Paddler News Feed

 

•	Letter from the Editor
•	Features

< Sept-Oct 2007
	Letter from the Editor
Think Mike Kord

That wasn’t what I wanted to hear, I admitted after finishing my conversation with Lara Whitely-Binder, an outreach specialist at the University of Washington’s Climate Impacts Group. She had just said, “We have to change. We have no choice.”

She was talking about the negative impact global warming will have on our world if we don’t significantly and immediately reduce the amount of greenhouse gases we discharge into the atmosphere. A lot of climatologists agree, including the International Panel on Climate Change, which released its fourth assessment report in February, painting a dire picture of the future.

So with that, I prepared to drive to the grocery store to get lunch. I’d already ridden my bike to work that morning (I apparently save about 50 pounds of carbon dioxide from the air each day I bike commute). That seemed a little hypocritical, though, so I walked to the nearby sandwich shop instead. Then I wanted to heat my sandwich in the microwave, but that would’ve released CO2, as well. I didn’t do that, either. I felt like I’d just left the doctor’s office upon being told my daily routine was leading to poor health.

It’s hard to believe simple acts like driving and using household appliances are making the earth dangerously hot. But after many hours of research, I’ve found the evidence too convincing to deny that greenhouse-gas emissions will be the probable cause of future temperature increases. The only remaining questions are to what extent, and what will we do about it.

That’s why I’m asking you to read our global-warming section, beginning on page 32. Disregarding climate change is like ignoring the symptoms of an illness. The subject is especially pertinent to paddlers, too, because hotter weather would lower river levels, especially the Colorado. And if you dislike the presence of dams now, you’ll loathe the very real prospect of more hydroelectric projects in a future where current drought conditions could become the norm.

I think it’s important, not to mention illuminating, to learn more about the science of global warming. Not just what the so-called alarmists are saying, but the doubters, too.

One talk-show host dismissed global warming because, he said, the IPCC’s report was inconclusive. I’ve read in multiple sources that the IPCC was about 90 percent certain.

A Canadian columnist wrote that solar output is the real cause of global warming. I’ve learned that the increase in the sun’s energy is also thought to be too low to warm the earth, and that the upper atmosphere is actually cooling, something that wouldn’t happen if solar radiation increased immensely.

Some doubters cite Newsweek’s 1975 article (“The Cooling World”), which noted that earth’s temperature seemed to be dropping, as a basis to denounce global warming. A 1976 National Geographic article (“What’s Happening to Our Climate?”), however, speculated that increased C02 concentrations would raise worldwide temperatures 0.6 degrees Celsius by 2000.

No matter your position, spirited debate is still better than stifling discourse altogether. In an intelligently written editorial stating that global warming ended in 1998, British geologist Bob Carter declared that skeptics are being intimidated into withdrawing from the discussion. Punctuating his point was the lambasting of NASA administrator Michael Griffin, who last May expressed doubt about the need to prevent global warming, then backpedaled under the weight of criticism.

There are sound arguments on both sides of the issue. So I suggest this: sift through all the presumption, tune out grandstanding politicians and celebrities, and listen to the scientists. Then think.