In this section taken from the Courrier de la Planète, our journalists answer questions from our readers.
Does the military industry have an environmental conscience? At a time when the world is mobilizing to reduce the pollution that threatens it, Normand Roy wonders if the military complex is participating in this war effort.
Army is still far from rhyming with carbon neutrality. The military industry may have worried about global warming for decades, but it remains one of the most fossil fuel-intensive institutions on the planet and one of the biggest sources of pollution on Earth.
In Canada, the Department of Defense (DND) alone produced some 1113 kilotonnes of CO2 equivalent (CO2eq) in 2021-22, more than all other federal government activities combined. The pollution generated by the fleet of conventional DND vehicles and by the 20,000 buildings placed under its management represents 504 kt eq. CO2.
Emissions from Canadian military aircraft, ships and tactical ground vehicles amount to 609 kt eq. CO2. Aviation and the navy alone generate 99% of this pollution, in respective proportions of 81% and 18%.
In the United States, it’s worse: in 2017, the Pentagon and its sprawling forces climbed to 47th place, wedged between Portugal and Peru, on the list of the most fuel-consuming states.
That same year, the U.S. Department of Defense guzzled 85 million barrels of crude to fuel its naval, air, and ground fleet, or, on average, 37 million liters per day, enough gasoline to make 10,000 times around the Earth in a car that consumes 9.4 liters every 100 kilometers.
No solar bomber…
Aware that global warming represents a threat to their national security, the armies are building ambitious plans to reduce their pollution. Canadian defence, for example, has made considerable progress in this area since the beginning of the millennium. Its 2021-2022 emissions, while gigantic, represent a 36% decrease from 15 years earlier.
This figure, again, excludes emissions generated by military operations. This is where the shoe pinches: the military industry shows a desire to reduce its dependence on oil, without taking measures to do so.
The American arms giant, Lockheed Martin, acknowledges the need to develop less energy-intensive technologies to remain competitive. “Our ability to provide low-carbon products will determine our ability to secure contracts in the future,” the company wrote in a memo produced in 2022.
That said, Lockheed Martin continues to market military devices with disastrous environmental records. Canada, for example, has set its sights on its F-35s to replace its aging fleet of fighter jets. The DND says it is unable to calculate their fuel consumption since this data “is variable and depends on the flight scenario”.
In Norway, however, environmental voices denounce the acquisition of these devices by their armed forces, arguing that an F-35 burns 5600 liters of kerosene per hour. The more Lockheed Martin improves its planes, the more they swallow oil. The F-35 replaces the F-16, a device that drank, him, “only” 3000 liters per hour.
Canada, in its Defense Energy and Environmental Strategy 2020-2023, recognizes the difficulty of building a carbon-neutral military. “Reducing emissions from parks and military operations is more difficult,” the document says. Reliable, low-carbon, renewable fuels are not yet widely available to power the critical military equipment that Defense needs. The solar-powered bomber still seems pipe dreaming — unlike the very real climate threat, according to Boston University researcher Neta C. Crawford.
In a 2019 article on the Pentagon and climate change, she spoke out against investing US$700 billion to beef up the Pentagon. She claimed that the terrorist threat, or the outbreak of a war against China or Russia, should be taken seriously, but that these dangers remained hypothetical and possible to avoid through diplomatic channels up to a certain point.
Climate change, for its part, represents a danger already at our doorstep and unavoidable. “Global warming is the most certain and immediate threat that the United States will face in the coming decades,” she wrote.
The armed forces do not deny this reality since they have studied it since the 1960s. Not without paradox, however, they have been fueling the climate crisis for 60 years, preparing the desolation to come as much in peace as in war.