in causes more emissions than hunting and eating game.

The bottom line is that cutting down on or eliminating meat and other animal products from our diets is necessary for protecting humanity from runaway climate change — and from many other environmental consequences, including water scarcity, degraded ecosystems and pollution of waterways and oceans. The FAO reports that global demand for livestock products could increase 70 per cent by 2050 if nothing is done to slow consumption.

Worldwide meat-consumption rates show there’s room to cut down in industrialized countries, where the average person consumed 95.7 kilograms in 2015, compared to the 41.3-kilogram global average, and 31.6 in developing countries. People in South Asia eat less meat than anyone, at about 7.6 kilograms in 2015.

A study by scientists at the U.K.’s Oxford Martin School found global agriculture-related emissions could be cut by a third by 2050 if people followed simple health guidelines on meat consumption, by 63 per cent with widespread adoption of a vegetarian diet and 70 per cent with vegan. The authors found adopting healthier diets with less meat and animal products could also reduce global health-care costs by $1 billion a year by 2050.

Although switching to better agricultural methods and encouraging local consumption could also reduce emissions, those are topics for another column. In the meantime, we can do our part by at least cutting down on meat, especially red meat, or by taking the more significant step of adhering to a vegetarian or vegan diet.

Perhaps the best dietary advice for our own health and the planet’s is from food writer Michael Pollan: “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.”

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Senior Editor Ian Hanington.

Learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org.

Image credit: Socially Responsible Agriculture Project via Flickr CC.

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B.C. faces a future of disappearing salmon runs, more wildfires and dying forests with a temperature increase of two or three degrees and it is time to adapt to a new reality, a panel of experts told a packed audience at the University of Victoria’s Ideafest.   The weird weather of 2015 broke records, but it is a harbinger of the future, said Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium climate scientist Trevor Murdock, adding that models showing a two degree temperature rise are probably optimistic.   By the end of this century, if greenhouse gas emissions are not curbed, there could be a temperature increase of six degrees Celsius, Murdock warned.   “With zero net greenhouse gas emissions and with some pulled out of the atmosphere — so pretty much what was agreed to in Paris — we are still looking at about two degrees of warming,” Murdock said.   “For the 21st century it looks as if 2015 is our way to the new future.”

Last year, which saw near record streamflow highs and near record lows, was “an uncomfortable glimpse into the future,” agreed Faron Anslow, PCIC’s climate analysis and monitoring leader.   “Between May and June (2015) things really went off the rails in terms of the snowpack,” he said.   That meant high water flows in late spring and record-breaking low flows in the summer and the glimpse into the future shows wetter winters and hotter, drier summers, with inevitable effects on everything from fish and forests to agriculture and recreation.   “There’s more precipitation in the wet season and less in the dry season. The biggest factor is the change in timing,” said Sybil Seitzinger, Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions executive director.   That is bad news for fish, said Fisheries and Oceans Canada research scientist Kim Hyatt who has studied problems with warming waters resulting from the 2014-2016 strong El Niño and The Blob of warm water that developed in the Eastern Pacific in 2014.   “With those things back-to-back you can expect biological outcomes in spades,” he said.   The water, which was two-and-a-half to three degrees warmer than usual, brought a toxic algae bloom that extended from California to Alaska and caused the death of seabirds, fish and whales, Hyatt said.   Toxic algae blooms are not new, but they usually die off after a few weeks. The scope and duration of the 2015 bloom was unprecedented.

