WMO: CO2 Concentrations Top 400 Parts per Million throughout Northern Hemisphere
Carbon dioxide levels throughout the northern hemisphere hit 400 parts per million (ppm) for the first time in human history in April, an ominous threshold for climate change, the World Meteorological Organization said on Monday.
The 400 ppm level in the atmosphere, up 40 percent since wide use of fossil fuels began with the Industrial Revolution, is rapidly spreading southwards. First recorded in 2012 in the Arctic, it has since become the norm for the Arctic spring.
The WMO expects the global annual average carbon dioxide concentration to be above 400 ppm in 2015 or 2016. Rising concentrations of the heat-trapping gas raise risks of more heatwaves, droughts and rising sea levels.
“Time is running out,” WMO Secretary-General Michel Jarraud said in a statement.
“This should serve as yet another wake-up call about the constantly rising levels of greenhouse gases which are driving climate change. If we are to preserve our planet for future generations, we need urgent action to curb new emissions of these heat-trapping gases.”
Almost 200 governments have agreed to work out a deal by the end of 2015 to slow climate change as part of efforts to limit the average temperature increase to two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial times.
Temperatures have already risen about 0.8C (1.4F).
In April, the U.N.’s panel of climate experts said that greenhouse gas concentrations, led by carbon dioxide, would have to be kept below 450 ppm to give a good chance of achieving the 2C goal.
The level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is seasonal, since plants absorb more in the summer months, causing a peak in the spring. The northern hemisphere, with more human-related sources of the gas, has a more pronounced seasonal cycle.
Carbon dioxide remains in the atmosphere for hundreds of years. It is emitted by fossil-fueled vehicles and coal-fired factories and power plants as well as by natural activities such as breathing.
During the last 800,000 years, the level of atmospheric carbon dioxide fluctuated between 180 ppm and 280 ppm, and has probably not been above 400 ppm for millions of years, scientists say.
With the widespread burning of coal and oil during the Industrial Revolution, the concentration of carbon dioxide rose to about 290 ppm by the end of the 19th century.
That accelerated last century, with levels between 370 and 380 ppm by the year 2000.
Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!
May 1, called May Day, historically was a fun-filled day for people to say goodbye to the long, cold winter and welcoming warmer weather, by gathering flowers, singing, and dancing.
May Day has also become know as also known as International Workers’ Day, Unions and union locals in the United States — especially in urban areas with strong support for organized labor — have maintained a connection with labor traditions through their own unofficial observances on May 1. Some of the largest examples of this occurred during the Great Depression of the 1930s, when hundreds of thousands of workers marched in May Day parades in New York’s Union Square.
International Workers’ Day is also the commemoration of the May 4, 1886 Haymarket affair in Chicago. The police were trying to disperse a public assembly during a general strike for the eight-hour workday when an unidentified person threw something at the police. The police responded by firing on the workers, killing four demonstrators. “Reliable witnesses testified that all the pistol flashes came from the center of the street, where the police were standing, and none from the crowd. Moreover, initial newspaper reports made no mention of firing by civilians. A telegraph pole at the scene was filled with bullet holes, all coming from the direction of the police On May 1, 2012, tens of thousands marched in the streets of New York and around the US to commemorate May Day as the worker’s holiday and to protest the dismal state of the economy, the growing divide between the rich and the poor and the status quo of economic inequality. Members of Occupy Wall Street and labor unions held protests together in a number of cities in the United States and Canada on May 1, 2012 to commemorate May Day.
This afternoon in Madison there is a May Day march and rally to the State Capitol for immigrant justice, worker’s rights, and a living wage for all, hosted by the Immigrant Worker’s Union. Marcher’s will be meeting at 3 pm at Brittingham Park of Monona Bay, Madison.
Tonight, the Industrial Workers of the World host a May Day celebration with live music, ols fashion labor singing, food, literature and solidarity from 6 – 10 pm at the Wilmar Center, 953 Jennifer Street.
“Mayday”, voiced three consecutive times, as done in the title, “Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!”, is a call for help used in maritime and aviation operations to broadcast that, unless we take major, significant, and TIMELY ALTERNATIVE ACTIONS (quickly), that reverse course – away from the3 status quo (business as usual), imminent doom for the planet and its inhabitants is inevitable.
