A researcher's climate pledge cost him his job. Here's how

A commitment to reducing carbon emissions has cost a researcher his job. How? Gianluca Grimalda is in the Solomon Islands for a research trip. The climate activist has been refraining from flying for over a decade. Whosoever he met during his field trip, including those displaced by climate change, the activist vowed that he would reduce his carbon emissions on the way back home on his return journey.

However, a challenge emerged about two weeks ago whenhis employer demanded him to fly at short notice to Germany from the Solomon Islands. His seniors at the Kiel Institute for Worldwide Economy (IfW) set a deadline for him to get back to his desk.

The only options he had to choose from were whether to travel by air or get sacked from his job. Given the climate pledge he had taken, the researcher declined to return.

Later, his employer on Wednesday (Oct 11) told him that his contract had been terminated and he had been sacked from his employment.

“IfW seems to ignore that we have entered the Anthropocene era and that the most important Earth ecosystems are close to collapse if not already collapsed,” Grimalda said.

“In this era, wasting 4.5 tonnes of CO2 (the difference between the flight emissions and the slow-travel emissions) to comply with the absurd request to be physically present in Kiel at such short notice is morally unacceptable and epitomises the ultimate privilege of the global elites."

He continued saying that the situation "is the sign that IfW is still living in an era that will be wiped out by the incoming climate collapses.”

Now, Gianluca Grimalda is still hanging in there in Bougainville waiting for a cargo ship.

The ship will depart on Saturday (Oct 14) and he will board it for his journey back to Europe. The researcher has spent about six months where he delved deep to investigate the impacts of climate breakdown and globalisation on the island’s inhabitants, reported Guardian.

How much emission the journey would have caused?

Grimalda, in an opinion piece in the Guardian, suggested that the carbon emissions owing to his one-way flight to Europe from the Solomon Islands archipelago were even higher than the carbon footprint of an average person living there in an entire year.

He also reportedly said that initially he thought to appeal against his employer's decision but “In this case, the initial impression is that IfW actions are justified legally.”

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