Some folks call flood pump stations “meat grinders.”

These pumps are common along B.C.’s Fraser River, where they remove water from nearby streams when levels get high and pump it into the river to prevent flooding.

But fish and amphibians can get sucked in with the water, said Lina Azeez, campaign manager for Watershed Watch Salmon Society.

“They grind them up in the machinery,” she said. “That’s a huge problem.”

Other flood infrastructure — such as dikes, floodgates and pumps — blocks fish passageways and makes potential spawning areas unreachable. As part of an ongoing mapping project, Watershed Watch has found 1,500 kilometres of current or potential fish habitat in the lower Fraser and its tributaries is blocked by flood infrastructure.

“It’s the biggest habitat issue that you’ve never heard of,” said Aaron Hill, executive director of Watershed Watch.

Many of these flood structures are due to be upgraded in response to sea level rise, increased seasonal flooding or aging. Hill said governments now have a chance to build innovative, fish-friendly structures such as pump stations that don’t catch fish or floodgates that open and close with the tide unlike older models that remain closed most of the time.

Natural infrastructure can also be harnessed to provide flood protection without disrupting wildlife. Lakes and ponds can help absorb freshet, while wetlands and vegetated areas absorb water and stabilize soil. A 2018 Insurance Bureau of Canada report found that natural infrastructure is “cost effective” by design but “underutilized.”

“There’s this tremendous opportunity to open up a whole bunch of habitat by putting in flood control structures that are better for salmon and also keep our communities as safe or even safer from flooding,” Hill said.

Cities continue to choose cheaper, non-fish-friendly options

The reality of flood risk has been looming over B.C. after above-average spring snowmelt in May caused the biggest flood in Williams Lake in approximately 200 years, triggering a state of emergency. A recent analysis by the World Resources Institute found that without major investments in flood protection, the number of people affected by coastal and river flooding each year could more than double by 2030. 

About 350,000 people live in the Fraser floodplain and are at risk of floods. The Fraser Basin Council estimates a major flood could cost up to $30 billion in damages. 

The NDP government committed $519 million to wildfire and flood preparation and response in its 2020 budget. But Hill said flood mitigation money keeps going to projects that block habitat and potentially harm fish. 

Hill pointed to Pitt Meadows, about 40 kilometres east of Vancouver, where community members have seen hundreds of dead fish at the McKechnie pump station. Despite this, the city has received one government grant and applied for another to replace two other pump stations with models that are just as harmful to fish. 

Watershed Watch Salmon Society is calling for fish-friendly flood infrastructure to replace old infrastructure along the lower Fraser River. Photo: Collette Rooney / Watershed Watch Salmon Society

Meghan Rooney, a field coordinator with Watershed Watch Salmon Society, conducts a habitat assessment at a side channel of the Coquitlam River. Photo: Collette Rooney / Watershed Watch Salmon Society

“Fish-friendly pumps are not requirements of these grant applications, but they were carefully considered,” the city said in a March 5 statement. The city added that it consulted with the B.C. Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy and Fisheries and Oceans Canada and found that fish-friendly pumps would spread invasive species and affect native species, including salmon. Fish-friendly infrastructure allows the free movement of fish — invasive and non-invasive species — whereas traditional infrastructure can kill them.

“We have our federal aquatic species regulation, which prevents us from moving or transporting invasive species, which we know we have in our water courses,” Samanatha Maki, director of engineering and operations services at the City of Pitt Meadows, said at a council meeting in February. 

Azeez said both invasive and non-invasive fish have been killed by pumps in Pitt Meadows. She said the city is relying on the assumption that federal regulation allows for the killing of native species so long as invasive species are killed as well. But, she said, this is “not necessarily accurate.” 

The Fisheries Act prohibits human activities and projects that result in the “death of fish by means other than fishing” and the “harmful alteration, disruption or destruction of fish habitat.”

The Aquatic Invasive Species Regulations prohibits the release of invasive species and allows eradication of those species, but “the prohibition on harm to non-invasive species under the Fisheries Act continues to apply,” Azeez said.

She added there are more efficient ways to address the impacts invasive species can have on non-invasive fish, such as protecting and restoring habitat and improving water quality.

Another big obstacle for many municipalities is the cost of fish-friendly infrastructure, which can be more expensive up front than existing designs, Azeez said. 

At the council meeting, Maki conceded this was a major factor in the recommendation to go with standard pumps. “One of the biggest drivers is cost, with fish-friendly pumps being twice the cost,” she said in reference to the capital cost. She added that the maintenance cost is “a bit of an unknown,” while the existing pumps are “reliable technology.” 

Azeez and Hill want the government to adjust infrastructure funding requirements to advance fish-friendly options in collaboration with local governments and First Nations. 

A spokesperson from the Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development told The Narwhal by email the province “encourages” fish-friendly infrastructure, but local authorities are responsible for developing that infrastructure.

Councillor calls for regional plan to bring back fish habitat to the Fraser 

While municipalities use provincial money to build more non-fish-friendly infrastructure, the province and the federal government are investing in habitat restoration through the salmon restoration and innovation fund, which supports projects to protect and revitalize salmon populations. The almost $150-million fund will be distributed over five years.

In 2019, MakeWay (formerly Tides Canada) received almost $600,000 from the fund to identify priority sites and fund infrastructure upgrades at those sites that would also make way for fish. In one of those projects, Watershed Watch is helping Port Coquitlam upgrade its pump station and floodgate at Maple Creek.

“It’s been on Port Coquitlam’s to-do list for a while, but they never really had the money to do it,” Azeez said.

Maple Creek supports all seven species of salmon, as well as steelhead and cutthroat trout. But spawning grounds are blocked by a floodgate, a “big metal door” that blocks out aquatic life, said Laura Dupont, a Port Coquitlam city councillor. While the old floodgate remains closed most of the time, the new gate would remain open at low tide.

Flood infrastructure blocks 1,500 kilometres of current or potential salmon habitat in the lower Fraser River, including important spawning habitat. Photo: Eiko Jones / Watershed Watch Salmon Society

Dupont believes the payoffs will be fast.

“Life comes back so quickly. Nature is so resilient,” she said.

“I would expect within one spawning season, we should see salmon returning and being able to spawn, and just letting life back into a waterway that’s been deprived of it for too long.”

In 2018, Dupont brought a resolution forward to the Union of B.C. Municipalities to prioritize fish-friendly flood infrastructure. The resolution passed and was presented to the province as a recommendation to consider for future decision-making. She said there needs to be a regional plan to bring back fish habitat in the Fraser.

“Municipality by municipality is so piecemeal,” she said, adding that she’d like to see enough funding to update all floodgates along the lower Fraser.

Innovative fish-friendly infrastructure can restore habitat and protect land

While fish-friendly infrastructure may be more expensive, the payoffs can be huge.

In Washington state, public-private partnership Floodplains by Design issues grants for projects that reduce flood risk and restore habitat. Between 2013 and 2018, it funded 36 projects on 13 major floodplains thanks to US$115 million from the Washington legislature. The projects have removed 700 residences from high-risk floodplain areas, restored 40 kilometres of salmon habitat and protected 200 hectares of agricultural land.  

