Climate change is an absolute reality despite what a certain segment of society wants to think. With a second Donald Trump presidency, America’s approach to climate change will change, introducing more deniers into the forefront of the climate debate.
The word change gives us a rash. We like things nice and stable, predictable and dependable. All you have to do to know the climate doesn’t play by those rules is to have a look at the weather. It changes. All the time. While it is more predictable today than ever before, Mother Nature still seems to have a mind of her own.
We know the climate is warming globally because ice that has been accumulating for tens of millions of years in places like Greenland and Antarctica is melting. The Greenland ice sheet seems to be more susceptible to air temperature, while the Antarctic ice sheets seem more influenced by water temperature.
There are many things that contribute to climate change. Most of those factors would be here without humans. In the Earth’s history, there have been massive climate changes, ice ages and ice-free times in a cycle that that stretches over millions of years. So why are we worked up about climate change now?
First, while the climate will change with or without humans present, human activity has increased the rate of change. Human activity has released at least double the amount of carbon into the atmosphere than has been present over the last several million years. That has been measured in air trapped in ice that is that old.
We also cut trees and clear land for farming. Trees store a great deal of carbon and other of the greenhouse gases that contribute to a warmer atmosphere. As the trees vanish, so does the capacity to store carbon and the change accelerates.
When scientists talk about climate change, they are not normally talking about what’s going to happen tomorrow. That would be the weather forecast. Climate change happens over years, decades, centuries, even millennia. Currently, the Earth is in a warming cycle that began at the end of the last ice age. We should have just about reached the temperature maximum in the natural cycle and a new, long, slow cooling trend would be starting sometime in the next hundred or few hundred years.
Human activity has pushed the global temps higher. That does several things in addition to making it hotter in places where it should not be hot, like northern Canada and Russia where a great deal of permafrost exists. Warmer water melts sea ice in the northern polar region and open water absorbs more sunlight thus increasing water temperature.
All of these things and others beside are working to extend and exacerbate the natural warming trend the global climate was already immersed in. The result is rising water levels in coastal areas, and intensifying storms. There are many others as well; some are deeply troubling.
Perhaps the one that is most frightening is the melting of the aforementioned ice sheets. This, of course, could raise the sea level and cause coastal flooding. A huge number of people live in coastal areas around the world. Many, many major cities are on coasts. That makes for a huge human impact.
Perhaps more disturbing is the addition of all that fresh water from ice melt being added to the world’s oceans. When the salinity of the water changes, the major ocean currents are affected. They could even be shut down if too much fresh water enters the seas. Right now, the Gulf Stream is a major weather producer from the coastal areas of West Africa all the way to North America and across the Atlantic to England and the European mainland. Without that warm water flow, Europe’s weather could become especially bad and, believe it or not, far, far colder. If the warm Gulf Stream shut down completely or moved away from Europe, it could trigger a mini-ice age. Talk about weird.
The fact is, the climate is pretty sensitive to even relatively minor changes in the average temperature. A degree or two or three can make all the difference in the world. Think about putting an ice cube in your drink. It is ice, but if the temperature outside your glass is above freezing by even a single degree, the ice will eventually melt.
The same goes for climate change. I think most people are smart enough to realize that living systems must change to survive. If stagnation occurs, death is sure to follow no matter if we are talking about a body of water or human culture. Keeping the climate the same isn’t necessary the goal. Keeping the climate within limits that favor human life is the goal.
We cannot live in a static world. On the other hand, if we overheat this thing, we probably can’t live in that either. Change must occur for the system to remain vibrant, but when humans mess up the climate and its rhythms, we are inviting trouble.
Reach Gary Cosby Jr. at gary.cosby@tuscaloosanews.com.
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Publish date : 2024-11-12 21:22:00
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Author : theamericannews
Publish date : 2024-11-13 11:02:29
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