Admitting you have a problem is the first step...

I hate to completely summarize a news article but I feel that this is a rather important stepping stone to society assuming accountability for our actions.

Four years late and under the shadow of a court order demanding it the White House produced their climate report this past Thursday.

Scientific Assessment of the Effects of Global Change on the United States

While offering no "new science" it does collaborate previous studies and reports that concentrated on human action, climate change and the resultant environmental impacts upon natural systems.

In 1990 the US Global Change Research Act of 1990 was passed stating that the United States government must issue a comprehensive science assessment of global warming but had not released one since 2000.

I have not had the chance to read the 271 page report. I will try to get through it this weekend however there have already been some tidbits bantered around the internet that I found interesting.

...from the New York Times; The Bush administration, bowing to a court order, has released a fresh summary of federal and independent research pointing to large, and mainly harmful, impact of human-caused global warming in the United States.

...from Yahoo AP ;
• Increased heat deaths and deaths from climate-worsened smog. In Los Angeles alone yearly heat fatalities could increase by more than 1,000 by 2080, and the Midwest and Northeast are most vulnerable to increased heat deaths.

• Worsening water shortages for agriculture and urban users. From California to New York, lack of water will be an issue.

• A need for billions of dollars in more power plants (one major cause of global warming gases) to cool a hotter country. The report says summer cooling will mean Seattle's energy consumption would increase by 146 percent with the warming that could come by the end of the century.

• More death and damage from wildfires, hurricanes and other natural disasters and extreme weather. In the last three decades, wildfire season in the West has increased by 78 days.

• Increased insect infestations and food- and waterborne microbes and diseases. Insect and pathogen outbreaks to the forests are causing $1.5 billion in annual losses.


Alright, so what are we going to do about it? More importantly what are you? The tools are right there to become informed, now act upon the information. Inaction is no longer a viable option.