Lauren RabainoCRACK!
SPLASH!
“Oohs,” “ahhhs” and the clicking of digital cameras are common sounds heard along the viewing boardwalk of the 60-meter tall crumbling Perito Moreno glacier in southern Argentina. During the spring and summer months, thousands of adventurers from all over the world travel to Patagonia in southern Chile and Argentina to catch a glimpse of these magnificent living pieces of ice.
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to travel to Patagonia and witness firsthand what scientists have been talking about for years. Greenhouse gases, created mainly from the combustion of carbon based fossil fuels, are warming the climate of our planet. This warming is causing glaciers and ice caps to melt at rapid rates.
Now, I understand that glaciers melt in the summer and grow during winter and that most of what I saw was normal seasonal thawing. But according to an experienced local guide in the Torres del Paine National Park in Chile, the melting (and lack of growing) of the “Grey Glacier” in recent years is far from normal. This popular trekking destination is now receding more than 15 meters per year, worrying scientists, locals and travelers.
As distant as the southern tip of South America may seem, Cal Poly students and their families are far from being isolated from the consequences of the melting ice.
Who exactly will be affected by the rising sea levels you ask? Is anyone from San Francisco, Oakland, Union City, San Mateo or Foster City? How about Santa Monica, Newport Beach, Coronado or San Diego? Well, what if I told you that a relatively conservative estimate of just a couple meters of sea level rise will put these cities largely underwater by mid-century. See for it yourself at www.architecture2030.org/current_situation/cutting_edge.html
OK, enough with the scare tactics because, believe it or not, it’s not you or your families that I am worried about. America will likely be fine. We live in a wealthy country that will build levees and barricades to keep us nice and dry when the water rises. (I hope!)
It’s the coastal communities in Third World countries that I’m worried about. The impoverished villages already struggling to survive each day will be the ones who feel the real wrath of climate change.
For example, one meter of sea level rise will displace more than 13 million people from the impoverished country of Bangladesh and threaten their rice fields, which are the country’s staple food source and cash crop.
In the south Pacific, New Zealand is expected to contain the world’s first climate refugees by the middle of the century. With an average height of just a couple of meters, the tiny, poor island of Tuvalu and its 11,000 native people are being forced out off their own land because of rising sea levels from global warming.
While industrialized countries account for about 80 percent of the world’s historic carbon dioxide emissions, it is clear that the poorest nations will suffer the most severe consequences of climate change.
Luckily for us, we can still preserve the beautiful glaciers of Patagonia, and give a break to developing nations if we (as the largest polluters in the world) take aggressive action to reduce greenhouse emissions in the next couple of years. With California’s presidential primary less than a month away, we have the chance to elect candidates who have bold plans (in both parties) to lead us to a clean, carbon-free future. So go ahead and get registered, get educated, and vote on Feb. 5 so you and your families never become “climate refugees.”
Chad is an industrial engineering senior, president of the Empower Poly Coalition and a Mustang Daily columnist.