RSN: Bill McKibben | How We Can Build a Hardier World After the Coronavirus

17 April 20

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17 April 20

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Bill McKibben | How We Can Build a Hardier World After the Coronavirus

Bill McKibben, The New Yorker
McKibben writes: "The coronavirus pandemic has revealed one particularly shocking thing about our societies and economies: they have been operating on a very thin margin."

 

The edifice seems so shiny and substantial, a world of silver jets stitching together cities of towering skyscrapers, a globe of soaring markets and smartphone connectivity. But a couple of months into this disease and it’s all tottering, the jets grounded and the cities silent and the markets reeling. One industry after another is heading for bankruptcy, and no one knows if they will come back. In other words, however shiny it may have seemed, it wasn’t very sturdy. Some people—the President, for instance—think that we can just put it all back like it was before, with a “big bang,” once the “invisible enemy” is gone. But any prosperity built on what was evidently a shaky foundation is going to seem Potemkinish going forward; we don’t want always to feel as if we’re just weeks away from some kind of chaos.

So if we’re thinking about building civilization back in a hardier and more resilient form, we’ll have to learn what a more stable footing might look like. I think that we can take an important lesson from the doctors dealing with the coronavirus, and that’s related to comorbidity, or underlying conditions. It turns out, not surprisingly, that if you’ve got diabetes or hypertension, or have a suppressed immune system, you’re far more likely to be felled by COVID-19.

Societies, too, come with underlying conditions, and the two that haunt our planet right now are inequality and ecological turmoil. They’ve both spiked in the past few decades, with baleful results that normally stay just below the surface, felt but not fully recognized. But as soon as something else goes wrong—a new microbe launches a pandemic, say—they become starkly evident. Inequality, in this instance, means that people have to keep working, even if they’re not well, because they lack health insurance and live day to day, paycheck to paycheck, and hence they can spread disease. Ecological instability, especially the ever-climbing mercury, means that even as governors try to cope with the pandemic they must worry, too, about the prospect of another spring with massive flooding across the Midwest, or how they’ll cope if wildfire season gets out of control. Last month, the U.S. Forest Service announced that, owing to the pandemic, it is suspending controlled burns, for instance, “one of the most effective tools for increasing California’s resiliency to fire.” God forbid that we get another big crisis or two while this one is still preoccupying us—but simple math means that it’s almost inevitable.

And, of course, all these things interact with one another: inequality means that some people must live near sources of air pollution that most of us wouldn’t tolerate, which in turn means that their lungs are weakened, which in turn means they can’t fight off the coronavirus. (It also means that some of the same people can lack access to good food, and are more likely to be diabetic.) And, if there’s a massive wildfire, smoke fills the air for weeks, weakening everybody’s lungs, but especially those at the bottom of the ladder. When there’s a hurricane and people need to flee, the stress and the trauma can compromise immune systems. Simply living at the sharp end of an unequal and racist society can do the same thing. And so on, in an unyielding spiral of increasing danger.

Since we must rebuild our economies, we need to try to engineer out as much ecological havoc and inequality as we can—as much danger as we can. That won’t be easy, but there are clear and obvious steps that would help—there are ways to structure the increased use of renewable energy that will confront inequality at the same time. Much will be written about such plans in the months to come, but at the level of deepest principle here’s what’s key, I think: from a society that has prized growth above all and been willing to play fast and loose with justice and ecology, we need to start emphasizing sturdiness, hardiness, resiliency. (And a big part of that is fairness.) The resulting world won’t be quite as shiny, but, somehow, shininess seems less important now.

Passing the Mic

Mary Annaïse Heglar is one of the freshest and most important voices in the climate movement. She’s the writer-in-residence at Columbia University’s Earth Institute in partnership with the Natural Resources Defense Council. Her personal essays—most of which revolve around themes of climate justice—are some of the most engaging writing I know on a subject that often inspires earnestness; a recent favorite was in Wired magazine. This interview has been condensed for clarity.

You say, “The facts have been on our side for a very long time, but we’re still losing.” Why?

