Reports Show Global Warming Already Hurting America; Fighting It Will Heal the Economy
I have received many briefings from climate scientists over the past 10 years. At first, most were based on modeling and projections, but more recently, they have included an alarming element: empirical evidence that global warming is interfering with America's water supply and agriculture right now.
The report released this week by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other federal agencies came to the same conclusion. The study outlines current signs of global warming across the United States.
It also includes the most urgent language about climate change ever to be issued by any White House.
I am relieved that the Obama administration grasps the pressing nature of this crisis. Even among proponents of climate action, many still view global warming as a future threat.
This report makes it clear that when it comes to the impacts of global warming, it's not about maybe or later. It's about definitely and already. We can debate the policy of global warming, but we can no longer debate the scientific reality that global warming is hitting us today.
To find out how climate change is altering your region, click here. And to find out what these changes might do to the American economy -- including food production, health-care costs, and transportation disruptions -- see this post on the Green, Inc.
The Silver Lining: New Reports Find Significant Job Potential
But if you are looking for some good news in the midst of these climate clouds, take a look at two other reports that came out this week.
The Economic Benefits of Investing in Clean Energy, prepared by the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at UMass and the Center for American Progress, found that the combined impact of the stimulus package at the American Clean Energy and Security Act could serve as a foundation for bringing total clean-energy investments in the United States to $150 billion per year.
This public spending and private investment would produce a net gain of 1.7 million new jobs.
The second report, released by the PERI, NRDC, and Green for All, shows that shifting from traditional fossil fuel to clean energy will improve the standard of living for millions of Americans across all skill and education levels, especially among lower-income families.
Climate Urgency Plus Economic Opportunity Equals Immediate Action
I am glad these three reports came out in the same week. The administration's report reveals the severe threat posed by unchecked global warming. The PERI reports illustrate the many economic benefits that will arise from combating climate change.
Taken together, the message couldn't be clearer: we can solve global warming, and doing so will create American jobs and prosperity.
I am also glad these reports were released when leaders in both the White House and Congress are willing to take the bold action needed.
Within weeks, the House will be debating the American Clean Energy and Security Act. Click here to tell your representative that you support this effort to create jobs, protect the planet, and restore America's leadership.
This post originally appeared on NRDC's Switchboard blog.
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Longer more productive growing seasons, vast areas of frozen waste may become habitable/ farmable, more fresh waster precipitation, more plant food (Co2) less energy requirement for heating(largest cause in energy use and deforistation)
If you are unaware of the benefits- check out the record plankton blooms in the North Pacific- this alone constitutes a significant increase in the entire food supply of the ocean- right from the foundation of the food chain.
Fresh water, warmth and Co2 are 3 of the most basic nutrients of all life on Earth. That is why even the IPCC acknowledges that warming will be on balance a benefit. It only starts to be negative at a point far far beyond that attainable by any realistic increase in Co2.
"Few seem to realise that the present IPCC models predict almost unanimously that by 2040 the average summer in Europe will be as hot as the summer of 2003 when over 30,000 died from heat. By then we may cool ourselves with air conditioning and learn to live in a climate no worse than that of Baghdad now. But without extensive irrigation the plants will die and both farming and natural ecosystems will be replaced by scrub and desert. What will there be to eat? The same dire changes will affect the rest of the world and I can envisage Americans migrating into Canada and the Chinese into Siberia but there may be little food for any of them." --Dr James Lovelock's lecture to the Royal Society, 29 Oct. '07
"We underestimated the risks ... we underestimated the damage associated with temperature increases ... and we underestimated the probabilities of temperature increases." -- Sir Nicholas Stern, author of "The Stern Report," April 17, 2008
'There is no linear predictability in terms of how ecosystems respond. The phenomena of20collapse is one that we have under-appreciated, partly because of the feed-back mechanisms that we are still trying to understand.' --Achim Steiner, head of the UN Environment Programme, Oct. '07
What many of us do realize is the IPCC models unanimously FAILED to predict the last 10 years of cooling. To trust them now, I would have to guess that you are in favor of the 'solutions' regardless of whether a 'problem' exists. Or am I wrong, are you the first global warming believer ever without the required political stance that goes along with it?