In the Netherlands, severe flooding in the 1990s forced more than 250,000 people to evacuate and prompted the government to develop a more innovative approach to flood management. The Room for the River project, launched in 2007 and completed in 2018, lowered floodplains, created water buffers, relocated levees, increased the depth of side channels and built flood bypasses. 

As part of the Netherland’s Room for the River project, a new channel was dug for the Waal river, creating an island in the city of Nijmegen. Photo: Richard Brunsveld / Unsplash

Azeez also pointed to the living dike project, a collaboration between the cities of Delta and Surrey and Semiahmoo First Nation. Instead of building an existing concrete dike higher to protect communities from sea level rise, which would mean encroaching on more land and vital salmon habitat, the coalition has launched a project to gradually increase the elevation of the foreshore over 30 years in hopes of providing natural protection and preserving the salt marsh habitat.

Looking at innovations that have taken place around the world and close to home, Hill said the fact that the Fraser River lacks an innovative flood management plan amounts to “government inertia.”

“There’s a lot of fear around moving away from the status quo,” he said. “But it really hasn’t served us very well.”

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Biologist Eric Balke was biking through Richmond, B.C., a few years ago when something caught his eye. He stopped at the dike and looked over to the other side — and saw a huge salt marsh expanding in front of him. He was surprised he’d never known it was there.

“I’m a biologist. I should have known better,” he mused. “It’s like you build a dike and that’s the end of the world, that’s the end of the area we care about.” 

“But these marshes are truly the gem of the Fraser estuary.” 

Salt marshes — coastal wetlands flooded and drained by salt water — can be found butting up against dikes throughout the Fraser River estuary, an internationally recognized centre of biodiversity with 17,000 hectares of wetlands. The sandy banks of salt marshes are filled with seagrass and low brush. Eagles fly overhead, eyeing sturgeon stranded on the bank. Packs of coyotes howl at nightfall.

But sea level rise caused by climate change threatens these rich ecosystems, which support migratory birds, salmon, seals and other marine life. Dikes, built to prevent flooding, make them even more vulnerable. When the sea level rises, salt marshes can migrate landward — but not if they’re blocked by structures like dikes. This phenomenon is called coastal squeeze. Communities behind those dikes are also at risk of catastrophic flooding if the ocean breaches the dikes.

The salt marshes in Boundary Bay are being conscripted in a novel fight against climate change-induced sea level rise as part of a ‘living dike’ solution. Photo: City of Surrey

Coastal squeeze is threatening Boundary Bay, home to another salt marsh in the estuary. But making the existing dike taller would also mean making it wider, encroaching on the salt marsh on one side or agricultural land on the other.

To protect the salt marsh and nearby communities, a coalition — which includes the City of Surrey, the City of Delta and the Semiahmoo First Nation — has formed to try an innovative solution.

It is creating a “living dike.”

In a pilot project at Boundary Bay, a 250-kilometre stretch of seashore that spans the three jurisdictions, the partners plan to deposit sediment in the marsh over three decades to raise its elevation and create a natural dike that can survive sea level rise. The gradual pace will allow plant life to adapt. Adding sediment too fast could bury plants and affect animals that use those plants for food or shelter. 

The hope is the marsh will survive and continue to provide wave protection for the people living nearby. Salt marshes in front of coastal dikes can reduce wave heights near the shore by as much as 40 per cent, slowing down wave energy and reducing the risk of flooding. They can also attenuate rainwater. Balke said eelgrass, which is abundant in salt marshes, can stabilize sediment, reduce erosion and further cushion wave action. 

Ducks fly along the waters of Boundary Bay. Photo: Tim Fitzgerald / Ducks Unlimited Canada

Biologist Eric Balke is working on a pilot project to turn the salt marsh in B.C.’s Boundary Bay into a living dike. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

Wild horsetail along McNeeleys Trail in Boundary Bay. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

The vision is: homes will remain, the salt marsh will remain, the dike will remain. While it will take decades of work and hundreds of millions of dollars, if the project is a success, no one will notice a thing.

This is drastically different from the notable concrete, human-made infrastructure to mitigate flooding, which has disrupted natural processes in the Fraser estuary such as salmon migration. This pilot project aims to strengthen the built-in protection of this ecosystem. 

“These ecosystems are infrastructure. The whole point of the living dike is harnessing that power,” said Balke, who is coordinator of the South Coast Conservation Land Management Program and part of the Boundary Bay Living Dike Roundtable, a group providing input and guidance for the project.

West Coast Environmental Law estimates the cost for the living dike will be $175 to $250 million. For the pilot phase, Delta and Surrey have committed just under $3.5 million combined. The federal government pledged more than $76 million to mitigate coastal flooding in Delta, Surrey and the Semiahmoo First Nation, which includes funding for the project. Some costs will be covered by the province.

Design work is set to start later this year.

A map of the Fraser estuary. Map: Carol Linnitt / The Narwhal

Using ‘the most important ecosystems in B.C.’ to prevent flooding

Flooding has always happened in the Fraser delta, but intense spring thaws and storm surges have put more people at risk. According to the Insurance Bureau of Canada, 1.7 million Canadian households — or 19 per cent of Canada’s population — are at risk of river and surface water flooding. 

A 2016 report by the Fraser Basin Council said a major flood in the Lower Mainland could be the most costly disaster in Canadian history. The report predicts a coastal flood would result in losses of $19 billion and a Fraser River flood would lead to losses of almost $23 billion. 

In another study, the council found that dikes in B.C. “generally do not meet current provincial standards and none fully meet or exceed the standards.”

Salt marshes remain an often-underrated ecosystem, even though they have a role to play in mitigating the impacts of sea level rise, which the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts will likely exceed one metre globally by 2100 (though predictions vary). 

Over the next three decades, sediment will slowly be deposited in the salt marsh in Boundary Bay to turn it into a living dike. Photo: City of Surrey

Balke said these marshes are “arguably the most important ecosystems in B.C.” since they support millions of migratory birds and provide critical habitat for juvenile salmon on their journey from the Fraser River to the ocean. 

The marshes provide space for salmon to grow, eat, rest and adapt to saltwater life. When the tide is high, the marshes are filled with invertebrates for salmon to feed on. When the tide goes out, the sand is picked over by small mammals and birds hunting for molluscs. 

Boundary Bay is home to a salt marsh that’s at the heart of an ambitious plan to protect nearby communities from sea level rise. Photo: City of Surrey

A eagle flies over the water near Boundary Bay, a 250-kilometre stretch of seashore that provides important habitat to bird species. Photo: City of Surrey

The rich soils support microbial life and can absorb as much atmospheric carbon per unit area as soils in tropical rainforests. 

Human-made infrastructure gets in the way of salt marshes doing their job. For instance, jetties and dikes disrupt natural sediment deposit processes and restrict salmon movement. 