The science on climate change has been crystal clear for literally decades. As Amy Westervelt has illustrated beautifully, on her podcast “Drilled,” the fossil-fuel companies knew that before anyone else. James Hansen testified before Congress thirty-two years ago. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (the precursor to the Paris Agreement) dates back to 1992. We didn’t wind up in a climate crisis for lack of information, or even for lack of clearly communicated information. What was done was not done out of ignorance—it was done out of malice and greed. If all we had to do was have the right facts, we’d have been done a long time ago.

People feel as if they can’t take part in the fight because they’re not scientifically inclined. What do you tell them?

What I tell them is, “Girl, me, neither!” But you don’t need a scientific background or inclination to be part of the climate movement or conversation. This is not about science; it’s about justice. The science proves the severity of the injustice, sure, but it’s not the entire story. There’s a place for everyone in the climate movement because everyone, even the smallest toddler, understands the concept of “no fair.”

Everyone always asks me, “What should I be doing as an individual?” But is that even the right way to frame the question?

I get that question all the time, too, and it’s really frustrating. As I argue in my article, if you’re ready to graduate beyond the things that everyone should be doing—like cutting your carbon footprint, and voting for the climate, and showing up to demonstrations—then you’ve reached the point where you’re ready to become a bona-fide climate person. That means you’re past the one-size-fits-all activism. It’s time for your activism to mold to you, and only you can do that. No one told Greta [Thunberg] to strike, no one told Jamie and Nadia [the teen-age climate activists Jamie Margolin and Nadia Nazar] to help start Zero Hour. They just did it. No one told me to write—in fact, plenty of people told me not to! There’s so much to be done on climate, and so much that the people already involved with it haven’t thought of. There’s so much room for new ideas and new voices, so if you’re a new or aspiring climate person, you’re right on time. The better question would be “What can I do next?” An even better question would be “How did you find your niche in climate?” And then take those answers and carve out your own niche.

Climate School

As Earth Day approaches, Denis Hayes, who spearheaded the original observance, in 1970, writes in the Seattle Times about what had been the plans for a mass fiftieth-anniversary day of action next week. The activities will be going online, instead, at EarthDayLive, but Hayes points out that we’ll get a real chance to show our commitment on November 3rd. His essay is worth looking at for the vintage photographs alone, but he adds an aside that I didn’t know: just days after the original protest, in which some twenty million Americans participated, the escalation of the war in Cambodia and the shootings at Kent State drove it out of the news.

Cutting down rain forests is a bad idea because it helps wreck the climate. It also increases the chances that diseases will jump from animals to humans, according to a new Stanford study. The veteran writer David Quammen distills some of those lessons in a new interview, based on his book “Spillover,” from 2012. I confess that I had no idea that one in four mammal species on our planet was a bat.

The Times has a doleful piece on Nepali climate migrants leaving their home villages because of the Himalayan drought. According to one official, ongoing bouts of extreme weather across the region threaten to “reverse and undermine decades of development gains and potentially undermine all our efforts to eradicate poverty.”

Scoreboard

President Trump keeps rolling back environmental regulations, but one of the few silver linings to the incompetence of this Administration is that it frequently manages the rollbacks with the same flat-footedness that it brings to, say, epidemiology. This means that the courts often overturn them; last week the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit restored a regulation that prohibited businesses from using chemicals in refrigeration systems that contribute to climate change.

In Kansas (of all places), a judge appointed by the former far-right governor Sam Brownback (of all people) ruled that the utilities could not charge people a monthly fee more for putting solar panels on their roofs. The surcharge—similar to plans put in place across the nation by utilities who fear that the quick penetration of solar power will undercut their revenues—would have in some cases extended the time it takes for residents to pay off their systems from thirteen years to thirty-nine. That the judge was the appointee of an anti-environmental governor makes the ruling “almost a cherry on top of an ice-cream sundae,” as one advocate put it.

Warming Up

Judy Twedt, a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Washington, managed to put the Keeling Curve of rising carbon dioxide to music—“it gets screechy at the end,” she admits, as the numbers keep rising. Here’s a short interview with her, and her TEDx talk, and her home page, where you can check out the score she made from the data record of melting sea ice.