Thus, a “Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!” call has collectively been sounded by the thousands of the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel of scientists who make up the IPCC and wrote and published the latest dire report on the status of our changing climate. What follows are some remarks they and others made following the report’s public release:
(Additions coming shortly.)
Earth’s future ability to sustain life will be directly incumbent are the success of us here today in reducing enough fossil fuel burning, fast enough, and in reversing the deforestation and paving of the earth with cement. We must contact our governmental officials, who we collectively chose to represent our interests, and demand they take immediate major actions to begin to combat not only global warming, but also income inequality, poverty and hunger and other condition of human injustice.
Energy efficiency is a key way to reduce the state’s carbon footprint and make customer energy bills more affordable. Innovative efficiency strategies, coupled with smart use of renewable resources, could position Wisconsin as a leader in climate and energy strategies for the 21st century.
See “Conserve, NOW” conservation solution which rewards those who burn less fossils fuels on an annual basis. Click on “About this blog” on page 1 for more information.
EARTH DAY ACTIONS – Madison, Wisconsin, and Washington DC
Madison, Wisconsin
As part of an organizing action of Global Climate Convergence and Wisconsin Wave, University of Wisconsin students, professors, teachers and other members of Madison area community marched down Madison’s State Street on the 44th Earth Day, Tuesday, April 22, 2014, with the purpose being to add to the public’s growing awareness and concern regarding the grave environmental threats and social injustices going on around them. The continuing and reckless mining and overuse of the earth’s valuable natural resources, often primarily for the profit of a few, was a common theme expressed at the march in posters and verbal forms. There was an overriding concern about the overuse of fossil fuels, metals, sand and gravel, to the great harm being inflicted upon the earth’s clean water and limited atmosphere, which are showing signs everywhere that they have reached the limit of sustainability for all of the earth’s future populations.
As reported in a April 23 article by Dana Kampa in The Daily Cardinal, titled “Madison environmental, social justice advocates converged on Earth Day” to “Protect our Water–Reject the Mines and Pipelines!”, mining in Wisconsin was cited as one of several significant environmental issues the protesters voiced concerned about.
Wisconsin used to be an environmental leader. It was the home of naturalist and writer Aldo Leopold; it was the first state in the country to ban the use of DDT as a pesticide on farmland; and it was the birthplace and home of U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson, who founded Earth Day in 1970 and was instrumental in waking up the nation’s awareness of the damaging ecological, health and economic costs of air and water pollution and the need for tough federal and state laws and regulations to minimize it. The State of Wisconsin did just that in the decades that followed, maintaining and protecting its natural resources throughout the decades that followed.
But natural resource protection in Wisconsin took an about face in Wisconsin in November 2010 with the election of Republican Governor Scott Walker. After passage of a bill into law that allows for significant environmental degradation from ore mining in the state, an environmentally sensitive area of northern Wisconsin could ultimately become the home of the world’s largest open-pit iron ore mine. Wisconsin’s once strong environmental laws and regulations have been weakened, and environmentally conscious people throughout the state are rising up and taking notice.
The mine is proposed to be built by Gogebic Taconite and is currently undergoing review for development in the Penokee Hills, despite the fact that the mine would destroy a vast, water-rich ecosystem that President John F. Kennedy in 1963 called “a central and significant portion of the freshwater assets of this country” after his visit there.
The $1.5 billion mine would initially be close to four miles long, up to a half-mile wide and nearly 1,000 feet deep, but it could be extended as long as 21 miles. It lies in the headwaters of the Bad River, which flows into Lake Superior, the largest freshwater lake in the world. Six miles downstream from the site is the reservation of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, whose livelihood is threatened by the mine. Environmentally conscious citizens of Wisconsin are protesting, as evidenced by the Earth Day march in Madison.
The protesters also voiced strong concerns for the overall degradation being inflicted on Wisconsin’s landscape by frac sand mining, as well as the human health concerns which occur over time when people breath in silica sand fragments, and the noise and dust from the various digging, processing and trucking of the sand from the mining sites to drilling sites, located out-of-state, mostly in North Dakota. But student marchers also expressed major concerns about the overall future and well-being of the entire planet earth, as its oceans are warming, becoming more acid, while sea levels are arising, from melting ice and snow on land masses and due to the thermal expansion that occurs when water warms, and as the air at the surface continues its record warming. The adverse effects on people and animals from the increasing weather extremes associated with the warming (longer and more dangerous heat waves, worse flooding in some areas and larger areas of drought in others; more and higher coastal flooding with stronger and stronger storms); in other words, more devastation of human and animal life and real estate as the earth continues to heat up. Property and life insurance rates the world over are rising as a result.
