lightblueline

May 15, 2007
A team of NASA and university scientists has found clear evidence that extensive areas of snow melted in west Antarctica in January 2005 in response to warm temperatures. This was the first widespread Antarctic melting ever detected with NASA's QuikScat satellite and the most significant melt observed using satellites during the past three decades. Combined, the affected regions encompassed an area as big as California.

Thousands of scientists and a hundred governments yesterday agreed, at least in outline, on plans to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, in an effort to avoid the worst scenarios for climate change. Meeting in Bangkok, a city vulnerable to even modest sea-level rise, the IPCC's third report of the year offered new insights and a perspective of hope for nations looking to cut their greenhouse emissions. [There is a link to the actual report the end of this blog.] The good news is that the effort's near-term cost is less than three-percent of global GDP.

In today's WIRED website (April 24, 2007) you will find an article on a proposed new city on the outskirts of Shanghai, China. This city is built on the tip of a nearby island at the mouth of the Yangtze River. What the authors don't say is that building an entire city on land less than two meters in elevation makes no allowance for future sea-level rise. In fact, they chose to build very close to the ocean.
In an email response to this blog, the article's author, Douglas McGray, added that the architects are mindful of the potential for sea-level issues, but felt that Shanghai is going to expand, and that the Dongtan project provides an opportunity to try out solutions to building near the ocean; solutions that might be of value to other coastal cities that might not be able to move their infrastructure out of the zone of vulnerability.
You can read the whole article here: Pop-Up Cities: China Builds a Bright Green Metropolis.
Rejecting previous plans that pulled the built environment back from the sea coast, the architects decided to create a new Venice: "Arup had to figure out how to keep Dongtan above water. Chongming Island is flat and barely higher than sea level. The previous planners, thinking defensively, had pulled development back to the middle of the site, imagining Dongtan as an island city with no harbor, no waterfront caf s, no ocean-view condos. Gutierrez thought that was kind of a waste.

Nasa's Earth Observatory brings you: Global Warming

Last night we heard writer/activist (the slash is rather new, he would admit) Bill McKibben offer a vision of what a civilization-wide response to the challenge of global heating might look like. This is the fourth, and last, talk in the series organized by liner (and UCSB professor) David Lea. Much of what McKibben offered could be described as an antidote to the economics of growth. We need an economics based on an understanding of what makes humans happy. He noted that a survey of happiness in the US had this commodity peaking in 1956.

Think Globally, Act Neighborly

While lightblueline focuses on generating public awareness and commitment to action against human induced climate change, we look to other partner groups to guide the way to a carbon-neutral lifestyle. Here are some links to organizations that are proposing measures you can do to help:
The Community Environmental Council has a "Fossil Free by '33" campaign with advice for companies and individuals:
Fossil Free by '33
The Union of Concerned Scientists have 10 personal solutions to global warming:
Ten Personal Solutions
The David Suzuki Foundation offers a range of actions you can take at home, at work, or to influence policy decisions:
Climate Change: What you can do
You company can become "climate neutral":
Improving the climate of doing business
L.A. Magazine has 25 ways to go Green:
Twenty-five ways to go green without going insane
General policy recommendations:
USA Today: 6 ways to Combat Global Warming
Wikipedia has a whole site on mitigation of global warming: from the planetary to the personal--
Mitigation of global warming
The National Geographic has a list of 10 things you can do:
Top Ten Tips to Fight Global Warming
The US EPA has a page on "What you can do" at home, at work, on the road, and at School:
What You Can Do

MORE SOON!

This week, the US Geological Survey's Center of Excellence for GIS released new maps and animations, and a report (presentation as a PDF file) on the impacts that sudden sea-level rise would have on global and regional populations. Here is their website:
Sea Level Rise

As reported on MSNBC.com (April 20, 2007), this project looked at both immediate (tsunami and storm surge) events, and longer term events, such as sea-level rise due to climate change:

Last night New Yorker science writer Elizabeth Kolbert brought a message of alarm, a call to action, and sliver of hope to a full room of concerned residents in Campbell Hall. Focusing on the issue of sea-level rise from her book Field Notes from a Catastrophe, she described her experiences in Alaska and Greenland, and the fears and predictions of the scientists who are trying to gain a better understanding of how the planet's ice sheets will respond to global warming. She also mentioned our local lightblueline action (but not by name).
Here is the Santa Barbara Newsroom's article on her talk:
Climate Change Close-Up at UCSB
Here is a review from the Santa Barbara Independent:
It's Not Easy Teaching Green