Global Warming / Climate Instability in the Mountain State

by Mel Tyree (this column appeared in the August 22, 2007 Charleston Gazette)

For nearly 12,000 years, since the end of the last ice age, the Earth has enjoyed a relatively mild and consistent climate.

That consistent climate allowed humans to invent agriculture and nurtured the development of civilization. All the grand accomplishments of humanity such as democracy, science, music, literature and modern medicine would never have occurred without that predictable mild climate in place.

We are now at a critical turning point to preserve that consistent climate for future generations. The decisions and actions that humanity makes over the next 10 years will determine if the Earth’s present biodiversity and civilization itself will survive this century.

Former World Bank Chief Economist Nicholas Stern, in his 2006 landmark, 700-page study (The Economics of Climate Change) warns that if the Earth’s atmospheric temperature increases by just 3.6 degrees over pre-industrial levels, more than 40 percent of the planet’s wildlife will go extinct, 2 billion people will suffer water shortages and the economic impacts will be more than $20 trillion.

The United Nations’ 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change researchers predict that a 3.6 degree increase above pre-industrial levels would cause replacement of the Amazon’s rainforest with savanna habitat; possible irreversible melting of the Arctic ice cap; greater impacts to the United States from floods, wildfires, heat waves and coastal erosion; and permanent destruction of the world’s coral reefs.

The danger is this: Even if we don’t care a dime about the environment, humans are absolutely dependent on the functioning of those key ecosystems. The Arctic ice cap acts as a climatic regulator to maintain ocean currents and weather patterns we’ve grown accustomed to for the

past 8,000 years.

Without it, our breadbasket (large portions of Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska) would become sterile desert, and weather patterns would become disrupted. Loss of the Amazon rainforest would severely disrupt rainfall and weather patterns in South America. The loss of the planet’s coral reefs would cripple humanity’s access to seafood due to a loss of about 30 percent of the ocean’s fish.

Contrary to what many people believe, dangerous climate change is not a problem awaiting us by mid-century. Recent research indicates that if we don’t take decisive action in the next 10 years, it will be too late.

Total levels of greenhouse gases (primarily carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide), which are causing our climate to change rapidly, are now at 430 parts per million (ppm) in our atmosphere, according to the Stern Report. Both the U.N. and Stern reports recommend that total atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases should cease increasing and stabilize at 450 ppm before 2015 to ensure avoiding the 3.6-degree temperature increase.

The major reason for the short window of time is that atmospheric temperatures have already increased 1 degree and another 1.5-degree increase is now in the pipeline, due to the time it takes climate inertia to react to present gas levels. Basically, we have 1 degree to play with.

As concerned citizens, what do we do? We should demand and hold accountable the following three declarations from the present lot of presidential candidates:

First, they should promise that the US will work with other world governments to implement an iron-clad, strongly enforced global agreement to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible.

A similar policy worked for reducing chlorofluorocarbons, which were destroying the Earth’s ozone shield. Nicholas Stern maintains it should occur within two years. California, New Jersey and Minnesota have passed laws that commit those states to an 80 percent greenhouse gas emission reduction by 2050. More than a dozen states are working on similar legislation. A similar federal law should be passed as soon as possible. Then the United States should work with Europe, China and India to seal a planetary agreement.

Second, he or she should demand an immediate moratorium be placed on the construction of additional old-fashioned coal-fired power plants not designed to capture and sequester carbon dioxide. The energy shortfall until carbon capture and storage technology comes online can be compensated through savings gained by a national energy efficiency program.

Finally, our future president should see that a comprehensive, strictly enforced, national energy efficiency policy is passed. The recent US House of Representatives bill is a first step. George W. Bush will probably veto it.

However, this is a vital framework for 2009, when, hopefully, we have a president who comprehends the seriousness of global warming and has the political will to begin solving the problem.