The Science of Climate Change A Bah' Perspective

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The Science ofClimate Change A Bahá'í
Perspective

• Arthur Lyon Dahl Ph.D.
• International Environment Forum (IEF)?
• http//www.bcca.org/ief
• Bahá'í Conference on Social and Economic
  Development
• Orlando, Florida, 20 December 2008

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Why are we worried?

• If climate change goes unchecked, its effects
  will be catastrophic on the level of nuclear
  war.
• The security dimension will come increasingly to
  the forefront as countries begin to see falls in
  available resources and economic vitality,
  increased stress on their armed forces, greater
  instability in regions of strategic import,
  increases in ethnic rivalries, and a widening gap
  between rich and poor.
• International Institute for Strategic Studies,
  Strategic Survey 2007 (September 2007)?

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Greenhouse Effect
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Carbon Dioxide, a Greenhouse Gas

• We are interfering with the carbon cycle,
  releasing carbon from long-term storage by
  burning fossil fuels (oil, coal, natural gas) and
  adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere

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Greenhouse gases and climate change

• More heat in the atmosphere and oceans changes
  air and water circulation and climate
• Local effects will be highly variable, and are
  not easily predictable
• Various computer models are used to predict the
  effect of rising greenhouse gas levels on the
  climate
• The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
  confirms a significant human climate impact

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Past and Future CO2 Concentrations
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Changes in greenhouse gas concentrationsCO2M
ethaneNitrous oxides

• IPCC 2007

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Carbon dioxide and temperature
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We are all responsible for climate change

• Everyone benefiting from the burning of fossil
  fuels is responsible
• Everyone involved in land clearing or benefiting
  from land use changes is a contributor
• How much we are responsible depends on our
  country of residence, lifestyle and consumption
  patterns, with the rich most responsible
• The poor will be the greatest victims of climate
  change, while contributing the least to the
  problem
• This is an ethical dilemma

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NationalCarbonDioxideEmissionsPer Capita
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Country Shareof GlobalCO2 Emissions2004Highly
concentrated(UNDP HDR 2007-2008)?
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Energy-related CO2 Emissions(UNDP HDR 2007-2008)?
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Cumulative CO2 Emissionsby rich countries(UNDP
HDR 2007-2008)?
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GHG Emissions by Sector(UNDP HDR 2007-2008)?
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Climate Change will bestronger and sooner

• Global carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel
  have accelerated since 2000
• Rise in 1990s 0.7/yr 2.9 since 2000
• Three causes growth in world economy, rise of
  coal use in China, weakening of natural carbon
  sinks (forests, seas, soils)?
• Growth in atmospheric CO2 about 35 higher than
  expected a few years ago

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TemperatureTrends
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Temperature increase last 50 years
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Climate Change Science

• No science is perfect, and there are always
  different interpretations of the available data
• Powerful interests have tried to discredit
  climate change science despite the overwhelming
  consensus of climate scientists on the human
  impact on global warming
• The counter-arguments have been disproved one
  after the other
• Even the latest IPCC report (2007) represents a
  very cautious compromise position reflecting what
  is certain, not probable

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Signs of Climate Change

• Many species are changing their latitudinal and
  altitudinal distributions in response to rising
  temperatures
• Coral reefs have suffered bleaching and mortality
  from unusually high temperatures
• The number of category 5 cyclones (hurricanes)
  has increased in all oceans over the last 30
  years
• The last 12 years have seen 11 of the warmest
  years ever recorded

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What the models sayIPCC 2007
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Ocean thermohaline circulation
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Polar areas are changing fastest

• Half of the permafrost in the Arctic is expected
  to melt by 2050 and 90 before 2100, releasing
  methane
• 14 of the permanent ice in the Arctic Ocean
  melted in 2005 23 more in 2007(worst melting
  ever) almost as much in 2008 opening the
  North-West Passage permanent ice in the Arctic
  Ocean may be gone by 2015-30
• Greenland glaciers have doubled their rate of
  flow in the last few years, raising sea level 0.6
  mm per year
• Similar melting of the West Antarctic ice sheet
  could add another 4 mm per year

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Did 'Abdu'l-Bahá know about global warming?

