Climate Change: It's Bad and Getting Worse | Common Dreams
Climate Change: It's Bad and Getting Worse | Common Dreams
A few key quotes:
Central China recently experienced its worst drought in more than 50 years. Regional authorities have declared more than 1,300 lakes "dead", meaning they are out of use for both irrigation and drinking water supply.
"If you had a satellite view of the planet in the summer, there is about 40 per cent less ice in the Arctic than when Apollo 8 [in 1968] first sent back those photos [of Earth]," Bill McKibben, world renowned environmentalist and fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences told Al Jazeera, "Oceans are 30 per cent more acidic than they were 40 years ago. The atmosphere is four per cent more wet than 40 years ago because warm air holds more water than cold air. That means more deluge and downpour in wet areas and more dryness in dry areas. So we're seeing more destructive mega floods and storms, increasing thunderstorms, and increasing lightning strikes."
"If this continues unabated this planet will not be habitable by the species that are on it, including humans," she (Cindy Parker*) concluded, "It will be a very different planet. One that is not very conducive to human life."
"The projected growth rate is 9.3 billion by 2050," Ryerson told Al Jazeera, "The additional 2.5 billion [onto our current 6.8 billion] is the climate equivalent to adding two USA's to the planet. Even though most of those people are in low greenhouse gas emitting countries, the sheer number of people adds to a huge impact on the environment."
"We have 225,000 people at the dinner table tonight who weren't there last night, so to maintain our current population we're already over-pumping underground aquifers," added Ryerson, "India is over-pumping, and we have over 100 million people in India dependent on over-pumping, so this can't be sustained. And climate change is making this all even more untenable, as the glaciers in the Himalayas that provide water for India and China are melting rapidly."
"Population is the multiplier of everything else," explained Ryerson, who believes climate change cannot adequately be addressed until the overpopulation problem is solved.
"Clearly the current number of people and per capita behavior is unsustainable and this is obvious in what has happened to the climate already," he said, "There are severe consequences already. And the cost of solving this problem of overpopulation is small compared to the cost of solving climate change as it progresses."
"Saudi Arabia has announced that the water they've been depending on, their underground aquifer for crops and drinking, will be gone by 2020," he explained, "They are dependent on imports, and can pay for it now, but in the future when oil declines, that country faces a serious issue of sustainability."
* co-directs the Program on Global Environmental Sustainability and Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and is the Associate Director of the Johns Hopkins Environment, Energy, Sustainability, and Health Institute
A few key quotes:
Central China recently experienced its worst drought in more than 50 years. Regional authorities have declared more than 1,300 lakes "dead", meaning they are out of use for both irrigation and drinking water supply.
"If you had a satellite view of the planet in the summer, there is about 40 per cent less ice in the Arctic than when Apollo 8 [in 1968] first sent back those photos [of Earth]," Bill McKibben, world renowned environmentalist and fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences told Al Jazeera, "Oceans are 30 per cent more acidic than they were 40 years ago. The atmosphere is four per cent more wet than 40 years ago because warm air holds more water than cold air. That means more deluge and downpour in wet areas and more dryness in dry areas. So we're seeing more destructive mega floods and storms, increasing thunderstorms, and increasing lightning strikes."
"If this continues unabated this planet will not be habitable by the species that are on it, including humans," she (Cindy Parker*) concluded, "It will be a very different planet. One that is not very conducive to human life."
"The projected growth rate is 9.3 billion by 2050," Ryerson told Al Jazeera, "The additional 2.5 billion [onto our current 6.8 billion] is the climate equivalent to adding two USA's to the planet. Even though most of those people are in low greenhouse gas emitting countries, the sheer number of people adds to a huge impact on the environment."
"We have 225,000 people at the dinner table tonight who weren't there last night, so to maintain our current population we're already over-pumping underground aquifers," added Ryerson, "India is over-pumping, and we have over 100 million people in India dependent on over-pumping, so this can't be sustained. And climate change is making this all even more untenable, as the glaciers in the Himalayas that provide water for India and China are melting rapidly."
"Population is the multiplier of everything else," explained Ryerson, who believes climate change cannot adequately be addressed until the overpopulation problem is solved.
"Clearly the current number of people and per capita behavior is unsustainable and this is obvious in what has happened to the climate already," he said, "There are severe consequences already. And the cost of solving this problem of overpopulation is small compared to the cost of solving climate change as it progresses."
"Saudi Arabia has announced that the water they've been depending on, their underground aquifer for crops and drinking, will be gone by 2020," he explained, "They are dependent on imports, and can pay for it now, but in the future when oil declines, that country faces a serious issue of sustainability."
* co-directs the Program on Global Environmental Sustainability and Health at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and is the Associate Director of the Johns Hopkins Environment, Energy, Sustainability, and Health Institute