350 and global warming

If human culture survives the next century in anything like its present configuration it will be because the number 350 became the watchword and battle cry of our species. 350 is the number that leading scientists say is the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide—measured in “Parts Per Million” in our atmosphere—if we are to avoid catastrophic global warming.

For most of human history the number ranged around 275 ppm. Today, thanks to human combustion of fossil fuels, the number is 385 ppm. If we don’t work that back down to 350 by making sharp reductions in fossil fuel use, the Arctic and Greenland ice sheets will melt, together with much of the sea ice in Antarctica. Sea level will rise by approximately 7 meters by the end of this century and a cataclysm almost beyond imagining will face our heirs including children already born. For a sobering glimpse of what sea level rise would mean for your favorite cities click here.

In the latest issue of Mother Jones magazine, environmentalist Bill McKibben argues that we need to impose taxes immediately which will raise gas prices above $10 per gallon. (There are ways to offset this cost through taxpayer rebates, but it will be messy.) He also suggests that if the next round of global warming talks in Copenhagen (scheduled thirteen months from now) should meet the same fate as the Kyoto accords, we are doomed. Time is running out.

George W. Bush has made our plight incalculably more perilous through his stalling, denial and intentional twisting of science to his political and fiscal ends. In the same way that he is now responsible for more abortions than any other world leader, ever (due to his stonewalling of family planning efforts), Bush will be remembered as the president who either abetted the biggest threat to modern civilization or, should we fail, ended it.

Learn more at 350.org

~ by bothwellsblog on November 29, 2008.