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The warm water brought in species such as trigger fish and butter fish, usually found in the waters off Hawaii, and those ecosystem changes are likely to continue this year, so more research is needed on interaction with native species, Hyatt said.   Salmon runs in B.C. did not collapse in 2015, but the fish were smaller than usual and the warm water in rivers had disastrous consequences for some runs such as the Columbia River.   Last year, 400,000 sockeye were counted at the mouth of the Columbia and, with 100,000 caught, 300,000 were making their way to the spawning grounds, but only 11,000 made it because of river temperatures that were elevated by two or three degrees.   “Ninety-seven per cent of the fish died en route,” Hyatt said.   “Two or three degrees doesn’t sound like much if you can air-condition your house, but fish can’t do that, so these fish expired,” he said.   “If 2015 is a harbinger of what we are going to see routinely, we are going to have serious problems maintaining salmon populations in the Columbia.”   Losses in the Fraser River were between 30 and 50 per cent because the more biologically diverse fish were better able to cope and that should provide a climate change adaptation lesson, Hyatt said.   “If we want fish in the future we are going to have to maintain biodiversity and look at fisheries systems that put demands on wild populations and make sure they are flexible and precautionary,” he said.   If people want to eat fish they must start relying more on aquaculture, Hyatt said.   “Marine populations are already at the ceiling of what they can support in the long run and, if you bring the ceiling down you are going to have to look at other ways,” he said.   Reduction of crop yields, increasing competition for water and wildfires are among the fallouts from drought, said Allen Dobb of the B.C. Agriculture and Food Climate Action Initiative.   Pests, diseases and pathogen patterns shift with warmer temperatures and, after the 2015 drought, salt water started coming further up the Fraser River and into irrigated areas, Dobb said.   “That is becoming a problem,” he said, pointing out that, in B.C., agricultural land is undervalued and underused.   “It is too easy to get produce somewhere else and I think that will have to change,” said Dob, who then skirted a question on the wisdom of flooding agricultural land to build the Site C dam.   “I can’t really respond to that dam situation,” he said diplomatically.   Drought will alter B.C.’s forests and species of trees planted, areas used for forestry and harvesting practices must change in order to adapt, Robbie Hember, a Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions research scientist, said.   British Columbians must expect more extreme weather events and there may be catastrophic mortality in some areas, Hember said, suggesting landscapes should be designed to be less vulnerable to wildfires.   “The timber supply will be more volatile and it’s going to be difficult to keep all the sawmills open all the time,” he said.   Anna Warwick Sears, executive director of the Okanagan Basin Water Board, watched the average snowpack suddenly melt away last year and, as the drought set in, she turned her mind to adaptation.   Her conclusion was that many solutions were basic common sense and she came up with a list of immediate actions for communities.   “Get the crap out of the water,” Warwick Sears said. “This is not rocket science, it’s manure and sewage and we know how to do this. With hotter, drier summers we’re going to grow more bacteria and algae and have a huge pollution problem. We’ve got to keep the water clean.”   Universal metering, expanded monitoring of streamflows and groundwater, local planning, a halt to lawn watering and going slow on new demands for water usage are among the actions suggested by Warwick Sears.   Then address obvious areas of difficulty, such as lack of communication between different levels of government and between governments and the public.   The number one piece of advice from Warwick Sears can be summed up with the word “collaboration.”   “Extreme weather events are going to cost more money and the only way we can get things done is to collaborate and get information from each other (on how to) adapt to climate change,” she said.   That may mean ditching preconceptions such as the necessity of preserving species in areas where they now exist.   In a world of imperfect solutions, resiliency is vital when addressing climate change, said Johanna Wolf, policy advisor with the Environment Ministry’s Climate Action Secretariat.   “Instead of focusing on species at risk, focus on the whole ecosystem. It’s a more resilient response.”

Image: BC Forest Fire Info via Facebook

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Clay and Katy Peck are just the type of young farming family that B.C. Agriculture Minister Norm Letnick says his government wants to support to ensure “a reliable food source for years to come.”

The Pecks own a 65-hectare farm in the Agricultural Land Reserve overlooking the Peace River, and are preparing for organic certification of a fruit and vegetable business to serve the northern area around Fort St. John.

The couple’s farm is high enough above the Peace River that it is not included in BC Hydro’s tally of 6,469 hectares of farmland — an area larger than all the farmland in Richmond — that will be destroyed by the Site C dam and its vast reservoir.

But the Pecks, along with other Peace Valley farmers, stand to lose significant amounts of farmland and crops to Site C in previously uncounted ways. The likely impact of Site C on agricultural land has been routinely underreported and will be far more dire than widely expected, according to scientists and information found in BC Hydro reports.

Work on the $8.8 billion dam project began in August and continues around the clock despite three on-going court cases by First Nations, missing federal government permits, and BC Hydro’s continuing failure to demonstrate the need for Site C electricity.

