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This is the text of my most recent column. It is scheduled to run
on Friday, Nov. 11.<br>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">When at the Morgan Hill Library, I
normally scan the new books section looking for something
interesting. The last time I did this, I discovered <i>The World
in
2050</i>, a look at the future by Laurence C. Smith, Professor
of
Geography at UCLA. It is an easy read, but I frequently had to put
it aside to think about what I had just read. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">Smith set out to write a book about
the
way climate change affects the extreme northern portions of our
planet. But his many conversations, especially with indigenous
people of the North, convinced him that he needed to broaden his
scope. The result is a sobering anticipation of what this world
will be like in 2050. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">According to Professor Smith, four
primary forces are changing the world for all of us: population
growth, resource depletion, climate change and globalization. It
makes sense to look at them in that order. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">The population of Earth has just
reached 7 billion. some are thinking long and hard about how we
are
going feed all of them. We see drought and famine in the Horn of
Africa now and most of us appear to be bystanders to that
unfolding
tragedy. Many had died. More have take to the road to escape this
tragedy. But the facts are that we are adding the population of
the
United States every 4 years. By 2050, there will be 9 billion
people, not 7. We will have added another China and the task of
feeding them will be much harder. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">Population growth will not be
distributed evenly. While most countries will see their
populations
increase, a few, notably Japan, Russia, Korea, Germany and Italy
are
projected to experience a population decline. In the case of
Japan,
perhaps 20%. Almost all of the growth will be urban. In 2008, for
the first time, more people lived in an urban rather than a rural
setting. Fewer will be providing their own food, but will buy food
imported from somewhere near or far. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">All of those people will need new
urban
facilities to be built. New buildings, new transportation
infrastructure, new things, perhaps even new parks. What resources
will be required and at what cost? We already copper prices so
high
that people risk death to cut the copper from live electrical
facilities. At current usage rates the earth has only a 35 year
supply of copper in proven reserves. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">Clearly, oil and coal will not be
around forever and yet we are continuously exhorted to use it up
as
quickly as we can. You can not listen even to PBS without hearing
an advertisement urging us to drill for more oil, exploit the tar
sands of Alberta, hold our breaths waiting for clean coal to
become a
reality, and all in the hope of generating more jobs. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">In California, as well as most urban
centers around the world, we will see an increasingly expensive
bid
to control our water. It is the one thing that we can not live
without, </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">The climate change genie is out of its
bottle and there is no apparent desire to stuff it back in. We
know
that temperatures are warming. We see the results with great
regularity as the world is buffeted with a series of deadly
storms,
each driven to increased intensity by our changing climate. So far
in 2011, the US has had 14 weather events costing us over $1
Billion
each with the April 25/30 super outbreak of tornadoes costing over
$9
Billion. </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"> </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">We are beginning to see the
development
of a new climate paradigm in the Mediterranean. Greece has
experienced 10 years without normal winter rains. Focused on the
current financial crisis there, we lose sight of the ecological
crisis underway.</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">Big changes in climate will create
climate refugees. We already see this beginning in Africa, where
Somalian refugees are flooding into Kenya. Can any country absorb
these refugees into its own growing population? The UN expects
that there will be over 100 million who need to move, some to
escape
drought as in Somalia, others to escape sea level rise in
Vietnam's
Mekong Delta or Bangladesh; </p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in">It is still our decision whether we
can
avert the worst of these problems. It appears that the US is quite
willing to do nothing. </p>
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