There is little doubt in my mind that crucial issues surrounding ‘climate change’ continue to surface. Just look at a few of headlines over the past year from several news outlets:
- Smoke from wildfires wiped out the United State’s pandemic-related clean air gains in 2020 (Washington Post, March 17)
- Climate change is making big problems bigger (New York Times, May 13)
- How debt and climate change pose a ‘systemic risk to the global economy’ (UK Time News, April 7)
- A 20-foot sea wall? Miami faces the hard choices of climate change (New York Times, June 2)
- Carbon dioxide spikes to critical new record, halfway to doubling pre-industrial levels (Washington Post, April 6)
- Swift action to cut methane emissions could slow Earth’s warming by 30 percent, study finds (Washington Post, April 27)
- Countries must ramp up climate pledges by 80 percent to hit key Paris target, study finds (Washington Post, February 9)
- Climate change could cut world economy by $23 Trn in 2050: Swiss Re warns (New York Times, April 22)
- Earth is now losing 1.2 trillion tons of ice each year. And it’s going to get worse. (Washington Post, January 26)
- Unprepared and under-insured Canada warned about escalating risk of mega-hurricanes (Bloomberg News, May 21)
These are just a sampling of the dozens of articles that I came across so far this year. As the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reiterates whenever it can, climate change is already happening around the United States. In many cases, that change is speeding up. Canada is no exception. The world will see more extreme weather events and associated disasters, including wildfires, droughts, heat waves, rising sea levels, flooding, lost of permafrost in northern hemisphere, increased insect infestations, property destruction, etc., etc. Scientists say the world needs to prevent average global temperatures from rising more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius) above pre-industrial levels to avoid irreversible damage to the planet. As in the case of dealing with the pandemic, we have no choice but to rely on the science when it comes to ascertaining the projected impact of climate change should we continue on our current course of action. The evidence is irrefutable!
As with the pandemic, climate change is a global issue and must be tackled through the cooperation and commitment of all countries, including the U.S. and Canada. Otherwise, we will continue to see more and more articles and discussions like those above with respect to the various impacts resulting from the failure to immediately and adequately deal with climate change. As with the pandemic, there is also a human dimension behind all the statistics.
In the past year, I also blogged about ‘climate change’, as noted in the following blogs:
All of a Sudden, Climate Change is Back in the News | FROLITICKS (wordpress.com)
FROLITICKS 