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A N95 respirator and other facial masks. (photo: Nicholas Pfosi/Reuters)

The Trump Administration Paid Millions for N95 Masks From a Bankrupt Military Contractor With No Experience Manufacturing Medical Equipment
John Haltiwanger, Business Insider
Haltiwanger writes: "The coronavirus pandemic has created a desperate clamber for vital medical supplies, like N95 masks, that has led the federal government to award massive contracts to third-party vendors to help fill the gaps."
READ MORE

Members of the national guard put food in bags to be delivered to people in need at the Find food bank in Indio, California, on 24 March. (photo: Étienne Laurent/EPA)

'We May Have to Ration': US Food Banks Face Shortages as Demand Surges
Nina Lakhani and Maanvi Singh, Guardian UK
Excerpt: "Food banks face going millions of dollars over budget as they struggle to meet surging demand from those hit hard by mass layoffs caused by the coronavirus pandemic."
READ MORE

The United States-Mexico border wall is seen in Organ Pipe national park south of Ajo, Arizona, in February. (photo: Sandy Huffaker/Getty)

Army Decides a Pandemic Is a Good Time to Give GOP Donors $569 Million to 'Build the Wall'
Spencer Ackerman, Noah Shachtman and William Bredderman, The Daily Beast
Excerpt: "In the middle of a pandemic that has killed 27,000 Americans and counting, the Army this week gave a politically connected Montana firm half a billion dollars - not to manufacture ventilators or protective gear to fight the novel coronavirus, but to build 17 miles of President Trump's southern border wall."

EXCERPT:

On Tuesday, the Army Corps of Engineers announced it awarded BFBC, an affiliate of Barnard Construction, $569 million in contract modifications for building “17.17 miles” of the wall in two California locations, El Centro and San Diego. That works out to over $33 million per mile—steeply above the $20 million-per-mile average that the Trump administration is already doling out for the wall. Construction is supposed to be completed by the end of June 2021.

And it’s only the latest wall contract the firm has gotten. BFBC, a reliable contributor to Republican politicians, has gotten over $1 billion in taxpayer money in less than a year to build a mere 37 miles worth of wall. Scott Amey, the general counsel at the Project on Government Oversight, urged federal watchdogs to investigate the new BFBC contract.

“$1 billion for 37 miles of wall is a travesty and it must be investigated and audited immediately,” Amey said. “That’s nearly $27 million per mile, which is well above other wall costs. These efforts might make good on a campaign promise, but who is minding the store and ensuring that military readiness and bases are not negatively impacted?”

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Michigan's former governor Rick Snyder. (photo: Michigan Municipal League)

Michigan's Former Republican Governor Knew About Flint Water Crisis Earlier Than He Testified Under Oath
Lee DeVito, Metro Times
DeVito writes: "To paraphrase the famous Watergate question, what did former Gov. Rick Snyder know about the Flint water crisis, and when did he know it?"
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Jair Bolsonaro, president of Brazil, takes off his protective mask to speak to journalists. (photo: Andressa Anholete/Getty)

Brazil's Jair Bolsonaro, the World's Most Powerful Coronavirus Denier, Just Fired the Health Minister Who Disagreed With Him
Andrew Fishman, The Intercept
Fishman writes: "Bolsonaro's health minister has become the most prominent public voice to contradict the president's full-throated denialism."

  EXCERPTS:

razilians “don’t know if they should listen to the health minister or if they should listen to the president,” said Health Minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta in an interview with TV Globo on Sunday, referring to far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, one of the world’s leading coronavirus deniers.

Mandetta had repeatedly advocated a science-based approach that includes social-distancing measures and quarantines, as well as shutting down much of Brazil. The positions weren’t in accord with Bolsonaro’s. On the same day Mandetta said that the worst is yet to come and that the coronavirus peak should hit in May and June, Bolsonaro told religious leaders, “It seems like this issue of the virus is starting to go away.”

Bolsonaro has gone out of his way to make highly publicized visits to supermarkets and bakeries, shaking hands and taking selfies without gloves or a mask. “Due to my history as an athlete, if I was infected by the virus, I wouldn’t have to worry,” said the 65-year-old Bolsonaro in a nationally televised address late last month. He has repeatedly referred to Covid-19 as “a little cold.”

