I've been reading a lot lately. The latest book is "The Weather Makers" by Tim Flannery. I'd heard a lot about this book so I finally picked it up.
It's a really good read and Flannery's writing style is very informative and the topics are organized well. The book is divided into five parts: Gaia's Tools, One in Ten Thousand, The Science of Prediction, People in Greenhouses, and The Solution.
The first part deals with the Gaia idea brought forward by James Lovelock that our planet is one large organism that we and all other life on the planet are part of it. It's an interesting idea that has some merit. Once you start looking into the mechanisms of nature, it's easy to see how everything is interconnected and how plants, animals, and people both affect and are affected by the weather.
He goes on to an explanation of the structure of Earth's atmosphere and how greenhouse gases affect the overall temperature of the planet. A key chapter in this first part of the book deals with the carbon balance on the planet and how plants, soils, and the oceans store carbon. He also explains how coal, oil, and natural gas are a form of long term carbon storage. The rapid rate at which we are consuming these fossil fuels means that we are transferring carbon from these carbon storage media to the atmosphere through combustion and the release of CO2.
As I understand it, the major problem is not that this transfer is taking place, but rather the rate at which carbon is being transferred leads to a relatively rapid increase in the Earth's temperature resulting in a rapid change of climate systems. This rapid change means that biological systems (arboreal forests, rain forests, savannas, etc.) do not have enough time to adapt to the changing climate. Consequently, a significant portion of animal and plant life on the planet most likely face extinction. Another problem with the rapid rise of Earth's temperature is that it brings instability into the climate systems that can lead to the disruption of the Gulf Stream, changes in rainfall patterns, more extreme weather in some parts of the globe, and milder weather in others. It's too complex a topic to describe here, and in any case, Flannery does a better job at explaining it than I ever will.
The book also takes time to explain the rigorous peer review system for publishing climate change data. There are several review stages done by hundreds of scientists so any published scientific data about climate change should be taken seriously because it has the consensus of a large group of scientists. Flannery also takes the time to explain predictive methods and how they are used to get a good idea of possible outcomes of a 2 to 5 degree Celsius increase in the average temperature of the earth. The picture doesn't look good for the majority of the world, but places like Canada and Russia will likely benefit from the warmer climate in terms of increased agricultural production, milder weather, and an expansion of more hospitable land.
Other sections of the book deal with the naysayers of climate change and how propaganda is used to cast doubt on the scientific studies and findings. This issue is not new, it's a dirty method that's been sued before and will likely be used again wherever massive corporate profits and public interests diverge.
Flannery does offer up solutions to reducing CO2 emissions but the information is already well known and he doesn't offer up anything new. He mentions hybrid cars and the french compressed air car that I wrote about in an earlier post. Solar, wind, and wave power all also have a role to play in replacing fossil fuels as renewable energy sources.
Apart from the science of climate change and the politics surrounding it, there are some nuggets of information about the wonders of nature including this frog that changes it's stomach from a digestive organ to a brooding chamber for it's young.
In terms of the climate change topic, it seems to me that the forces of government and corporations will be to slow to react to the growing danger of climate change unless the public exerts pressure on both parties. There is a lot of debate still going on even in the face of volumes of scientific information dating back at least 3 decades. The poeple muddying the issue will be successful in delaying any seriuos reduction of CO2 emissions unless the worldwide public gets more informed as to the nature of the problem and what it takes to solve it. Getting more aware and informed can begin with reading this book.
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