21st century climate change could turn out to be one of the biggest stories in world history, and yes, let’s fight back, but let’s take care. Let’s deal with reality even as we recognize the miracle of fossil fuels, the leftover, underground remains of plants and animals that died millions of years ago and were crucial in the creation of modernity.
Best known as coal, natural gas and oil, they nevertheless release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. It generates heat, and the more it expands, the hotter it gets and the less likely we are to hang onto modernity’s miracles.
That’s one way to read a recent message from a U.N. panel of climate-change experts drawing on miles worth of frowning data and aspiring theories. They deny Armageddon with a virtual affirmation that nations of the world will get serious enough to put workable plans into action by December.
There’s a deadline beyond that. It’s 2030. If CO2 emissions haven’t been cut by more than half by then, the increased temperatures since the beginning of industrialism could be as high as 1.5 centigrade (2.7 Fahrenheit), and that could mean calamity. Even if that goal is met, more work will have to be done, namely a forever sequester of all fossil fuels by 2040.
Missing these goals could lead to inadequate food caused by further extinction of plants and animal species and far less arable land. There could be mass migrations from the southern parts of the earth to the northern parts, infections of varied diseases, economic collapse, far less drinkable water and misery, misery, misery if still some tinges of hope.
We are already seeing some of the above, and what’s the rescue? Well, in the minds of many, it’s the replacement of fossil fuels with the renewable energy of solar panels, wind farms and batteries enough to get the job done, although it isn’t. One problem is obvious. The sun does not always shine and the wind does not always blow. Conclusion? Unreliability.
Yes, renewables should be part of any plan, but a more central element should be nuclear power that’s now becoming available in small plants that are far cheaper and can be built more quickly and safely. They have not been mentioned enough because too many people incorrectly fear them. In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel got rid of most of her country’s hugely effective nuclear plants because of the 2011 tsunami accident in Japan in which, it turned out, radiation release did not provably kill anyone. She thought renewables would come through for her, but they didn’t, and Germany ended up depending largely on natural gas sent through pipelines from Russia.
Another answer is carbon capture, both taking some CO2 from the air or from coal and power plants and burying it. Trees love to consume CO2 and so we can plant more of them and come to recognize that huge wildfires can usually be avoided with proper forest management. A bunch of other ideas are out there, and though it may make you shiver, don’t forget geo-engineering, varied ways to hush up CO2 that are right now worrisome. They could, however, become safe and sound and rescue us if we miss the deadlines, maybe because China refuses to cooperate, something some observers dread.
Spending carelessly, more out of fear than homework, could defeat another safeguard, namely individual and communal adaptation, using varied ways to modify the heat’s transgressions. Building dykes to deal with sea rises just might be impossible if impoverishment came our way through good intentions substituting for thoughtful analysis.
We need to stay calm and aware and keep a close eye on politics. President Joe Biden has mistakenly used the word “existential” to describe the climate change threat, ignorantly meaning the end of humankind. He has reduced drilling opportunities to the point where we are increasingly at the mercy of foreign countries selling us fossil fuels just as dangerous as our own. Now, to avoid a financially ruinous lawsuit on top of his unbelievably wild expenditure adventures, he has agreed to an enormous Alaska project that could provide fossil fuels enough to instigate anxiety worldwide.
Fellow citizens, a lot is up to us.
