The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
The facts and future on climate change data
I spent my childhood in Fairfield, and I remember ice skating on ponds pretty much all winter. My kids have no such memories. Those days are gone.
Here’s what we’re up against. Climate change is serious to some and a hoax to others. One opinion is championed by right-side noise and the other by left-side noise. Let’s look at data that both sides agree is valid, and from both their perspectives.
First, here’s an individual’s view of climate change since 1958: slow, gentle, and what’s the big deal?
The 65-year span covered by the data is approximately the same as a person’s life. This data is all that a person has experienced.
Every responsible scientist involved with climate science will agree that this graph accurately, truthfully, and faithfully represents the deseasonalized mid-monthly average atmospheric CO2 levels since 1958 and that my forecast for the near future is at least reasonable.
This data was measured by scientists at NOAA-GML (Global Monitoring Laboratory) at Mauna Loa, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Those people don’t understand politics, but they’re really good at math. They got it right. The data is publicly available and anyone can copy it and use it, provided only that the source is attributed.
Let’s take a longer view. The data is the same data as above, except the first seven months of 2023 weren’t available. This is the Earth’s view of climate change.
We’ve accomplished — in one human lifetime — what nature has never done in 800,000 years.
Let me put this time span into perspective. The oldest Homo sapiens fossil is less than 300,000 years old; the entire existence of our species is less than half this time span.
One of the places I worked was NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. The thing I learned there is this: right answers matter. When the outcome is important, your opinions and beliefs are irrelevant. If you’re an astronaut strapped into a chair 35 stories up on top of a Saturn V loaded with 2,800 tons of rocket fuel that’s about to be lit on fire, how the engineers voted is probably not your main concern.
Remember the Challenger explosion? Politicians overrode and/or pressured engineers and launched in belowfreezing weather.
When it comes to science, you’ve got to get it right, or pay the consequences. If politics interferes with abating climate change, the consequences are going to be beyond forgiveness.
Now let’s discuss the details.
First, I’m not going to talk about temperatures because global temperature data before the late 19th century is unavailable. Without direct data, temperatures have to be inferred via temperature proxies, like tree rings, coral reefs, and so on. This gets into dueling assumptions and, on the web, spurious claims and name-calling. Speaking of the web, have you ever walked across a cow pasture? You’ve gotta be careful where you step. There’s good stuff on the web, but there’s also a lot of … well, bovine effluvia.
Second, CO2 is directly measured from glacial ice cores. The science is wellestablished, standard stuff. There’s no need for proxies or assumptions dependent on a proxy choice. Even deniers recognize the accuracy of Figure 2. They just manage to convince themselves that 800,000 years of natural history suddenly changed during our lifetime and the increase is due to natural causes.
Third, both sides agree that the following facts are indisputable: as CO2 increases, the Earth warms. As CO2 decreases, the Earth cools. CO2, regardless of its source, is a cause of warming. The warming Earth is an effect of increasing CO2. Burning carbon is a cause of at least some of the increasing atmospheric CO2. At least some atmospheric CO2 is an effect of burning carbon. Simple cause and effect leads directly from burning carbon to climate change.
Fourth, there are other greenhouse gases besides CO2, so this discussion is a lower limit on atmospheric warming.
What can we do? How much will solar panels on tiny Connecticut’s roof tops help when China and India, combined, will produce, and probably burn, five billion tons of coal this year? Solar panels are not nearly enough, nor has their manufacturing and recycling been addressed.
Electric cars? Well, their batteries are recharged by electricity. They need to be recharged more frequently, and more slowly, than gas tanks are filled. Electricity comes from burning oil or coal or natural gas. To the extent that generating plants around the world don’t scrub their CO2 effluents, electric cars are contributing to atmospheric CO2. (This may be why the oil industry is not interfering with their proliferation.) Electric cars and trucks may well be a big part of the right answer, but only a small influence until the grid is green.
Wind, solar, geothermal, tides … unavailable at scale and in time without massive and immediate global commitment.
I don’t know the best answer, but we really ought to consider that nuclear energy is safe, clean, and readily available. Maybe Big Oil could invest in it heavily and rapidly if it wants to own the future the way it owns the present.
The U.S. has largely punted on this issue, probably due to school-yard political squabbles. This is unconscionable. We used to be a world leader. Both political parties need to grow up, grow a backbone, and nominate intelligent, principled candidates. Like, now.
Whoever moves to safe, clean nuclear energy first may well own the future. Whoever insists on staying with oil … well, they’ll be the next chapter in the history books. Maybe the last chapter.
Now, I don’t really have a dog in this fight. I’m almost as old as Joe Biden and I won’t live to see the outcome 25 or 50 years from now. But I care very much about my children and their children.
Well, OK, I have puppies in this fight. But then, don’t we all?