by Jim Gordon
There was no blanket of snow this winter upon the Catskill In fact, if experts in the fields of climate change, biology and economy are correct, implications of our warm winter should give us all the chills.
Yet despite the dangers posed by climate change, these same observers say that increasing chaos in the world’s weather patterns could spark progressive social changes. If the recent bizarre weather convinces people to change from passive consumers to active citizens, by, say, embracing conservation strategies, the recent drought conditions may have had a positive effect.
The most recent studies show that investing in energy efficiency could create more then one million jobs by 2020, and pump an additional $50 billion annually into the national economy.
“We’re in the midst of climate change around the planet, and yes, human activity is playing a role in it,’’ said Dr. Steven Breyman, director of the Department of Science and Technology Studies at Rensselear Polytechnic Institute. “From my perspective there is absolutely no doubt left.’’
The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded last year, for the third time in ten years, that global climate change caused by human activity is occurring now. IPCC also said the situation is shaping up to be much worse then scientists previously believed.
“So here we are. From the perspective of civilization, we are in uncharted territory. Another metaphor I use to describe the current situation is an experiment without controls,’’ Breyman said.
While perhaps difficult to see from the city, harbingers of change are evident. At the Mohonk Preserve on the Shawangunk Ridge in southern Ulster County, about 90 miles north of Manhattan, the weather was so warm this winter that some flowers, including segments of forsythia shrubs, were “tricked’’ into blooming early. Butterflies were observed on the ridge in December. Cherry trees bloomed in Buffalo in November, the first November on record without any snow in that “snow belt” city. “A phrase I use is gift-wrapping on the time bomb. It’s wonderful now, but it’s going to get really ugly in a few years,’’ said Ross Gelbspan, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and author of a book on global warming called, The Heat Is On.
If this winter was just a freak occurrence, it might have been enjoyable, but its actually part of a long-standing pattern. Satellite readings revealing vegetation growth patterns show spring is arriving a week earlier, and fall lingering a week later, in the Northern Hemisphere compared to the early 1990s.
Dr. George Woodwell, an ecologist and biologist who directs Woods Hole Research Center, has been studying aspects of climate change for 30 years. “I don’t have any patience at all with those who claim there is nothing to worry about. There is everything to worry about. The chances of keeping a technological civilization intact with an open ended warming of the planet taking place is practically zero,’’ said Dr. Woodwell.
Woodwell said that data show that within the next decade, at current rates of emission, industrial society will double the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
“That is not acceptable. That is absolutely unacceptable crazy risk taking. The politicians who think there’s time to fiddle are just dead wrong. And the commercial interests who say there is nothing to the problem, and have gained control of governments, certainly our own government, they are scurrilously misleading.’’
Woodwell said that if trends continue, trouble could come suddenly in around 2015. “About that time, the Arctic ocean goes from being frozen to thawed. It goes from a white body [reflecting sunlight] to a black body [absorbing sunlight]. What does that do to the climate of the earth? We don’t have a clue.’’
“It’s important for readers to understand the debate about global warming stops at the shores of the U.S. Everywhere else in the world, the question is not whether humans are changing the climate, but how to deal with it,’’ said Gelbspan.
The IPCC, convened in 1988 by the U.N. and the World Meteorological Organization, has concluded three times that climate change is occurring due to human activity, particularly the burning of fossil fuels depositing carbon dioxide, methane and an array of other “greenhouse gasses’’ into the atmosphere.
Smoke stacks and automotive tail pipes are the main source of greenhouse gas. The U.S. is the leading culprit, releasing 25 percent of the world’s greenhouse gases though it only has 5 percent of the world’s population. At the request of the Bush administration, the National Academy of Sciences assessed the IPCC work last year. In June, the U.S. body strongly endorsed the IPCC conclusion. Still, in February 2002, Bush again refused to commit the U.S. to reducing greenhouse gases. Global temperatures have risen by about one degree in the last century. And in a startling finding that raises the stakes for climate change dramatically, the IPCC last year predicted that over the coming century, temperatures could rise between 2.5 and 10.4 degrees Fahrenheit.
“To give you an idea how serious that would be, consider that all the effects we’re seeing now, from global ice caps melting to the timing of the seasons being altered, all that came about with a one degree increase over the last century,’’ said Gelbspan. While 20 years ago the biggest glacier in the Peruvian Andes was retreating at a rate of 14 feet annually, it is now receding at a rate of 99 feet annually.
The effects of such changes on the local environment and local way of life would be far reaching. The infamous West Nile virus that struck New York in the summer of 1999 could become only a harbinger of other ailments and pests moving into new realms from their tropical breeding grounds. Without any snow in the mountains that feed New York city reservoirs, water restrictions could become a fact of life. Sugar maples, currently a dominant species, is not expected to survive in a warmer climate, which could have implications for everything from tourism, to maple syrup, to the amount of water and sediments in reservoirs.
Gelbspan noted that in the United States, about $20 billion in taxpayer money goes to subsidize the oil and coal industry each year. The figure does not count the billions of dollars in military spending to safeguard oil supplies. Globally, about $300 billion per year is spent on subsidizing the fossil fuel industries. Gelbspan advocates providing that $300 billion to industry as a subsidy to develop renewable energy supplies. He said the money should come from industrial nations, and should include support for developing nations, since population centers in China, India and Brazil, among others, contribute to global warming but cannot afford strategies for renewables.
Gelbspan also advocates mandating an annual five percent reduction in fossil fuel use, either through efficiency measures or use of energy alternatives. And he said that efforts by ordinary citizens to reduce personal energy use, and pressure business and politicians to reign in climate change, will set up the policy framework to put such macro ideas in place.
Dr. Ann Davis, director of the Marist College Bureau of Economic Research, notes that 25 percent of national economic activity is related to automotive and oil related industries. “The kind of action needed to do anything dramatic would be on the par of the demobilization of World War II. And that would take a lot of political will. It will take an act of the g-word, government involvement to actually bring this about.’’
