Climate Extremes: Anxiety or Opportunity?

Colorado National Guardsmen respond to floods in Boulder County, Colorado, United States. 12 September 2013. Image: United States Department of Defense

"Impacts from recent climate-related extremes, such as heat waves, droughts, floods, cyclones, and wildfires, reveal significant vulnerability and exposure of some ecosystems and many human systems to current climate variability (very high confidence). Impacts of such climate-related extremes include alteration of ecosystems, disruption of food production and water supply, damage to infrastructure and settlements, morbidity and mortality, and consequences for mental health and human well-being. For countries at all levels of development, these impacts are consistent with a significant lack of preparedness for current climate variability in some sectors."

Unfortunately, though clear cut and definitive, statements like this trigger anxiety, guilt, denial, or sadness. Fortunately, for some, they trigger opportunity - an opportunity to make a difference. Even small differences added together make things happen. 

Source: IPCC WGII AR5 Summary for Policymakers 

3 Takes on the changing climate

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Last month’s “weather event” should have taught us that. Whether in 50 or 100 or 200 years, there’s a good chance that New York City will sink beneath the sea. But if there are no patterns, it means that nothing is inevitable either. History offers less dire scenarios: the city could move to another island, the way Torcello was moved to Venice, stone by stone, after the lagoon turned into a swamp and its citizens succumbed to a plague of malaria. The city managed to survive, if not where it had begun. Perhaps the day will come when skyscrapers rise out of downtown Scarsdale.

Is This the End?

The New York Times