LYCEES Fantine BLIEK: Airpocalypse now?

Ladies and gentlemen,

Let's imagine an engine. In this engine, we put fuel. It works wonders. It drives our cars, flies our planes, takes off our rockets... Let's stop giving it fuel. What's the matter with it? It coughs, spits, shakes, goes out slowly until it comes to a complete, irretrievable stop. Nothing works anymore, it's death. Let's use adulterated fuel, same thing. But that won't come to mind. To keep our engine running, we keep an eye on our gauge, make sure it's correctly fed, good quality fuel so as not to damage the mechanics.

Well, when it comes to our own mechanics, we are much less attentive. Why don't we do the same with our most essential engine, the one that makes us get up every morning, move forward, run, live: the heart! It doesn't need a lot of maintenance ... fortunately, I've always sucked at mechanics! But it remains dependent on its fuel, air and oxygen! 

Air is not oil, you may say. Inexhaustible, within reach of the nostrils...

And yet, the Airpocalypse is not the invention of a successful new dystopia author. It is now, it is here and elsewhere on our planet earth. All concerned. All ready to suffocate.

In some cities (Beijing, New Delhi, but also Paris), the air has become a burden: it stings our eyes, burns our throats, cuts off our breathing. You have probably already experienced this feeling of suffocation. 9 out of 10 people breathe air containing a high level of pollutants according to the WHO.

And there is a kind of general acceptance to live with this polluted, suffocating air ; you have to live with it and you can't do much about it ... But I don't think we have to accept it : we have the duty to be revolted, to demand better. 

According to the COP21 analyses, each man inspires, on average, between 15 and 30,000 litres of air every day. Breathing is man's main activity. An invisible and odorless substance, air is everywhere around us. It is one of our most precious possessions. It is the source of life. 

Unfortunately, only those, more and more numerous, who are deprived of it realize its value. 

I live in the countryside, and in spite of some unpleasantness known only to rural people, the nauseous smells during the manure spreading season, I benefit from clean air or at least quality air with 0 to 20g of nitrogen dioxide per m³, twice as good as the standard according to the Association de surveillance de la qualité de l'air en Auvergne Rhône-Alpes (Auvergne Rhône-Alpes Air Quality Monitoring Association) (Atmo).

There are too many who don't share my luck. Too many are those who do not have the same right as me to a vital, non-deadly air.

The misfortunes of some have always made the happiness of others. In Canada, Moses Lam and Troy Paquette founded "Vitality Air" in 2014. 32$ for 160 puffs of air. Beijing is out of breath. Every year, the Chinese suffocate, overwhelmed by the Asian Brown Cloud, and are ready for everyone for a few sips of clean air. These bottles of air sold under the label of benevolence and solidarity are not solutions but on the contrary reveal injustices, accentuate them. To trade with air is to barter life. We accept a human trade right before our eyes.

Always with this same search for profit and power, we are burning the lungs of our Mother Earth. The Amazon is disappearing more and more each year. According to an article published on August 26, 2019 in Science magazine, deforestation is clearly the cause of the fires. The air is filling up with CO2, global emissions in 2018 reached 37.1 billion tons. The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has never been so high in 3 million years. And global warming is accelerating the trend. The Australians no longer believe in the airpocalypse plot. They've breathed it into their lungs.

Scarcer and scarcer air quality, more and more industrial disasters. 1984 : Bhopal disaster in India, 1986 : Chernobyl nuclear disaster, 2011: Fukushima disaster, 2019: Lubrizol industrial disaster! It's time to reinvent a new future, don't you think?

Clean Air is nowadays a luxury reserved for the privileged few. A century ago, rural areas were the living place of the majority, today cities and their pollution have become the daily life of more than half of the world's population according to the World Bank. 

Like my sister Emma, hundreds of millions of people suffer every day from chronic respiratory diseases according to the WHO. 9 out of 10 of them are direct victims of air pollution! 570,000 children under the age of 5 die every year from air pollution around the world. Your children are choking in front of your eyes, will they be able to catch their breath? 

The covid19 health crisis: yet another alarm signal. A Harvard study has shown that in the United States, individuals living in polluted environments are more likely to be lethal victims of the coronavirus. The same observation was made in Italy. And those living in these areas are often the poorest. Inequalities are piling up dramatically.

Finally, I would like to ask you a question.

Do you know the tale of the Princess Mononoke?

Since the dawn of time, there has been a sacred place ruled by the spirit of the forest. This place is under threat. The venal man who destroys it endangers the natural balance. The Mononoke, half she-wolf, half human, is the guardian of that balance. Bringing man and nature to their senses, she prevents a devastating war that would have led to the apocalypse. Man cannot live without Mother Nature. To play with her is to play with life. We must all become a Mononoke and save our home! Let's run a # I am Mononoke (with a twist).

I'm 18, but I'm neither naive nor innocent. I have my share of responsibility, just like you. But I'm not resigned to it. There are solutions. At my level, I am committed to using the least polluting modes of transport such as walking, cycling or public transport. I refuse a consumerist style and prefer the products of local and seasonal craftsmen.

We can also act together. The producers of hemp, a plant with many environmental virtues, need support. Setting up local events such as marathons or balls to raise funds is within everyone's reach. 

The planet is out of breath, so let's give it some air. Let's organize local citizen movements to plant trees in cities, especially oak trees. Let's move towards green cities. All over the world they're popping up, Copenhagen, Vancouver, so why not us?

Finally, we, students, must mobilize within our high school or university and demand meals with seasonal products, without too much meat and favouring vegetables. Composts could be set up from food and water waste. The ecological development of our schools must be demanded: energy and carbon balance, greening plan, concrete avenues to explore.

My speech may seem dreamy to you. That may be true, but didn't the dream send us to the moon? Let's reinvent ourselves whatever it takes.