Climate change is an emergency

Stop waiting for someone else to fix this problem

Alan Williams, Times Staff
March 11, 2019

The Earth is warming at a faster pace than scientists previously estimated because of human reliance on unsustainable energy such as
fossil fuels. This is not the United States’ problem; it’s the entire world’s problem.

When fossil fuels are burned greenhouse gases are emitted into the atmosphere causing a blanket effect across the entire globe. This blanket effect traps heat and prevents it from escaping the atmosphere; as a result of the entire world gets hotter.

Scientists say that global warming is responsible for: the collapse of ecosystems, rising ocean temperatures, increasing ocean acidity, sea levels rising, deadlier wildfires, more catastrophic storms, and lengthier more severe droughts. Scientists also agree that many unintended consequences are occurring, as a result of these changes.

Hundreds of experts from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have given an overly optimistic estimate that, if carbon emissions are not curbed drastically by the year 2030 the effects of climate change will become irreversible. If seven of ten Americans believe the science, that man-made climate change is real, why does it seem as if there is no urgency to address this issue?

One explanation to this question is that reality is often disregarded by those who have power to enact a Green New Deal. Enacting such a deal seems impossible considering the fact that President Trump has once again failed to acknowledge the severity of climate change by confusing climate with weather. Weather is the condition of the atmosphere over any given moment in time, while climate is how the atmosphere behaves over a designated longer period of time.

In a recent tweet the president said, “In the beautiful Midwest, windchill temperatures are reaching minus 60 degrees, the coldest ever re- corded. In coming days, expected to get even colder. People can’t last outside even for minutes. What the hell is going on with Global Warming? Please come back fast, we need you!”

When Mar a Lago, the president’s getaway, becomes submerged under water maybe then the president will take climate change seriously. In the meantime, doing nothing is much easier than taking action against those who disregard the legitimacy of climate change.