Land and Sea Change for Earth Day, Expanding the Climate Change Narrative
Have you ever considered how our perspective of climate change might shift if we focused not just on the sky above us but also on the earth beneath our feet? Today, let’s explore the role of plants, soils, and climate moderation, a tale often overshadowed by the buzz of greenhouse gases.
Human activities are not only carbon loading the air with rising greenhouse gases and drastically altering our land and sea. We’re cutting down trees, scraping away topsoil, eroding the land, and suffocating wetlands and rivers with sediments. This disturbance is causing water to rush to the sea, carrying away homes and reshaping landscapes.
Furthermore, freshwater warmed by the land is spilling out over the salty sea, giving the ocean more energy. This has led to an alarming increase in hurricane ferocity. Hurricanes that pass over open seas have been observed to strengthen from category 4 to 5 in just 24 hours, a fourfold increase in destructive power.
Increased greenhouse gases retain more heat, tipping the planetary heat exchange balance by an additional 1% (3 Watts per meter square). Like the doctor using a thermometer to measure a patient’s temperature, we measure degrees of climate change in parts per million atmospheric carbon dioxides. Seeing the planetary fever rise, we slow…
