It's
Expensive To Ignore
Global Warming
By Bruce Barnbaum
14 March, 2007
Seattle
Post-Intelligencer
Some leaders -- notably President
Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney -- have stated they will do nothing
to stem global warming if it will harm our economy. Let's examine two
examples of what would happen to our economy if we follow their advice
and do nothing.
Note that predictions of
climate change have been quite accurate, so a high degree of confidence
exists (and, in fact, a growing degree of confidence) that future predictions
will be borne out.
Look at the consequences
of rising sea levels. If the oceans rise 20 feet, much of our coastal
land would be imperiled. What would that mean?
Most of Florida is barely
above sea level. A 20-foot ocean level rise would put half of Florida
under water, including Miami, Tampa Bay and Jacksonville, Florida's
three largest cities.
What would be the cost of
building dikes around all this real estate? Hundreds of billions of
dollars, perhaps well into the trillions. Florida has the longest coastline
of any state except Alaska, and the dikes needed to protect Florida
would have to be extended across the other Gulf States and up the East
Coast to truly be protective.
We can't build a Maginot
Line of dikes just around Florida, allowing the rising waters to flow
around the ends of the dikes. If we build protective dikes for some
areas, we have to protect them all. Not only are we looking at excessive
expenditures, but we're looking at an impossible amount of material
needed to build thousands of miles of dikes 20-plus feet high.
The option is to abandon
all that land. What costs would that entail? What would be the further
cost of rebuilding all that infrastructure elsewhere?
A third of Manhattan lies
less than 20 feet above sea level. That's very expensive real estate.
Do we dike Manhattan? Should Manhattan and Florida (together with the
other states) battle it out for the money? Which is more important to
save? Do we enter a new civil war to answer that question?
The same problems plague
Washington, D.C., Boston, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, San Diego
and other low-lying areas. A sea level rise would not present difficult
problems; it would present catastrophic problems and impossible choices.
Shifting our focus to diseases,
everyone has heard of ebola virus, malaria, cholera, West Nile virus,
etc. Until recently, these were confined to the tropics. But West Nile
virus already has spread across the lower 48 states.
So far, it has done little
except kill some birds and a few people, but it could become rampant
at any time. The other diseases could, as well.
What would be the cost --
or even the possibility -- of vaccinating the entire U.S. population,
the European population and the Asian population against these formerly
"tropical" diseases? What would be the cost in lives of not
vaccinating the population?
We can't create enough vaccine
to inoculate everyone, so who gets it when it becomes available?
These are just two of the
upcoming costs and conflicts of doing nothing about global warming.
They should be enough to convince everyone of the complete lack of thought
or foresight shown by our president and vice president.
Bruce Barnbaum lives in Granite
Falls.
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Post-Intelligencer