Open letter to Lane County, OR

I'm writing to seek support for two of the most important courses that I've ever taught.

I have designed them to help communities more deeply understand the true nature of the climate crisis that has begun, why it will get worse quickly, & why the information about this issue from most other sources - including IPCC - significantly underestimates the scale, speed & severity of the crisis.

These courses, along with two weekend workshops, will form the core of Euglena's Climate Adaptation Program (ECAP) for 2009, our new public education & training program designed to help participants understand: 1) the true nature of a climate crisis, & 2) the positive actions (including economic) that we can take NOW to both mitigate & prepare for adaptation to large-scale changes. Through ECAP, we are beginning collaborative efforts with educators, architects, builders, health care workers, energy specialists, policy makers & others.

These courses & the other components of ECAP are also designed to counter misinformation from climate change “deniers”. For example, fact: Earth is NOT cooling. 2008 was the 10th hottest year on record, only slightly cooler than any other year since 1998, the hottest year on record. Given accelerating atmospheric carbon gas levels, it is physically impossible for Earth to cool significantly now. Jagged temperature records with ups & downs? Sure. That's the nature of climate change on any scale: it's never smooth.

But the extreme weather – cold & snow storms – that continue to bash the Pacific Northwest is fully consistent what we expect: climate change will be wildly chaotic, bringing extremes of both wet & dry, heat & cold (at least for now). The long term forecast has been described as a wild ride: extended droughts punctuated by extreme storm events.

Why should you care about this issue? Think of it this way. If the building that you are in catches fire, you would not run away without alerting others – especially your friends & family. The same must apply now on a much larger scale because Earth is “catching fire”. From a geophysiological perspective, our planetary-scale life & climate system has a serious fever, & it will get worse. The consequences for humans will be equally serious.

This is no longer an academic or intellectual exercise. We must deeply understand the scale, speed & severity & plan accordingly for adaptation.

These are the two classes:

• Climate & Gaia: the systems sciences, especially Earth systems sciences or geophysiology (Gaia theory) necessary to understand climate.
  
  
• With Speed & Violence: the evidence from scientists “on the ground” about what is currently happening to Earth's ecosystems (especially forests), oceans, permafrost & atmosphere, & the astonishing (& very sobering) story of how rapid & extreme climate change has occurred in the past.

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Other groups in our region (& elsewhere) addressing these issues are using IPCC reports as a model for their educational & planning endeavors. Yet here is a main point supported by both courses: the assessment & predictions of the IPCC significantly underestimate the scale, speed & severity of the crisis. Among other reasons, both authors of the texts we're using for the courses - Dr. James Lovelock & Fred Pearce - point out that IPCC reports are based on models that do not account for the high probability of abrupt jumps & wild, chaotic swings in the climate system, the nature of which our species has never experienced, extremes that haven't existed since the PETM 55 million years ago.

This is a very serious omission. Because of it, year after year, IPCC predictions consistently fall short of the reality of rates of change. The more accurate version of the issue – presented by Lovelock & Pearce - strongly calls into question whether current mitigation efforts – such as cap & trade systems, “sustainable” development, & electric cars - will contribute significantly to abating catastrophe, or whether they are but window dressings distracting us from more realistic projects, including active preparation for adaptation to inevitable large-scale changes.

Unless we understand the nature Earth's climate system, how rapidly it has changed in the past & is changing now, then we can neither adequately prepare or attempt to mitigate.

Let me put it this way: if you don't understand a problem, then how can you solve it?