Katharine Hayhoe, climatologist: ‘In the last year alone, China installed more solar panels than the US in its entire history’

Despite the terrible news for the fight against climate change occasioned by Donald Trump’s return to the White House, such as the United States’ withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe, 52, hasn’t lost hope, nor her smile. A Texas Tech University professor and chief scientist at the environmental organization The Nature Conservancy, this native of Toronto, Canada who teaches and lives in one of the most conservative U.S. states, specializes in opening doors to discussing global warming — a skill of which we are in desperate need.

Question. As a climate scientist, what do you think about the new U.S. government’s disengagement from the fight against climate change?

Answer. It’s as if, a hundred years ago, the United States had decided to invest in horses and carriages instead of the Model T. The clean energy revolution cannot be stopped and no person nor any government can halt climate action. They can slow it down, but they can’t stop it. The world is changing very quickly. Just last year, China installed more solar panels than the United States has in its entire history. All countries are changing — the United States has chosen to get left behind.

Q. Even if Trump can’t stop climate action, what if he manages to slow it down?

A. The science tells us that every additional tenth of a degree of warming matters. Every ton of carbon dioxide that we produce has consequences. Every decision matters. As John Holdren, who was a senior advisor to Obama, says, we have three options: mitigation, adaptation and suffering. We can mitigate climate change — meaning, reduce emissions — adapt to the changes that are coming, or suffer the consequences.

Q. What worries you most about the United States failing to listen to climate scientists?

A. What worries me is that, even though climate change affects all of us, it doesn’t affect all of us equally. Those who have least contributed to the problem are those who most suffer from its consequences. And that’s not fair. This is why I became a climate scientist. I was studying astronomy, but I started studying climate change when I realized how unfair it all is.

Q. How can we counteract the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Agreement?

A. We all contribute and we all have a role to play in reducing our emissions. Within the United States, there is an organization called We Are Still In. This group of cities, states, businesses, tribes, universities, represents more than 60% of U.S. emissions. So, while it’s true that the federal government [in the hands of Trump] plays a very big role in emissions, so do cities, states, businesses themselves. We at The Nature Conservancy are also committed to reducing emissions in a way that is consistent with the Paris Agreement.

Q. In recent years, there’s been a rejection of climate policy around the world. What are we doing wrong?

A. For more than 60 years, we’ve talked about the global risks of climate change, which I call communication of the brain. But we haven’t communicated all the reasons why we care about ourselves, that is, the heart. People don’t understand how climate change affects their home, their job, their family, their life. If you ask people what should be done to fight climate change, their answer is to recycle or use less plastic. And that is important, but it doesn’t have much to do with climate change.

Q. How can we break through to climate emergency skeptics?

A. That kind of person speaks very loudly, especially on social media and in online comment sections, they’re quite vociferous. But even in the United States, they represent less than 10% of the population. Arguing with those people doesn’t help to change their opinion, because it doesn’t have anything to do with science. They actually have what psychologists call solution aversion. They think that the cure is worse than the disease, they think that solutions to climate change like clean energy represent a threat. Their scientific doubts are a smokescreen. If we try to argue with those people about science, we’ll be like Don Quixote, fighting windmills.

Q. How do U.S. residents see the link between climate change and disasters like the fires in California?

A. At Yale University, they have a center that has been recording opinions on climate change for more than 15 years, and they’re seeing that more and more people in the United States are becoming concerned about warming. This is happening due to the climate-related disasters that are affecting us. We know without a doubt that climate change is increasing these risks. In the 1980s, in the United States there was a disaster that cost more than a billion dollars every four months, at least three every year. Nowadays, every year there are 30 disasters of that magnitude. That is changing public opinion.

Q. So then why did so many people in the United States vote for Trump?

A. Unfortunately, when it comes to climate change, we still haven’t made those connections between what we know as scientists — the brain — with homes, people’s lives — hearts. Neither have we made the connections between our own decisions and the companies and countries that continue in their addiction to fossil fuels. What I see in the United States also is that when you speak with regional leaders, mayors for example, they are more conscious, they think more about the impacts and importance of clean energy. I live in Texas, and there, cities like Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, El Paso have plans to fight against climate change and are reducing their emissions. Texas has more solar and wind farms than any other state in the United States.

Q. And what do people in a traditionally Republican state like Texas say about Trump’s rejection of climate action and clean energy?

A. Based on the conversations I’ve had, I think that they still haven’t connected the dots about how it is going to impact their jobs, the local economy. The problem — in the United States, but in other countries as well — is that the question of climate change is quite polarized. If you talk about clean energy, about adaptation, natural solutions, the majority of people support it.

Q. So what needs to be done?

A. Once in Texas, I gave a talk to a group of more than 300 directors of water districts, with representatives from the state government who do not support climate action. I decided to do the entire talk without saying “climate change.” I talked about long-term trends, about climate variability, the same data that we always give, but without ever mentioning climate change. When I was done, a woman came running up to shake my hand and tell me that she agreed with all of it. She told me that it made sense and that people talking about global warming didn’t. I learned that when we talk about risks and solutions without using the words climate change or global warming, we can win over many more people.

Q. How can you be so hopeful when the news is so negative?

A. We need to be worried, because there is a problem and if we’re not worried, why would we want to solve it? Still, fear is not enough. We have to know what we can do. Hope for me is not an emotion, but rather something you practice, like an Olympic sport.

Q. Can you say more about that?

A. I’m not talking about hope as an emotion, thinking that if we want something hard enough it’s going to be solved, sticking our head in the dirt like an ostrich. For me, hope is that we can change the future. That’s how it’s happened throughout history. How did we manage to end slavery? How did women get the vote? How did we end apartheid? It wasn’t because of a president or a famous person or a rich person, but rather, individuals who came together against great established powers until society was changed.

Q. There are some people who think that not transmitting a pessimistic message right now is to hide reality.

A. I hear that nearly every day on social media, in emails I receive. But scientists have been sharing bad news for 60 years, and what’s happened? What psychologists and social scientists tell us is that fear is not enough when it comes to climate change. They say that fear helps us wake up, but once we’re awake, fear paralyzes us. Many of the people who use the physical science of climate change to send negative messages do not then accept social sciences. To solve climate change, we need the bad news. Or as I say in my newsletter, the not-so-good news. We need it to know that we have a problem. At the same time, we need to know how to solve it, what other people like us are doing, other cities, other families, other businesses, other universities.

Translated by Caitlin Donohue.

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