Mike Clancy Addresses Climate Change
Our speaker for January 6, 2022, was Oceanographer and Meteorologist Mike Clancy, whose topic was “Understanding and Mitigating Climate Change.” Mike has an M.S. in Meteorology from the University of Miami and worked for U.S. Navy’s Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography, including as its Technical and Scientific Director, since 1983. He is also a member of the Citizens’ Climate Lobby and frequent speaker on climate change. Mike presented compelling statistics showing that the Global Mean Surface Temperature of the earth has increased at least 1 degree centigrade since the beginning of the industrial period. In the last 120 years the Global Mean Surface Temperature has increased 20x faster than natural climate change. Most of this drastic change has been the result of the greenhouse effect. Greenhouse gases, including primarily Co2 (carbon dioxide), CH4 (methane), F-Gases (fluorinated gases), and N20 (nitrogen dioxide), become trapped in the atmosphere and trap heat close to the earth’s surface. The consequences are devastating, and include increasing frequency and intensity of severe storms, heat waves, cold snaps, floods in wet regions, drought and wildfires in dry regions, rising sea levels, increasing mortality of coral reefs, and decreasing snowpacks and fisheries. Severe weather events in 2021, including floods, freezes (in Texas!), rain at the summit of Greenland, and a heatwave that killed hundreds in the Pacific Northwest, among others, are some of the most obvious recent human consequences of climate change.
The projected consequences of climate change by the end of this century depend on the extent to which the world can mitigate climate change. For example, if the Paris Climate Accord goals (net zero GHG emissions by 2050 and near zero GHG emissions by 2100) could be met, total post-industrial mean surface temperatures are estimated to be approximately 1.5 degree centigrade (+/- .7 degrees). However, these goals now appear to be slipping and it is very possible that the net change could be closer to a catastrophic 3.0 – 4.5 degrees centigrade.
Mike presented Project Drawdown as a roadmap to climate change mitigation. Project Drawdown provides 82 solutions for reducing climate change, including 9 separate sections, 5 involving reducing greenhouse gases and 4 involving protecting and enhancing or ability to remove greenhouse gases.
Thank you, Mike, for bringing us this very important topic and providing us with information about mitigating the effects of climate change. And thank you for all of your work in this field.
You may view the ZOOM recording HERE! It will be available for the only the next week or so.