In addition to the agricultural land BC Hydro counts as permanently lost to Site C, another 5,900 hectares of farmland falls within what BC Hydro calls a “stability impact zone” and is at risk of destruction. BC Hydro insists a further 1,125 hectares of farmland — an area about the size of four Stanley Parks — will be lost only on a “temporary” basis during the next 10 years, but farmers and a soil scientist question whether topsoil on the land can ever be replaced.

Clay and Katy Peck stand on their property, overlooking family farmland that will be flooded by the Site C Dam. Photo: Sarah Cox.

The list of agricultural land lost temporarily to Site C includes 203 hectares of agricultural land in a Flood Impact Zone that may experience “crop losses when flooding occurs,” according to BC Hydro. Collapsing Peace River banks will create a landslide-generated wave that will sweep over an additional 174 hectares of prime farmland. Since water will not remain on the fields forever, BC Hydro does not include these areas in its tally of permanently lost farmland, even though flooding and waves can cause soil erosion and leave behind debris.

“In my view this is a permanent loss,” says Vancouver soil scientist Eveline Wolterson. “It’s like a tsunami. Essentially what it does is it eats away at topsoil. It will all get washed into the reservoir. They’ll never be able to restore those soils.”

Also not counted as permanently lost farmland are 506 hectares of agricultural land at the dam site itself. B.C. says the loss will be “temporary” but recent photographs of the construction site taken by Victoria photographer Garth Lenz reveal a compacted and industrialized landscape that Peace Valley farmer Ken Boon says may no longer support some agricultural operations when the dam is completed by 2025.

“They’re doing some pretty heavy disturbance in that area,” says Boon, who would lose prime farmland and his family home to Site C and the $530 million relocation of Highway 29 away from the flood zone. “There are areas where they are removing topsoil to excavate gravel.”

An additional 109 hectares of farmland will be lost on a “temporary” basis for the relocation of 30 kilometres of Highway 29, according to BC Hydro.

A further 38 kilometre stretch of land with “agricultural activities,” including private farmland and land with active grazing leases and licenses, will also be lost in the short-term when a new transmission line is constructed to connect Site C with the existing Peace Canyon dam substation. Another 37 hectares of farmland will be out of commission for construction access, but BC Hydro dismisses such losses as well, saying they too will only be “temporary.”

Even more worrisome for the Pecks and other Peace Valley farmers and ranchers, however, is the “stability impact zone,” which is distinct from the much smaller erosion zone.

The stability impact line represents the unknown impact of the Site C reservoir on the Peace River’s unstable clay banks as they crumble and collapse into the water over a period of years or decades. This occurs on a routine basis along the Williston Reservoir that lies behind the 50-year-old W.A.C. Bennett dam near Hudson’s Hope.

An abandoned cabin sits perched on the edge of a cliff created by sloughing in the Williston Reservoir in 2008. Photo provided to DeSmog Canada by West Moberly First Nation Chief Roland Wilson.

That same cabin seen again in 2009. Photo provided to DeSmog Canada by West Moberly First Nation Chief Roland Wilson.

A sign near the Williston Reservoir warns of unstable banks. Photo provided to DeSmog Canada by West Moberly First Nation Chief Roland Wilson.

“In a rough estimate from BC Hydro’s inadequate maps I would say that anywhere from 10 to 25 per cent of our land is in that zone,” says Clay Peck, an environmental scientist who works for the oil and gas industry in addition to farming. “Our land may or may not slide into the reservoir.”

Wolterson says BC Hydro should have included agricultural land within the stability impact zone in its calculation of permanently lost farmland, especially given serious and persistent erosion in the nearby Williston Reservoir. “In my view the stability impact line will be reached. To not include that as agricultural land that will be affected is absurd.”

Clay and Katy Peck. Photo: Sarah Cox.

BC Hydro says agricultural land in the flood, wave, and stability impact zones was not included in its count of permanently destroyed farmland because the risk of ruin is “lower.” But that’s cold comfort to Clay and Katy Peck and their uncle and aunt, Ross and Deborah Peck, who own 130 hectares of land adjacent to the younger Pecks, where they grow wheat and canola.

Ross and Deborah Peck live an hour’s drive upstream, in a custom-built log home high on the banks of the Peace River. According to maps BC Hydro gave to 34 Peace Valley farming families affected by Site C, Ross and Deborah Peck’s guest cabin falls within the erosion impact line and will topple into the reservoir. Their nearby house is just on the other side of the line, prompting the couple to question if it will be safe to stay in their home.