Concrete versus natural infrastructure

Sumas Lake in Abbotsford once absorbed freshet from the Fraser River in the spring, mitigating flooding. But settlers disliked the mosquitos and drained the lake in 1924, building an artificial canal and pump station to control water flow. 

Murray Ned, councillor for Semá:th (Sumas) First Nation, said the lake was their “livelihood” and was home to salmon, wolves and elk.

“It was probably the biggest impact on our community at the time, and even today, because we now no longer have that resource at our front door, so to speak,” said Ned, whose ancestral name is Kwilosintun. 

The living dike provides an opportunity to return to a more harmonious approach to working with nature as communities adapt to climate change, said Deborah Carlson, a staff lawyer at West Coast Environmental Law, who is also part of the living dike roundtable.

“It’s having a relationship with that coastal ecosystem,” she said. “A relationship that acknowledges that salt marsh is taking care of us, and [we’re] taking care of it.”

She said it can be complicated to experiment in areas with “complex, overlapping jurisdictions” like Boundary Bay but collaborative projects like this will be needed to adapt to climate change. 

Semá:th (Sumas) First Nation Councillor Murray Ned said it’s imperative that First Nations work with all levels of government on flood mitigation. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

Juvenile fish swim in an Abbotsford waterway during an interview with Semá:th (Sumas) First Nation Councillor Murray Ned. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

Matt Osler, Surrey’s program manager for disaster mitigation, agreed.

“Flooding doesn’t get held back by jurisdictional boundaries,” he told The Narwhal. 

Compared to all the dikes, jetties and pump stations, Osler said the living dike will be more “adaptable and resilient” — able to migrate or grow. He has high hopes for what this project could mean for the communities involved.

“We know we just have to try it and see if it works,” he said. “Maybe with climate change, we have to do things differently. We at least have to be asking the question of how we can do it differently.”

The Semiahmoo First Nation was not available for comment before publication.

A butterfly in the wild grasses along the Boundary Bay dike. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

Boundary Bay marsh in a part of the coastal wetlands that are flooded and drained by salt water. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

Horseback riders enjoy the Boundary Bay Dike Trail on May 18, 2020 in the territory of the Semiahmoo First Nation. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

Climate change adaptation must be ‘collaborative effort’ with First Nations

The living dike project also provides an example of working in equal partnership with First Nations on flood management instead of working around them, Ned said.

In 2014, the City of Abbotsford undertook emergency flood work without consulting the First Nation and destroyed a Semá:th fishing site in the process. Last year, Abbotsford and the province signed a memorandum of understanding with the Semá:th agreeing to consult with the nation on flood response from now on.

“That was a major crisis in our community, the loss of that fishing site,” Ned said.

In addition to being on council for the Semá:th First Nation, Ned is part of the Emergency Planning Secretariat, an Indigenous organization that works with First Nations to help them build capacity to respond to floods. The secretariat wants to facilitate a coordinated flood management strategy across Coast Salish communities along the Fraser River. The secretariat is also participating in discussions around the living dike.

The Serpentine Fen is a part of the larger wetland supported by a system of dikes in the Fraser estuary and is protected as a nature reserve. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

Agricultural land adjacent to the Serpentine Fen. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

He said it’s integral for First Nations to work on equal footing with other jurisdictions.

“This work we’re talking about can’t be done solely by First Nations or solely by the provincial or federal governments,” Ned said. “It has to be a collaborative effort.”

First Nations are often in low-lying areas at risk of floods and have little protection, largely due to colonization. 

“When the Indian Act came into effect and constrained them to these small areas, they happened to be at their fish camps at the time, so that’s why a lot of reserves are near the river,” said Gillian Fuss, project coordinator for the secretariat. 

First Nations are at risk of losing fishing sites, cultural sites and graveyards to flooding. But band councils are often too overstretched to have an employee dedicated to emergency planning. The secretariat works with First Nations to increase that capacity.

Tyrone McNeil is also on the secretariat and is vice-president of the Stó:lō Tribal Council. He said his community, the Seabird Island Band, has lost 600 hectares of land to erosion and has been struggling to build up infrastructure that also protects salmon habitat. 

Boundary Bay’s West Dike Trail is home to a large marsh area. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

A duck takes off in the wetland of Beach Grove, an important part of the Fraser estuary marsh system. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

He said planning is much more difficult due to climate change.

“Say, 40 years ago, we had a pretty good idea of what to expect for freshet,” he said. “Now, with climate change, you can take every predictive modelling and toss it out.”

Richmond’s West Dike Trail looking toward the Fraser River and, beyond that, the North Shore mountains. Photo: Jennifer Osborne / The Narwhal

McNeil wants to prepare for a two-metre sea level rise.

He said another challenge that hasn’t been talked about enough is the probability of needing to move reserves to higher elevations due to flooding and sea level rise, something that would take years to complete. He said this will also take collaboration between First Nations and federal and provincial governments to find new reserves and start building as soon as 2040.

“[First Nations] need that long-term planning ability. We’re at the earliest stages of developing that,” he said.

Without that capacity, “We’re going to be losing a whole lot more land,” he warned.

And the solution for that, without major impacts on the ecosystem, won’t be found in concrete.

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Gary Krause was mystified by an unusual fish he caught in his trawl net off B.C.’s Pacific north coast in October. It was a Pacific electric ray, named for a pair of organs behind its head that can knock a human adult down with a powerful shock.

Trawl fishery records show 88 of these rays in B.C. waters since 1996. Although an electric ray was first recorded off Vancouver Island’s west coast in 1928, nearly a quarter of the more recent sightings came from 2015 alone.

Fishermen like Krause, who worked an astounding 4,000 days at sea over the past 35 years, are often the first to observe the beginnings of fundamental ecosystem shifts. In 2008, he also identified the first ever brown booby, a tropical seabird, in Canada’s Pacific waters.

Why are creatures like electric rays, which prefer warmer southern California or Baja waters, turning up with greater frequency further north?

Unlike land temperatures, which constantly fluctuate, ocean temperatures are usually stable, with virtually no daily changes, little seasonal differentiation and only minor shifts over decades. Most marine animals prefer a narrow temperature range and move only in response to changes.

Short-term oceanographic events, such as El Niño and the Pacific “blob” — an enormous area of unusually warm water in the North Pacific — demonstrate that while oceans may be relatively stable, they aren’t immune to temperature shifts. These phenomena explain the appearance of unexpected species off B.C.’s coast over the past winter, including a Guadalupe fur seal, green sea turtle and Risso’s dolphins.

Higher water temperatures are also changing the relative concentrations of microscopic, occasionally toxic algae.

While these marine oddities don’t necessarily indicate a full-scale ecosystem shift, they may be signs of what to expect as the planet warms. Shorter-term phenomena correspond with longer-term oceanographic changes around the world. These changes promise to fundamentally alter the cast of characters in marine ecosystems before we’ve had the opportunity to adequately study them.

