Vienna, 4.4.2024: Over 80 Austrian scientists from various disciplines are calling for evidence-based policy in the climate crisis. At a public press conference, they highlighted the security risk posed by inadequate climate policy, and demanded expert-driven policy in this bumper election year. "This is about civilisation as we know it — about protecting civilisation. We hope that the ÖVP will develop a climate policy befitting a party of government — and before the EU and national council elections," said Dr Nicolas Roux from the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna.
The climate crisis as a security risk
Global warming, at 1.48 °C above the pre-industrial average (1850–1900), is dangerously close to the 1.5 °C threshold that was enshrined in international law in Paris in 2015. What might sound like a numbers game is, in fact, an extremely relevant security question for human civilisation, explains Roux: "With current climate policy, there will be two to three times as many heat-related deaths in Europe as there would be if we can limit global warming to 1.5 °C in the long term through effective climate protection. We're talking about thousands of human lives every year."
The People's Party's Stone Age metaphors are harmful to the climate
The 2020–2024 government programme promised to make our legal framework fit for the climate. However, only a small part of this has actually been implemented, summarises legal scholar Dr Leonore Theuer: "Every further degree of warming poses a risk to us that we should prevent using every available means — and for that, we need to put the right legal framework in place." The rhetoric of the People's Party is hardly conducive to this. "According to the ÖVP, simply not building a new road can send us back to the Stone Age. This is a completely out-of-touch view that undermines constructive climate discourse. We won't get out of this through blocking and business as usual either," said Dr Willi Haas, Deputy Head of the Institute of Social Ecology, BOKU.
The People's Party's current policy is heading towards climate catastrophe
The escalating climate crisis demands climate policy driven by expertise rather than gut instinct, explains Prof. Reinhard Steurer, because "as we've known at least since the pandemic, gut instinct is a poor guide when it comes to solving highly complex problems. Climate policy based on gut instinct is like pandemic policy based on horse dewormer: deadly for many." Not only Kickl's FPÖ but also Nehammer's ÖVP therefore pose a security risk to Austria: "The ÖVP's climate policy is a security risk because it endangers not only security and prosperity, but ultimately human lives." Of course, expert-driven climate policy is more likely to happen when it's demanded by a large majority. The bumper election year of 2024 offers plenty of opportunities for that, says Steurer.
2024: A year of turning points
"2024 will be a year of turning points — in every sense. Will climate-sceptic, science-denying parties come to power in the EU and in Austria, or will decision-makers listen to the unified voice of science and recognise the seriousness of the climate crisis? That voice of science will be loud in the coming year — we'll be taking it to the party headquarters of every party over the coming months!" summarises Roux. Scientists For Future also announce that they will, together with other climate movements, put questions to the parties standing for election and publish their responses alongside a scientific assessment. In doing so, they aim to give voters a scientific basis for their electoral decisions.
