Sounding the alarm on Earth Day
originally published April 21, 2019 at OregonLive
By Dominick A. DellaSala, William J. Ripple and Franz Baumann
Another Earth Day is here and it’s time to check on the planet, our climate, and what it means for Oregonians. While we remain hopeful that climate change is solvable if we act now, it’s hard not to be alarmed.
For decades, scientists have been monitoring the planet’s life-support systems like the warning lights on a car’s dashboard. We scan satellite images of humanity’s unprecedented ecological footprint on forests, rivers, and oceans. We use thousands of weather stations to track rising temperatures and super-computers to forecast impacts.
In 1992, we joined 1,700 scientists in issuing a warning that “a great change in our stewardship of the Earth and the life on it is required if vast human misery is to be avoided.” In 2017, more than 21,000 scientists from 184 countries issued a second warning that conditions had worsened and time was running out.
In Oregon, rising temperatures means more extreme fire-weather – hotter, drier, windier. Smoke now pours into the state from fires as far away as British Columbia. Winters deliver more rain, less snow, and intense storms damage coastal communities.
Fortunately, forward-thinking members of Congress recently introduced a bold resolution that responds to the climate challenge at scale. Aptly named a Green New Deal, it is as ambitious as President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal in the 1930s.
By calling for carbon-free energy, clean air and water, and an economic system that addresses inequalities, it is the most comprehensive response yet to the warnings. Hundreds of cities, including Portland, are supporting these initiatives via the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy.
The sense of urgency means the Oregon Legislature needs to do its part by passing a strong Clean Energy Jobs Bill that curbs greenhouse gas emissions now with a fair, equitable, and effective carbon pricing scheme that enlists nature in climate solutions.
Our coastal rainforests and older forests are vital to a safe climate as they scrub vast quantities of carbon from the atmosphere, helping to keep the planet from overheating. Lawmakers need to include measures that protect these forests and increase the time between logging cycles to grow and store more carbon in forests. Landowners practicing such climate-smart forestry should be rewarded.
Meanwhile, communities need to prepare for unavoidable consequences of carbon pollution. For much of Oregon, this means avoiding the tragedy of Paradise where entire homes were destroyed while surrounding trees were left unscorched. No amount of logging in the surroundings could have prevented unprepared homes ignited by embers blown from fires miles away. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown’s Wildfire Council needs to focus on proven home-hardening measures like building with fire-resistant roofs and thinning flammable vegetation around homes while avoiding Trojan-horse promises that claim intensive logging and more fire suppression will reduce or stop wildfires. Containing housing sprawl, enforcing clean air standards, providing smoke shelters and indoor air filtration systems are climate-smart responses.
The Green New Deal and Clean Energy Jobs Bill are the best ways to celebrate Earth Day with practical solutions to the scientists’ warnings.
DellaSala is chief scientist of the Geos Institute and a member of the Oregon Global Warming Commission’s Task Force on Forest Carbon. William J. Ripple is distinguished professor of ecology at Oregon State University and lead author of the 2017 World Scientists’ Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice. Baumann, is former United Nations Assistant Secretary-General, and a visiting research professor at New York University.
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Robert Macnee, Ph.D. is Deputy Director of Resilience Services at Climate Resilience Consulting, where he helps governments, institutions, and communities reduce climate risk in equitable and practical ways. He holds a Ph.D. in Environmental Management focused on climate change impacts on health and communities, and brings over a decade of experience spanning economic development, resilience planning, and implementation.
Samantha Medlock is President of Climate Risk Advisors, helping communities and organizations advance equity, sustainability, and resilience. Her career began chasing floods as a local official in Texas Flash Flood Alley—a hands-on experience that still shapes her approach to climate and disaster risk management.
Arsum is the Senior Adaptation and Coastal Resilience Specialist for the National Wildlife Federation’s Southcentral Region. In this role, she advances climate adaptation efforts, with a focus on nature-based approaches to address the impacts of climate change and extreme events across the Gulf region. She has authored and co-authored numerous publications on climate impact assessments and adaptation solutions. Additionally, she regularly participates in state-based coastal resilience and hazard mitigation planning across the Gulf, collaborating with regional and local stakeholders.
Jim is a multilingual world traveler. Based in Bavaria during the 1970s, Jim spent most of this period in India, Afghanistan and Nepal, where he founded and operated a charitable medical clinic serving Tibetan Refugees. He settled in Oregon in 1983 on a forested ranch in the Umpqua National Forest.
Dr. Micah Hahn is an Associate Professor of Environmental Health in the Institute for Circumpolar Health Studies at the University of Alaska-Anchorage. She received her joint PhD in Epidemiology / Environment and Resources from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and her MPH in Global Environmental Health from Emory University. Subsequently, she was a postdoctoral fellow for the CDC Climate and Health Program, and in this position worked collaboratively with the CDC Division of Vector-borne Diseases and the National Center for Atmospheric Research. Her research focuses on understanding the health impacts of climate change and working with communities to develop locally-relevant adaptation and resilience-building strategies. Dr. Hahn is also on the Management Team of the Alaska Climate Adaptation Science Center.
Michael is a former Founding Principal of Resilient Cities Catalyst, a global non-profit helping cities and their partners tackle their toughest challenges. He is currently the Executive Director of Climate Resilience Academy at the University of Miami.
Dr. Quintus Jett is a consultant, educator, and strategist for public causes. He has a doctorate in Organizations & Management from Stanford University, and a two-decade faculty career which spans schools, departments, and programs of business, engineering, liberal studies, divinity, and public and nonprofit management. Following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, Dr. Jett launched a volunteer project in New Orleans, which enlisted residents, students from over a dozen colleges and universities, and hundreds of others to field map the city’s Gentilly district, Lower Ninth Ward, and New Orleans East. Dr. Jett is an innovator in higher education, bridging the divide between academic research and the other priorities of the modern university, including student access and diversity, community engagement, and providing foundations for life-long learning in today’s rapidly changing world.
Scott is Monfort Professor of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University. He has written about 100 publications in the peer-reviewed climate literature, is a former editor of the Journal of Climate, and served for five years as founding Science Chair of the North American Carbon Program.
Linda has many years of experience in disaster preparedness and resilience. She has been an elected official on the Linn County Iowa Board of Supervisors, Chair of the Metropolitan Planning Organization, the East Central Iowa Council of Governments, the statewide Mental Health Developmental Disability and the Linn County Board of Health. Langston is a former president of the National Association of Counties (2013-2014).
Ken works with families and organizations as a mediator, organizational consultant, trainer and facilitator. Along with his passion for helping people prepare for and reduce climate change, Ken also volunteers as a mediator through Mediation Works and is passionate about supporting youth through mentoring with Boys to Men of Southern Oregon.
Matthew is a retired high school teacher who was once honored as Oregon High School Social Studies Teacher of the Year. Before his teaching career he was in the restaurant business in Portland. He is also a lawyer who has been a member of the Oregon State Bar Association since 1980.
Andrea is the Resilience Policy Advisor for the North Carolina Office of Recovery and Resiliency. She works across state agencies and with local governments to increase the state’s resilience to the impacts of climate change.