By Huck Fairman
The world has had some good news in the past year. The Paris Climate Accord took place and gained the support of essentially all the nations around the planet. This spring those nations signed on to do, each as each sees fit, something to head off climate change. The questions are: Will they follow through, what will they do, and even if they act, will it be enough to head off the worst repercussion of global warming?
More specifically, will it enable us to avoid exceeding the somewhat arbitrary goal of a 2 degrees C rise in temperatures? There is no way to compel compliance; there is only leadership and the appeal to global responsibility.
The other good development, in this country at least, is that polls show over 60 percent, and as many as 70 percent, of Americans now recognize global warming is a manmade threat to our well-being — which needs to be tackled.
But science, including our local Climate Central research group, and the United Nations’ IPCC reports, warn that a great deal needs to be done. And with local reluctance widespread around the world, again the question is: Will nations do what science tells them is necessary?
These necessary steps are not difficult concepts. The difficult part is developing the political will to enact them. But the steps are basically three straight-forward strategies:
1 — Reduce CO2 emissions, accomplished through a number of means, including conserving or reducing energy demands and adopting some form of carbon fee.
2 — Install or otherwise turn to more renewable sources of energy. The ideas and technologies exist. Implementation is the key, and here again, putting a price on carbon is an efficient way to encourage that.
3 — Pulling more carbon out of our atmosphere, by using nature’s efficient mechanism, photosynthesis, by sequestering carbon, in the earth say, and by adopting new technologies that use carbon for fuels or even building materials. The goal is to get to a carbon-neutral level where there is no global increase.
A microcosmic example is Princeton University which is planning to reach 1990 emissions levels by 2020 and become carbon neutral by 2050.
Perhaps surprisingly, nature’s photosynthesis capacity is more prevalent than many might expect. Our nation’s prairie grasses, whose roots can reach down 20 feet and more, can store great quantities of carbon (not CO2) below ground. If state and national governments were willing to pay farmers or other land owners to increase these grasses, or trees, which serve as carbon sinks, such policies could help take us toward that carbon-neutral goal.
Paying now for such policies will certainly be much cheaper than responding to disasters, such as Hurricane Sandy and recent widespread flooding and droughts, all fueled, or intensified, by the energy from rising temperatures. This country currently possesses 300 to 400 million acres of abandoned agricultural land, and degraded prairie and forestland that could support grasses, trees and other plants. Again, the solutions are in our grasp; the question is: Will we adopt them, in time?
To get an idea of the challenge facing us, Climate Central in Princeton estimates that we must reduce fossil fuel usage by 80 percent if we are to keep to the estimated, and very general, 2 degree C temperature rise. And beyond that, the nations of the globe need to reach the carbon neutral goal by 2045 — ahead even of our local university’s goal.
Is this possible? Although, again we know what to do, individuals and societies seldom respond quickly, until disaster strikes. In addition, newly developing countries, such as China, India, Indonesia, and Brazil are tempted to choose development over conservation and reduced fossil fuel usage. In addition, new technologies suddenly coming on line could either increase the demand for fossil fuels, or reduce them. In short, there are many unknown variables that could tilt the situation one way or the other.
Stephen Pacala of Princeton University and board chair of Climate Central has expressed his hope that the many young scientists and technology researchers will find some solution. But that hope suggests Mr. Pacala sees little likelihood of political or policy solutions will be adopted in time.
So, where are we, in terms of the well-being of our planet? The two previous years have been the warmest on record; 14 of the 15 warmest years ever recorded have occurred this century, CO2 levels, while seeing reduced increases in this country and Europe, are elsewhere rising; the oceans are warming and acidifying, threatening fish and food supplies; glaciers and ice packs are melting; drought and flooding have ravaged most continents; climate migration is increasing, and politically, many nations appear to be split between those who want to return to the past and those who see the need to look ahead and respond to the threats already under way, and which science predicts, accurately so far, will only get worse.
Thus we are at this peculiar, but not unprecedented, juncture between the very real possibility of disastrous decline and the ability, through choosing knowledgeable policies, to forestall that decline, and in fact take us, regionally and globally, to improved well-being.
In a recent New York Times, columnist Thomas Friedman urged us to elect Democrats this year at all levels of government, because the current Republican Party is incapacitated by division and an 18th century view of government, and is thus unable to address any of the many crucial issues we face, including, at the forefront, on which so much else will depend, global warming.
Huck Fairman is a Princeton author who writes SOLUTIONS on environmental issues.