Bolsonaro’s health minister has become the most prominent public voice to contradict the president’s full-throated denialism, but Mandetta speaks for an overwhelming majority of governors and health experts, as well as the public. In a recent survey, 76 percent of respondents approved of the health minister’s handling of the crisis, compared to 39 percent for Bolsonaro.

Bolsonaro, however, found a tidy solution to this problem: Fire the health minister. Bolsonaro chafed at having to share the spotlight with a subordinate who openly disagreed with his statements and had repeatedly threatened to remove the minister from his role. On Thursday, Mandetta was out.

It’s not clear that Bolsonaro’s new health minister will be any better for the far-right president. On Thursday afternoon, Bolsonaro replaced Mandetta with Nelson Teich, an oncologist and health care executive who apparently also does not share the president’s vision of how to handle the crisis. In recently published articles, Teich has endorsed wide-scale social isolation measures and lamented the polarized nature of the debate. Teich wrote, “It is as if there is a group focused on people and health and another on the market, companies and money, but this divided, antagonistic and perhaps radical approach is not the one that will most help society to get through this problem.”

Teich, however, also knows that the way to Bolsonaro’s heart is flattery, and the incoming health minister has not come up short in this regard. In an essay published on April 2, Teich wrote, “Fortunately, despite all the problems, the handling [of the coronavirus crisis] has been perfect so far.”

Quarantine and Health Systems Breaking Down

With Bolsonaro burrowing his head deeper into the sand, facts on the ground continue to grow more dire. According to official statistics, 30,425 Brazilians have been diagnosed with the coronavirus and 1,924 have died from the disease, but those numbers grossly underrepresent the true likely tolls. Rio Health Secretary Edmar Santos has said that for every case reported, there are likely another 50 to 100 infected people who have not been tested. Mandetta has also acknowledged that the official statistics undercount total deaths from the disease.

Tests have been in woefully short supply and even those who are lucky enough to get tested face long waits for results, as the laboratory backlogs pile up. The Health Ministry does not know how many tests have been administered nationwide.

In São Paulo, the wealthiest and largest metropolis in the country, 62 percent of public health workers did not have access to personal protective equipment, known as PPE, according to a study reviewed exclusively by The Intercept.

Other regions are even worse off. Half of Amazonas state’s 4 million people live in the capital city of Manaus, a blip of concrete and asphalt in the middle of the endless Amazon rainforest. In a state nearly as big as Alaska, where most long-distance travel is by boat, every single one of the 293 intensive care unit beds is located in the capital; 95 percent of them were already full as of last Monday. As of Wednesday, the state had 1,554 confirmed cases and 106 confirmed deaths, including on isolated Indigenous reserves.

This March, Brazil registered 2,239 more deaths due to respiratory failure and pneumonia than in the year before, many of which, specialists believe, are likely unconfirmed Covid-19 victims. More than 41,000 Brazilians were hospitalized as of Tuesday for Covid-19 or suspected or undetermined SARS cases, only 15 percent of which were diagnosed as Covid-19. A recent study projected that Brazil’s universal public health service needs more than 40,000 additional ICU beds to deal with the crisis, a 273 percent increase over its current capacity.

The crisis is also reaching high into Brazil’s power structures. The governors of Rio de Janeiro and Pará, a northern state that borders Amazonas, both announced on Tuesday that they have tested positive for Covid-19. Almost two dozen people who traveled with Bolsonaro to the United States last month, included top aides, contracted the disease as well. The president claimed he tested negative but would not publish his results.

Despite these terrifying indicators of a growing health crisis, quarantine measures have not been strictly adhered to across the nation of 211 million. Cellphone data showed that 41 percent of São Paulo’s population did not isolate at home over the Easter holiday weekend.

In every major city studied, researchers found that only 53 percent of people nationwide had stayed at home in the first days of April, a 2 to 3 percent decrease compared to mid- to late-March, when social-distancing measures were first put in place in most areas.

The Bolsonaro Effect

Bolsonaro has repeatedly attempted to undermine quarantine efforts. He tried to invalidate parts of various governors’ quarantine orders, but was blocked by federal judges. He has found other ways to influence the public, for instance, using the bully pulpit of his office.

