Fighting fossil fuels: In conversation with Fossil Free UCL

Yesterday I spoke with Savina Venkova from Fossil Free UCL. She gave me her take on the Paris climate deal, why getting off fossil fuels is crucial to tackle climate change, and the challenges that lie ahead.


 
KG: Why is it absolutely necessary for UCL to cut its ties with the fossil fuel industry, and especially right now?

SV: The era that we're in right now is one past climate denialism. For the past few years or so it's been firmly accepted that climate change is happening and that fossil fuels and western civilization are largely the cause of it. Right now we're on a tipping point: organisations like UCL can either stand with the fossil fuel industry and be dinosaurs, basically pulling society back from progressing on issues of climate change - or they can be leaders. That's why it's so crucial for UCL to divest and cut all ties right now.

Why is it such a bad idea for us to rely on a geoengineered techno-fix to solve climate change?

A quote that really sums it up for me is that: "science teaches us that every problem has a solution, but history teaches us that every solution comes with a whole host of other problems".

I think that for the past few years and decades - even before the Industrial Revolution - western civilization and society has had this idea that western science and technology is going to fix everything and that there's a right answer to everything; if a problem isn't being solved then you just have to keep looking for the right answer. But if you want to "solve" a problem as complex, as deep and as long-lasting as climate change then you're not going to find a technology that's going to solve it.

That's a really nice quote. It sums up an attitude that I see a lot, of using science to "tackle" problems but really only treating the symptoms of a problem while ignoring the root cause.

Yeah, and another analogy, for example, is if you look at the internet and smartphones. They were supposed to save people labour, but in the end they're creating even more labour. We spend so much time trying to sort through our inboxes and manage our social profiles online but people are still working just as much, if not more, despite the fact that this technology was supposed to save us from that.   


Via BBC News

Are you feeling optimistic about the deal that was brokered in Paris at the COP21?

[Laughs] Me personally, and I'd say Fossil Free UCL as a whole, we were actually pretty upset with it because even though the media and the general opinion was "oh, what a lovely agreement just came through!" I think a lot of that was just general mindless enthusiasm. A lot of the issues that were supposed to be solved by this COP were not actually addressed in this agreement. For example, the 2 degree warming target: it was put in there that it would be nice to keep warming below 2 degrees, and ideally below 1.5 [degrees]. But there was no cap on emissions and regarding fossil fuels, in the final draft their aim was to cut their usage down to a safe amount within 100 years, which as we know isn't going to lead to less than 2 degrees warming - it's going to lead to 3 or 4. And in the final draft there wasn’t even anything on phasing out fossil fuels! They also took out the bit about human rights. On the whole it was not a very good agreement.

I've heard a lot of disappointment that not enough was made legally binding, no real deadlines were included. It was quite underwhelming.

Demonstrations marked the close of COP21. Thousands of people formed symbolic red lines that cannot be crossed. Source: Emma Cassidy/Survival Media Agency via CommonPeople.org.

  

Fossil Free UCL was in Paris last weekend at the climax of the COP. What was the atmosphere there like at the end?

So at the start of Saturday [12th December] the atmosphere was pretty elated. Fossil Free UCL had joined a bunch of other groups in doing civil disobedience, which had been legalized that day. So basically we felt like this movement for civil expression had won this small battle. But over the course of the march we heard the news, and then we started seeing all these articles about what was coming out of the agreement. And that's when the mood got a little bit sour because as part of civil society groups we were large enough and we were enthused by how many people had come all the way to Paris to have their say and how many people were active in doing something for climate change, but we felt pretty betrayed by our governments and companies as well.

Something that added to that bitterness and confusion were the statements that were coming out from well-known groups like Greenpeace and WWF and so on, because they were a little bit ambiguous and quite positive. And you can see why they did that, you know, of course they weren't going to come out and say the whole thing sucked for obvious reasons, but at the same time we felt like what needed to be said was not actually said. But we kind of expected it...

You held a COPupation at UCL before setting off to Paris. What were your highlights of that?

Actually quite a few highlights. We had a lot of mini events going on. We had film screenings, we had talks, we had panel discussions. A really good highlight for us was having other groups coming in from the London community, like the London Latinxs, and on the last day we had a discussion about colonialism and climate justice. So it was nice to have that because at UCL, although we would like to represent Global South issues, we are quite white and privileged.


Fossil Free UCL occupied private campus space and demanded that UCL take serious action on climate change. Source: Fossil Free UCL on Tumblr

 

What are your hopes and plans for 2016?

Obviously UCL has to divest! The only problem with that - and this isn't us backing down, it's only going to make us try harder - is UCL's relationship with BHP Billiton. As you know, BHP Billiton funds the UCL Institute of Sustainable Resources, and so that's a big problem for UCL. Because all the other companies that UCL invests in - Shell, BP, Rio Tinto and so on - they could easily do without those investments and I'm sure it wouldn't be a problem to get rid of them in the end. But UCL has a rule that it's not allowed to divest from any companies that it receives funding from. So obviously divesting from BHP Billiton would mean dismantling a whole department which is necessary, but I'm guessing will come with a lot of opposition. So that's on the agenda and something we're going to hope to break this year.

Do you think there's going to be any momentum now following what happened in Paris?

I think in addition to what happened in Paris. BHP Billiton was involved in a mining accident in Brazil a few weeks back that was called a “human calamity”. And so there are a lot of people associated with UCL who have ties in Brazil and can testify to what a horrible thing happened there and how awful it is that UCL is even remotely involved in that.


How could people get involved with your campaigns?

Sign our petition! But anyone can sign a petition, and so what we really need is not just people being pissed off - anyone can do that anyway - but also bringing it up in any way that you can. For example in social groups, or student reps. If student reps mention it at meetings then everything that happens in a meeting is reported and then sent to the union, which is supportive of our campaign. So that would help because it would inform them that the student body as a whole is united, or at least a significant part of it.

A challenge for us is this: because we're a student-run campaign we tend to think of things in terms of students, but we really want to involve staff. If staff members care to get involved, there's a lot of influence they have and a lot they can do to help us.



Savina is an alumna of UCL and completed her Masters in Environment and Sustainable Development at The Bartlett’s Development Planning Unit.

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