The Kolbert Report - Sea-Ice Loss In 25 Yrs = NY, TX GA Combined

[hatrack]

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Her pages are replete with bad news: perennial sea ice, which 25 years ago covered an area of the Arctic the size of the continental United States, has since lost an area "the size of New York, Georgia and Texas combined". Carbon dioxide levels, if emissions go unchecked, could reach three times pre-industrial levels by the end of the century.

The book is organised around notes Kolbert took on "field trips" not only to places where climate change is affecting the natural world but also to ones - labs, offices, observatories - where humans are trying to understand the phenomenon of human-induced global warming. In language that is clear, if somewhat dry, she examines the major pieces of the story, shedding light on some insider concepts of climatologists. The book may make a good handbook; it is both comprehensive and succinct. (If you have ever wondered how a climate model is put together, that's in there, too.)

She visits the Netherlands, where rising sea levels caused by global warming are expected to swallow up large parts of the country. In areas where there are already periodic floods, a construction firm has started building amphibious homes and "buoyant roads". Another field trip took her to Washington, where she was treated to double-speak by an under-secretary charged with explaining the Bush administration's negative position on climate change. The United States is the largest emitter of carbon in the world, accounting for a quarter of the world's total, with the average American putting out 12,000 pounds of carbon a year, or about 100 times what the average Bangladeshi does. In two decades, the Chinese will surpass Americans in this, unless they can somehow be persuaded to build their many projected new coal plants using modern, low-emission - and expensive - technology.

Some of the most downbeat (or realistic) observers are climate scientists. "It may be that we're not going to solve global warming," Marty Hoffert, a physics professor at New York University, told her. "The earth is going to become an ecological disaster, and, you know, somebody will visit in a few hundred million years and find there were some intelligent beings who lived here for a while, but they just couldn't handle the transition from being hunter-gatherers to high technology." Hoffert isn't giving up in despair, though, but turning to high technology for help. He's trying to find carbon-free sources of energy - away from Earth. Satellites with photovoltaic arrays could be launched into space, he suggests. Solar collectors could be placed on the moon. Turbines suspended in the jet stream could generate wind power. At least in the long term, "I think we have a shot," he says.

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http://living.scotsman.com/books.cfm?id=854492006

[NNadir]

1. Oh hell. I think I'll drive around all day in my car and ponder this.

[Massacure]

2. Screw the car, get a hummer.