Problems listed in report
WASHINGTON — When it came time to deliver a new federal report detailing what global warming is doing to America and the dire forecast for the future, President Barack Obama turned to the pros who regularly deliver the bad news about wild weather: TV meteorologists.
“We want to emphasize to the public, this is not some distant problem of the future. This is a problem that is affecting Americans right now,” Obama told “Today” show weathercaster Al Roker. “Whether it means increased flooding, greater vulnerability to drought, more severe wildfires — all these things are having an impact on Americans as we speak.”
Climate change's assorted harms “are expected to become increasingly disruptive across the nation throughout this century and beyond,” the National Climate Assessment concluded, emphasizing the impact of too-wild weather as well as simple warming.
Still, it's not too late to prevent the worst of climate change, says the 840-page report, which the Obama administration is highlighting as it tries to jump-start often-stalled efforts to curb heat-trapping gases. Said White House science adviser John Holdren, “It's a good-news story about the many opportunities to take cost-effective actions to reduce the damage.”
Release of the report, the third edition of a congressionally mandated study, gives Obama an opportunity to ground his campaign against climate change in science and numbers, endeavoring to blunt the arguments of those who question the idea and human contributions to such changes. Later this summer, the administration plans to propose new regulations restricting gases that come from existing coal-fired power plants.
Not everyone is convinced.
Some fossil energy groups, conservative think tanks and Republican senators immediately assailed the report as “alarmist.” Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said Obama was likely to “use the platform to renew his call for a national energy tax. And I'm sure he'll get loud cheers from liberal elites — from the kind of people who leave a giant carbon footprint and then lecture everybody else about low-flow toilets.”
Since taking office, Obama has not proposed a specific tax on fossil fuel emissions. He has proposed a system that caps emissions and allows companies to trade carbon pollution credits, but it has failed in Congress.
Republican Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana said the report was supposed to be scientific but “it's more of a political one used to justify government overreach.” And leaders in the fossil fuel industry, which is responsible for a large amount of the heat-trapping carbon dioxide, said their energy is needed and America can't afford to cut back.
“Whether you agree or disagree with the report, the question is: What are you going to do about it? To us that is a major question,” said Charlie Drevna, president of the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers. He called the report “overblown.”
The report was written by more than 250 scientists and government officials, starting in 2012. A draft was released in January 2013, but this version has been reviewed by more scientists, including twice by the National Academy of Sciences, which called it “reasonable” and “a valuable resource.”
Environmental groups praised the report.
“If we don't slam the brakes on the carbon pollution driving climate change, we're dooming ourselves and our children to more intense heat waves, destructive floods and storms and surging sea levels,” said Frances Beinecke, president of the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Scientists and the White House called it the most detailed and U.S.-focused scientific report on global warming.
The report looks at regional and state-level effects of global warming, compared with recent reports from the United Nations that lumped all of North America together.
“All Americans will find things that matter to them in this report,” said scientist Jerry Melillo of the Marine Biological Laboratory, who chaired the science committee that wrote it.
Even though the nation's average temperature has risen by between 1.3 and 1.9 degrees since record-keeping began in 1895, it's in the big, wild weather where the average person feels climate change the most, said co-author Katharine Hayhoe, a Texas Tech University climate scientist. Extreme weather hits us in the pocketbook and can be seen with our own eyes, she said.
The report says the intensity, frequency and duration of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes have increased since the early 1980s, but it is still uncertain how much of that is from man-made warming.
The report says “climate change threatens human health and well-being in many ways.” Those include smoke-filled air from wildfires, smoggy air from pollution, and more diseases from tainted food, water, mosquitoes and ticks.
A report by the National Climate Assessment lists concerns for the Northeast because of climate change including more days over 90 degrees, increased cases of Lyme disease and West Nile virus, changes to commercial fishing areas and coastal erosion.<b>HEAT WAVES IN BIG CITIES:</b> Climate change is expected to bring many more days with temperatures above 90 degrees, with cities being hotter than other places because of all the asphalt, concrete and less vegetation. The report cites projections that heat-related deaths in Manhattan could increase by 50 percent to 91 percent in the 2080s. More ground-level ozone is expected to lead to more emergency department visits for children with ozone-related asthma.<b>LYME DISEASE AND WEST NILE VIRUS: </b>The Northeast is already home to the most Lyme disease cases in the U.S. Researchers are concerned that projected increases in precipitation will create more ideal conditions for Lyme disease-carrying ticks as well as mosquitoes with West Nile virus. The report says suitable habitat for the Asian Tiger Mosquito, which can transmit West Nile virus and other diseases, is expected to increase dramatically by the end of the decade.<b>THREATS TO FISHERIES: </b>Suitable habitat for fish and shellfish is expected to shift northward because of increasing ocean temperatures. As a result, lobster and cod fisheries south of Cape Cod are expected to see significant declines. But suitable habitats could increase in the region for warmer water fish including bass.<b>RISING SEA LEVELS: </b>Higher seas and increased coastal erosion could threaten power plants and other shoreline infrastructure. Boston alone could see as much as $94 billion worth of damages to buildings and associated emergency costs through 2100, depending on how much the sea level rises. Global sea levels are expected to rise 1 to 4 feet. With a 2-foot sea rise and no changes in storms, the frequency of dangerous coastal flooding through most of the Northeast would more than triple.
