How to blow up a pipeline: Learning to fight in a world on fire By AndreasMalm, London: Verso. 2021. 208 pages $21.25 (paperback). ISBN: 9781839760259

Andreas Malm's book has a preface, three chapters, 38 pages of notes, an acknowledgments section, and unfortunately no index. The book's premise is that climate change is so serious, and unabated, that fossil fuel infrastructure must be deliberately destroyed. Preventing a complete breakdown of the Earth's climate will require a global prohibition of all new carbon dioxide (CO2) emitting devices and substantial reductions in the historical lifetimes of existing fossil fuel infrastructure. However, since no state seems prepared to even consider this idea, due to property's sacrosanct nature under capitalism, fossil fuel infrastructure must be sabotaged—pipelines must be blown up! Malm immediately makes it clear interpersonal violence is not being advocated because, like Jesus chasing the money changers from the temple, he states “righteous property destruction falls within the boundaries of non-violence” (p.100). Malm's controversial and thought-provoking thesis has several problems. First, as he openly admits, “extremism can make a movement look so distasteful as to deny it all influence” (p. 121). In Alberta, this reviewer's home province, climate change activists are maligned enough; the last thing those concerned about climate change want is to bear the opprobrious label of “terrorists.” Second, Malm firmly regards the world as permanently committed to fossil fuels while eschewing renewables; as Malm writes, nowhere on the horizon can “a transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy be sighted” (p. 27). It is questionable as to whether this disdain for renewables exists. According to Our World in Data (Ritchie et al., 2023), from 2000 to 2022, annual per capita CO2 emissions have fallen, on average, by 0.93% in Australia, 1.20% in Canada, 3.29% in the United Kingdom (UK), and 1.62% in the United States—some of the world's heaviest CO2 emitters. In the UK, wrote Ritchie (2024, p. 80), “Coal is now almost dead in its birthplace, where it all began. It has been replaced with other sources of energy: gas, then nuclear, and now wind, solar, and other renewable sources.” What has led to coal's discontinuation is the abrupt decline in renewables’ cost. Malm, however, seems oblivious to low-carbon technologies’ declining costs and acts as if renewables cannot, and will never, replace fossil fuels. Third, citing the fossil fuel industry's advantages in media propaganda, institutional coordination, logistical resources, political legitimacy, and money, Malm objects to divestment campaigns. This is ironic as Malm emphasized how the African National Congress (ANC) sabotaged the South African apartheid regime's infrastructure while simultaneously discounting the divestment campaigns of the 1980s, which, arguably, had more to do with apartheid's end than ANC sabotage campaigns. The Alberta government, beholden to the oil industry, seems (to this reviewer) more concerned about institutions divesting from Alberta than sabotage campaigns; the former would constitute a threat to the oil industry's ability to raise money, while the latter would only facilitate more anti-environmentalist propaganda. Fourth, Malm seems unaware of the shifting baseline syndrome. According to Malm, as climate change worsens, attacks on fossil fuel infrastructure will become more likely. In this regard, Malm is like many who regard environmental degradation as something which will eventually reach a point where people no longer tolerate it and act to stop it. “We should posit,” wrote Malm, “a law of a tendency of the receptivity to rise in a rapidly warming world” (p. 118; italics in original). This, however, fails to consider how, as environmental degradation occurs, people become used to it, and their baseline of what is an undegraded environment changes to progressively accommodate a more and more degraded environment. The book does have strengths. Malm engages in an excellent discussion of the concept of climate (in)justice, referencing the topic's seminal writers such as Anil Agarwal, Sunita Narain, Henry Shue, and Steve Vanderheiden. Malm not only makes it clear how the world's rich are responsible for a disproportionate share of global CO2 emissions, he skillfully differentiates between the rich's luxury emissions and the poor's subsistence emissions. A European yacht's emissions are incomparable to those from a Thai rice field; this makes it clear to the reader there are not only differences in the quantities of CO2 emissions, but also differences in the qualities of CO2 emissions. The book concludes on a strong note in its final chapter where Malm implores a reader confronting climate change to never give up. To Malm, every gigaton of CO2 emitted into the atmosphere matters and “as long as humans are around, resistance is the path to survival in all weathers” (p. 147). While there are more thoroughly researched books on coping with climate change, such as Hannah Ritchie's 2024 book, Not the end of the world: How we can be the first generation to build a sustainable planet, this reviewer, who teaches introductory courses in environmental science, still recommends Malm's book. It is highly readable and written in a jargon-free manner. Its weaknesses (when pointed out) provide a pedagogical vehicle for teaching about renewable energy. It provides an excellent discussion of climate (in)justice. Lastly, it implores the reader to never relent in trying to stop climate change—something, given the stakes at hand, we must never do.

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