The protesters began the march at Madion’s Monona Terrace building, which is Madison’s Convention Center (designed by architect Frank Lloyd Wright), and marched past the Wisconsin’s State Capitol Building, and then down State Street, where they convened at the UW campus Library Mall.
At the mall, several speakers referenced the latest projections made by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), citing numerous examples of recent environmentally injurious governmental decisions of late, not just by our own state senators and representatives in the Wisconsin Legislature, but by current Wisconsin Republican Governor Scott Walker.
As most Wisconsinites know, Wisconsin has tens of thousands of individual and families living in poverty in the state, most who have been been able to just barely get by on the low income jobs they’ve been working up to now. Yet just this last November, the U.S. Congress voted to end the 2009 Recovery Act’s modest monetary increase in food share benefits (food stamps), by its failing to continue funding the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits for poor individuals and families, cutting the funding source of the food budget for many thousands of Wisconsin individuals, families and their children on November 1, 2013. This action by our Congress resulted in a benefit cut for nearly every household receiving food share benefits. For families of three, the cuts amounted to $29 a month — November 2013 through September 2014, totaling a $319 for families of three for that period.
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities said that the cut amounted to “a serious loss, especially in light of the very low amount of basic SNAP benefits available”, and that “without the Recovery Act’s boost, SNAP benefits will average less than $1.40 per person per meal in 2014”. Unfortunately, it is individuals and families eligible for receiving SNAP funding – a large percentage who are Blacks of African and American descent who live in Milwaukee or Dane (Madison area) counties, as well as many thousands of rural preschool age children, and minority families who have children enrolled in public elementary, middle or high schools throughout Wisconsin – who were hurt the most by the November 2013 federal SNAP program cut. Studies show these are the times of human life that are most essential for the child to receive proper nutrition – when their bodies demand the largest amount of good food to grow properly and function well while in school as well as play. When children of any race are deprived of good, nutritious food in their preschool and school age years they are more likely to be more anxious and distracted in school and elsewhere, and they are thus more prone to act in ways get them into trouble in school and elsewhere.
Studies show that when deprived of good, nutritious food at a very young age (2 – 6 years of age), any child, regardless of their race or ethnicity, will be impaired for life as those years are key in proper brain development. When family poverty results in these young children being fed less than nutritious food, or not enough food, during the ages of 2 to 6 years of age, it saddles these young children with impaired mental capabilities, making it more difficult for them to succeed when they enter school, and ultimately reduces their ability to compete for good grades and reduces their chances of succeeding in school and the work place, which can increase their risk of getting into trouble with the authorities and land in prison. To generate this sequence of events for children of families having limited income, in a country as wealthy as the U.S., is an American tragedy of intolerable proportions. Yet, inflationary food pricing brought on by likely global-warming-caused drought in large portions of the western United States, southwestern California in particular, over the past 3 years, and the harsh political decisions affecting Wisconsin’s poor families by our Wisconsin political representative have made this situation worse, especially for the large African-American and Latino populations living in and around Wisconsin’s two largest urban areas – Milwaukee and Dane Counties in particular.
Many who marched this Earth Day (Tuesday) in Madison claimed that they were totally outraged by the fact our own U.S. Representatives and Senators in the Congress have hugely shirked their responsibilities as government employees and public office holders by their continued refusal to initiate or act on legislation to significantly bring down annual U.S. emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) to the atmosphere, both by each individual state, as well as the country as a whole, and fund the development of community strategies to adapt existing and needed infrastructure to handle higher flood waters and drier and hotter condition affecting water supply and air conditioning during heat waves for those who can’t afford it; while creating alert systems and emergency response networking as extreme weather events become more extreme and potentially deadly,as is predicted in the coming decades due to human-caused global warming.
Not only is there now clear evidence of global warming, nearly everywhere, but studies also show the warming is likely to accelerate, the longer countries, such as the high carbon dioxide emitting, or those projected to become high annual greenhouse gas emitters: United States, Canada, China; India; Australia; European counties; Southeast Asia countries, Brazil, and many of the more prosperous South and Central American countries that rely heavily on the tremendous greenhouse gas emitting aviation industry, as well as the many countries having large numbers of military transport vehicles, ships and aircraft and who them on a regular basis, for training purposes and in war, and the very lucrative cruise and airline tourist industries, all who continue to fail at drastically cutting their annual GHG emissions, to the detriment of future decades.
