Highway to Hell: How BR319 Threatens the Amazon + Undermines Brazil’s #cop30 Credibility

"The Amazon directly influences global climate stability. If it collapses, the consequences will extend far beyond Brazil – disrupting weather patterns, increasing extreme events, and accelerating global heating."Visit https://Genn.cc for more information.View the related article: https://monicapiccinini.com/2024/03/06/the-br-319-highway-a-scientists-call-to-action-for-the-amazon-and-beyond/In this Climategenn episode we are taking a closer look at conflicts of interest in Brazil, threatening the Amazon rainforest, an essential global ecosystem. As well as the indigenous communities that live within the forest regions and it also threatens all of us around the world. A common phrase we hear these days is: what goes on in the Arctic doesn’t stay in the Arctic. We also know that what goes on in Antarctica does not stay in Antarctica. It is the same for the Amazon. If it is allowed to collapse – and this is the policy trajectory Brazil is on – then the outcome will be catastrophic for the global climate system. Two years ago I interviewed a Chinese climate scientist, professor Jingfang Fan, working with the Potsdam Institute, who identified a teleconnection between heat from the burning Amazon and the Tibetan Plateau. The transported heat to the Tibetan Plateau, via stratospheric jets, is accelerating the melt of the ice in a region often referred to as the third pole. The heating of the Amazon directly threatens the water security of 1.5 billion people on the other side of the world.To bring us up to speed on the conflicts of interest between what the Brazilian President, Lula da Silva, says is policy and the projects he is green lighting, is journalist Monica Piccinini. Monica and her colleagues are covering these issues in depth and as the spotlight is shot on Brazil for COP30 in Belem, a city within the Amazon region, we get a glimpse of what is really going on. Links to Monica’s related articles are also in the notes.In the next episode I am speaking with Professor Raymond Pierrehumbert from University of Oxford. Professor Pierrehumbert coauthored an article in The Guardian very recently with Professor Michael E. Mann from University of Pennsylvania, specifically criticising the UK government for their research grants into solar radiation management geogineering techniques. This is a topic I have covered for about 15 years and – far from fading away – geoengineering is being seen by a growing number of people as humanity’s escape route from continued burning of fossil fuels. Thank you to all subscribers and members for supporting this ongoing series of interviews. I have many more in the pipeline and episodes are available in the members area before going public. If you like, you can also support my work by ordering my book 'COPOUT - How governments have failed the people on climate’ available worldwide in paperback and from a multitude of online retailers not owned by Jeff Bezos. It remains as relevant as ever in todays world of political malaise.