On March 24, Bolsonaro gave a nationally televised address attacking social distancing as “scorched earth” tactics; hyping chloroquine as a promising treatment; blaming the press for creating “hysteria”; and insisting that Brazil “should go back to normal.” The Intercept’s Bruno Sousa wrote about the impact that the address had on his working-class Rio de Janeiro neighborhood the following morning, describing scenes where some people began to go about their lives as normal following the remarks; many nonessential businesses even opened back up. “Everyone talked about coronavirus and the president’s speech. Until yesterday, few stores opened here,” Sousa wrote.

The day after his speech, Bolsonaro doubled down: “What they are doing in Brazil, a few governors and a few mayors, is a crime. They are breaking up with Brazil, they are destroying jobs. And those guys who say, ‘Oh, the economy is less important than life.'”

Small street protests by Bolsonaro supporters who oppose the quarantine have broken out in multiple cities and, in some cases, have been shut down by state police and the courts.

Paulo Guedes, the Minister of Austerity

The World Bank estimates that Brazil’s economy will retract by 5 percent this year, according to new estimates released on Sunday, putting South America’s largest economy behind Mexico, Ecuador, and Argentina on the list of countries in the region that are expected to be the hardest hit. “To help the vulnerable face the loss of earnings from the lockdown, existing social protection and social assistance programs should be rapidly scaled up and their coverage extended,” the World Bank argued.

Yet Bolsonaro’s Economic Minister Paulo Guedes has resisted such measures and instead wants to continue his agenda of neoliberal reforms, which have gutted social services, labor protections, and pension benefits since the administration took office last year. “The best response to the crisis is the reforms,” Guedes told reporters last week, referring to pending proposals to privatize state-owned companies, reduce government spending, restructure the tax code, and incentivize private business.

It’s not that Congress isn’t trying. The legislature quickly passed a much-celebrated plan to provide low-wage informal sector workers with between $114 and $228 per month for three months. But the bill sat on the president’s desk for three days until it was finally signed and enacted. Guedes had initially proposed only a third of the amount and fought the measure, but publicly backed it after it became clear that the bill would pass. The administration blamed the delay on “bureaucratic issues,” but in the meantime, Guedes was attempting to hold back the president’s signature to negotiate other legislation from his list of reforms.

After the emergency relief package was finally approved, The Intercept reported that Caixa, a large, government-owned bank, planned to keep the federal relief payments of account holders with debts or negative account balances. Government officials said that an agreement had been reached with banks to avoid this outcome, but could not produce any evidence to corroborate the deal.

Guedes then went on to fight against a federal aid package to state and local governments, a plan that was approved by the lower house on Monday. The government has signaled that it would veto the final bill.

Of the $227.7 billion in coronavirus-related economic relief measures projected by the government, only $40 billion is new spending, which is roughly 3 percent of national gross domestic product. By comparison, the $2 trillion U.S. stimulus package represents 10 percent of GDP.

“The central issue is that the entire economic team is in conflict,” Antonio Corrêa de Lacerda, president of Brazil’s Federal Economic Counsel, told the Valor Econômico newspaper. “They have always preached austerity as an instrument to restore confidence that would take us out of the crisis. Now that the most relevant countries have adopted policies of strong state intervention, they are forced to do so. Although in a timid, late, and wavering way.”

The public, however, along with some of the president’s allies, are increasingly losing faith in Bolsonaro’s leadership. The shifts are not because of his timidity or tardiness, but largely because Bolsonaro’s response to the crisis lacks any coherent rhyme or reason. For example, Bolsonaro has emphasized the importance of the economy, and yet his sons and education minister have launched repeated — and sometimes racist — attacks on China, the country’s largest trading partner and principal source for essential medical supplies.

For weeks, at 8:30 p.m. nearly every night, neighborhoods across Brazil come alive to the sounds of pots and pans banging, punctuated by shouts of “Bolsonaro out!” peppered with an increasingly creative array of epithets. Another round of cacophonous protest rang out across Brazil as Bolsonaro announced Mandetta’s firing.

