PLANETARY LIFEGUARD? Sees Tipping Points as More Beach Sand is ‘Gone with The Wind’ and ‘Frankly, My Dears, He Gives a Damn’ About Our Future
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If you’re following worrisome climate developments around the world like Planetary Lifeguard ?, you might also see them approaching tipping points.
And where will our planet go when we reach these tipping points?? Frankly, my dears, Planetary Lifeguard ? does give a damn as he sees this raising the specter of our planet undergoing changes that are irreversible, and more disastrous!
A flood of recent reports is alerting our ever-watchful lifeguard that our planet’s intricate environment is undergoing major upheavals from activities we humans are irresponsibly engaged in like deforestation, carbon emissions, and not proceeding fast enough building wind and solar power plants.
As a result, glaciers around the world, from Greenland to Switzerland to Antarctica, are melting faster than expected.? Atmospheric and ocean heat keeps hitting new highs caused by what Planetary Lifeguard ? is furiously blowing his whistle against--climate change.
As if emissions weren’t bad enough, now research is indicating that up to half of the Amazon rainforest is rapidly being transformed into grasslands or weakened ecosystems in the coming decades because of deforestation, compounded by, climate change and drought.
Our watchful lifeguard sees those stresses eventually driving the entire forest ecosystem, home to a tenth of the planet’s land species, past a tipping point that would trigger a forest-wide collapse.
And now research suggests that a crucial network of ocean currents carrying warm water into the North Atlantic is showing early signs of collapse because of an influx of fresh water from another worrisome problem--melting glaciers.
Some climatologists believe we’re approaching a key threshold that if crossed could accelerate change causing a profound transformation and an onslaught of self-propelling changes that could become, perish the thought, permanent.
Our earth’s ecosystems, forests, coral reefs, and lakes are in turmoil, too.? The collapse of boreal forests, which burned at an unprecedented rate last year, sent carbon flying into the atmosphere.? Compounding that was the water stress that fires cause, reducing the ability of trees to resist insect infestation, which in turn makes them more vulnerable to fires, in what’s called a “feedback loop.”
Currents and monsoons regulating the oceans and the atmosphere also can slow down, warm up and shift in various ways. They can move saltier water from one part of the ocean to another and if they become weaker, less salt is transported, making surface water less salty, which in turn makes it less dense and less likely to sink, weakening currents further and on and on, as the harmful effects spiral.
Since researchers started identifying tipping points, the list of systems that are close to the edge has been growing steadily.? While there is no consensus we’ve reached any large-scale tipping points, there is debate whether some on the Greenland ice sheet and in many of the world’s coral reefs, we’re coming close.?
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However, Planetary Lifeguard ? sees serious harbingers that we may have already reached some tipping points.? And among the most worrisome tipping point concern is the condition of the world’s vast ice sheets. ??
If the Greenland ice sheet collapses, global sea levels could rise seven meters, or 23 feet, over the next centuries. ?I don’t know about your neighborhood, but tides where I live keep getting noticeably higher in unseasonably warm South Florida. ?
Strong winds and high waves have already eroded the coastline in small beachside towns nearby where tons of sand are now gone with the wind. But Planetary Lifeguard ? says “frankly my dear, I do give a damn” about climate change.” ?In Palm Beach County 20,000+ tons of sand deposited on Singer Island as part of a $2.5 million emergency dune restoration plan has been washed away.
Another $2 million is now needed to restore beaches in Tequesta. ?Strong windstorms and king tides late last year caused such severe beach erosion the county had to place 53,000 tons of sand onto Singer Island and another 45,000 tons onto Coral Cove beaches.? Rhett Butler where are you?
Further north, a succession of storms has caused the shoreline to recede drastically in Nantucket fully exposing a sewage-treatment plant there after washing away a dune protecting it. ?And on it goes as the planet warms.
In these so called “feedback loops” comes another hazard.? As ice melts, its surface declines in altitude, so air on top is warmer, leading to more melting. ?Also, disappearing ice means fewer white surfaces to reflect sunlight back into space, which in turn warms the atmosphere even more.? And the beat goes on!?
The thawing of permafrost could release gigatons of planet-warming methane into the atmosphere causing the atmosphere to warm further and further, melting more permafrost as the negative consequences keep spiraling out of control.
And on and on those consequences keep spiraling out of control on a warming planet, which is why our whistle-blowing Planetary Lifeguard ? keeps urging us to “give a damn” about green energy.? Why?? Because frankly, my dears, we must change what we’re doing to our land, sea and air or we’re going to feedback loop ourselves beyond too many tipping points . . . to a point of no return!?
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Concerned about tipping points, Tom Madden created Planetary Lifeguard ? to alert us to dangers ahead and inspire faster crossovers to green energy before warmer temperatures cause perhaps irreversible consequences to our planet.??
When he’s not sounding alarms by having his lifeguard blow the whistle on climate change, Madden and his crack staff of publicists led by his daughter Adrienne Mazzone are serving clients of TransMedia Group , the award-winning PR firm Madden started when he left NBC in NYC.
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8 个月So explain to me how a country of 350 million people, with one of the lowest rates of pollution in the industrialized world, should destroy its economy to accommodate the remaining 8 billion people who don’t care?