Climate change is pushing more species of fish closer — and faster — to the cooler North and South poles than similar climate-provoked wildlife movements on land. Fish are moving an average of 277 kilometres every decade and phytoplankton are speeding along at 470 kilometres. Land-based wildlife are inching along at an average of six kilometers a decade.

These shifts are bringing together species that have never had contact before, introducing new predators that could result in regional extinctions. In addition to moving, phytoplankton, which produce half the world's oxygen and support most ocean life, have been declining dramatically over the past century, an average of one per cent a year.

Sea levels are also rising quickly because of climate change. Over the past two decades, global levels have risen more than twice as fast as in the 20th century. As water warms up, it expands.

Thermal expansion in warmer ocean waters has been the greatest contributor to global sea level rise over the past century — although rapid melting of glaciers, polar ice caps, and Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets is also a factor.

Higher ocean temperatures also stress coral reefs, which then release algae, causing the corals to bleach and often die.

Australia’s Great Barrier Reef just experienced its worst bleaching ever, with the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority reporting that half the coral in the northern parts of the reef were dead, according to a Guardian article.

Along with environmental impacts, warming oceans will create economic insecurities for industries such as fisheries. One study predicted a nearly 50 per cent decline in B.C. First Nations’ catches for culturally and commercially important fish by 2050.

We can help marine life by reducing greenhouse gas emissions to keep global average temperature increases below the 1.5 C goal set out in the December Paris Agreement. Well-monitored fisheries, like those in British Columbia, will become essential data-collection points for understanding shifting marine environments.

Although it’s difficult to reverse temperature and other oceanographic changes that climate change has already set in motion, we may be able to lessen the impact through habitat protection, strong fisheries management and robust scientific monitoring.

The Pacific electric ray is just one of many marine canaries warning us of changing ecosystems. We’d be wise to listen to these signals.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation senior research scientist Scott Wallace.

Learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org.

Image: Pennington Marine Science Center/Youtube.

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By Aimée Slangen, Utrecht University and John Church, CSIRO

Global average sea level has risen by about 17 cm between 1900 and 2005. This is a much faster rate than in the previous 3,000 years.

The sea level changes for several reasons, including rising temperatures as fossil fuel burning increases the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. In a warming climate, the seas are expected to rise at faster rates, increasing the risk of flooding along our coasts. But until now we didn’t know what fraction of the rise was the result of human activities.

In research published in Nature Climate Change, we show for the first time that the burning of fossil fuels is responsible for the majority of sea level rise since the late 20th century.

As the amount of greenhouse gases we are putting into the atmosphere continues to increase, we need to understand how sea level responds. This knowledge can be used to help predict future sea level changes.

Measuring sea level

Nowadays, we can measure the sea surface height using satellites, so we have an accurate idea of how the sea level is changing, both regionally and in the global mean.

Prior to this (before 1993), sea level was measured by tide gauges, which are spread unevenly across the world. As a result, we have a poorer knowledge of how sea level has changed in the past, particularly before 1960 when there were fewer gauges.

Nevertheless, the tide gauge measurements indicate that global mean sea level has increased by about 17 cm between 1900 and 2005.

What drives sea level rise?

The two largest contributors to rising seas are the expansion of the oceans as temperatures rise, loss of mass from glaciers and ice sheets, and other sources of water on land. Although we now know what the most important contributions to sea-level rise are, we did not know what is driving these changes.

Changes in sea level are driven by natural factors such as natural climate variability (for example El Niño), ongoing response to past climate change (regional warming after the Little Ice Age), volcanic eruptions, and changes in the sun’s activity.

Volcanic eruptions and changes in the sun affect sea level across years to decades. Large volcanic eruptions can cause a temporary sea-level fall because the volcanic ash reduces the amount of solar radiation reaching the ocean, thus cooling the ocean.

Humans have also contributed to sea level rise by burning fossil fuels and increasing the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

Separating the causes

We used climate models to estimate ocean expansion and loss of mass from glaciers and ice sheets for each of the individual factors responsible for sea level change (human and natural). To this we added best estimates of all other known contributions to sea level change, such as groundwater extraction and additional ice sheet contributions.

We then compared these model results to the observed global mean 20th century sea-level change to figure out which factor was responsible for a particular amount of sea level change.

Over the 20th century as a whole, the impact of natural influences is small and explains very little of the observed sea-level trend.

The delayed response of the glaciers and ice sheets to the warmer temperatures after the Little Ice Age (1300-1870 AD) caused a sea-level rise in the early 20th century. This explains much of the observed sea-level change before 1950 (almost 70%), but very little after 1970 (less than 10%).

The human factor

The largest contributions to sea-level rise after 1970 are from ocean thermal expansion and the loss of mass from glaciers in response to the warming from increasing greenhouse gas concentrations. This rise is partly offset by the impact of aerosols, which on their own would cause a cooling of the ocean and less melting of glaciers.

The combined influence of these two factors (greenhouse gases and aerosols) is small in the beginning of the century, explaining only about 15% of the observed rise. However, after 1970, we find that the majority of the observed sea-level rise is a direct response to human influence (nearly 70%), with a slightly increasing percentage up to the present day.

When all factors are considered, the models explain about three quarters of the observed rise since 1900 and almost all of the rise over recent decades (almost 90% since 1970).

The reason for this difference can be found either in the models or in the observations. The models could underestimate the observed rise before 1970 due to, for instance, an underestimated ice sheet contribution. However, the quality and number of sea level observations before the satellite altimeter record is also less.

Tipping the scales

Our paper shows that the driving factors of sea-level change have shifted over the course of the 20th century.

Past natural variations in climate were the dominant factor at the start of the century, as a result of glaciers and ice sheets taking decades to centuries to adapt to climate change.

In contrast, by the end of the 20th century, human influence has become the dominant driving factor for sea-level rise. This will probably continue until greenhouse gas emissions are reduced and ocean temperatures, glaciers and ice sheets are in equilibrium with climate again.

Aimée Slangen, Postdoctoral research fellow, Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research, Utrecht University and John Church, CSIRO Fellow, CSIRO

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. Main image: A glacier at South Georgia Island. Credit: Flickr/DavidStanley

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This blog originally appeared on Carbon Brief.

The Canadian Rockies, which sit as a backdrop to many a stunning vista, could be almost entirely devoid of glaciers by the end of the century, a new study suggests.

Researchers modelled the impact of rising temperatures on glaciers across western Canada.

The results show widespread ice loss by 2050, and ice all but vanishing a few decades later.

Around 27,000 square kilometers of Western Canada is covered by glaciers, an area similar in size to the amount of ice in the Himalayas or the whole of South America.

For the new study, published in Nature Geoscience, the researchers developed a model to see how rising temperatures will affect the volume and area of glaciers in three regions in western Canada. These regions are shown in the map below: the coast (green sections), the interior (pink) and the Rockies (blue).