Scientists the world over have already essentially issued a RED ALERT and sounded the alarm bells on the looming state, national and worldwide threats that are now becoming reality as rapid global warming becomes reality. Economists have reported that major industries which depend greatly on a stable climate are unlikely to prosper when they begin to experience heavy losses as they already have because of increasingly severe droughts, unusually fast and heavy rainfalls causing terrible flooding.
It is a fact that every time someone on the planet burns fossil fuels, whether the fuel is gasoline that gets burned up in a car or a lawn mower, ATV, boat jet ski, snowmobile; or if its diesel fuel for running a truck, train, bus or generator, or whether its aviation (jet) fuel from a plane; or natural gas, oil, propane or any other fuel source burned in one’s furnace; more carbon dioxide is emitted into the atmosphere, where it mixes with the other GHG’s already present in the atmosphere.
During their march down State Street in Madison, participants chanted phrases such as “keep the oil in the soil, keep the coal in the hole,” “people power, not corporate power” and “beat back the frack attack, we’re gonna say no mine, GTAC” to promote their individual and collective goals.
Trudi Jenny, a 350 Madison member, said she thought the main message of the march was to “protect our waters.” She said she opposes climate disruption and pipelines.
“We hope that [people attending the rally] learn to become active in the climate change arena,” Jenny said.
Jenny also said she hopes people will write to their congresspeople about creating legislation to keep the planet healthy, promote a carbon tax and oppose a pipeline coming through Minnesota, and support divestment from fossil fuel industries.
Madison Action for Mining Alternatives member Carol Buelow said frack sand mines need more regulation, and bills altering iron mining regulation need to be repealed.
“I think people need to pay attention to the threats to our environment and do what they can to stop them,” Buelow said. “[Iron and frack sand mining] are very destructive to the environment, and they’re very poorly regulated, if at all. The state is doing a totally inadequate job of protecting the environment.”
Environmental advocate Brandi Browskowski-Durow, a public school teacher and University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Education graduate student, said she wants to see more environmental education in schools.
Browskowski-Durow added one of her biggest concerns about the frack sand mining industry is the development of silicosis, which is the accumulation of fine sand in the lungs.
“Right now, [the government is] allowing permits to be more lenient, especially in Wisconsin, and that’s not going to be good for future generations,” Browskowski-Durow said.
Self-described “raging granny” Rebecca Alwin said she thought the rally was a convergence of issues and uniting of progressive groups.
“Raging grannies typically don’t like walking this far, but I’ve got my good walking shoes on,” Alwin said.
Multiple peace marshals walked with the group to help the large group comply with the law and stay safe around traffic.
After the march, several speakers voiced their environmental concerns in a rally.
Federation of United Tribes spokesperson Larry Littlegeorge said he would like to see a complete stop to sand mine construction. He said he got involved when he heard about the potential creation of a 5,000-acre sand mine.
Littlegeorge connected his current concerns to Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act moving all Native Americans west of the Mississippi River.
“Now in 2014, we have another forced removal,” Littlegeorge said. “The Federation of United Tribes is commissioned by the elders and their beliefs to stand up and be accountable for the rights of Mother Earth and for the people who are not in harmony and balance with one another.”
Speakers then led a traditional Native American dance, encouraging people to join hands in a line that eventually converged in the center of Library Mall.
350 Madison spokesperson Beth Esser addressed climate change policy for future generations, specifically her children at the rally.
“Like every parent out there, I want so many wonderful things for their future, but most importantly, I want a healthy, vibrant planet for them to live on,” Esser said. “The time has come to move beyond changing light bulbs.”
Esser also spoke of the fossil fuel divestment program on UW-Madison campus.
“If it is wrong to wreck the planet, surely it is wrong to benefit financially from doing so,” Esser said. “Together, we can put people, planet and peace over profit.”
Finally, Carl Whiting spoke of the No Keystone XL Pledge of Resistance’s opposition to building a pipeline through the Midwest to transport crude oil with civil disobedience.
“It’s high time we all got together, celebrating our collective vision for a healthy planet and flexing our collective muscle,” Whiting said. “All of us here are deeply concerned about the future, and rightly so.”
