J.F.D.I.

Runaway Climate Change could lead to a planet that is simply uninhabitable.

The purpose of the previous articles has been to explain why and how we need to change our economic model from one of dig up, ship out, ship back and throw away to one that is focussed on renewable and recycled resources. In the last couple of articles, I have then tried to show you when and how it could be done. Throughout those articles I have showed how this can be done through evolution rather than revolution. However, there is increasing demand from the scientific community that we need something more dramatic than an evolutionary change due to the dangers of Runaway Climate Change. Runaway Climate Change will happen when global temperatures rise sufficiently to trigger positive feedback mechanisms causing a rapid increase in CO2 concentrations and further heating of the planet. So, in this last article I would like to explain why we may need a touch of revolution if we want to stop the worst of climate change. I want to start with this graph. It was my Aha moment.
700 CO 2 in 2100 (with business as usual)

The last 160,000 years (from ice cores) and the next 100 years

600 Double pre -industrial CO

500 CO concentration ( ) ppmv 2

Lowest possible CO stabilisation level by 2100

400 CO 2 now 300 10 Temperature difference from now C 0 200

10 160 120 80 Time (thousands of years)

J TH 1 -07-200 7 1 11 COP6 bis/SB STA

100 40 Now

I saw this in 2004. It comes from work done in 2001 showing the correlation between carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and global temperatures over the last 160,000 years and a projection of carbon dioxide emissions for this Century. To me, it rang a big warning bell for, superficially, it indicated we were heading for a planet that would, to all intent and purposes, be uninhabitable. It was this that triggered my own research into global warming and climate change and, in that research, I discovered three key things: 1. The science of greenhouse gases increasing global temperatures, is almost 200 years old and is as rock solid as any science can be. 2. The speed of that increase in temperature is more problematic due to other factors and feedback mechanisms.

3. The science of the affect of a warmer planet on our climate and on sea levels is new and still being developed. The Greenhouse Effect When I first started researching this, I thought that this was a seventies thing, along with wide lapels, afro hairstyles and flared trousers. I was wrong by about 150 years. A famous French Mathematician, Joseph Fourier, first calculated that the energy coming from the sun was not sufficient by itself to warm our planet and that there must be something in the atmosphere that trapped the suns heat. He did this in the 1820s. In the 1870s the Irish physicist, John Tyndall, worked out that it was only a small number of trace gases that trapped the suns heat. Oxygen and Nitrogen, which make up 99% of our atmosphere had no effect. It was only Water Vapour, Carbon Dioxide and Ozone that stop radiant heat from escaping back into space. (Methane, Nitrous Oxide (laughing gas) and those same CFCs that destroy our Ozone layer are the other main Greenhouse gases.) We observe the Greenhouse Effect all time. The Earth and the Moon are the same distance from our heat source, the sun. Yet the moon is some 30 degrees cooler than the earth. Although there is a small amount of volcanic influence on the earth, the rest is due to our atmosphere. Cloudy skies at night give us warmer temperatures. Water vapour in the clouds stops heat from escaping and slows the cooling of the land below. That is the greenhouse effect in effect. In the 1890s the Swedish scientist, Arrhenius did the first calculation of the impact higher Greenhouse gases would have on the planets temperature. He calculated that a doubling of those gases would increase global temperatures by about 5 degrees Celsius. A 5 degree increase may not sound like much, but if the planet were 5 degrees cooler, we would be in the last ice age. Over the following century other scientists refined those calculations finally leading up to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that has now given us a range of temperature increases from 1.5 up to 6.5 degrees dependant upon various factors. The speed of temperature increase The level of Greenhouse Gases in our atmosphere is the principle driver of long term temperature changes (the other is the Earths orientation to the Sun, but that doesnt change very often!) but there are a few short term drivers of temperature change: 1. The activity of the Sun, fairly obviously, affects the amount of heat that reaches our planet. 2. Ocean currents can move the heat deep into the Ocean or bring it to the surface, affecting the temperature in the atmosphere. 3. Climatic changes in wind and pressure can move the heat around the planet and up and down the different layers of the atmosphere, affecting temperature readings.. Although the activity of the Sun can be observed and accounted for in global temperature calculations the complexity of ocean currents and climatic changes makes it very difficult to assess their short term effects. These areas will have little effect on temperature changes over the long term but they do cause short term fluctuations. As well as these other factors we also have feedback mechanisms. Some positive. Some negative. Sadly there are far more positive ones than negative ones. Positive feedback mechanisms include: 1. Reduced snow and ice cover as the planet warms means that more heat is absorbed by the land.

