Creating climate-responsible systems is right next step

Seen from space, life may appear a mere fluorescence over the surface of the earth: the rich blue of oxygenated oceans, the wash of green across the continents, the amber highlights where air and moisture have rusted minerals.

But that thin veneer of beauty also shows the power of life to transform the entire planet. When photosynthesis in cyanobacteria first tapped the power of sunlight to fuel life’s processes, it released oxygen that slowly shifted more than just the hues of sea and land. The oxygen was toxic to the anaerobic life forms that then held sway. That triggered a mass extinction event, with creatures that could breathe oxygen taking over the course of evolution.

Life had inadvertently changed everything, including its own future direction. In the roughly two billion years since the “oxygen revolution,” some scientists suggest that life has also played a part in rebalancing the mix of atmospheric oxygen and carbon dioxide to maintain conditions conducive to life’s continuance.

Now, of course, the baton of planetary change — and planetary stability — has passed into human hands. Our clever, opposablethumbed, digitally amplified species has demonstrated its power to change everything, again often inadvertently. With that power comes responsibility. Now that we know the impacts of our actions, the only ethical choice is to act in ways that enhance rather than degrade the planet.

At first, that may mean acting with restraint. As a climate advocate, I’ve spent the last decade urging Marin governments to establish rules and systems to limit the damage we’re doing to the earth. No one knowingly runs a stoplight, I’ve suggested, once they understand the deadly consequences of such carelessness.

And once climate-responsible systems are in place, we can readily reduce our impact on the earth with little real impact on our lives. A clean electric car drives just as fast as a gas one. A well-sealed electric home or business is just as warm as one that burns fossil fuels (aka, “natural gas”). Electricity from renewable sources behaves the same as that from dirty power plants. All come at comparable cost (or less) and bring us the deep satisfaction of living in alignment with the earth and sun.

Such actions are key to halting the harm that people are doing to the planet. They can move us close to achieving the science-based goal of net zero greenhouse gas emissions set by the United Nations, California and Marin — and promised by Joe Biden’s administration.

But stopping the harm is no longer enough. We now know that to curb runaway climate change we must also heal the damages we’ve already done to the habitability of the earth, replenishing natural systems so they can capture or “draw down” the excess carbon dioxide accumulated in the atmosphere from two centuries of burning fossil fuels. That means restoring soils and ecosystems, on both wild lands and working lands, to increase carbon sequestration, along with productivity.

As we reemerge from the pandemic, let us recommit to healing our fevered planet. Let us rebuild the carbon-rich soils that feed us. Let us manage forests to reduce fuel loads to natural, presettlement levels, while also enhancing the carbon-absorbing growth of larger trees and the biodiversity they support. Let us bring back the salt marshes that protect shorelines, build up carboniferous peat and provide nurseries for new sea life ready to repopulate recovering oceans.

Let us replant streets to shade ourselves from the hotter days ahead, soak up carbon dioxide and reconnect people to the beauty of the natural world. Let us fashion towns and cities that celebrate that connection, striving to emulate the integral functions and harmonies of nature and using sustainably grown wood and other materials that sequester carbon for the life of our buildings.

In time, as we monitor the vital signs of our planet with ever greater consciousness and care, we may then begin to see a literal re-greening of the earth, visible even from space.

We will have recolored the world with our presence, in concert with the rest of life, aligning human creativity with the ongoing creativity of evolution and with the lasting and changeable beauty of the earth.

As we reemerge from the pandemic, let us recommit to healing our fevered planet. Let us rebuild the carbon-rich soils that feed us.