A rally coordinator said despite the smaller-than-expected turnout, the positive energy of the crowd was encouraging and empowering.
More Info:
For more information about the Global Climate Convergence in Wisconsin, go to https://wisconsinwave.org/global-climate-convergence-wisconsin-0
Regarding Earth Day news in Washington DC, USA Today journalist Paul Singer, who gives weekly reports to Wisconsin Public Radio’s “Central Times” show on Congressional activities, said nothing special for Earth Day was happening there, and that Earth Day is seldom celebrated in the nation’s capital, as it is perceived mostly as an celebration only by Democrats.
Our Children’s Future is being Sabotaged by the Failure of U.S. Congress and Wisconsin Politicians to Act NOW to Reduce Greenhouse Gases
Things have gone real bad for our natural and human environment in Wisconsin, and especially for poor Black children in the state, under the governorship of Scott Walker. There may still be time to fix things, but scientists the world over say now that “major action is needed and fast” – from everyday people, from all businesses, and especially from all current and acting government officials. It is morally wrong for them not to act now, both meaningfully and without delay, for the sake of today’s children. It is they who will face the brunt of global warming impacts as this century progresses.
The effects of rising greenhouse gas concentration level in the atmosphere are latent and slow to develop. But once they do – and they are beginning to do that now – those effects are long-lasting. Decades and centuries, not just years. And more warming also creates chain reactions, producing positive feedbacks that lead to more warming;for example, reducing snow and ice cover at the poles leads to a reduction in albedo (reflection of Sun’s rays back out to space). Because less of the Sun’s radiation is reflected, more is absorbed by the darker (than snow) ocean, thus warming the ocean waters, which causes more snow and ice on the ocean to melt, reducing albedo at the poles even more, warming the water even more and so on. This has already been measured as happening now.
Another example of the positive feedbacks of more warming is that the Permafrost region, which covers one-fifth of the earth’s surface, is now thawing. The thawing of eons of organic material in the Permafrost causes the production and release of methane gas, which is another greenhouse gas (in addition to carbon dioxide and several others) that has 37-times the heat absorbing power of carbon dioxide in the earth atmosphere. This will add to the warming that is already occurring. Add the additional warming will cause even more methane to be released by the thawing Permafrost region. And so on. This dangerous compounding and reoccurring effect has already started as well.
It’s time to Conserve, Now! – for all children living today, and especially for those who follow them. Maybe by that time humans will find a way to safely combat the warming temperatures and rising oceans. But there is much yet that has to happen. The latest reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are out, and farming and consumption as practiced in the U.S. must change in many ways. Researchers say climate change has already cut yields of wheat and corn, reducing gains achieved by better farming technology. Meat and dairy production consumes vast amount of fossil fuel derived energy, and animal waste adds more methane to the atmosphere.
Making matters worse, world population is expected to hit nine billion by 2050. The world’s population needs to be reduced, not allowed to grow more rapidly. To do that, aid and education will need to be given to countries having out of control population explosions. We are morally obligated to help them on this for the sake of all humanity. Future and distant future populations need to be given a chance. To achieve that, all the world’s countries need to drastically reduce all activities causing the most greenhouse gases to be emitted by their people and industries, while everyone should be encouraging activities that will sequester greenhouse gases from the atmosphere (growing plants and trees, primarily). Some of this is starting now and such initiatives should be amplified in number and be heavily financed by countries that have historically deforested the world while burning up the most fossil fuels.
There should be only a minimum number of fossil fuel development projects developed, and only the most clean and energy efficient fuel should be taken from the earth for combustion. The goal should be to obtain as much power from wind, solar and and renewable energies as possible.
Major Global Warming Upheaval Already Underway
National Public Radio: “The United Nations International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC): “major action is needed and fast”. The IPCC’s latest report to the United Nation presents an ominous threat for the entire world by the end of the century, and many of those threats are already well in the development phase
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“The report clearly shows that adaptation is an option only if efforts to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions are strengthened substantially. Without mitigation, the impacts of climate change will be devastating.” – Wolfgang Cramer
“Conserve, NOW 3” Program Needed to Promote Environmental Justice and Income Equality in the U.S.