Map of study area in western Canada, including three subregions of the Coast (green), Interior (pink) and Rockies (blue). Present-day (2005) glacier extent is shown in white. Source: Clarke et al (2015)

The researchers looked at how temperature evolved under four different scenarios for future greenhouse gas emissions. Their model then calculated the amount of ice loss for glaciers in each region for each scenario.

You can see in the graphs below the striking losses of ice the model calculates. Even under the most stringent emissions cuts (RCP2.6, shown by the blue lines), glaciers in the Interior (bottom left graph) and Rockies (top right) regions are projected to lose around 70 per cent of their ice compared to 2005. Under higher emissions, they would lose 95 per cent of their ice.

Up until the middle of the century, the fate of most glaciers is similar for all four scenarios, the researchers say. But by 2100, there is a clearer separation between the amount of ice loss for each one.

Project percentage changes for ice volume of glaciers in each region: Coast (top left), Interior (bottom left), Rockies (top right) and All (bottom right). For four emissions scenarios, from lowest (RCP2.6, blue) to highest (RCP8.5, red). NARR (black) shows observed changes. Source: Clarke et al (2015)

Precipitation Likely to Fall as Rain, Not Snow

The projected decline in ice volume is mainly caused by rising temperatures, Prof Garry Clarke, lead author and professor of glaciology at University of British Columbia, tells Carbon Brief: "This has two different effects, neither of which is helpful to glaciers: One is more summer melting, and, two, is less winter snowfall."

Precipitation could actually increase under climate change, says Clarke, but rising winter temperatures mean it is more likely to fall as rain than as snow. And this is of no benefit to glaciers.

Ice loss is least drastic in the coastal region as it tends to receive more snow during winter, and cooler temperatures mean it loses less ice in summer, Clarke says. The glaciers in the very northwest are the most resilient to warming because they are at a higher elevation and get more snow than the other areas.

'Cutting-Edge' Research

The researchers' methods are at the cutting-edge for studying the fate of glaciers across large regions, says Dr Tobias Bolch, a senior glacier researcher at the University of Zurich, who wasn't involved in the study.

Glacier models tend to consider either an individual glacier in detail, or ice changes across a region more broadly, says Clarke. Theirs is the first to model both, analyzing many glaciers in detail at the same time.

Glacier model images of projections of ice extent for the Columbia Icefield during the 21st century, under a high emissions scenario (RCP8.5). Credit: Garry Clarke.

Dr Alex Gardner, a solid earth research scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at Caltech, tells Carbon Brief that the study manages to model the flow of ice in the glaciers: "Since mountain glaciers, by definition, are located in areas of complex topography, modeling this redistribution of ice has proven challenging at large scales. Garry Clarke and his colleagues make a considerable contribution to the field of glaciology by developing and employing a mathematical framework to do just this."

The authors have also made all the projections available online, so that other scientists can build on their work.

'Future is Dim'

The loss of these glaciers would contribute around 6mm to global sea levels. This is relatively modest, says Clarke, but there are other impacts that he thinks could be more of a concern.

For example, the glacier meltwater feeds alpine streams, keeping the region cool during hot, dry summer months. Losing this natural thermostat would affect freshwater ecosystems, he says.

But Clarke thinks the major loss will be the visual changes to the landscape as mountains lose their glacier cover. The glaciers provide a key tourist attraction. The Athabasca Glacier in the Rockies, for example, is the most-visited glacier in North America. Millions of people each year visit to clamber over the huge mass of ice, yet it is retreating and thinning already, says Clarke.

"Athabasca Glacier is doing badly at present and will fare worse as climate warming continues," Clarke says.

Canada's Glacier National Park, which sits in the 'interior' region of the study, will experience near-total loss of its glaciers by 2100, says Clarke.

The glaciers also give Canada's iconic mountain lakes their distinctive colour. Fine sediments, known as rock flour, are eroded by glaciers and then washed downstream by meltwater.

Banff National Park, for example, attracts 3 to 4 million tourists every year, many of whom come to see its brilliant emerald lakes, such as Lake Louise. However, as the glaciers disappear, these lakes will look very different by the end of the century, Clarke warns:

"The future of this kind of tourism is dim."

Lake Louise's brilliant emerald colour comes from glacier melt. Source: Karl Johnson via Flickr

So, is there any good news from this study? Clarke thinks the glaciers and lakes could still have a future if we act quickly to cut emissions. He says: "If we had the global will to hold to the mildest likely scenario for greenhouse gas increases, mountain glaciers would not entirely disappear from our study area."

Clarke, G.K.C. et al. (2015) Projected deglaciation of western Canada in the twenty-first century, Nature Geoscience, doi:10.1038/ngeo2407

Main Image: Snow dome from Athabasca Glacier by Jeroen van Luin via Flickr

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Canadian oil and gas companies could be liable for billions of dollars of damages per year for their contribution to climate change caused by toxic greenhouse gas emissions, according to a study published Thursday.

The study looked at five oil and gas companies currently trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange — Encana, Suncor, Canadian Natural Resources, Talisman, and Husky — and found they could presently be incurring a global liability as high as $2.4 billion annually.

“Climate change is increasingly discussed not as some far-off threat but in terms of current realities,” said the 62-page study — Payback Time? What the internationalization of climate litigation could mean for Canadian oil and gas companies.

Published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and West Coast Environmental Law (WCEL), the study found data showing the global financial cost of private and public property and other damage associated with climate change in 2010 has been estimated at $591 billion, rising to $4.2 trillion in 2030.

“That number is expected to increase dramatically in the coming years,” said the study written by Andrew Gage, WCEL staff counsel and University of British Columbia professor Michael Byers.

“In Canada, the National Roundtable on the Environment and the Economy has estimated that climate change will cost $5 billion annually by 2020. Given these significant costs, attention will inevitably shift to the issue of compensation and liability. In short, who will pay for the costs and damages caused by climate change, as well as the necessary adaptive measures?”

Fossil fuel companies and other large-scale greenhouse gas producers have contributed, globally, to trillions of dollars of damages related to climate change, Gage said in an accompanying media release.

“As with tobacco companies in the 1980s, these producers are confident the law will not hold them responsible for these damages,” Gage added.

“But rising levels of climate damage, increasing scientific evidence about the links between emissions and the damage they cause, and an emerging public debate about who is financially responsible for this damage, could change the situation very quickly.”

The most serious risk to Canadian companies is not litigation in Canada, the media release said. “Because the impacts and causes of climate change are global, climate damages litigation could take place in, and apply the laws of, any of the countries where damage occurs.”

Byers, Canada Research Chair in Global Politics and International Law, said substantial shifts will be required of large-scale greenhouse gas producers and their investors if they hope to manage the risk of climate damages litigation.

Those shifts include “moving away from fossil fuels, and supporting the adoption of international agreements that could link the reduction of liability risk to the provision of financial assistance or future emission reductions.”

The study concluded that the potential for climate damages litigation is global in scope.

“Cases could be brought in a large number of countries, under a wide range of legal theories, then enforced in Canada or other countries in which greenhouse gas producing companies have assets,” the study said.