• Should the fire of the love of God be kindled in
  Greenland, all of the ice of that country will be
  melted, and its cold weather become temperate...
• 'Abdu'l-Bahá (1916), Tablets of the Divine Plan,
  5, p. 28
• (He is also reported to have said that palm trees
  would grow in Chicago and Montreal.)?

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ArcticTemperatureScenario2090
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PredicteddecreaseinArcticOceanice cover
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Arctic Ocean permanent ice cover
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Glacier retreat - Argentina(BBC News)?
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Retreat of the Rhone Glacier, Valais, Switzerland
(BBC News)?
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ReductioninSnow2080-2100
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There is little time left to act

• Global temperatures have already risen 0.6C and
  will probably rise a further 3, or even up to
  4.5-5 by 2100
• Ocean temperatures have risen at least 3 km deep
• Glaciers and snow cover have decreased cold
  days, nights and frost have become rarer hot
  days, nights and heat-waves more frequent
• Sea level rise has doubled in 150 years to 2
  mm/year, and recent polar melting may add another
  4 mm/year
• Recent surge in CO2 levels from less uptake by
  plants
• We may soon be approaching a tipping point where
  runaway climate change would be catastrophic

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Agricultural Productivity 2080
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Predicted changes in precipitation

• December-February
  June-August
• Percent change 1900-1999 to 2000-2099
• IPCC 2007

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Biodiversity 2050
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Biodiversity Impacts
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ChangingBiomesinSouthAfrica
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Coral reefs protect tropical coasts and provide
fishbut global warming could bleach and kill them
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Climate change and coral reefs
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Coral reefs will grow more slowly Carbon
dioxide makes the water more acid

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Ocean Acidification to 2100
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The most vulnerable areas risking catastrophic
collapse this century

• Arctic Ocean and Greenland ice sheet
• Amazon rain forest
• Northern boreal forests
• El Nino affecting weather in North America,
  South-East Asia and Africa (3C rise)?
• Collapse of West African monsoon
• Erratic Indian summer monsoon

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Human Impacts of Climate Change

• Increased damage from extreme weather events
  floods, droughts, cyclones
• Less winter snowfall, melting glaciers, water
  shortages
• Changing conditions for agriculture and forestry,
  shifting fish stocks, disease vectors
• Sea level rise, flooding low-lying areas and
  islands
• Millions of environmental refugees (500m-1b)?
• High costs of mitigation and adaptation
• Greatest impact on the poor

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Spread of Malaria 2050
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Food Insecurity
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Sea Level Rise 1870-2006
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Projected sea level rise to 2100(IPCC 2007)?
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Effects of 1m Sea Level Rise
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Rising sea levels will create millions of refugees
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If you lived on a coral islandWhat would you do
if the sea level rose?

• Carrie Bow Cay, Belize, Research Station of the
  Smithsonian Institution

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Atoll Butaritari, Kiribati
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Tuvalu is already being flooded (BBC News)?
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Predicted Climate Refugees 2010(IAASTD 2008)?
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Economic impact of natural disasters linked to
global warming

• Record 112 billion in 1998
• Unprecedented 204 billion in 2005, reflecting
  the high number of disasters affecting built-up
  areas

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Effect on the economy

• The Stern Report estimated the annual cost of
  uncontrolled climate change at more than 660
  billion (5 to 20 of global GDP, as compared to
  1 for control measures for greenhouse gases).
• Climate change represents the greatest market
  failure in human history
• IPCC 4 says stabilizing greenhouse gases by 2030
  will slow global growth 0.12/yr or 3 total
  global GDP

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Global warming is driven by our addiction to
fossil fuels

• Industrial economy depends on cheap energy, 80
  from fossil fuels
• Transportation, communications, trade,
  agriculture, urbanization, consumer lifestyle all
  depend on abundant energy
• Energy needs 50 by 2030, half in China and
  India coal 73 CO2 emissions 57 (2/3 from
  US, China, India, Russia)?
• Adaptation will be expensive and the struggle for
  diminishing resources globally destabilizing

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The double economic challenge