You might want to research this issue a bit: "In France, 14,802 people—mostly elderly—died from heat"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_European_heat_wave
there were many issues related to this, including the usual flight in August of the affluent to the beaches, leaving fewer family members and health care workers to tend to the elderly. Nursing homes did not have air conditioning. There was a strike of emergency care workers.
If this was global warming, how come it hasn't happened every year since?
See Jeff Goldstein's Profile
Frances-
I'm so sorry. It is so disheartening to see some of the comments associated with a serious piece on global warming. It's clear that many simply cannot get beyond their perception that the warming we're seeing cannot be explained by natural phenomena. So instead of accepting a human cause and concentrating on technical, economic, societal and global solutions, we're still wrestling with folks that don't believe, that take it on FAITH that science cannot be correct in its modeling, and no amount of data and critical dialog will make a difference. Meanwhile the doomsday clock is ticking.
I hope some folks that are in the not-human-induced camp are still open to consider they might be ... wrong. If so, here is my attempt at putting it all in perspective: see "A Day in the Life of the Earth" at:
http://bit.ly/2uhzdO
"Taking it on faith that science cannot be correct in its modeling"
I know this will come as a startling shock to you, but modeling, especially THIS modelling, is not science. Why? Because no one model can correctly regress all known datasets without "special assumptions". If we were to classify these models according to the scientific method, then they would be hypotheses. The actual measured data sets would be 'experimental data', in spite of the fact these are not products of controlled experiments, only observations of the real system. Since the observed data conflict with the models over some parts of the interval of interest, the hypotheses are incorrect, and therefore must be rejected according to the scientific method.
In spite of the above, a great many people have concluded predictions made by these models are accurate. You are apparently one of these. I should think that the failure of actual results to track the over the last 18 years predictions made in 1991 coupled with the recent behavior of the climate system at the commencement of sunspot cycle 24 would be sufficient proof to shake your faith in these climate models and their 'scientific' predictions of calamity.
Jeff, define "the warming we're seeing". We're one day short of summer and here in the northeast it has been more like early October.. It's colder than normal damn it! And temperatures have been declining since........ well you tell us jeff, have global temps been warming or cooling, and for how long now.
The jig is up, the party is over. We've called your collective bluff and you have no cards to show. The only reason this issue continues to live in it's current form 'climate change' is so the govt and industry can make a buck, at our expense, via the carbon trading scam. Just ask Gore, just ask Obama, just ask Immelt.
Jeff, join the revolution, it's time to fight the man
See Jeff Goldstein's Profile
First off, NL20's says that "modeling is not science". Earth to NL20 - Science is BASED ON MODELS AND MODELING. It's a statement as silly as "religion is not about faith." NL20 talks the jargon, but it's just jargon, and in terms of his understanding of science fundamentals - not so much. HERE, read about models: http://http://bit.ly/cFMpi
NL20 has wrapped himself in a belief system - something like "I adamantly believe anthropogenic global warming is a myth. And I'm going to seek out, reorganize & repackage data to suit my conclusion." NL20 is not reachable. GW as a natural occurrence is his mantra, and he'll wrap it in junk science to try & convince the undecideds.
So I'm not writing to NL20. I'm writing to those that might otherwise be swayed by NL20. The data for human induced GW is overwhelming. Outside of Singer (who's been in bed with Exxon, didn't believe CFCs had a connection to ozone depletion, questioned ozone depletion, and denied a connection between cancer risk & second-hand smoke) and a few others, the OVERWHELMING majority of the world's climate scientists - independent thinkers, & US civil servants surpressed by the Bush White House - have concluded after a massive SCIENTIFIC effort employing MODELING that we're in deep doodoo if we don't get our collective act together.
Read IPCC report!
http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/ar4-syr.htm
Read last week's WH report!