2. Over half of all CO2 emissions are absorbed by the oceans. As the oceans warm they are able to absorb less and less CO2 leaving more in the atmosphere. 3. As frozen vegetation thaws, it releases carbon dioxide and methane from the rotting vegetation that has been trapped there since before the last ice age. 4. As the oceans warm there will be greater evaporation increasing the most prevalent greenhouse gas, water vapour, in the atmosphere. The greater evaporation of water also gives us the only substantial negative feedback and that is cloud formation. Increased cloud cover will reduce the amount of heat reaching the ground. Those feedback mechanisms have yet to have any major impact. Without them this is how temperatures have moved over the last century and a half.

This shows a steady increase in temperature over the last century or so. Although there is no denying the long term trend, no one fully understands the short term fluctuations. Impact on our climate and on sea levels Our climate is poorly understood. Forecasting the weather for next week is hard enough. Forecasting our climate for the next decade is even more problematic. Having said that though, a bit of commonsense identifies that: 1. A warmer planet will cause greater evaporation of water which will cause droughts to start sooner and last longer. 2. That same evaporation will put more water into the air which means, when it does rain, more will come down leading to greater flooding. 3. Increased atmospheric temperatures and increased moisture will increase the energy in the atmosphere leading to more powerful storms. As for rising sea levels, again commonsense shows that:

1. Water expands as it warms, therefore sea levels will rise as the oceans warm. 2. Warmer temperatures will cause ice to melt. Land based ice that melts will raise sea levels. Thermal expansion will increase sea levels by up to half a meter. Melting of land based ice will add to this. Luckily it will take many centuries and much higher temperatures to fully melt the biggest depositaries of land based ice which are in Greenland and the Antarctic. If the Greenland ice sheet fully melts, it will raise sea levels by some 7 meters. If the Antarctic Ice Sheet melts it will raise sea levels by some 60 meters. Enough to put every city in Australia underwater - except Canberra! Droughts, heat waves, bushfires, floods, storms and inundation from the sea will be the result of acontinually warming planet. But how would our planet become uninhabitable? This is where Runaway Climate Change comes in. This is the point where temperatures rise such to trigger the positive feedbacks mentioned earlier. No one knows precisely what that temperature increase would be, but current estimates are between 2 and 4 degrees above 19th Century temperatures. If that does happen then, for example, the thawing of frozen vegetation would release carbon dioxide and methane. (Methane is a far more powerful greenhouse gas than CO2.) The increase in Greenhouse Gases would raise temperatures that would thaw yet more frozen vegetation, which would release more Methane etc, etc. Once we reach that Tipping Point there is little we could do to slow down or reverse those temperature increases. Even if we stopped burning fossil fuels overnight, the cycle would still continue as the amount of Greenhouse gases locked up in the frozen tundra of Canada, Europe and Russia is enough to increase CO2 levels ten fold or more. We have spent two centuries discovering the Greenhouse Effect. We have spent five decades knowing of the dangers. We have spent one decade arguing over what to do about it. For the sake of our kids and grand kids and for the sake of business certainty and the future competitiveness of Australia in the coming Green Capitalist world we need to act now. So the message I ask everyone in business to send to our politicians is

J.F.D.I
(Just Focus and Do It, or Just Fucking Do It dependant upon the sensitivities of your audience!)