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["Marie McHarry" <mmcharry AT gmail.com>]

Lately I've read a couple of articles that suggest strongly that the
American West will be hit hard by global warming, so concerns about
local carrying capacity may become moot. Or not. It remains to be seen
what happens when major weather patterns change.

The following is just another projection, but something to think
about. I imagine I'll have been dead 20 or more years by the time it
seriously starts to get bad, just another perk of advancing age.


http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/oct2006/2006-10-13-03.asp

Failure to Tackle Global Warming Could Cost Trillions

LONDON, England, October 13, 2006 (ENS) - The world economy could suffer a
$20 trillion hit by century's end if governments fail to address global
warming, according to new report by two American economists. The report,
released today, warns the figure - equal to six to eight percent of
projected global economic output in 2100 - is likely an underestimate
because it does not account for the cost of biodiversity loss or of
unpredictable events such as extreme weather or the collapse of the Gulf
Stream.

"The climate system has enormous momentum, as does the economic system that
emits so much carbon dioxide," said coauthor Frank Ackerman, an economist
with Tufts University's Global Development and the Environment Institute.
"We have to start turning off greenhouse gas emissions now in order to avoid
catastrophe in decades to come."

The authors contend the true costs of climate change are incalculable, but
argue that relatively small amounts of money are needed to keep temperatures
in check.

Action to limit temperature increases to two degrees centigrade could avoid
$12 trillion in annual damages at a quarter of the cost, the report said.

"The world, as a whole, can just barely, cope with the impacts of the first
2 degrees of warming, but only if there are immediate, large-scale, and
creative approaches to international equity and cooperation," the report
said.


Global temperatures have already risen by 0.6 degrees centigrade above
pre-industrial levels. If emissions continue to rise unchecked global
temperatures could increase by more than four degrees centigrade by 2100.
The world is very likely to hit a 2 degree increase without rapid action,
the report said, with an array of costly environmental impacts - including
decreased crop yields in the developing world, as well as from widespread
drought and water shortages.

Other impacts include a near total loss of coral reefs, the expanded
northward spread of tropical diseases such as malaria, and the potential
extinction of arctic species including the polar bear.

The report "Climate Change the Costs of Inaction" was compiled by economists
at Tufts University's Global Development and Environment Institute. The
study brings together the very latest scientific and economic thinking on
climate change.

"This report demonstrates that climate change will not only be an
environmental and social disaster: it will also be an economic catastrophe,
especially if global temperatures are allowed to increase by more than two
degrees centigrade," said Elizabeth Blast of Friends of the Earth, which
commissioned the report.

The study warns that a three degree temperature increase will have further
impacts on world food supplies, spread diseases and potentially cause the
wholesale collapse of the Amazon ecosystem as well as the complete loss of
all boreal and alpine ecosystems.

If temperatures rise four degrees by century's end, sea levels will rise
five to six meters, the report said, putting vast tracks of land underwater
and producing millions of environmental refugees. Elsewhere entire regions
will have no agricultural production whatsoever as a result of the changing
climate.

A temperature increase of more than four degrees, the report said, will
bring a 50 percent chance that the ocean's circulation system will shut
down, removing the crucial currents that warm and stabilize the climate of
Northern Europe.