According to BC Hydro, Ross and Deborah Peck’s cabin on the left will fall into the reservoir while their home, pictured right, will not. Photo: Sarah Cox.

Ross Peck points to the “impact stability line.” His home can be seen in the background. Photo: Sarah Cox.

The certain destruction of Ross and Deborah Peck’s best farmland and the potential loss of more, combined with a new BC Hydro Statutory Right of Way over remaining sections of their farmland, leaves Ross Peck wondering if he will be able to continue farming at all, even on land that is not slated to be destroyed or potentially affected by Site C.

“We question if there would be anything left on our property that is suitable for grain crops,” says Peck, a third generation Peace Valley farmer and rancher. “Is it really worth it if we’ve only got 10 or 20 acres left?”

Even Peace Valley farmers whose land is not included in the permanent, temporary or potential loss of farmland stand to lose crops and income to Site C.

The reservoir is so large it will cause groundwater levels to rise within a two-kilometer radius around its perimeter, which will stretch along 107-kilometres of the Peace River and its tributaries, a distance nearly the equivalent of driving from Victoria to Nanaimo. Rising groundwater could result in decreased crop yields and restrictions on the range of viable crops that can be grown, according to BC Hydro.

BC Hydro also points to potential crop loss and damage from displaced wildlife. As the reservoir fills, deer and elk will lose prime riverside habitat and the islands on which they calf, and will move uphill onto farmland in search of food.

Additionally, farmers will suffer the impacts of climate change induced by the sheer size of the Site C reservoir, which will create its own mini global warming experiment when it boosts the annual average temperature by up to one degree Celsius within a one-kilometer radius.

The warmer average temperature, along with increased moisture and wind from the reservoir, will alter local weather patterns, according to a Site C technical report. Warmer winter temperatures will not affect farming, but Ken Boon, the Pecks and other Peace Valley farmers are concerned that cooler temperatures predicted for the summers will stymie crop growth. At Bear Flat, where Ken Boon and his wife Arlene farm, average summer temperatures are expected to dip by 3.3 degrees due to the reservoir. 

An increase in humidity caused by the reservoir will also generate more fog and moisture in the late summer and fall, just when remaining Peace Valley farmers are drying crops for market. To put this into perspective, an increase of 13 hours of normal and heavy fog is expected each year at the Fort St. John airport, about 15 kilometres from the dam site, once the reservoir fills.

“If there’s fog the crops could spoil and it might be a total loss,” says Clay Peck, an environmental scientist who works for the oil and gas industry in addition to farming. “If you have mould in a hay crop it can cause respiratory illnesses in animals.”

Despite the shadow of Site C, the Pecks hope to delve into Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) and experiment with permaculture and a food forest. “There is basically nothing we put in the ground [here] that we couldn’t grow,” says Katy Peck, who has an MBA in green business. “We grew corn, melons, field tomatoes…I planted everything from hazelnuts to goji berries.”

The Pecks also plan to invest in alternative energy by installing solar panels and examining geothermal and wind potential on their property. “With the dam going in it’s pretty important to us to use as much alternative energy as possible,” says Katy Peck.

“We don’t think we need Site C.”

Image: Don Hoffman

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The agriculture sector will rise in importance in coming decades as the world warms and moves away from fossil fuels.

That’s the most recent prediction from Jeff Rubin, former chief economist for CIBC World Markets, whose latest book, The Carbon Bubble, forecasts a not-so-distant future in which climate change will open up the possibility for cultivating crops, historically grown in places like Kansas and Iowa, much further north. At the same time, Rubin argues, global dependence on fossil fuels will drop, freeing up capital to migrate to crops like corn and soy.

“There could be some tremendous opportunity for Western Canada, in the same provinces that are likely to be victims of the carbon bubble,” Rubin told DeSmog Canada. “Food is the only real sector in the commodity field that has been resilient, that’s kept its pricing power. You could argue that just that alone is sufficient.”

Agriculture has always played a major role in Canada’s economy. Rod MacRae, associate professor of environmental studies at York University and national food policy expert, notes the food sector trails directly behind energy and automobile manufacturing, employing one in every eight Canadians.

