These are new words or phrases that have caught my eye. My definition of a new word is one which is not in the Macquarie Dictionary online.
Some words seem to have more significance than others in terms of reflecting changes in the Australian culture, so I will give each word a Zeitgeist rating (ZG) within a range of 1-10.
If you disagree with the rating that I give, please argue your case in the comment field provided.
I would love you to contact me if you have made any new word discoveries of your own.
Fifteen years ago a group of scientists identified nine processes vital to the Earth system in an attempt to clarify what climate change was going to mean to us all. Three of these processes are based on what we are removing from the environment. The other nine are what we have put into the system to its detriment.
ZG: 5
WE should be paying more attention to planetary boundary but it is still probably part of the jargon of scientists rather than mainstream.
Read MoreThe various natural disasters that have occurred in the last few years have led to an increase in insurance costs for areas badly affected by flood or fire. This has divided the people in the area into the group which can still afford to insure their homes, and those who can’t.
ZG: 7
There is a growing awareness of the problems arising from uninsurability.
Read MoreThis is a blended word, combining agriculture and photovoltaics (the generation of electricity using light sources, in particular, the sun). The panels and the plants or animals have to share the sunlight so an agrivoltaic farm needs to make it work for both.
Read MoreWe have come to talk about this latest period of the Holocene as the Anthropocene epcoh, that is, the period where the effects of human activity on the environment are marked. Now a fire historian, Stephen J Pyne, has suggested a new term, the Pyrocene.
ZG: 3
Doesn’t have huge frequency yet but it may become adopted as wildfires become more devastating.
Read MoreIt has become fashionable for companies and organisations to claim in their public documents that they are doing wonderful things for the environment. Climate disclosures and commitments are now being revised in a process that is described as green hushing.
ZG: 6
A term employed by those engaged in environmental watchdog activities.
Read MoreThis is the increase in the number of tourists visiting a tourist destination to the point where it is beyond the capacity of the people who live there to deal with the influx. In these post-pandemic times travel is once again an option and overtourism is becoming an acute problem.
ZG: 8
I expect a great deal more discussion of over tourism and how to manage it.
Read MoreThe no-wash movement is hardline about not washing clothes, both for the sake of the fabric and for environmental reasons. Alongside them are the low-wash people who agree that we are obsessive about washing our clothes and that the environment would benefit if we stopped doing this, but they also feel that our clothes can reach a point where throwing them in the washing machine is the correct thing to do.
Read MoreMore correctly this is the sodium-ion battery contrasted with the lithium-ion battery. We all know we want better batteries and sodium may provide at least one answer.
ZG: 6
The currency of this item will increase if it does become the solution to the battery problem.
Read MoreInitially this was a term used in economics to describe the situation in which the failure of one aspect of the economy leads to other failures which collectively bring about an economic catastrophe.
ZG: 3
Our current economic state has brought this bit of economic jargon to the surface.
Read MoreThis is an urban planning concept in which cities are so arranged that everyone can get to the places they need to go to — shops, schools, healthcare, parks and leisure activities — on foot or by bicycle inside 15 minutes.
ZG: 6
This would have remained the jargon of the town planners if it had not been for the conspiracy theorists.
Read MoreThis is a form of solar energy that has, until recently, been overlooked in Australia. Basically the sun’s rays are captured in mirrors concentrated on a radiation collector and heat up a heat-bearing medium, usually thermal oil. The heat energy is then stored until required at which point a turbine transforms it into electricity.
ZG: 4
This is not a huge feature of our world yet but it could become more prominent in the future.
Read MoreA room that is a total mess — clothes everywhere, bed unmade, last night’s dinner still on the floor — is an indicator that the inhabitant of the room is suffering severe depression.
ZG: 6
Many more people than usual experienced a depression room during COVID so the awareness of the depression room and how to climb out of it is greater.
Read MoreIt won’t be long before we are all familiar with the details of an EV but they are still novel at the moment — at least to me. The trickle charger is the slowest way of charging the battery in your EV.
ZG: 6
We are at the early stages of learning the jargon of EVs but it is coming.
Read MoreIn the current discussions carbon abatement is the purchasing of Australian Carbon Credit Units to offset the production of greenhouse gases in a planned project. One ACCU represents the avoidance or removal of one tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2-e).
ZG: 5
There will be increasing analysis of who gets ACCUs and on what basis.
Read MoreThis is the sudden release of a massive amount of methane gas, mostly as a leak from an oil or gas project. The companies responsible for the methane bombs are called super-emitters and their emissions were mapped last year in NASA’s Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation (EMIT).
ZG: 5
Now that NASA is mapping these, and given the huge addition to greenhouse gases that they make, we can expect more discussion about them.
Read MoreAbleism is discrimination against people with disabilities. In the case of eco-ableism such discrimination is driven by a zeal to protect the environment. Unfortunately some of the measures taken to achieve this righteous cause can create difficulties for the disabled.
ZG: 6
Read MoreVanlife is a movement that embraces minimalism and personal freedom and self-development. The corollary is that it opposes consumerism, the economic and political status quo, and the imposition of restrictions on the individual by the government.
ZG: 6
It is one of the surprises of the pandemic that we have discovered so many ways to escape our cities and find a new lifestyle that combines safety with pleasure.
Read MoreThere are many versions of the quarantini but the there are some basic ideas which shape the nature of the cocktail which began life as the martini you have in quarantine.
ZG: 6
This is another example of black humour, designed along with the drink to keep our spirits up during The Rona. It will probably fade as the joke wears thin, and definitely fade when the crisis is over.
Read MoreThis is the harvesting of water from floodplains after heavy rain. It can be done by channelling water into storage sites for later use.
ZG: 5
As we become increasingly aware that there is not enough water in our rivers to sustain all the use that people want to make of it, the debate becomes more heated about who gets what share of it.
Read More