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/Streaming-Now-Climate-Change-Impacts-Across-America-Renewed-Focus-for-Decisions/
See Jeff Goldstein's Profile
Lbry212 -
Look at your checkbook. Is it possible the monthly ebb & flow of dollars - paycheck in, and mortgage, electric bill out - reflect highs & lows of funds in your account, but it's set against a long term increase in total if you're a good saver? "Hey! They told me the money in my account was increasing, but that can't be right! I paid the mortgage & my account total plummeted!!" The temperature in your area is low for summer so you're led to conclude GW isn't real?? OMG. Effects are painstakingly averaged over the globe & over seasonal timescales.
But RIGHT NOW, in last 150 years of fossil fuel use - human population has exploded, technology has exploded, CO2 has SPIKED to highest levels in 850,000 yrs (the time span for 34,000 HUMAN GENERATIONS), AND there's a spike in globally averaged temperature-highest in at least last 2,000 years.
This ISN'T rocket science! So let's buy a lottery ticket. I say odds are that in this moment in time when humanity's exploded on the scene, & is pumping VAST quantities of greenhouse gases into our thin atmosphere, it's only shear COINCIDENCE that nature decides to spike the global environment. If it quacks like a duck, and the vast majority of the scientific community study it to death and say it's a duck. Then for me IT'S A DUCK.
NL20 - you're on the loosing side, just in the nick of time (maybe.)
Read my "Day in the
The more I read this article, and the reports cited, the funnier it gets.
For example: "According to the “Green Prosperity” report, nearly half of the 1.7 million new jobs created by green investment will be accessible to workers with relatively low levels of formal education."
In other words, we'll be putting them on stationary bicycles, and having them pedal to create electricity. Of course, we will only pay minimum wage, but it will improve their standard of living because all that exercise will keep them from getting obese and polluting the planet more than us skinny people.
funny how you never see these reports, you just see press releases about the reports that make outlandish claims about the reports' data.
Another juvenile comment in need of adult supervision. Many so called green jobs are in the skilled crafts. These may require a year or two at a technical college or an apprenticeship.
We are in a SUN CYCLE thats heating the planet.
We need revived manufacturing to restart the economy.
Legalizing hemp would really create a green economy.
Mars is Melting
Like Earth, Mars has seasons that cause its polar caps to wax and wane. ... As the cap shrinks it develops rifts, dark spots, and a ragged border. ...science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2003/07aug_southpole.htm
The climate has ALWAYS been changing, dear. It may indeed be getting warmer (or cooler) but the evidence that humans are to blame for climate change is very weak.
No, no! I hate having a healthy environment. And more highly skilled jobs that can't be outsourced just sounds like an economic disaster! Things are GREAT the way they are. Anyway, changing the way we do things is UNCOMFORTABLE.
Can't agree more,
Governments asking for money to 'fight global warming' isn't a new idea
Denmark fell for this 'green energy' thing ages ago.
It has the most windmills in the world, financed by the highest taxes and highest energy costs in the world.
On top of this. it is a net importer of energy- since it has to be wired in from Germany when it's not windy.
Luckily it's largest industries are also oil and gas to pay for all this, and they have elected to move away from wind after a long failed experiment, so people aren't completely starving, and the country is recovering.
but if you were to drop our country's purchasing power per person to the level of Denmark's-
I think it would be fair to describe that as an economic disaster, and you probably would find it quite uncomfortable.
Meanwhile the planet has spent 10 years cooling- so maybe they did have an effect after all!
If their largest industry is oil and gas, why are they a net importer of energy?
"Meanwhile the planet has spent 10 years cooling-"
http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/04/warming-stopped-in-1998.php
Longer more productive growing seasons, more food for humans and wildlife worldwide? less freezing less energy needed for heating (main source of deforistation) more pleasant temperatures for everybody. more fresh water precip. greater oceanic plankton blooms- providing greater food supply at the base of the Oceans food chain
- sounds great- but there is a serious downside people- you have to look pretty hard to find it but..
