The National Climate Assessment and Development Advisory Committee (NCADAC) released a draft report on the current state of climate change and its growing impacts on the United States. It’s not good news. In fact, perhaps it’s the worst news ever, even though it doesn’t basically say anything different than previous federal reports going back to the George W. Bush administration. It’s such bad news because so little has been done to mitigate the coming storm.
- Some of the highlights:
– Expect more bizarre and extreme weather events: more superstorms, more heat waves, more floods in some areas, longer drought in others.
– The ocean continues to acidify (although there is a glimmer of hope for coral, reports Mother Jones). Sea levels continue to rise precipitously spurred on by and spurring on glacial ice melt.
– The air and water we humans depend on will become more polluted.
– Climate changes will negatively effect infrastructure across the country.
On the other hand:
– Some changes might brings benefits, for example, a longer growing season in some areas.
– Knowing and preparing for inevitable changes now will mitigate the harms and reduce the misery and costs they bring.
One thing this report states, as have all the federal reports, as well as countless international reports, including from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and even the World Bank‘s recent “Turn Down the Heat” report, is that there is NO DOUBT that global warming is happening, and there is NO DOUBT that it is human-induced, a result of our economic dependence on carbon dioxide releasing fossil fuels. “Skeptics” are dead weight keeping the world from solving serious problems.