This Week on Earth: Nov 13-19

A squirrel behind Chapin Hall on Northwestern’s Evanston campus. (Jonathan Zhao/ION)

Northwestern

Northwestern’s Dittmar Memorial Gallery unveiled “Fabric of the Earth,” an exhibit highlighting the urgency of climate change through fiber-based works. On display from Nov. 7 to Dec. 3, “Fabric of the Earth” was curated by communications junior Maggie Munday Odom and features pieces from four different artists. 

The exhibit uses craft techniques to inspire climate action, prompting the audience to consider how community perspectives on climate anxiety contribute to the “creation of a fabric for our future,” Odom said.

“I think that there’s something about climate grief and climate anxiety that is palpable, and so having this tangible medium and palpable emotion creates a link,” Odom said to the Daily Northwestern. 

Some of the pieces include Chicago-based artist Katie Vota’s weavings, which are based on images of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Bonnie Peterson’s climate-related embroidery pieces are also on display, featuring silk, velvet, graphs and facts to explain different climate concepts. 

Artists featured in the exhibit will also be holding workshops open to the public. The last upcoming workshop, titled “Accumulation as metaphor,” will take place from 6 to 8 p.m. on Nov. 20, led by Katie Vota. Participants will bring collected, repurposed objects to transform them into art.

Azerbaijan

COP29, the 29th U.N. Climate Conference, started last week on Nov. 11 in Baku, Azerbaijan. The conference garnered numerous critiques from climate activists, who highlighted the limitations of working within the status quo to achieve successful global environmental policy.  

This year, the main goal of COP29 is to secure the necessary finances to fund climate mitigation initiatives across the Global South. However, multiple scientists and activists have accused the conference of greenwashing and excluding the voices of the most climate-vulnerable communities. 

The location of the conference symbolizes the inability of fossil fuel producers to properly engage climate vulnerable communities. Fossil fuels account for over 91% of Azerbaijan’s exports. The petrostate has arrested over 300 climate activists, journalists and political opponents for critiquing the current government. Azerbaijan has also committed numerous human rights abuses against the ethnic Armenian population. Armenians in Azerbaijan are considered extremely vulnerable to climate change due to their geographic location and their status as a minority subjected to ethnic cleansing. 

Representatives from Azerbaijan, such as Elnur Soltanov, the chief executive of COP29, have been accused of promoting oil and gas deals at the conference. 

Just like the previous conferences, COP29 has become nothing more than a spectacular event of greenwashing, as representatives of the oil and gas industry meet with the most fossil fuel-reliant nations on Earth, such as the U.S. and other European countries. 

Representatives from Vanuatu and Tuvalu, for example, have called on Australia, the world’s third largest fossil fuel exporter, to stop a massive fossil fuel expansion that would increase the devastating impacts of the climate crisis on Pacific nations. 

Given that at least 1,733 coal, oil and gas lobbyists were granted access to COP29, it seems as though the conference will fail to produce any meaningful change. In fact, the number of fossil fuel lobbyists exceeds the sum of all the delegates from the 10 most climate vulnerable nations, or 1,033 people, indicating that the people who need to be heard the most on the global stage are far outnumbered by the industry primarily driving climate change. 

Nearly 500 carbon capture and storage (CCS) lobbyists were granted access to COP29, with half of them coming as members of national delegations. CCS technology has been heavily promoted at COP29, despite being a risky and potentially unsafe technology that is being utilized to delay the phase out of fossil fuels. 

Climate-vulnerable nations, however, such as countries across Oceania, have repeatedly warned that their security relies on a swift transition away from fossil fuels as well as the Global North taking responsibility for their own historical emissions by funding renewable energy initiatives in the Global South.

Solomon Islands

The world’s largest known coral was identified by scientists last week in the Solomon Islands. Visible from space, the standalone coral is “pulsating with life and color,” according to scientists. The mega-coral has been growing uninterrupted for between 300 and 500 years and has amassed a circumference of 183 meters. 

The discovery of such healthy, extensive coral offers hope while coral reefs across the world have degraded from climate change. Of the Pavona Clavus species, the mega-coral is a dome-shaped shelter for juvenile reef fish, crabs, shrimp and other marine life. 

Despite its massive size, the coral was never reported by the surrounding Indigenous communities. It was originally mistaken for a shipwreck by the National Geographic Pristine Seas team. 

“The ocean provides for our livelihoods and has contributed so much to our national economy and communities,” said Solomon Islands PM Jeremiah Manele. “Our survival depends on healthy coral reefs, so this exciting discovery underlines the importance of protecting and sustaining them for future generations.”