Earth's Heated Question
The Earth is Heating Up. Now What?
Fitz E. Barringer
April 2006
Read National Geographic's Global Warming Feature
Most people do not care about the environment. Sure, we all like fresh air, beautiful forests, and smog-free cities. Who doesn't? But when push comes to shove, people would rather have electricity in their homes than a spotless environment. Air conditioning is more important than not drilling in the Artic Wildlife Preserves. Plus, an SUV just looks better than a Toyota Prius. Climate change seems too abstract to attract much worry.
Still, it seems clear that earth's environment is warming up. The September 2004 issue of National Geographic contains a series of reports on global warming. The average temperature has increased steadily since the early nineteenth century. And the temperature increases are most extreme at the poles. On Antarctica's Western Peninsula, for instance, the average temperature has risen by 8.8 degrees Fahrenheit in the winter and 4.5 F degrees for the rest of the year.
At the same time, the five hottest years since 1880 have all occurred in the last decade with 2005 being the hottest year on record. Glaciers are melting, the ocean water is becoming less salty (proving that more fresh water is melting into the oceans), and flowers are blossoming earlier.
The real question, then, is why is this global spike in temperature happening?
Many scientists cited in the National Geographic articles point to the recent rise in carbon dioxide emissions as evidence that humans are affecting the climate in a negative way. Carbon dioxide released from power plants, factories, and cars, they say, collects in the atmosphere and prevents solar energy from escaping into space. As these 'greenhouse gasses' build up over the poles, earth will trap more and more solar energy and become increasingly hot.
What is undeniable is that CO2 levels have risen. Since industrialization began in the 1860s, global levels of carbon dioxide have increased by 100 parts per million - a jump of nearly 50%. During the same period, the average temperature has risen by over two degrees at the Earth's poles. According to believers in human-caused global warming, the carbon dioxide produced by our factories, cars, and other industrial activities are greatly affecting the temperature of the planet.
Many of those same scientists also believe that rising global temperatures will lead to longer summers, higher sea levels, and more intense storms. Hollywood, of course, has long been preaching that temperature spikes could be disastrous. First there was Kevin Costner's "Waterworld," which portrayed a world where all of the icecaps had melted. Then came the politically charged "The Day After Tomorrow," which imagined the Western world being obliterated by violent storms. Soon, Al Gore - yes, that Al Gore - will star in a documentary about pollution's effects on global life titled "An Inconvenient Truth."
Recent weather patterns, however, may be confirming Hollywood's darkest fears. In a recent interview on MSNBC, TV personality Bill Nye speculated that Hurricane Katrina and the recent tornados in Tennessee and Iowa could be a sign that global temperatures are creating worse storms. While it is too soon to say conclusively if the violent storms are related to global warming, Nye said, most scenarios for rising temperatures predict more storms like the one that devastated New Orleans.
While rising temperatures may be causing worse storms, some scientists think it is inaccurate to blame global warming on humans. Long-term data show that the earth has repeatedly undergone cycles of warming and cooling every 100,000 years for the last 400,000 years (before that the cycles lasted about 41,000 years). These warming cycles, scientists say, are caused by slight changes in earth's orbit around the sun. When the earth's orbit is more circular, the planet cools down. When the orbit becomes more elliptical, the planet heats up.
An astronomical interpretation of global warming even accounts for the spike in carbon dioxide emissions. National Geographic reports that ice samples taken from Antarctica confirm that each significant temperature fluctuation during the past 400,000 years has corresponded with a major rise in carbon dioxide levels. According to these data, therefore, temperature changes have (much) more to do with the Earth's orbit around the sun than human industrialization.
Finally, skeptics of human-caused global warming point out that computer predictions pointing to catastrophic climate failure - think "The Day After Tomorrow" - are simply not accurate enough to justify mass panic. A 2000 study conducted for the George C. Marshall Institute for Public Policy found that the earth's environment and temperature cycles are so complex that it is impossible for even the most powerful super computers to accurately simulate the world's geo-system. "The most sophisticated computer program would have to track 5 million climate parameters and their interactions," the report states. "Such a computer does not yet exist."
Clearly there are at least two interpretations about what is happening to our planet. The problem, of course, is that we just do not know enough to blame the situation on one cause. Humans weren't polluting the air with their horse-drawn SUVs 100,000 years ago, and yet the temperature shot up then just as it has today. At the same time, if the Earth keeps warming up like it is, humanity could be in for a steamy situation. So what are we to do?
The 1998 Kyoto Protocol, a UN sponsored meeting, called on the industrialized nations to slash greenhouse emissions. In typical UN fashion, however, the Protocol is biased, lame, and ineffectual. The Protocol asks nations to control their greenhouse emissions based on 1990 data. The problem is that Kyoto sets different (and unfair) targets for each country. The European Union is asked to cut 8 percent of its emissions; the United States must cut 7 percent. Such reductions would significantly impact these countries' economies through taxes and industrial cleanup. Other countries such as Russia and China would feel almost no effect from the treaty, however. Under the Kyoto Protocol, Russia would be required to cut 0 percent of its emissions because its economy - and CO2 emissions - has dropped significantly since the fall of the USSR. China, meanwhile, an early signer of the treaty, is under no obligation to cut any of its emissions by any date. So of course the People's Republic signed the treaty.
Problems with the Kyoto Treaty are further compounded by the fact that there is no date on when these emissions must be curtailed. Nor is there any punishment for nations that fail to comply with the treaty. Finally, most scientists agree that even if nations complied with the Kyoto standards it is unlikely it would have any major change on the planet. China and India could pump out CO2 emissions guilt free, while everyone else tries to cut back. Clearly, this treaty is ridiculous. So ridiculous, in fact, that even our distinguished former president, Bill Clinton, was not foolish enough to send this Protocol to Congress for ratification.
If humans are going to get serious about the environment, we first need to study the situation better. We have to know what is causing the rise in temperatures. It makes no sense to sign a global climate treaty if the sun - not humanity - is causing global warming. Moreover, technological advances may one day negate the need for any such treaty.
Even if humans decide to curb CO2 emissions, however, any agreement must be fair. Yes, the United States does produce more carbon dioxide than any other nation, but an agreement should produce a resolution that encompasses all nations. Global pollution is one issue that the United States cannot solve by itself. It is foolish to penalize the United States and Europe and leave the Chinese to pollute all they want. Furthermore, a treaty on global warming should have dates when emissions should be reduced, and it should have punishments for nations that do not comply.
In other words, the UN will have to do something it has rarely done before: create a treaty that is timely, effective, and enforceable.
Obviously, such an agreement is a long way off. In the meantime, I suspect people will be more concerned with a less serious, but not unrelated topic: Does that SUV look better in black or red?