Reversing climate change… really?
We are annealed to our creature comforts and our leaders are placed there to serve that end, whether they are corrupt or honest.
This month, scientists issued a new study concluding that global warming has dramatically increased the likelihood of severe heat and drought — days after a heat wave across the Plains and Midwest broke records that had stood since the Dust Bowl, threatening this year’s harvest. You want a big number? In the course of this month, a quadrillion kernels of corn need to pollinate across the grain belt, something they can’t do if temperatures remain off the charts. Just like us, our crops are adapted to the Holocene, the 11,000-year period of climatic stability we’re now leaving… in the dust.
— Bill McKibben, Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math, Rolling Stone, July, 2012
I can feel the heat of the sun on my thinning scalp more than I can recall having felt before. Maybe it is imagined, or maybe it is the much higher UV now. As the climate crisis spirals out of our control more with each passing day, we are all feeling the heat, and grasping for solutions, anything, to get us out of this mess.
The Great Change is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts…