We Still Have Time to Restore Our Climate. But the Climate Time Bomb Is Ticking

GR: The article below describes the current state of our changing climate, the disasters facing us, and the things we could do to save ourselves. Like David Wallace-Wells, Carlin leaves the sugar-coating off. There is some optimism here, but Carlin doesn’t minimize the difficulties. In fact, he makes it clear that the ticking has grown so loud it should be drowning out most other concerns. Recommended.

“A recent New York Magazine article about the climate ruin we are facing, by David Wallace Wells, has caused a furor for describing the catastrophes that could happen to our planet by the end of the century if we do not mitigate the harms to our climate and reverse course. This op-ed by guest contributor Alex Carlin contends that those crises could happen much sooner, and he details steps he believes could help forestall disaster.

“Yes, Virginia, we still have time to restore our climate. But the Climate Time Bomb is undeniably ticking–and Trump has pulled out of the Paris agreement.

What Should We Do To Restore Our ClImate?

“Trump climate policy is blind and deaf to the fact that the Climate Bomb can cause millions—or even potentially billions—of deaths by mid-century. I believe Trump’s rogue refusal to defuse the Bomb is an unfathomably heinous crime against humanity.

“While the Paris agreement focuses on lowering CO2 emissions, there is a second indispensable task we must also perform to defuse The Bomb: restoring the Arctic ice.

“For thousands of years, the frozen Arctic has been keeping our climate hospitable—until now. The Arctic is a critical part of the earth’s mechanism for controlling the planet’s temperature and climate.

“But ominously, the Arctic Ocean has nearly finished changing from a state of “perennial ice”–covered with sea ice in the winter and never substantially ice free in the summer–to a state of “seasonal ice”–substantially ice free in the summer.

“Completing this switchover would herald the biggest change in the global ecosystem since before the start of human civilization, and it would have a devastating impact.

“Billions of people will face the risk of death in this century from adverse climate change outcomes such as starvation, heat stress, resource wars and disease if we don’t restore the perennial ice.

Next: Mass Starvation

–Alex Carlin (Continue reading: We Still Have Time to Restore Our Climate. But the Climate Time Bomb Is Ticking).