“As a result, these companies and their shareholders are exposed to significant legal and financial risks — and these risks will only grow.”

In a telephone interview, Gage told DeSmog Canada that he is not aware of any successful climate damages litigation anywhere in the world, even in the highly litigious U.S.

“This is very new and in very early days but it is evolving fairly rapidly,” he said. “I would think there would be lawsuits of this type outside the U.S. within a couple of years but we’ll have to see.”

In a related commentary in Thursday’s Globe and Mail, Gage and Byers said climate change is no longer a distant threat.

“Canadian oil and gas companies could soon find themselves on the hook for at least part of the damage,” they wrote. “For as climate change costs increase, a global debate has begun about who should pay.”

They also noted Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu recently called on global leaders to hold those responsible for climate damages accountable.

“Just 90 corporations – the so-called carbon majors – are responsible for 63 per cent of CO2 emissions since the industrial revolution,” Tutu was quoted as saying. “It is time to change the profit incentive by demanding legal liability for unsustainable environmental practices.”

Image Credit: Zack Embree

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In less than a decade, climate change-induced sea level rise could force thousands of people to migrate from some small island developing states (SIDS), according to the executive director of the United Nations Environment Program.

The world’s 52 small island developing states (SIDS) increasingly share sea level rise and other escalating environmental threats that are further aggravated by economic insecurities, Achim Steiner added.

“What makes this situation even more grievous is that the climate change threats facing many SIDS are by-and-large not of their own making,” Steiner wrote in The Guardian. “Their total combined annual carbon dioxide output, although rising, accounts for less than 1% of global emissions.”

In his commentary, published in advance of this week’s third international conference on Small Island Developing States in Samoa, Steiner said small island states are suffering disproportionately from acts of environmental negligence of which humankind is collectively guilty.

“Larger economies, until recently, have managed better than small ones to mask the impacts of exhausting their natural capital and contributing heavily to greenhouse gas emissions, but the consequences of this neglect are catching up with them too,” he said.

Steiner said that recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates indicate that if average global temperatures increase by approximately 4 C, sea levels could rise as much as one metre by 2100.

That scenario, he added, “would see nations such as Kiribati, Maldives, Marshall Islands and Tuvalu become uninhabitable, while a large share of the population of many other SIDS could be displaced or otherwise.”

Addressing the conference, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a press release Monday that the world needs to listen to small islands as their issues have global consequences.

“I see small island developing states as a magnifying glass,” Ban said. “When we look through [their] lens, we see the vulnerabilities we all face. And by addressing the issues facing small island developing states we are developing the tools we need to promote sustainable development across the entire world.”

Ban added that the plight of small island developing states highlights the moral case for climate action. “By failing to act, we condemn the most vulnerable to unacceptable disruption to their lives.”

He also urged governments to commit to significant action at the Sept. 23 climate summit in New York.

“Small island developing states will have an important role. You can tell the largest emitters what action you expect from them. And you can show how you are working to build resilience and create the green economies of the future,” he said.

Samoan Prime Minister Tuilaepa Aiono Sailele Malielegaoi said global action is required to deal with sea level rise caused by climate change.

“Climate change is a global problem, yet international action to address it, remains grossly inadequate,” the Samoan prime minister said.

In addition to dealing with the ramifications of climate change, the conference is addressing environmental degradation and access to energy.

Photo: Easa Shamih via Flickr

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Two new academic studies released Monday reveal that the crucial West Antarctic ice sheet is now melting, a seemingly unstoppable disaster that could eventually trigger sea levels to rise by more than 14 feet (4.3 metres).

The studies could finally make politicians rethink how climate change is affecting humankind and how society is going to deal with the increasingly expensive cost of mitigating climate change caused by burning fossil fuels overheating our atmosphere.

One of the studies indicates the glaciers in the Amundsen Sea sector of West Antarctica “have passed the point of no return,” according to glaciologist and lead author Eric Rignot, of UC Irvine and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. The new study has been accepted for publication in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

NASA says the glaciers already contribute significantly to sea level rise, releasing almost as much ice into the ocean annually as the entire Greenland ice sheet. “They contain enough ice to raise global sea level by four feet (1.2 metres) and are melting faster than most scientists had expected,” according to a press release.

Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. Image Credit: NASA

“The collapse of this sector of West Antarctica appears to be unstoppable,” Rignot was quoted as saying. “The fact that the retreat is happening simultaneously over a large sector suggests it was triggered by a common cause, such as an increase in the amount of ocean heat beneath the floating sections of the glaciers. At this point, the end of this sector appears to be inevitable.”

Image from NASA's "The Unstable West Antarctic Ice Sheet: A Primer."

The other study, conducted by University of Washington researchers, also shows the collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet appears to have already begun. “The fast-moving Thwaites Glacier will likely disappear in a matter of centuries, researchers say, raising sea level by nearly two feet,” according to a media release.

“That glacier also acts as a linchpin on the rest of the ice sheet, which contains enough ice to cause another 10 to 13 feet (three to four metres) of global sea level rise. The study is to be published in Science.”  

Lead author Ian Joughin, a glaciologist at the UW’s Applied Physics Laboratory, said scientists looking at ice thinning previously didn’t know how fast the glacier would melt. “In our model simulations it looks like all the feedbacks tend to point toward it actually accelerating over time; there’s no real stabilizing mechanism we can see,” Joughin said.

“All of our simulations show it will retreat at less than a millimeter of sea level rise per year for a couple of hundred years, and then, boom, it just starts to really go,” Joughin said.

The studies suggest the ice sheet won’t totally melt for between 200 and 1,000 years, as they aren’t currently sure of the pace of melting, but they say the accompanying sea level rise is inevitable.

West Antarctica bed topography. Areas colored brown are below sea level. Sea level itself is colored yellow, and green areas are above sea level. Image credit: NASA/GSFC/SVS

And while scientists have been warning about the possibility of the West Antarctic ice sheet melting for years, the studies released Monday suggest that human-induced climate change is indeed redefining our world.

The two studies come just a week after an alarming U.S. National Climate Assessment report noted climate change is already occurring in every region of America and a month after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said global emissions of greenhouse gases have risen to unprecedented levels.

Together the recent reports could force politicians, engineers, money markets, health planners, military leaders and insurance companies to more aggressively embrace climate change as humankind’s most pressing issue.

Ironically, as sea levels rise, offshore oil exploration platforms and drilling rigs — one of the most high-profile symbols of society’s addiction to fossil fuels — will also have to deal with problems associated with higher seas. But almost certainly the most negatively affected will be the more than a billion people estimated to live along low-lying coastlines, some of which will most likely be abandoned over time.

Image Credit: Thwaites Glacier, NASA

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Climate change is already negatively affecting every region in the United States and the future looks even more dismal if coordinated mitigation and adaptation efforts are not immediately aggressively pursued, according to the third U.S. National Climate Assessment report released Tuesday.

“Climate change, once considered an issue for a distant future, has moved firmly into the present,” notes the massive NCA report.