More to come … Start by reading Feb.7, 2014 Testimony to Wisconsin State Assembly Committee
“… There’s no Planet B …”
What does sustainability look like? Those who tuned in to WORT’s FM radio station’s “THE ACCESS HOUR” last night (Monday at 7:00 – 8:00 pm) at 89.9 FM (also available to listen to live at http://www.WORTFM.org, or through the WORTFM.org archives), would have a pretty good inkling of what sustainable living is truly all about, and why it is especially URGENT that all of us begin practicing it, NOW, since in the words of one of last year’s speakers, “there’s no planet B”.
On Monday, March 24, 2014, Madison, Wisconsin’s listener sponsored radio station, WORT-FM, aired on its “The Public Access Hour” program a show in which climate change educator and WORT volunteer Kermit Hovey interviewed a number of the presenters and participants who had attended last year’s Sustainability Summit in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The quotes on this post come from the March 24th Public Access Hour show.
This year’s Sustainability Summit is called “Conserving the Future Together” and is being held in Milwaukee on March 26-28, 2014. See http://www.sustainabilitysummit.us for more information.
Last Monday’s access hour show began with Kermit Hovey interviewing Milwaukee Area Technical College’s (MATC) educator George Stone, who was the 2013 and this year’s Sustainability Summit director. In response to Hovey’s question on how he would define “sustainability”, Stone answered:
“Well, A hundred years ago, in the era of Teddy Roosevelt, we called it “conservation”. I think basically that’s what it is. And when I think of sustainability I’m not thinking primarily about sustainable financial resources, or that sort of thing, I’m thinking of the sustainability of natural resources. You know the basic necessities of life, food, water, and that requires soil for the food, all kind of the materials that Mother Earth supplies, for our advanced civilization, they’re in limited supply, we live on a finite planet, with a growing population, we need to be wise – wise use – we need to be wise and frugal in the way that we use these resources, and adopting the Native American philosophy of inter generational justice: let’s say we have a responsibility to future generations -many of the Nations consider 7 generations in the future. So that’s sustainability. It’s our moral responsibility – and I might say, parenthetically, I consider that all human activity has a moral dimension – it’s our moral responsibility to pass on a planet, and habitats on this planet, to future generations that are as close as possible to what we’ve enjoyed. Plundering the earth, and destroying for our own excess, is not justifiable.
“So sustainability I think is an expression of that in the sense that there is a moral responsibility to future generations. James Hansen, our keynote speaker today, refers to it as “inter-generational justice”. That’s my idea of “sustainability”.”
Climate scientist Michael Mann: “… there’s only one planet, right? And if we screw it up, there’s no planet “B”, and so there couldn’t be anything more important in our lives especially when we think about the sort of world we want to leave for our children and grandchildren, what could be more important than trying to find a way to live sustainably, so that we don’t leave a degraded planet for future generations?”
Go to the archives for “The Public Access Hour” for March 24, 2014 at http://www.wortfm.org for the full interview by Kermit Hovey with Michael Mann along with other speakers and participants.
Will Today’s Children Be Left in the Lurch on Future Planet Earth?
What will Earth’s climate in the future be like? Today’s children will have no choice but to spend the majority of their time in whatever we leave them.
As anyone today who pays even the slightest bit of attention to what 98% of world scientists have been warning us, the consequences of our unprecedented and continued combustion of massive quantities of the earth’s fossil fuels – primarily in transportation, heating and electricity use – over the past several centuries will likely be dire.
The continuing build up of more and more greenhouse gases in our atmosphere (and oceans) from too much fossil fuel burning will likely leave our planet as a sickening place for today’s children, or children to be, to live.
The earth’s atmosphere will trap more radiation thus more heat from the Sun, making weather storm systems much more potent and deadly than those of today.
The water levels of the earth’s oceans will continue rising, warming and the oceans will become more acidic, causing intolerable conditions for many of our oceans’ species. Ecological and biological systems everywhere are likely to be severely impacted. Sustaining life (and living) will become more difficult on Future Planet Earth. If we continue our ecologically reckless burning of fossil fuels, even at the level we burn them now, today’s children and future children will have to pay the price of that overindulgence. The way we are living now is unsustainable, and how long our present day Earth will remain hospitable for human beings and animals to live is limited. Many known “positive global warming feedbacks”, such as more methane releases by the increasing thawing of the permafrost region; and increasing solar radiation absorption (heating) of the Arctic ocean waters due to replacement of its snow and ice cover with its darker, more sunlight-absorbing, sea water are quite probably already kicking in. Once those feedback systems approach their maximum, global warming could take on the characteristics U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry recently described as: “the world’s most fearsome weapon of mass destruction”, and moreover that “the science of climate change is leaping out at us like a scene from a 3D movie… It’s warning us; it’s compelling us to act” (Kerry).
