Latest IPCC report – Is it time for plan B?
Ian Brockwell
March 11, 2007
A recent article Climate report: Droughts, starvation, disease includes portions of a draft of an international scientific report obtained by The Associated Press.
The draft document by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) is the second report in a series of four to be issued this year, and will be released in early April.
This latest report, quoted as being the “emotional heart” of climate change research, will concentrate on how global warming alters the planet and life here.
Some of the likely effects, according to the report, include:
A shortage of water for “Hundreds of millions of Africans and tens of millions of Latin Americans” in less than 20 years.
Death rates for the world’s poor, as a result of global warming related illnesses, will rise by 2030
Europe’s small glaciers will disappear with many of the continent’s large glaciers shrinking dramatically by 2050”
200-600 million people could be hungry by 2080
About 100 million people each year could be flooded by 2080 by rising seas”
A number of the scientists involved in the report seem to accept that the results they have forecast depend on the speed of the warming. This could mean that the effects will take longer to appear, or happen more quickly. Either way, it appears that we must prepare for some serious times ahead.
Perhaps the outcome of global warming, rather than the cause, should become a higher priority now? If sea levels should increase rapidly (in the next 20 years, for example), this doesn’t give us a great deal of time to start moving some of the population onto higher ground.
Unfortunately, it will not be possible to relocate every person on the planet in this way, and it may become necessary for someone to decide who gets that chance. To make this task a little easier, we might have to consider introducing some birth control policy, and begin preparing more suitable living areas as soon as possible.
Our planet has experienced much higher temperatures and sea levels before, the worst, according to historical records, happened about 100 million years ago. But this was probably caused by an Asteroid impact, unlike the climatic changes seen 250 million years ago.
It is my personal belief that our solar system, which passes around the galaxy every 250 million years, enters an area that causes this effect (which is being seen on all the planets in our system). This period in Earth’s history has been called the “great dying”. According to US researchers, temperatures were up to 30 degrees Celsius higher than today. Some 95% of lifeforms in the oceans became extinct, along with almost 75% of land species. Of course, humans were not around then, so we don’t know how we would cope with such conditions.
The book “Global Warming – The Final Solution” attempts to reveal how life will be over the next 20 years, as sea levels and temperatures rise, and the choices we must make. A world where special zones are created for a selected few, lucky enough to be given a chance of life in the future.
We all hope that any climatic changes will have a minimal affect on life, but it’s nice to have a backup plan, don’t you think?
The draft document by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) is the second report in a series of four to be issued this year, and will be released in early April.
This latest report, quoted as being the “emotional heart” of climate change research, will concentrate on how global warming alters the planet and life here.
Some of the likely effects, according to the report, include:
A shortage of water for “Hundreds of millions of Africans and tens of millions of Latin Americans” in less than 20 years.
Death rates for the world’s poor, as a result of global warming related illnesses, will rise by 2030
Europe’s small glaciers will disappear with many of the continent’s large glaciers shrinking dramatically by 2050”
200-600 million people could be hungry by 2080
About 100 million people each year could be flooded by 2080 by rising seas”
A number of the scientists involved in the report seem to accept that the results they have forecast depend on the speed of the warming. This could mean that the effects will take longer to appear, or happen more quickly. Either way, it appears that we must prepare for some serious times ahead.
Perhaps the outcome of global warming, rather than the cause, should become a higher priority now? If sea levels should increase rapidly (in the next 20 years, for example), this doesn’t give us a great deal of time to start moving some of the population onto higher ground.
Unfortunately, it will not be possible to relocate every person on the planet in this way, and it may become necessary for someone to decide who gets that chance. To make this task a little easier, we might have to consider introducing some birth control policy, and begin preparing more suitable living areas as soon as possible.
Our planet has experienced much higher temperatures and sea levels before, the worst, according to historical records, happened about 100 million years ago. But this was probably caused by an Asteroid impact, unlike the climatic changes seen 250 million years ago.
It is my personal belief that our solar system, which passes around the galaxy every 250 million years, enters an area that causes this effect (which is being seen on all the planets in our system). This period in Earth’s history has been called the “great dying”. According to US researchers, temperatures were up to 30 degrees Celsius higher than today. Some 95% of lifeforms in the oceans became extinct, along with almost 75% of land species. Of course, humans were not around then, so we don’t know how we would cope with such conditions.
The book “Global Warming – The Final Solution” attempts to reveal how life will be over the next 20 years, as sea levels and temperatures rise, and the choices we must make. A world where special zones are created for a selected few, lucky enough to be given a chance of life in the future.
We all hope that any climatic changes will have a minimal affect on life, but it’s nice to have a backup plan, don’t you think?
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