America Will Eventually Get it Right

It will just be too late.

In the wake of the American election last week, you saw the typical gnashing of teeth, hair-pulling, and triumphalism on one side and crushing despair on the other. It was the exact opposite of four years ago, and the safest money is to bet it will be the exact opposite in four years. But none of that matters. It is already too late.

The more sanguine pundits have talked about the back and forth swings of the American electorate, and that this is all just part of the political dance.

But we have already waited too long to do what is necessary, and we are very close to locking in, no dancing anymore – for anyone.

Wake up it’s much too late.

Winston Churchill is to have famously said; “Americans can always be trusted to do the right thing, once all other possibilities have been exhausted.”

But Winston was talking about a war, where America could join late and still make a difference. America did join, the Allies won and Europe was rebuilt. Better late than never right?

Right for then. But for now, America has already left it too late and now has comically signaled that we will be waiting at least four more years for any real action on climate and overshoot … if even then … if even at all.

This is from a misunderstanding of the problem by those in power (somewhat likely) or a knowing but ignoring of the problem (more likely because you know … money and power).

People who make decisions that drive our lives seem to think it is not that big of a deal, America can always decide to do something about climate and overshoot if we really want to (but we don’t yet), we can just throw money and bodies and the problem and it’ll work out … right?

Tipping points and feedback loops

The problem with letting global warming get up to 2 degrees C or more is that we may reach some bad tipping points before that. Tipping points refer to a point at which one of Earth’s systems passes a threshold that can’t be reversed on a human timescale. These tipping points can then lead to feedback loops where a change in a climate system feeds back on itself and amplifies the damage done. Let’s take a ride on some of the terrifying tipping points that await us.

Water cycle feedback loop

For example, a heating planet leads to more water vapor in the atmosphere, which captures heat, which warms the planet, which causes more evaporation, which leads to more water vapor in the atmosphere, and so on. This leads to more and more intense storms due to climate change.

Another feedback loop is the melting of Artic Sea ice. Arctic ice, which is white, reflects sunlight back into space, thus avoiding warming. A warming planet is melting Arctic Sea ice, revealing a dark ocean underneath, which absorbs heat, thus warming the ocean, causing more melting, and so on.

Shutdown of the AMOC

This ocean warming can lead to a tipping point that can eventually shut down the system of currents in the Atlantic Ocean that brings warm water up to Europe. This Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) brings warm water up from the Gulf of Mexico. The cooler water from the North Atlantic and Arctic is denser than warm water, and thus sinks, which helps drive the current. As the warm waters from the Gulf of Mexico cool, they sink, releasing heat into the atmosphere, much to the delight of Europeans that would otherwise enjoy much cooler temperatures. The Atlantic currents are part of a bigger system that acts as a conveyor belt of water that circles the world.  As freshwater melts from the Artic and Greenland’s glaciers, along with increased freshwater from rain, it makes the water lighter (salt water is heavier) and less likely to sink. At some point, this could shut the AMOC down. The recent IPCC special report on 1.5C of warming concluded that it was unlikely that the AMOC would shut down anytime soon, but it has already weakened and could eventually shut down if temperature rises continue unabated. However, more recent reports warn that the AMOC could shut down much sooner, sometime between 2025 and 2095.

A shutdown of the AMOC could cool North America and Europe by about 9 degrees Fahrenheit (5 degrees C) within a decade. This would be a respite from climate change for Europe and North America but would also be a relatively permanent change to our climate, for which our society is not prepared. So, let’s not root for an AMOC shutdown as a fix for climate change. A drop by a couple degrees C would wreak havoc with North American and European agriculture, and society. Because such a scenario makes places colder, it would drive up expenses such as increased energy use as the continent adapted to a new mini-ice-age. If you are wondering, it is estimated that it would take at least 100 years, but likely much longer for the AMOC to recover.

Collapse of West Antarctic Ice Sheet

A particularly scary tipping point is the melting of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (The WAIS). The WAIS holds enough water to raise global sea levels by about 3.3 meters (10.8 feet). This ice sheet is particularly vulnerable to ocean warming because it sits in the ocean, as the land it sits on is primarily below sea level. Recent research estimates that the tipping point for irreversible loss of the WAIS is between 1.5C and 2C of global warming above industrial levels. We are quickly approaching those numbers. All of Antarctica holds enough ice to raise sea levels up to 60 meters (just under 200 feet). That’s where you get future world maps where Florida and most of the East Coast and Gulf Coast of America are gone.

Amazon Rainforest

A dieback of the Amazon Rainforest may reach a tipping point soon, where the jungle cannot grow back and becomes Savanah more than a jungle. Currently, the Amazon is one big positive feedback loop. Rain in the Amazon returns to the atmosphere through evaporation, trees also return water to the atmosphere through their leaves (transpiration). This process results in a moist atmosphere and the rising upward motion of air which ultimately brings more rain.

Making the forest smaller, which we have been doing through logging and cutting away the forest to make farmland, slows down this pattern. At some point, the Amazon will become too dry to come back as a jungle on any kind of human timescale, instead turning into Savannah which would mean less evaporation and transpiration in the atmosphere, which leads to a drying of the environment, which leads to a loss of jungle, and so on. Not only does the Amazon bring rain to South America, but it is also responsible for a great deal of the oxygen we breathe. Losing that would be devastating.

Loss of ocean phytoplankton.

A similar problem plagues the ocean. Phytoplankton, the tiny organisms that are at the center of the ocean food web, decreased about 40 percent from 1950 to 2010 according to a 2010 report out of Canada’s Dalhousie University. Not only does this bode ill for humanity's love of seafood, but also for humanity's love of breathing, as phytoplankton are thought to produce about half of the oxygen we breathe. If the phytoplankton go, that may be game over man. As phytoplankton dies off there is less ocean capacity to absorb carbon because they consume CO2. This warms the ocean, killing more phytoplankton, and so on.

Thawing of Permafrost

Another unpleasant tipping point to consider is all the methane frozen in the land in the northern hemisphere, in the Arctic, Scandinavia, and Siberia, as well as areas of Patagonia, Antarctica, and New Zealand in the southern hemisphere. This permafrost has stayed frozen for so long that it is thought to be permanent – hence the name “permafrost”. As the climate warms, some of this permafrost is thawing. That is all kinds of not good.

The thawing of permafrost exposes carbon in the soil that microbes will then start to consume, which will release CO2 and methane. This will slowly warm the atmosphere, which will thaw the permafrost further and, well, you know the drill. The 2019 NOAA Arctic report estimates that this process is already underway and will only accelerate with more warming. Great.

There are other tipping points and feedback loops out there to explore, such as the West African monsoon shift, coral reef die-off, Indian monsoon shift, and boreal forest shift, but you get the picture.  These huge natural systems are susceptible to collapse, which would make climate change worse based on feedback loops. Waiting around and hoping that we hold things to 2 degrees C or less isn’t a safe bet to make. But our leaders seem pretty confident that “fuck around and find out” is the best course of action.

For four more years it is at least.