Yesterday I Googled the subject "climate change" and was surprised to find a preponderance of doubters on the page that opened before me. Not that I didn't expect that they would be out there – those who find it inconvenient to change their ways, those who are fatalistic in their views, those who have financial interests in maintaining the status quo. My surprise stemmed from the apparent fact that the doubters seemed to have a lot to say, and that the supporters said very little. My reason for Googling the topic was to learn more about the reported increase in melting of a glacier in Kashmir the Himalayas, an event that had come peripherally into my consciousness when a TV news report flashed by, an event of no small importance in consideration of the huge population of people dependent upon a consistent flow of water from that icy storage. I did find a report about it, buried half way down the column of search results. And just below that result was another report containing a statement from a Kashmir official downplaying the research results, saying that while the report may be true, several other glaciers in the area appear to be growing.
Clearly, without a dramatic illustration of climate change, such as an entire city engulfed in flood water (oh, wait! That did happen!), the skeptics are not prepared to accept that our climate is changing and that we the people will need to change as a result. Never mind that the predictions of the prognosticators are being realized as I speak, in fact sooner than most foretold. Those indicators are all present, but in scattered places about the globe; this is, after all, a global crisis. The scientists and those that synthesize their findings (reporters, writers) call for increased sea ice melt, glacier melt, sea level rise, increased coastal storm damage, greater storm intensity, greater precipitation amounts in storms, decreasing rainfall and increasing drought, increased wildfires, and so on. No one expected all of this to occur in one single location. But it is all occurring increasingly and alarmingly, as foretold, around the globe.
Teasing out and presenting here even a portion of the multitudinous examples of foretold global weather changes that appear to be materializing would be tedious and time consuming, if fascinating. I propose then to content myself with an investigation of the event that generated this piece, the reported unusual rate of melt of the Kashmir glacier. For background, one should know that the Himalayan Glaciers form the world’s largest ice body outside of the polar caps and are popularly known as the “Water Towers of Asia”, because they are the water source for the largest rivers on that continent. According to the report I read yesterday (ART News, Oct. 13, 2009) Indian Kashmir’s largest glacier, the Kolahoi Glacier, has shrunk 11 square miles in the last two decades, faster than all other glaciers in the region and threatening the water supply for tens of thousands of people. Experts attribute the temperature rise causing this shrinkage to climate change. The IPCC reported in 2007 that the glaciers in the Himalayas are receding quicker than those in other parts of the world. But (whoa!) India’s Environmental Minister Jairam Ramesh rushed in to say that “more scientific studies were needed to conclusively establish the link” between climate change and melting glaciers. He then pointed out that although a “couple” of Himalayan glaciers were receding, some others were advancing, and others were receding at a decreasing rate compared with the last few decades! (Can you spell ‘obfuscate’?). Shakil Ramsoo, assistant professor of geology at the University of Kashmir and the leader of the three year study said: “Other small Kashmir glaciers are also shrinking and the main reason is that the winter temperature in Kashmir is rising.” (Seems clear to me!) “’Global warming’ is a misnomer” (John Holdren, in Hot, Flat, and Crowded, Friedman) “It implies something uniform, gradual, mainly about temperature, and quite possibly benign. What is happening is…none of those. It is uneven geographically…A more accurate label…is ‘global climate disruption’”. A better term, according to Friedman, might be “Global Weirding”.
Increased glacier melt around the globe that must inevitably be accompanied by devastating effects such as flash flooding from moraine dams collapsing and inconsistent and diminishing water flow to the world’s major rivers was observed back in the 70’s. Al Gore’s film “An Inconvenient Truth” memorably illustrated the disappearing of once mighty glaciers with current photos juxtaposed to old postcards. Seeing is believing. Concerned groups around the world have placed monitors and data gathering devices on glaciers to measure the rate of melt. The facts are immutable. But leadership is about dealing with those facts, not hoping that they are wrong or will change.
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