“Corn producers in Iowa, oyster growers in Washington State, and maple syrup producers in Vermont are all observing climate-related changes that are outside of recent experience. So, too, are coastal planners in Florida, water managers in the arid Southwest, city dwellers from Phoenix to New York, and Native Peoples on tribal lands from Louisiana to Alaska.”

The report adds evidence of human-induced climate change continues to strengthen and that impacts are increasing across the nation. The report says Americans are already noticing the results of climate change, from longer and hotter summers to shorter and warmer winters. Rain falls in heavier downpours, there is more flooding, earlier snow melt, more severe wildfires and less summer sea ice in the Arctic.

“Scientists who study climate change confirm that these observations are consistent with significant changes in Earth’s climatic trends,” says the report that was prepared by hundreds of scientists for the U.S. government.

“Precipitation patterns are changing, sea level is rising, the oceans are becoming more acidic, and the frequency and intensity of some extreme weather events are increasing.”

The climatic changes are triggering wide-ranging impacts in every region of the U.S. and throughout the nation’s economy, the report says, adding that while some of the changes can be positive over the short run, most are detrimental since American society and its infrastructure was not designed for the rapidly-changing climate now being experienced.

The report analyses impacts on human health, water, energy, transportation, agriculture, forests, and ecosystems. It also assesses impacts on the country’s eight major regions.

“What is new over the last decade is that we know with increasing certainty that climate change is happening now,” the report says. “While scientists continue to refine projections of the future, observations unequivocally show that climate is changing and that the warming of the past 50 years is primarily due to human-induced emissions of heat-trapping gases. These emissions come mainly from burning coal, oil, and gas, with additional contributions from forest clearing and some agricultural practices.”

Noting that the climate is projected to continue to change over this century and beyond, the report says there is still time to act to limit the amount of change and its damaging impacts.

The report says U.S. average temperature has increased by 1.3°F to 1.9°F since 1895, with the most recent decade being the nation’s and the world’s hottest on record.

Temperatures are projected to rise another 2°F to 4°F in most areas of the U.S. over the next few decades. The report says by the end of this century, a roughly 3°F to 5°F rise is projected under a lower emissions scenario, which would require substantial reductions in emissions, while a higher emissions scenario assuming continued increases in emissions, predominantly from fossil fuel combustion, would result in a 5°F to 10°F rise.

Many scientists suggest that the safe and manageable level of global temperature rise due to climate change should not exceed 3.6 °F (2°C) above pre-industrial levels.

“Climate change poses a major challenge to U.S. agriculture because of the critical dependence of agricultural systems on climate,” the report says.

“The United States produces nearly $330 billion per year in agricultural commodities. This productivity is vulnerable to direct impacts on crops and livestock from changing climate conditions and extreme weather events and indirect impacts through increasing pressures from pests and pathogens.”

“Climate change will also alter the stability of food supplies and create new food security challenges for the United States as the world seeks to feed nine billion people by 2050.”

Water quality and quantity are already being affected by climate change, the report says, adding changes in precipitation and runoff, combined with changes in consumption and withdrawal, have reduced surface and groundwater supplies and increasing the likelihood of water shortages for many uses.

The report adds that climate change affects human health in many ways.

“Increasingly frequent and intense heat events lead to more heat-related illnesses and deaths and, over time, worsen drought and wildfire risks, and intensify air pollution,” the report says.

“Increasingly frequent extreme precipitation and associated flooding can lead to injuries and increases in waterborne disease. Rising sea surface temperatures have been linked with increasing levels and ranges of diseases. Rising sea levels intensify coastal flooding and storm surge, and thus exacerbate threats to public safety during storms.”

The report says that Americans face choices as the impacts of climate change are becoming more prevalent. It adds that some additional climate change impacts are now unavoidable because of past emissions of long-lived heat-trapping gases.

“The amount of future climate change, however, will still largely be determined by choices society makes about emissions. Lower emissions of heat-trapping gases and particles mean less future warming and less-severe impacts; higher emissions mean more warming and more severe impacts.”

The report may give President Barack Obama more power to deal with climate change, the environment and energy issues through administrative amendments during his last 2.5 years in office. On Tuesday, the White House issued a media release saying the report underscores “the need for urgent action to combat the threats from climate change, protect American citizens and communities today, and build a sustainable future for our kids and grandkids.”

Lou Leonard, the World Wildlife Fund’s vice president for climate change, said the report provides a pathway for Americans to choose a more beneficial future.

“We need to use this practical report as a guidebook for preparing local communities for extreme weather and other climate impacts,” Leonard said. “At the same time, we need to transform the way we produce and use energy, leaving dirty coal, oil and gas behind. There is no time to lose.”

Sierra Club executive director Michael Brune applauded the report and urged the Obama administration to promote clean energy solutions like wind and solar power. “We can create good American jobs and power homes and businesses nationwide without polluting our air, water, or climate,” Brune said.

Image Credit: Map showing consecutive dry days from NCA report website

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I've always had a deep affinity for nature, having been blessed to spend my childhood summers on the idyllic and mysteriously underpopulated pristine beaches of Nova Scotia’s Northumberland shore.

During the summers, my extended family would sometimes gather around the red varnished picnic tables in our backyard, for feasts of clams, mussels and sometimes oysters that we had gathered from the shores near the cottage built by my great grandfather in 1917. These gatherings – attended by young and old, aunts, uncles, nephews, neices, siblings and parents of multiple generations – stand out as cherished highlights of my youth.

One day, quite a few summers ago, a neighbour noticed us struggling to haul our aluminium boat across the hot white sand beach, and kindly offered to lend a hand, as local beachgoing etiquite dictates. When we finally reached the water the helpful neighbour (who happened to be a family physician) asked where we were headed. I explained that we were going off to dig some clams. His demeanour changed as he warned that it was too risky to eat the wild shellfish anymore, due to the danger of potentially fatal paralytic shellfish poisoning (PSP). I later learned that PSP was occurring around the entire region with increasing frequency.

The realization that my son might never experience the time honoured family tradition of clam digging greatly underscored the poignancy of this sad and unwelcome revelation.

My son Julian on the beach near my family's cottage in Nova Scotia.

This stuck in my mind long after my return to Ottawa that summer, as I pondered how something on such a scale could occur, and what it portended. I had personally and ominously been witness to the end of a traditional activity that had likely been practiced for 10,000 years.

Change is in the Air

I have been following the unfolding saga of climate change since it first started appearing in the media. For quite a few years it has been my main area of concern, and I am an abnormally avid follower of current affairs. It’s not unusual for me to read a dozen or more reports on the subject in the course of a day. Lately the deluge of articles on climate change and related events such as extreme weather has become completely overwhelming. If the frequency of media reports is at all indicative, the impacts of this phenomenon are accelerating very rapidly. But perhaps even more telling is the increasing concern of the experts.

