[Coral-List] Proposal that ICRS supports the organization of remote meetings for ICRS 2020

Chelsie Counsell chelsiew12 at gmail.com
Thu Sep 5 02:49:33 UTC 2019


Aloha,


The devastating impacts of marine heat waves are in the forefront of the
minds of many coral reef scientists. In Hawai‘i, we have already seen
bleaching of up to 70% of colonies from surveys on O‘ahu conducted in
August. Given the direct connection between air travel and increased carbon
dioxide emissions, many coral reef scientists that are based far from
Germany are deeply conflicted about flying to Bremen despite our desire to
share our most recent research with the community and to catch-up with
colleagues. From Hawai‘i, Bremen is 14,000 miles round trip. MyClimate.org
estimates the CO2 emissions for one economy class passenger to make this
flight is 4.3 t. To put this number in perspective, to stop contributing to
climate change, each person on this planet can only generate 0.6 t of CO2
each year.



As a community of coral reef scientists, *we have an opportunity to let our
actions speak louder than our words*. We can show society that coral reef
scientists are taking climate change so seriously that we are limiting our
travel and modifying the structure of our main research conference. I would
like to propose *ICRS support the organization of remote meetings for the
2020 symposium*. I am offering my time to help lead the organization
of a *remote
meeting in Honolulu*. Ideally, recordings of plenary seminars will be
screened in as close to real time as is reasonable, as well as screenings
of any other sets of talks or panels that can be shared digitally. Remote
meetings still provide an opportunity for coral reef scientists to hold
workshops, share research updates, network, and perhaps most importantly,
take time to strategize and deliberate next steps to tackle climate change
at a local scale.



I fully understand that without getting corporations and governments on
board, our individual actions alone will not address climate change fast
enough. However, coral reef scientists understand the climate models better
than other members of society, and we certainly understand how dire the
effects of burning fossil fuels are for coral reefs. We need to help direct
the attention of politicians and society to taking action against climate
change. *Changing our normal routine from flying internationally to
research conferences and/or research sites, and seeking creative local
options with dramatically lower CO2 emissions is one way we can show the
world that we are taking climate change very seriously.*



If you would like to help put together a remote meeting for ICRS in
Honolulu or to talk about putting together a remote meeting elsewhere,
please be in touch.


Thank you for your support in shifting the paradigm for sharing our
research.



Chelsie Counsell, Ph.D.

Quantitative Coral Reef Ecologist

Hawai‘i Institute of Marine Biology

counsell at hawaii.edu


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