President John F. Kennedy once famously said: “Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”
Not many Americans these days must be thinking about the meaning of those words as so many in particular take round-trip flights by jet to far away places, yearly, which requires the burning immense amounts of fossil fuels, especially in take-off and cruising very long distances.
A prime example here in Wisconsin is Wisconsin Public Radio (WPR) and Wisconsin Public Television (WPT) are sponsoring round-trip vacations for anyone who’s willing to pay them to arrange flights to Hawaii, Ireland, the Mediterranean, and New York City this year. More trips are being planned to other exotic places, as well. In addition to those people not spending their money to help out our state’s economy, those excursions contribute to the many tons of greenhouse gases from the jet airliners flying those tourists to their destinations and back to the Badger State over the course of those flights. I have informed WPR that flying by jet is without question the worst thing individuals can do if their goal is to minimize their greenhouse gas emissions. It appears they care only about making money off these excursions and care little or not at all about the perils of a warming planet they are helping to cause by arranging these exotic trips. It’s shameful.
Global Warming Likely to Hurt Wisconsin Agriculture
Agriculture has been a critical dimension of Wisconsin from early settlement and the logging era, through industrialization, and remains an important economic, social and cultural component of the Dairy State. Wisconsin ranks first nationally in cheese production, and second for milk and butter production. Yet Wisconsin is also second in milk cows, oats, carrots, and sweet corn used in processing. It remains the national leader in processed snap beans, cranberries, corn for silage, mink pelts and milk goats. It is also among the top five states for important agricultural commodities such as potatoes, maple syrup, mint for oil, and cucumbers for pickles.
Continue global warming is predicted to bring increases in both the frequency and the severity of droughts and floods, resulting in increased challenges for Wisconsin farmers and livestock operations. Warmer water temperatures are also likely to cause the habitat ranges of many fish species to shift and disruption of ecosystems already stressed by human activity. Overall, climate change in Wisconsin resulting from global warming will make it more difficult to grow crops, raise animals, and catch fish in the same ways and places as in the past.
Changes in the frequency and severity of droughts and floods could pose challenges for farmers and ranchers. Meanwhile, warmer water temperatures are likely to cause the habitat ranges of many fish species to shift, which could disrupt ecosystems. Overall, climate change could make it more difficult to grow crops, raise animals, and catch fish in the same ways and same places as we have done in the past.
Heat waves, which are projected to increase under climate change, could directly threaten livestock. A number of states have each reported losses of more than 5,000 animals from just one heat wave. Heat stress affects animals both directly and indirectly. Over time, heat stress can increase vulnerability to disease, reduce fertility, and reduce milk production.
Drought may threaten pasture and feed supplies. Drought reduces the amount of quality forage available to grazing livestock. Some areas could experience longer, more intense droughts, resulting from higher summer temperatures and reduced precipitation. For animals that rely on grain, changes in crop production due to drought could also become a problem.
Climate change may increase the prevalence of parasites and diseases that affect livestock.The earlier onset of spring and warmer winters could allow some parasites and pathogens to survive more easily. In areas with increased rainfall, moisture-reliant pathogens could thrive.
Increases in carbon dioxide (CO2) may increase the productivity of pastures, but may also decrease their quality. Increases in atmospheric CO2 can increase the productivity of plants on which livestock feed. However, studies indicate that the quality of some of the forage found in pasture lands decreases with higher CO2. As a result, livestock would need to eat more to get the same nutritional benefits.
The negative effects of climate change will be exacerbated by continuing declines in the acreage of Wisconsin farmland. Wisconsin lost more than 620,000 acres of farmland from 2007 to 2012, a 4% decrease according to the Census of Agriculture, which is conducted every five years by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Likely causes of these declines are urban sprawl development, enabled by federal, state and local highway expansions which replace vegetation and topsoil with heat-absorbing Portland cement or asphalt in order to facilitate continued growth in motor vehicle driving (more fossil fuel burning) and more employment and profits for the construction and bridge building industry.
Sources: U.S. EPA; U. S. Department of Agriculture; Wisconsin Initiative on Climate Change Impact
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