READ MORE

This crisis might change our mindset, so we see travel more as a privilege, not a right. (photo: Art Wager/Getty)

With a Ban on Non-Essential Travel, We're Now Able to Witness What Happens to the Earth When We're Absent
Chloe Berge, BBC
Berge writes: "When the world stays home, the planet benefits."

s a travel journalist and someone who cares deeply about the future of our planet, the moral dilemma of air travel is something I constantly grapple with. I’ve reduced the number of trips I take, buy carbon offsets when I travel and focus my assignments on stories that allow me to tackle conservation issues whenever possible. But the positive effect these measures have had is hard to quantify.

What isn’t as nebulous is this: when the world stays home, the planet benefits. There’s nothing good about the coronavirus, but with a ban on non-essential travel and some countries in lockdown, we’re able to witness what happens to the Earth when we’re largely absent for the first time.

Satellite images published by NASA and the European Space Agency detected a reduction in nitrogen dioxide emissions (which come predominantly from the burning of fossil fuels) from January to February in China, due to the economic slowdown during quarantine. Findings by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) show that China’s carbon dioxide emissions (which also come from fossil fuel combustion) have reduced by 25% because of measures taken to contain the coronavirus.

During Italy’s quarantine, similar satellite data has shown a drop in nitrogen dioxide emissions in the country’s northern region; and waterways in Venice appear cleaner because of a drastic reduction in tourist boat traffic (though, much to the chagrin of animal lovers, the photos circulating of dolphins frolicking in the canals were actually taken nearly 800km away in Sardinia).

In India, a nationwide curfew on 22 March resulted in the lowest average level of nitrogen dioxide pollution ever recorded in spring, according to the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA). And as North America (one of the world’s major polluters) enters a major economic downturn, it’s likely we’ll see similar effects there.

Of course, a global health crisis is not the answer to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but the phenomenon should give us cause to reflect on the impact human activity has on the planet – including how we travel.

Restrictions on non-essential travel means airlines are grounding planes, drastically slashing flights or suspending operations completely. While data on the specific environmental outcomes of reduced aviation is yet to be published, we know it’s likely to have a significant impact. A 2017 study conducted by researchers at the Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies in Sweden (LUCSUS) in partnership with the University of British Columbia showed that there are three personal choices we can make to quickly cut a lot of greenhouse gas emissions: reduce air and car travel, as well as meat consumption.

A 2018 study published in Nature Climate Change showed that emissions from tourism add up to 8% of the global total, with flying making up the largest share of this. “By far, the biggest action we can take is to stop flying or to fly less,” said Kimberly Nicholas, a sustainability scientist at LUCSUS. “One round-trip flight from New York to London is the equivalent of about two years of eating meat [in terms of personal carbon footprint].”

In light of these startling statistics – in conjunction with the visible signs of environmental relief we’ve seen as the world stays home to beat Covid-19 – the question needs to be posed: when we can travel again, should we?

“There's just no way to have a safe climate and the business-as-usual plan with the aviation industry,” said Nicholas.

If we want to meet the Paris Agreement’s target of limiting global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels by 2030, we need to make significant changes to how we travel. Part of this is going to have to come from within the airline and transportation industries.

Some airlines are making headway through research into innovations like biofuel and electric-powered aircraft. “There's still a lot of potential fuel economy that could be gained from redesigning aircraft to be more efficient,” said Colin Murphy, deputy director of The Policy Institute for Energy, Environment and the Economy at University of California, Davis. “If you're using waste oil, biofuels typically get about 60% greenhouse gas reductions compared to conventional petroleum,” he added. The amount of land needed to grow new sources of biofuel – renewable fuel derived from organic materials – could pose a problem, however. And while there’s potential for electric-powered aircraft, Murphy notes that limited battery technology means this will never be a viable solution for long-haul flights.

Even if we succeed with these technological innovations, we still need to change our approach to travel as individuals. Just as the planet seems to be taking a breath right now, we’ve also been offered an opportunity for introspection. The coronavirus pandemic has forced us to see how interconnected the people, systems and organisations in our world are. While this revelation has been devastating in terms of how quickly the virus has spread globally, it’s also shown us how we’re able to unite and act as individuals for the collective good. We’ve practised social distancing to protect the elderly and immune-compromised; we’ve cheered healthcare workers on from our balconies; and shared the message to #stayhome on social media.

