The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

The Reality of the Climate Crisis

So, here’s the bad. The science is indisputable.  97% of actively publishing climate scientists say that Earth’s climate is warming due to human activity.  The planet’s average temperature is 0.8ºC warmer than the 1880-1920 average, and increasing.  This warming is caused mainly by CO2 emissions from fossil fuels.  CO2 acts like a blanket and prevents heat radiation from escaping into space, causing a planet-wide energy imbalance:  more heat is coming in than going out.  The planet will continue to warm until balance is restored at a higher global temperature. 

And here’s the ugly. Earth is already giving clear signals that 0.8ºC is already too much warming.  The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are melting.  The total volume of arctic sea ice is half what it was in 1980, and the planetary reservoir of frozen Arctic methane is thawing and activating.  Ecological zones are shifting poleward, milder winters and warmer summers are destabilizing ecosystems, and mountain glaciers are melting or disappearing.  Warmer oceans and changes in the water cycle causes increasingly extreme weather, even in our own backyards.  We are experiencing record floods; stronger hurricanes; record snowstorms; extreme droughts and deadly heat waves leading to fires, massive livestock death, and widespread crop failure.

It is likely that positive feedbacks will begin to significantly enhance the human-induced warming.  Ice reflects solar energy, so as ice melts on the Arctic Ocean, on Antarctica, and on Greenland, the Earth warms ever faster. Methane is an even stronger greenhouse gas than CO2, and vast deposits are frozen into the Arctic tundra and on the ocean floors.  As the Earth warms, this methane is released causing the Earth warms ever faster. 

These planet-wide feedback mechanisms have the potential to suddenly push the climate over a “tipping point.”  We don’t know precisely when these major feedbacks will kick in, but we know they will almost certainly kick in if we continue “business as usual” until 2030 due to the sustained warming this would cause.  The unpredictability of climate feedback mechanisms is a reason to take immediate aggressive action.  Every day we wait increases the risk. 

The good? Well, the good is that youth are standing up for the planet and for our futures.  It seems lame sometimes to keep shouting and feeling like nobody is listening, that nobody cares about US.  But, we are making a difference.  We, as a generation, “get it” more than any other generation.  Even your friends who seem to only care about celebrities, shopping and their boyfriend…there is something inherent in our generation that knows something is off, something is wrong.  And as we awaken to the reality that the climate crisis is directly related to our own futures, we get active and change The Way Things Are.  Because of our generation, our addiction to fossil fuels is coming to end…as we lead in defining new definitions of success and reject the ways of society NOW that insist on MORE MORE MORE while ignoring those who will suffer as a result of greed and self interest.  We really can be the generation who fought back.  Join the revolution!