Scientists and science journalists are alarmed. And scientists are a curiously conservative bunch. Professionally obligated to deal in evidence and not emotion, you may have read or heard statements such as "we're not in the business of making predictions." The scientific culture is one wherein statements are scrutinized or criticized if there is no credible source (typically peer-reviewed papers published in esteemed scientific journals) to support an assertion. Given that, for there to be such a vast scientific consensus on the fact that climate change is happening, and that it is almost exclusively caused by human generated greenhouse gas emissions, lends significantly more gravity to this issue than perhaps most people appreciate.  And yet, the effects of climate change, even to a casual observer, seem to be dramatically outpacing most of the predictions many are familiar with. I asked the noted scientist and author Michael Mann, who introduced the world to the famous “hockey stick graph,” about this discrepancy and the track record of underestimating the rate of climate change by the IPCC and he responded:

“The current projections (e.g. as described in the most recent report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) have in many respects been too conservative, underestimating for example the rate of decline in Arctic sea ice. That may, in turn, be influencing the pattern of the jet stream, in such a way that certain effects – heat waves, floods, droughts – become more persistent. The precise impacts are uncertain. But rather than being an argument for inaction, as contrarians in the climate change debate often like to claim, it is a reason for more immediate and more concerted action. The uncertainties could well cut against us, giving us impacts that are considerably worse than what the model projections currently forecast."

I also asked acclaimed scientist Naomi Oreskes why scientists are reluctant to publicly express the full extent of their concern, as many have to me in less public venues, and she supplied the following comment on the subject:

“We call the phenomena 'erring on the side of least drama.' The culture of science also discourages scientists from talking about how they feel, so even if they feel worried, concerned, anxious, scared, terrified, these are not words that scientists will normally use. Scientists are ill-equipped, both individually and collectively, to speak clearly about things that are worrisome – or indeed, that provoke any kind of emotional response at all.”

Meanwhile, journalists, scientists and citizen groups alike have taken on the unfortunate but necessary task of combating the fossil fuel industry’s well orchestrated and heavily funded misinformation campaign. A campaign dedicated  to undermining and bringing the established science into doubt in the minds of the general public for the sole purpose of protecting their vast and grossly disproportionate financial interests. At the same time the mainstream media has been under-reporting and frequently mis-reporting the issue while the climatic stability that has facilitated the rise of civilization for millennia seems to be rapidly deteriorating before our eyes.

Given that CO2 molecules will persist in the atmosphere for a century even if all emissions ceased today we know that the trends we are witnessing will continue well into the future. If we unleash any of a number of uncontrollable tipping points, we may induce changes that will continue for thousands of years, if we haven’t done so already.

Watch Coral Reefs Die as Ocean Temperatures Rise, Water Acidifies on PBS. See more from PBS NewsHour.

Whether or not someone is familiar with – or concerned about – the mechanisms behind this phenomenon, one only need scan the headlines on any given day to appreciate how our world is changing.

Amongst the staggering volume of recent empirical evidence: unprecedented extreme weather events such as epic and life threatening heat waves, tornados, hurricanes, historic flooding,and all-around crazy weather; persistent droughts; crop failures and diminishing crop yeilds; the proliferation of invasive species; rapidly depleting aquifers; warming oceans; peak soil; dying forests; raging forest fires; disappearing coral reefs and marine ecosystems; unprecedented rates of species extinction; sea level rise and hyper expensive projects to attempt to mitigate against it; spreading diseases; severe coastal erosion; vanishing glaciers and polar ice sheets, strained cross-border relations over rapidly depleting critical resources; and ocean acidification, which could ultimately pose a mortal threat to all marine and terrestrial organisms.

Any one of the above should be cause for grave concern, in combination they represent unprecedented challenges for humanity.

The Incalculable Cost

We are now left to grapple with the incalculable risks and costs associated with a highly unstable and rapidly changing planetary biosphere: the loss of thousands of species that have contributed to nourishing and sustaining humanity for eons. And only a select few benefit from the very cause of our demise: primarily the fossil fuel industry and its political backers. It could be argued that any member of industrialized civilization contributes to climate change just by being part of modern society. However, the vast majority of us would opt for cleaner and cheaper sources of energy if we had the choice.

Yet, despite all of these outrageous offences, and decades of warnings, our governments continue to generously subsidize the fossil fuel industry. And our political affairs seem easily swayed by disproportionate wealth, power and political influence. Organized campaigns work to deceive decision-makers and the general public about the dangerous reality of climate change or the affects of highly-polluting fossil fuels. And, by and large, we tolerate their efforts to undermine and impede the development of cleaner alternative sources of energy; sources that would mitigate the effects of climate change, reduce pollution and liberate us from energy tyranny.

Climate Externalities

Ordinary people around the world, particularly the poor – now and many generations into the future – will bear the burden of this incalculable expense on behalf of the fossil fuel industry and its “externalities” – those expenses the industry outsources to the public.

These un-paid-for expenses amount to an additional subsidy of massive proportions. If the true dollar cost – not to mention the human cost – of our addiction to fossil fuels could ever be calculated, the industry would surely be insolvent many times over. Recent efforts to calculate things like the ‘social cost of carbon’ show just how expensive our continued reliance on fossil fuels really is. It's fair to say this represents the greatest ponzi scheme in human history – by far.

If our leaders were serious about resolving this problem, nations would come together and devote all resources necessary to address this crisis immediately. STAT.

Making the Transition

What we need (and I’m not the first to say this) is something akin to the Apollo program, which landed humans on the moon in 1969 – except bigger – if we are to avert catastrophic outcomes. It must, for instance, rapidly advance, and broadly implement, cheap and clean alternative sources of energy, dramatically improve energy efficiency while reducing the consumption of fossil fuels and stop unfairly subsidizing fossil fuels.

There are no silver bullets here, as many will remind you. And there likely aren’t short term answers, such as geoengineering, that don’t involve huge risks of geopolitical conflict or unpredictable outcomes. But international governments are already bracing themselves for very serious and widespread problems that are already arising from their failure to act on globally significant environmental issues.

Yet we are racing to exploit even the dirtiest and resource intensive fossil fuels while we have been warned that up to 80 per cent of reserves must stay in the ground in order to maintain a habitable planet for future generations.

It’s well past time to make the switch to cleaner sources of energy and yet we have barely begun to embrace the idea. At least not popularly. At least not yet.

In the meantime some scientists have dire warnings about how bad things could get if we do not take urgent action immediately. Paleontologist Peter Ward told me such large scale changes to Earth’s biosphere should be considered against the backdrop of the ancient history of our (one-and-only) planet:

“What is missing in the current debates about climate change and their anticipated results on both the physical and biological worlds (where in fact "anticipated" should not be interpreted in the hopeful sense sometimes attached the word, if Deep Time is any indicator) is that, like politics, we as a society cannot seem to expand our temporal view either far enough into the past or future to encompass the full effects that a rapidly warming world, with a rapidly rising sea level can wreak.

The reality is that in the deep past, the many million years old past, short term warming caused by volcanically produced carbon dioxide increases in the global atmosphere have begun chains of events ending in mass extinction.

Repeatedly.”

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