It is hard to tell which is more intolerable, the current blistering, muggy weather or the current news about the weather, specifically the way the news media is underplaying the incredible drama that is now unfolding all around us.
Yes, there are articles and news flashes about record heat, forest fires, and flooding. But they appear in a random and disconnected fashion. Today's Wall Street Journal's article about record heat and massive crop failure in Russia for some reason showed up buried on A13, despite the fact that the failure of their grain harvest is now sending agriculture futures soaring and will ultimately affect the global cost of food. Don't you think that might deserve mention on A1 or A2? Also, unmentioned in the article is even a passing reference of what's on the preceding page, A12, where you can see a beautiful photo of an enormous garbage flow that is clogging China's gigantic Three Gorges dam, caused by the severe flooding there that killed 1,000 people.
The colossal failure of the media to keep us focused on the planet's larger story is only overshadowed by those who fail to acknowledge there is a story at all. Every single thing that is now happening -- floods, heat, crop failure -- was entirely predicted more than a decade ago by those familiar with the science, and yet there are actually talking heads still debating the existence of climate change. These malicious idiots are spewing confusion and blocking legislation aimed at curbing the problem's human causes. Last week, Fox News paused in their denial of climate change only long enough to run a story about how climate change might cause a surge in illegal immigration, conveniently and momentarily embracing the science in order to help fan the flames of their favorite Tea Party anti-immigrant hysteria. It is as Orwellian and laughable as it is absurd and tragic.
Everything is being affected. Here in Midwest, the Great Lakes' water temperature is at a record high, up to ten degrees warmer than usual, creating shocks in the lakes' ecosystem. One scientist used the phrase "tremendously anomalous" to describe the temperature increase. That sort of language makes me sweat. "Tremendously anomalous" is what movie scientists say in sci-fi films just before the big ugly monster appears. In this case, of course, the ugly monster happens to look a lot like Glenn Beck.
Perhaps part of the problem is the language itself; we once called it "global warming" before people got tired of arguing why it was caused some places to be actually cooler. Fair enough. So we started calling it "climate change," which is perfectly fine except it sounds like something you might be able to live with. After all, we're raised to believe change is good, right? Sounds like we'll merely have to adapt. But what we are experiencing - from the dissolving northern permafrost that's releasing massive amounts of pent up methane to the thousands of miles of ice shelves that are on the brink of melting into the sea -- is something much less quaint. I would like to suggest that "climate chaos" is more appropriate nomenclature. "Climate chaos" is something you maybe can't wish your way through. "Climate chaos" demands some kind of dramatic collective action that will help us begin to correct the terrible course we're on.
To some degree, you have to be sympathetic to the media's failure. It's hard to see the point of even talking about it here. The whole thing inspires a very Beckett-esque "I can't go on, I'll go on" sort of malaise. You just want to crank up the Lady Gaga, pray for Lindsey Lohan, hit the accelerator and get on with your life. But the chaos won't let you ignore it for long. And even though it's undoubtedly going to get worse before it gets better, we need to stay focused on the steps we need to take.
We need to urge the politicians, the press, and the people around us to keep connecting the dots of what is happening today all around us. Because if we don't, those dots are only going to keep growing in scale until they converge into one very large, very chaotic dot that is just about the size of our planet.
Global Warming has caused the ocean surface waters to warm which makes them less dense. They don't mix as well with the lower, cooler layers. Little plants grouped together with the name Phytoplankton are the base of the oceanic food chain. That is, everything: eats Phytoplankton, or eats something that eats Phytoplankton, or.... well you get the picture. If Phytoplankton are reduced in numbers then everything else in the food chain above them must be reduced in numbers by starvation.
We have lost 40% of our Phytoplankton since 1950 and currently the loss is 1% a year (source Nature). Seems the food they eat is located in the lower cool areas of the oceans but that food is not being delivered in great enough quantities to support a healthy biomass of Phytoplankton near the surface.
So what happens now? We have enough CO2 in the atmosphere to easily heat the planet another degree C even if we stop emitting CO2 completely right now. We are at about 0.7 degrees C over baseline and it is creating a loss of 1% a year in Phytoplankton. At 1.7 degrees C over baseline we will be killing Phytoplankton at 2 or even 3% or maybe more a year.
Without them the ocean life we know will die.
In short, if they go .... we go.
Absolutely incredible that it has come to this ...
The phytoplankton are the base of the oceanic food chain. If the amount of phytoplankton has really declined by 40%, then every living thing above them on the food chain should have been equally impacted. Have we seen a 40% reduction in all kinds of fish catches, for example? Have we seen 40% fewer fish, 40% fewer whales, 40% fewer seals, 40% fewer polar bears, 40% fewer sea birds, etc?
Somehow those events didn't make it into the scientific literature. Why not?
400 parts per million of carbon has recently been found to be the Arctic Tipping Point, which could conceivably endanger everybody. We are approaching 390ppm and adding 2ppm each year. The safe limit is 350ppm.
At 450ppm a study released yesterday stated we must begin winding down carbon no later than 2015. At 400ppm we seem to have an emergency!
According to one scientist, a very thin oil film on the surface of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans could threaten to accelerate temperatures toward the catastrophic Tipping Point.
There may still be time for a monumental effort to confine the oil to the Gulf.
Renewable energy systems that can be deployed rapidly should now be produced on a 24/7 basis. The White House and Congress should do whatever is necessary to make that possible.
See A 5 Point Emergency Program at http://www.aesopinstitute.org
Little known and hard to fathom breakthroughs involving radically new energy technologies can help to supersede fossil fuels much more rapidly than conventional wisdom suggests might be possible.
See Moving Beyond Oil on the same Aesop Institute website.
The immediate need is to find practical ways to initiate emergency actions that avoid a catastrophic loss of life.
Ironically, the emergency might result in Overfull employment and perhaps an eventual 20 hour week by age 50. See Millions of Jobs, on the www.aesopinstitute.org website.