Polar Bears might have a harder time catching baby seals, OK That's great if you are a baby seal
but we already had a campaign to save them so it's not cool anymore
This time around, our donations to this cause are mandated. Gov't hates to do it but they have to.
Oh, so the Inuit and the Bengalis who are losing their homes to rising sea water don't count? The TIbetans and the Africans who are losing their drinking water don't count?
Yeah, I guess YOU would have to look pretty hard to see those downsides.
That's mighty white of you.
If the Inuit and Bengalis are losing their homes because of a few inches of sea level increase, they need to be a bit further inland. Much the same as those who live below sea level in New Orleans seem to be assuming the risk of a flood to live there. Any "loss of drinking water" has only conjectural ties to the myth of global warming anyway: more assumptions on top of assumptions on top of assumptions.
I suppose that global warming caused the ten year drought in the Midwest that was referred to as The Dust Bowl? Those remain the hottest years in my state, global warming to the contrary. And by my recollection of history, that was more than 70 years ago. Drought happens.
The government needs more tax revenue, and coincidentally the government issues a report supporting their programs for increasing taxes. How convenient.
There seems to be pervasive confusion about terms like "could", "Very likely" "projected to be", etc. This is the language of science. Scientists are, by inclination and training, doubters and skeptics. So they will not give you an ironclad guarantee. But "very likely" is about the strongest language you will get from a scientist.
Ironically, while the "skeptics" scoff (ie the deniers who hope that ignoring a warming planet means only their children will have to deal with it - they can check out before it gets bad and who cares about the kids? Not the deniers. Meanwhile, the professional skeptics, the ones who look at the data, are making more and more noise that the problem is worse than anticipated, that the effects are showing up faster, sea levels rising faster, etc.
Think about it.
Also, if you want to learn more about the real science of global warming, try one of these sites:
www.scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/
www.realclimate.org
Save me the denier blather about one cool spring and it hasn't warmed since 1998 and the ice caps are growing and this one thermometer 400 feet in the air shows cooling and the sun is the real cause replies. If it isn't already debunked on the sites above, go ahead and post it. But I haven't seen a denier argument yet that wasn't debunked long ago.
Tom
As always, believers invariably show little interest or understanding in the actual scientific issues.
It's always -'I refer you to such and such a political/environmental group that I trust to interpret the science for me'. And I don't blame them - they are invariably keen on the same 'solutions' they are- so why dig deeper?
If we are interested in the truth behind such a politically charged subject, we have to understand it ourselves, don't let a politician or journalist or poster tell you you're not that smart.
Read the actual studies, not the political 'projected to be' 'very likely' interpretations and summaries
and you will find that most honest scientists, acknowledge the difficulty in applying scientific principles to such inherently variable and poorly understood systems.
Co2 itself is known to have very little direct affect on climate, anything problematic requires a software simulation to model mutliple hypothetical feedback loops, the only way to verify any accuracy in these models is by the simple scientific principle of accurate outcome prediction.
The accelerating cooling since 1998- is quite relevant, not because it disproves warming, but because it was not predicted by the same models that the whole theory depends on,. It verifies instead , as scientists acknowledge, the inaccuracy of the models
At the very least- have a look at the thousands of independent scientists who all agree that Al Gore type catastrophic GW is nonsense. Not the politicians who claim to speak for their own hired 'climatologists'
I thought the term "global warming" is no longer in vogue.....
Yes, global warming IS hurting us now..
I can look out my window and actually see a few red leaves on the maple trees around here.. This kind of thing usually doesn't happen until early september..
Oh wait.. my mistake, it's the inordiately cold weather we've had this spring.
good one lbrty2112
Did you read this report? It's the classic Gorespeak of "could" "projected to be" "may"
I could just as easily say " Missouri MAY BE completely covered with mayonnaise by 2075" . "Rats could be driving Oldsmobiles" "Availability of tootsie rolls is projected to be significantly less than seen today due to a decrease in convenience stores". It's all FANTASY.
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