Last year, farm cash receipts (the income from selling commodities combined with direct subsidies) totalled $57.4 billion. To put that in perspective, the auto industry sold $82.6 billion worth of products in 2012, with oil and gas contributing $133 billion to the country’s GDP in 2013.

But the energy industry is currently in trouble: projects in the Alberta’s oilsands are stalled out, with low prices and market access woes resulting in shoddy returns.

Rubin calculates that over the last seven years, the oilsands have lost 70 per cent of share value. Yet land in the prairies has seen double digit annual increases in the same window, he says, pointing to the Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board’s 2013 acquisition of 115,000 acres of Saskatchewan farmland as an example of the changing economic terrain.

Droughts in California and British Columbia may further incentivize purchases of prairie lands.

“The strength of food prices themselves are going to make that land valuable,” Rubin says. “But once you start taking into effect the corn belt and a lot of food belts may be migrating to higher latitude regions, which is certainly what all the climate change models are suggesting, then that’s an even more compelling reason.”

Farming in a Hotter World

However, diseases, pests and weeds will also benefit from increased temperatures and atmospheric carbon dioxide, says York University’s MacRae.

Add in the inevitable rise in extreme weather events (like microburst rainfalls that drop several inches of precipitation in a very localized area) and climate change may have some seriously detrimental side effects on Canadian agriculture.

While MacRae likes Rubin’s argument that the food system should be a greater priority, he questions if current agricultural practices will survive such rapid and significant changes.

If Canada promotes local and organic farms, it might be a different story, he says.

“If we dramatically change the food system, we can create resilience and also mitigate emissions,” MacRae said. “Then, we’re in a much better place to deal with climate change. If we manage that properly, we can create a very viable food system economy.”

That requires government intervention — specifically, a national food strategy, he says.

Without one, MacRae says, “We can’t design anything around big pictures challenges and solutions, because it’s so fragmented and nobody wants to take the lead on it so there’s no way to marshal and coordinate resources.”

Rubin said the transition from an energy-centric to a food-centric economy is already being guided by market forces.

But for MacRae the right type of agricultural industry will require a heavy interventionist approach. He added there hasn’t been an adequate level of government participation in the food system since the Second World War.

A future of carbon taxes, biofuels and local power

But a shift to an agriculture-oriented economy may not just revolve around food, according to John Parkins, professor of rural and environmental sociology at the University of Alberta.

In coming years, oilsands majors like Suncor, Syncrude and Shell may be keenly looking for new opportunities to reinvent themselves, especially if a significant economy-wide carbon tax or another type of polluter-pay system is implemented, he said.

Parkins suggests such transformation may take the form of biofuels, which can range in origin from corn to potatoes to vegetable oils to wood chips. Oilsands companies, he says, are ultimately in the business of transportation: as alternative fuels become more viable, they could significantly reduce the need for fossil fuel-generated energy.

“In a big way, [agriculture] is related to questions about how we electrify the grid and how we put fuel in our vehicles,” he said. “If the solutions become more located within agriculture, then I could see a massive transition. That takes the question around agriculture beyond just the food question to a whole bunch of other sectors.”

Yet that shift will also require some power moves from various levels of government.

While a carbon tax may serve as a stick, capital (which Parkins describes as “agnostic about what sector it’s in”) may need more incentive to invest in socially beneficial areas.

Unfortunately, MacRae reiterates that food or agriculture is rarely a priority for the federal government, making such options significantly less probable. Based on the vague planks in the platform of the three major federal parties, he’s not optimistic that will change soon.

Image Credit: Israel Photo Gallery via Flickr

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Two days ago, the weather forecast for northeastern B.C. called for snow. And snow it did, at least up on the plateau in places like Fort St. John and Dawson Creek. But there’s one place in the northeast that stayed conspicuously snow-free: the Peace River Valley.

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A new series looking at the likely impacts of climate change could help companies, politicians, financial planners, entrepreneurs, defence analysts and leaders of various industrial sectors learn how to adapt to the increasing pressures of global warming.

Based on work already done by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) announced Thursday it had released a briefing series so that people, organizations and governments would be better prepared for a challenging and volatile future.

