History of the future
The core of our problem today is the continuation of increasing heat in our atmosphere.
A current article in the Guardian entitled “Tenth consecutive monthly heat record alarms and confounds scientists.” Climate experts feel if this trend continues come August, the world will be in uncharted territory.
We are in a warming phase that has shattered all previous records. The core of the problem – fossil fuel emissions – is well known and largely uncontested in the scientific community. Thousands of studies over the decades show that humans are altering the climate by burning gas, oil, coal and trees.
Opposition to this view does not come from science but from the fossil fuel industry, in particular 57 companies linked to 80% of the emissions. Scientists doing research in Antarctica on March 18, 2022 recorded the largest jump in temperature ever measured in a single day of 101.3 degrees above its seasonal average: a world record. The dark waters that used to lie below the ice are now becoming ice free and no longer radiate the solar heat received back to space.
A vicious circle of warming oceans and melting seas is disrupting the weather and climate the world over. We see it every day with the fires, droughts, floods and storms.
Accu-Weather has just released their Atlantic Hurricane season forecast showing a predicted increase in storms from the average 14 to 20-25. Looks like a busy hurricane season.
Along with the weather we have problems with air pollution and cancer caused by cancer -ausing gasses and other toxic air from chemical operations.
An article in the Washington Post on April 9th entitled “EPA limits toxic air pollution from chemical plants.” Again it’s been decades in the making, however the aim is to prevent cancer in nearby low income and minority communities. EPA says it will benefit an 85-mile stretch in Louisiana between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, known as “Cancer Alley.”
There are many other areas that are plagued with high cancer death rates. The industry says it will make the manufacture of its products more difficult and, like the Petroleum industry, will challenge the ruling in court. Air pollution kills over 7 million humans each year according to the World Health Organization.
We know we have problems and we know that fixing them will require new ways to think about solutions to climate and cancer causing products.
The Petroleum industry has known for decades the damage it was doing to our planet. It’s a difficult situation with jobs at stake and profits at risk but perhaps it’s time to gather in the larger picture and bring into play what about the future.
Last week Public Television had an excellent program, “The history of the future,” and that we humans need to factor into our decisions not just the jobs and profits of today but what we owe our children, grandchildren and the future of humanity.
Mother Earth gave us a home in much better condition than we are leaving it. In the past it took millions of years to bring about the changes that we humans have been able to do in just 250 years of our use of fossil fuels.
Of course lots of good came to the human species as a result of our use of these fuels and chemicals but perhaps with the knowledge of today we need to remember those who are entitled to a future and those who will die this year, a gift of a habitable planet as precious as life itself.