When Covid-19 is behind us, we need to once again look outside ourselves and take individual action for the good of the planet. Just as coronavirus has forced our lives to slow down, we should consider a slower, more thoughtful approach to travel. There’s an authentic connection that comes with a place when we take the time to understand its people, culture and natural beauty in a meaningful way. This can’t be achieved with superficial port-to-port itineraries – we could also do without the environmental wreckage that a lot of large cruise ships leave in their wake – or by hopping around to a legion of countries in two weeks. It might mean taking one longer trip per year instead of packing in five or six shorter ones, which would drastically reduce our carbon footprint.

“Overtourism is just another form of overconsumption,” said Shannon Stowell, CEO of the Adventure Travel Trade Association and sustainable travel advocate. “I'm fine seeing tourism numbers lower overall and for the quality of tourism to increase, where people understand the destination better and have a positive impact on it versus overcrowding and pollution and wildlife habitat loss – which are all outcomes of too much tourism,” he added.

We can also alleviate some of the environmental stress of travel simply by keeping more of our adventures local. “This is actually the biggest impact we can have,” said Nicholas. “I used to be a frequent flyer, but I’ve found other ways to find that kind of novelty and adventure. Basically, slow travel and self-powered travel.” This might look like enjoying your local beach instead of one in Mexico and saving your carbon budget for a more impactful trip.

When we do fly, we can purchase carbon offsets. “Carbon offsets help and they absolutely move the needle,” said Murphy. They're not as good as actually reducing the emissions from travel so you're not completely undoing all the harm, but they help.” When trying to decide what kind of offset to purchase, it’s vital to donate to a project that’s additional, meaning that it didn’t exist beforehand. So, when you donate to a cause that’s protecting deforestation, make sure the land in question wasn’t going to be protected anyway.

How we fly also matters. As enticing as the extra legroom in business class is, purchasing those seats also increases your carbon footprint because it means less passengers per plane. “The more densely packed you are, the lower your emissions are per passenger mile by quite a bit,” Murphy notes. “At a policy level, we need transparency about the true environmental impact of our choices, and we need prices to align with those impacts,” said Austin Brown, executive director of the Policy Institute at UC Davis. “For example, making first-class tickets cost more.” (The price tag on first-class seats is used to subsidise cheap economy tickets, reducing the overall cost of travel and allowing more people to fly.)

When we’re on the ground in a destination, we can reduce our footprint by being respectful to the area’s culture and environment. “When you travel to a new place, you’re a guest in their home,” said Stowell. Part of accomplishing this is to choose sustainable accommodation and activities, and a green mode of transportation to explore the place you’re in. This might mean partnering with a sustainable local tour operator who is more familiar with the tourism landscape, which is also a way to give back to the local economy.

To weed through eco-tourism greenwashing, travellers should be looking for tour operators with a transparent sustainability plan. “If you go on a company website and find a sustainable tourism plan, and you then see an impact report in the next 12 to 48 months, you know they’re putting their money where their mouth is,” said Shannon Guihan, sustainability officer at TreadRight, a sustainable tourism non-profit that has developed a checklist to help travellers adopt eco-friendly habits and be more conscious with their choices.

“We still need travel,” Guihan added. “Tourism is one of the biggest employers in the world and there are destinations, worldwide, reliant on travel and tourism for survival.”

Outside of the global tourism economy, travel has the potential to benefit all of us. When we travel in a meaningful way, we gain cross-cultural understanding and develop greater empathy for people outside of our immediate circle. Travel gives us the global perspective we need to care about the future of our home here on Earth.

Throughout my career as a journalist, I’ve shared mint tea with Bedouins in the middle of the desert in Jordan, looked into the eyes of a mountain gorilla in the lush jungles of Rwanda and tracked tigers under a white-hot sun with local naturalists in India. These experiences have given me a deep appreciation for the vast, diverse, infinitely beautiful world we live in, and a desire to protect it.

Our ability to wander has been temporarily taken from us, and never has it felt like more of a luxury. “This crisis might give us the opportunity to instill a new travel mindset,” said Stowell. “Travel is a privilege, not a right.”

I can’t imagine a world without travel, but I know that if we don’t change how we travel, there won’t be a planet left for us to explore.

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