Carbon Footprints

In the UK The Times is reporting Rapid rise in global warming is forecast.

The oceans are losing the capacity to soak up rising man-made carbon emissions, which is increasing the rate of global warming by up to 30 per cent, scientists said yesterday.

The reduced ability to absorb carbon is thought to be a result of high winds acting on ocean currents bringing deeper waters that already contain high levels of carbon to the surface.

The higher winds are themselves believed to have been caused by climate change due to a combination of changes in the ozone layer and carbon emissions.

This is really bad. Carbon Planet has engaged a marine biologist to help us better understand issues such as this and ocean acidification, the process by which the seas are becoming more acidic due to their absorption of CO₂, that is starting to have a serious impact on the ability of shellfish to form their shells. Seafood is the very basis of our food-chain accounting for almost 40% of all human edible proteins, so it almost goes without saying that if we lose even a small fraction of our shellfish the consequences for human beings will be devastating.

Everything is connected and the consequences of our using the skies as our dumping ground are frighteningly non-linear. A steady rise in CO₂ concentrations does not simply increase the temperature by a gradual, steady amount. Tipping points abound and we are only just starting to appreciate just how risky our profligacy actually is. Alas we can’t turn back time to make the changes we should have started making 30 years ago, so we must act now. Any delay, any obfuscation, just costs us exponentially more. And if we delay too long then the costs could well be absolute. Is that a risk you are willing to take? You can act now to reduce atmospheric CO₂ with the purchase of forestry carbon credits. You can also act now to prevent more CO₂ from reaching the air in a hundred different ways, from switching to green-power, driving less, or investing in all manner of energy reduction carbon credits.

Carbon Planet offers CO₂ measurement services, tailored emissions reduction strategies and can source almost any kind of forestry or gold standard carbon credits to offset the emissions you can’t reduce. You can be the change®. — DS

Technorati Tags: Carbon Planet, climate change, disrupted nature, emissions reduction, global warming, ocean acidification, sea levels

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 19th, 2007 at 11:49 am and is filed under Climate Change. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.