• On current trends, ...humanity will need twice
  as much energy as it uses today within 35
  years.... Produce too little energy, say the
  economists, and there will be price hikes and a
  financial crash unlike any the world has ever
  known, with possible resource wars, depression
  and famine. Produce the wrong sort of energy, say
  the climate scientists, and we will have more
  droughts, floods, rising seas and worldwide
  economic disaster with runaway global warming.
• John Vidal in The Guardian Weekly, 9-15 February
  2007, Energy supplement, p. 3

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Present institutions have failed to address such
global challenges

• No politician will sacrifice short-term economic
  welfare, even while agreeing that sustainability
  is essential in the long term
• Deep social divisions within societies and
  between countries prevent united action in the
  common interest
• Climate change is just one symptom of the
  fundamental imbalances in our world
• Our present economic system is driving us in the
  wrong direction

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The values underlying the economic system are
threatened fundamentally

• - Economic thinking is challenged by the
  environmental crisis (including climate change)?
• - The belief that there is no limit to nature's
  capacity to fulfil any demand made on it is false
• - A culture which attaches absolute value to
  expansion, to acquisition, and to the
  satisfaction of people's wants must recognise
  that such goals are not, by themselves, realistic
  guides to policy
• (based on The Prosperity of Humankind, Bahá'í
  International Community, 1995)

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Climate change is driven by our consumer culture

• - Materialism's gospel of human betterment
  produced today's consumer culture pursuing
  ephemeral goals
• - For the small minority of people who can afford
  them, the benefits it offers are immediate, and
  the rationale unapologetic
• - The breakdown of traditional morality has led
  to the triumph of animal impulse, as instinctive
  and blind as appetite
• - Selfishness becomes a prized commercial
  resource falsehood reinvents itself as public
  information greed, lust, indolence, pride - even
  violence - acquire not merely broad acceptance
  but social and economic value
• - Yet material comforts and acquisitions have
  been drained of meaning (based on Baha'i
  International Community, One Common Faith, 2005)?

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Ways forward

• Harness all available sources of energy on the
  surface of the planet (UN estimated investment
  required 20 trillion over 2 decades)?
• Reduce environmental impact to sustainable limits
• Accelerate the transition to reduce the shock
• Create global governance mechanisms to manage
  this global challenge
• Share the cost, effort and benefits globally with
  equity and justice

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A Global Approachis Necessary

• Climate change cannot be separated from the
  challenges of economic globalization, energy and
  resource depletion, poverty reduction, social
  imbalances and security
• Each problem interacts with the others in complex
  ways
• Partial solutions will not solve the problems
  that threaten future sustainability

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Moral and ethical challenge

• Mitigation of climate change... asks profound
  moral and ethical questions of our generation. In
  the face of clear evidence that inaction will
  hurt millions of people and consign them to lives
  of poverty and vulnerability, can we justify
  inaction? No civilized community adhering to even
  the most rudimentary ethical standards would
  answer that question in the affirmative,
  especially one that lacked neither the technology
  nor the financial resources to act decisively.
• UNDP Human Development Report 2007/2008, p. 68

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Sustainability an ethical conceptAs trustees
or stewards of the planet's resources and
biodiversity, we must- ensure sustainability
and equity of resource use into distant future-
consider the environmental consequences of
development activities- temper our actions with
moderation and humility- understand the natural
world and its role in humanity's collective
development both material and spiritual(based on
Bahá'í International Community, Valuing
Spirituality in Development. 1998)?
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Sustainability is a fundamental
responsibilitySustainable environmental
management must come to be seen... as a
fundamental responsibility that must be
shouldered, a pre-requisite for spiritual
development as well as the individual's physical
survival.(based on Bahá'í International
Community, Valuing Spirituality in Development.
1998)?
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Moderation in Material Civilization

• The civilization, so often vaunted by the learned
  exponents of arts and sciences, will, if allowed
  to overleap the bounds of moderation, bring great
  evil upon men....
• Bahá'u'lláh (1817-1892)

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JUSTICE AND EQUITY

• It is unjust to sacrifice the well-being of most
  people -- and even of the planet itself -- to the
  advantages which technological breakthroughs can
  make available to privileged minorities
• (based on Baha'i International Community,
  Prosperity of Humankind)

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An ethical approach will be essential to convince
all of us to act

• Climate change may be the common threat that
  forces governments to work together in their
  collective interest