100 Amazing Places That Will Be Destroyed by Climate Change
100 Amazing Places That Will Be Destroyed by Climate Change
by Linda McClure, AlterNet, June 6, 2011
Gondar, Ethiopia, via Wikimedia Commons
A father's desire to show his children the consequences of climate change culminated in the book, "100 Places to Remember Before They Disappear," which shows some beautiful places in the world at risk of loss from global warming. Publisher Gaute Hogh uses the power of photographs to illustrate that climate change should not be a political football: Many cultures, places and species are now threatened by our failure to effectively address climate change.
A Web site with an interactive map provides links to 100 places, including the "Land of the thunder dragon" in Bhutan where increasing snow melt threatens water flows that cause landslides and floods "damaging farmland, housing, infrastructure and the ancient dzongs (fortress monasteries)."
The plains of central Asia where the pastoral life of Mongolian nomads (who have roamed the area for the last 3,000 years) is threatened because of new rainfall patterns and increased temperatures. Major cities like Caracas, Venezuela face extreme weather events, such as hurricanes and rainstorms that threaten people and infrastructure with floods and landslides; and Chicago, where heat waves and flooding may result in more health impacts as well as damage the city's vibrant tourism industry.
Let's take a closer look at just a handful of places that illustrate how climate-change impacts will have a domino effect due to the interconnections among people, culture, wildlife and natural resources.
Gondar, Ethiopia
If justice prevailed on Mother Earth, Africa, asmall contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions, would not have to suffer the disproportionate impacts of climate change.
Rain-fed agriculture is the backbone of the economy and livelihoods in Ethiopia as "[i]rrigation is currently applied to only 3% ... of irrigable land." This dependence on rain-fed agriculture will leave small-scale farmers vulnerable, as noted in an Oxfam International study, "The Rain Doesn't Come on Time Anymore: Poverty, Vulnerability, and Climate Variability in Ethiopia."
Big Sur, California
Wildfires in the Western U.S. have increased in frequency, intensity and scope of scorched earth consistent with global warming as summers become "longer, hotter, and drier." The Santa Barbara Independent reported on a 2006 study fromScience, saying:
[S]ince 1986, the number of major wildfires has increased by 400%, and the amount of land these fires burned increased by 600 percent, compared to the period from 1970 to 1986.
Located on the California coastline, and covered by pine forests, Big Sur provides a beautiful haven for people, biodiversity and endangered species. Our inaction threatens its existence. In 2008, a forest fire in the Big Sur area burned more than 160,000 acres and required more than a month to fully contain the fire.
Lake Balaton, Hungary
Lake Balaton is known as the Hungarian Sea, and has existed for at least 2,000 years. It is now the largest lake in Central Europe and a popular spot for tourists. Historic vineyards located on the surrounding hillsides are dependent on the lake because the "grapes receive twice the amount of sunlight thanks to the reflection of the sun's rays on the lake," accord to 100 Places. Today, the Hungarian Sea is shrinking due to years of decreased rainfall and increased temperatures.
Nenets' Normadic Life
The Nenets are indigenous people with a nomadic life in the Yamal Peninsula in Siberia. The culture and life of the Nenets has been intertwined for 1,000 years with their reindeer herds, which provide food, transportation and shelter.
However, Yamal's ancient way of life is melting because of global warming as "permafrost begins to thaw and large areas are either denuded by landslides ... or inundated by melting ground ice..." according to research by the Polar Institute. Today, migrations within Yamal peninsula are delayed as the Nenets wait for ice to thicken while their reindeer go hungry from insufficient pasture.
The Battery, New York City
Hundreds of thousands work in this part of Manhattan Island. A study by Columbia University concluded that sea-level rises will cause 10-foot floods. Now, such extreme flooding can occur around every 100 years. With climate change, it may occur as frequently as every four years, with "floods raising water levels by 11-14 feet and paralyzing the whole Manhattan infrastructure," according to a Yahoo News story.
Species, Not Just Places
While Hogh's book is focused on places, there are also many species that face disappearance. As Seth Borenstein wrote for the Associated Press:
Animal and plant species have begun dying off or changing sooner than predicted because of global warming, a review of hundreds of research studies contends. ...At least 70 species of frogs, mostly mountain-dwellers that had nowhere to go to escape the creeping heat, have gone extinct because of climate change, the analysis says. It also reports that between 100 and 200 other cold-dependent animal species, such as penguins and polar bears are in deep trouble.
If you want to see our magnificent polar bears that "walked the planet for at least 40,000 years," you might want to make arrangements now. In 2007, the U.S. Geological Survey reported that melting sea ice will result in the disappearance of two-thirds of polar bears by 2050. However, conditions have worsened: An Arctic ice study found that "[t]emperatures from 2005 through 2010 have been the highest since records began in 1880," and thus the ice is melting faster than scientists had previously predicted. Today, the ice is not strong enough to support polar bears, who try to "spread their weight" as they walk and crawl over thin ice, struggling not to drown [I'm going against my long-standing, undeclared policy of not posting heart-wrenching videos of my favorite animals in peril]:
A recent study found that the populations of two species of Antarctic penguins have decreased over the past 30 years because sea ice is melting. Sea ice is both the penguins' habitat and a necessary link in their food chain. Sea ice is needed for the reproduction of krill, a primary food of the penguins, but the krill eat photoplankton, which thrive under the steadily disappearing sea ice.
It's not just far-away species that are at risk. Global warming is affecting our National Park ecosystem and our grizzly bears. Rising heat and drought have provided opportunistic pine beetles with the chance to infect and kill pine trees that carry the seeds which are a key part of the bears' diet. The bears also eat trout, but the fish are dying from increased water temperatures.
In 2007, U.N. scientists reported that 30% of "Earth's species could disappear" if "temperatures rise 4.5 °F -- and up to 70%, if they rise 6.3 °F..." Now the International Energy Agency reports that the goal to hold temperature rise to only 2 °C or 3.6 °F, is "likely to be just 'a nice Utopia'" because greenhouse gas emissions for last year increased by a record amount to the "highest carbon output in history."
All this means that we need action right now to address climate change. Lawmakers who continue to obstruct needed action should be required to explain to children who will grow up in a world with climate change impacts -- such as rising sea levels, extinction of wildlife and biodiversity, water shortages, increased intensity and frequency of extreme weather events and wildfires -- why they are refusing to take action to pass an effective, comprehensive climate change bill. Their refusal to take such actions now means that cultures, lifestyles and wildlife will be harmed or rendered extinct.
Linda McClure practices environmental, climate change, endangered species and water law in California and was a principal contributor for the legal treatise, California Water Law & Policy.
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