Working with the Judge Business School and the European Climate Foundation, the CISL series summarizes the likely impacts of climate change on agriculture, buildings, cities, defence, employment, energy, investment, fisheries, primary industries, tourism, and transportation.

Among the topics addressed, the series looks at the urgency of protecting people
in urban areas from climate change impacts, the potential for the energy sector to reduce emissions by switching to lower-carbon fuels, improving energy efficiency and introducing carbon capture and storage, the disruptive impacts global warming will have on the financial system, potential losses to global fisheries of up to $40 billion by mid-century, the way climate change acts as a “threat multiplier,” driving involuntary migration and indirectly increasing the risks of violent conflict, and the need for additional energy supply investments of between $190-900 billion per year from now until 2050.

The series, which includes numerous infographics, also looks at the capacity for various sectors to adapt to climate change and to contribute to greenhouse gas emissions reductions.

Between 10 and 12 per cent of man-made GHG emissions in 2010 came from the agricultural sector, which is increasingly threatened by a warming climate. Click image to enlarge.

According to CISL "there is potential for energy savings of 50-90 per cent in existing and new buildings." Click image to enlarge.

More than half the world's population now lives in cities, making urban areas more important than ever for climate change adaptation. Click image to enlarge.

Defense will play an increasingly important role in responding to climate change. Click image to enlarge.

Rajendra K. Pachauri, Chairman of the IPCC, said in an accompanying media release that he endorsed the series.

“I applaud this initiative,” Pachauri said. “Spelling out the implications of climate change for different sectors, on the basis of the work of the IPCC, will allow businesses to adapt to the challenges they face and understand the role they are able to play in reducing their climate impact.”

Polly Courtice, Director of CISL, said that understanding the science of climate change is absolutely vital. “This series does a remarkable job of taking the hugely-complex and technical findings of the IPCC report and translating them for business.”

According to CISL, the impacts of climate change threaten the employment sector, while mitigating climate change and adapting to its effects will create employment opportunities. Click image to enlarge.

Carbon capture and storage, limiting use, greater efficiency and a greater use of renewables are all ways to reduce energy emissions. Click image to enlarge.

GHGs from industry nearly doubled between 1970 and 2010 and the sector is anticipating a 45-60 percent increase in global demand for industry products by 2050. Click image to enlarge.

An estimated investment of USD $190-$900 billion a year to 2050 is needed for the energy sector to keep temperatures from rising 2C. An estimated $340 billion was invested in reducing GHG emissions in 2011/2012. Click image to enlarge.

Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, said the series infographics translate the sometimes complex science into compelling visuals and narratives. “They underline why we need a meaningful agreement in Paris in 2015 — one that can put in the pathways that will dramatically bend down the emissions curve, trigger a deep de-carbonization of the global economy and realize a climate neutral world in the second half of the century.”

As an example of how the series explores likely climate change impacts in different sectors, the briefing on agriculture addresses reduced crop yields and predicted food price rises of 37 per cent (rice), 55 per cent (maize), and 11 per cent (wheat) by 2050.

Turning to mitigation, the briefing notes that greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from agriculture comprised about 10 – 12 per cent of man-made GHG emissions
in 2010. “This is the largest contribution from any
sector of non-carbon dioxide (CO2) GHGs such as methane, accounting for 56 per cent of non-CO2 emissions in 2005. The agricultural sector has significant potential to make cuts in GHG emissions.”

The world's oceans have seen roughly a 30 per cent increase in acidity since pre-industrial times. Click image to enlarge.

Forests, lakes, rivers, snow, and biodiversity are all affected by climate change, which is expected to impact all sub-sectors of the tourism industry. Click image to enlarge.

Nearly 25 per cent of energy-related emissions come from the transport sector and that contribution is expected to rise more than any other energy-related sector. Click image to enlarge.

In terms of adaptation, the briefing says no single approach for reducing risk is appropriate across all regions, sectors, and settings. “Farmers can adapt to some changes, but there is a limit to what can be managed. Agricultural companies can draw from a range of options to maximize adaptive capacity based on a solid understanding of risks.”

The briefing document then lists various options — supply, demand, livestock, policy and crops — to help those employed in the agricultural sector deal with future climate change.

All images from the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.

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