In the Bahamas, a constant race to adapt to climate change
At last year’s United Nations Climate Summit in Egypt, Prime Minister Philip Davis of the Bahamas emerged as one of the most impassioned speakers among the more than 100 heads of state in attendance.
“We have to believe that a safer, brighter future is possible,” he told the gathering. “We believe that action – real, coordinated action – can save the planet and our human race.”
But as Mr. Davis spoke, the Bahamas was preparing for a direct hit from Tropical Storm Nicole, the 14th named storm of the 2022 hurricane season. Nicole slammed into what Mr. Davis called “the most beautiful country on Earth,” as a Category 1 hurricane before traveling on to the United States. The storm ultimately caused more than $1 billion in damage to vulnerable communities.
It was another reminder that the Bahamas is uniquely threatened by the impacts of climate change. As the continued burning of fossil fuels rapidly heats the planet, the weather is deteriorating, sea levels are rising and developing island nations like the Bahamas are on the front line of a daily battle between civilization and an increasingly unstable climate. These issues are among the topics being discussed as leaders in business, science, culture and policy gather in Busan, South Korea, on Thursday and Friday for a New York Times conference, A New Climate.
“It’s only getting worse,” said Mr. Davis in Egypt. “We are entering a new climate era that will bring extreme geopolitical and economic instability.”
Against that dire backdrop, the Bahamas has emerged in recent years as a leader among nations scrambling to adapt to a hotter, more dangerous planet.
It has made progress towards decarbonising its power grid and building a network of storm-resistant solar installations. The academic institutions are developing programs to train a new generation of climate-conscious professionals. The government has taken measures to sequester carbon. And the private sector is home to a growing network of companies working on solutions to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Coral Vitaa private company working to restore coral reefs decided to locate in the Bahamas because it welcomed climate start-ups and was smack in the middle of one of the most vulnerable regions on Earth.
“The Bahamas is a living climate lab where we can test these solutions that can benefit both nature and people,” said Sam Teicher, co-founder of the company. “We are on the front lines of the climate crisis.”
Coral Vita is in what is known as the Blue Action Laba free trade zone hub in Freeport where a collection of businesses and nonprofits work to build resilient ecosystems.
Elsewhere in the country, work is underway to build a reliable, sustainable electricity generation network that can withstand even the most destructive storms.
Hurricane Dorian, which hit the islands in 2019 with winds of about 300 kilometers per hour, left large parts of the Bahamas without power.
But since then, the government has been working with partners, including the Rocky Mountain Institute, an organization that advocates clean energy, to develop storm-resistant solar installations. On Great Abaco Island, a solar installation recently came online that provides the majority of the power to a group of schools.
And on Ragged Island, a sliver of land off the coast of Cuba, the Rocky Mountain Institute helped create a solar microgrid that will power every home on the island.
“The Bahamas has made it a national priority that all of their citizens, regardless of which island they are on, regardless of their income, have access to power,” said Chris Burgess, director of projects for the Global South program in the Rocky Mountains. Mountain Institute. “They are absolutely fantastic renewable energy and adaptation champions.”
At the Bahamas Agriculture & Marine Science Institutethe president, Erecia Hepburn, is integrating climate resilience programs into a range of the institute’s work, including promoting sustainable agricultural practices and an early warning system for coral bleaching, and efforts to restore damaged mangrove forests.
“I’ve seen in my short life that climate change really affects my daily life,” said Dr. Hepburn.
She said that while the Bahamas had contributed only a minuscule share of global warming greenhouse gas emissions, it was among the countries most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.
“As a developing state on a small island, we may not be a major polluter, but we will be the first to be affected,” she said. “If we don’t keep the temperature below 1.5 degrees, islands like the Bahamas may not exist. Soon we will have to become climate refugees.”
And in an effort that’s more about financial engineering than creating new solar power or restoring coral reefs, the Bahamas unveiled last year a plan to sell “blue carbon” credits companies that want to offset their emissions. Under the plan, companies can pay the land to preserve natural habitats, such as the coastal mangrove forests, and in turn receive credits that they can use to offset their continued greenhouse gas emissions.
As part of the work to implement the plan, the Bahamas passed new laws to regulate the sale and trading of carbon credits, and entered into an agreement with the International Monetary Fund to develop a framework for how carbon credits can be used as a new asset class.
Critics say the strategy is a misguided attempt to make money while polluters continue to emit planet-warming gases and that efforts should focus on reducing overall emissions.
“Carbon credits may seem attractive to boost funding for conservation and climate action, but they are unlikely to have much of an impact in the long run.” wrote Marjahn Finlayson, a Bahamian climate scientist. “They are largely a dangerous distraction from actively mitigating global warming.”
And yet, despite all the work in the Bahamas, the islands remain extremely vulnerable.
When Hurricane Dorian swept through the archipelago, it destroyed 73 percent of the mangrove trees on the island of Grand Bahama, one of the country’s main islands. The loss of so many mangroves, which grow along the coast and serve as crucial buffers against storm surges, allowed floodwaters to penetrate deeper inland and left the region without a crucial line of defense.
However, just four years later, much of the mangrove forest has been restored. Groups including the Perry Institute for Marine Science have planted tens of thousands of new trees along the coast, restoring a valuable ecosystem that is also an important carbon sink.
It’s the kind of small success story that encapsulates the optimism – and lucid sense of danger – that the prime minister channels in his public remarks.
“We refuse to give up hope,” Davis said in Egypt last year. “We are not giving up. We have no choice. The alternative forces us to present ourselves as refugees at your borders. The alternative sends us to a watery grave. The alternative will erase us from history.”