Blue Ocean Event by 2030. This means the arctic ice cap will be completely (well, just about completely, the ice around the northern Canadian archipelago is pretty thick and won't melt for a while) melted during the summer. Water has an albedo of 0.1, ice and snow has an albedo of 0.6. Albedo is the measurement of how reflective a material is from 0 to 1 (1 being 100% of light is reflected). This will have a feedback loop of heating the oceans even faster.
This will change the polar vortex and with it will also change the jet stream, the climate that our global agricultural industry has developed in will be completely different. It may be that large swathes of previously productive land become vastly less productive, or it may be that things mostly continue as they have been lately with a slight increase too much rain during spring and fall (preventing spring spraying and fucking up fall harvests).
This may also cause an increase in Siberian methane release, which we'll see as an increase in these bizarre-ass giant caverns in what used to be permafrost. The Clathrate Gun Hypothesis also poses an increasing danger of sudden release of methane from ocean shores, again mostly centered on Siberia. Methane has a "half-life" in atmosphere about 9 years long before it reacts with UV and atmospheric oxygen/ozone to regular CO2. During those 9 years, methane acts as a GHG with 28x the effectiveness of CO2.
All of the above can be dealt with and adapted to. We still have 10 years left to make major changes (on the timeline the IPCC presented). Cutting GHG emissions and making systemic changes alongside personal changes (but in that order of priority) will allow us to stay below +2°C of warming and around only +1°C. We can even potentially use geo-engineering projects to further keep warming down, from things like dumping Iron and nutrients into the ocean to allow microbes to sequester CO2 in their bodies to putting artificial snow in the icecaps (just large reflective sheets, really) to the truly out there like enormous sunshades in the Lagrangian points in the orbit of the Earth.
If change isn't made, you're lifetime will probably be pretty normal even if you have to learn to live under permanent austerity and read about yet another massacre done by eco-fash and border agents against climate refugees. There may be heat waves strong and long enough to kill the elderly by the time you're past middle age, but we'll probably adapt to that and just keep the elderly indoors during summer and fall.
The only thing holding us back from making the systemic changes necessary are the politicians and business elite and Capital and capitalism at the head of it all. They have an awesome array of powers, they have a lot of equipment, they have class traitors, they have crazy tech, they have the NSA and CIA/FBI. But we have all the power that matters - our labor and numbers. The only thing we lack is a mass class consciousness and the mass will to take on these enemies. The task that has been dumped unceremoniously on your entire generation's head - and on the working class as a whole - is not an easy one, but it is doable and you can help right now by talking to your friends about socialism, about the Green New Deal, about who our enemies are, etc. Even little things like recycling, going vegetarian/vegan for environmental reasons, participating or organizing a climate protest can help - but they can also make you feel better when you're feeling anxious and overwhelmed.
Blue Ocean Event by 2030. This means the arctic ice cap will be completely (well, just about completely, the ice around the northern Canadian archipelago is pretty thick and won't melt for a while) melted during the summer. Water has an albedo of 0.1, ice and snow has an albedo of 0.6. Albedo is the measurement of how reflective a material is from 0 to 1 (1 being 100% of light is reflected). This will have a feedback loop of heating the oceans even faster.
This will change the polar vortex and with it will also change the jet stream, the climate that our global agricultural industry has developed in will be completely different. It may be that large swathes of previously productive land become vastly less productive, or it may be that things mostly continue as they have been lately with a slight increase too much rain during spring and fall (preventing spring spraying and fucking up fall harvests).
This may also cause an increase in Siberian methane release, which we'll see as an increase in these bizarre-ass giant caverns in what used to be permafrost. The Clathrate Gun Hypothesis also poses an increasing danger of sudden release of methane from ocean shores, again mostly centered on Siberia. Methane has a "half-life" in atmosphere about 9 years long before it reacts with UV and atmospheric oxygen/ozone to regular CO2. During those 9 years, methane acts as a GHG with 28x the effectiveness of CO2.
All of the above can be dealt with and adapted to. We still have 10 years left to make major changes (on the timeline the IPCC presented). Cutting GHG emissions and making systemic changes alongside personal changes (but in that order of priority) will allow us to stay below +2°C of warming and around only +1°C. We can even potentially use geo-engineering projects to further keep warming down, from things like dumping Iron and nutrients into the ocean to allow microbes to sequester CO2 in their bodies to putting artificial snow in the icecaps (just large reflective sheets, really) to the truly out there like enormous sunshades in the Lagrangian points in the orbit of the Earth.
If change isn't made, you're lifetime will probably be pretty normal even if you have to learn to live under permanent austerity and read about yet another massacre done by eco-fash and border agents against climate refugees. There may be heat waves strong and long enough to kill the elderly by the time you're past middle age, but we'll probably adapt to that and just keep the elderly indoors during summer and fall.
The only thing holding us back from making the systemic changes necessary are the politicians and business elite and Capital and capitalism at the head of it all. They have an awesome array of powers, they have a lot of equipment, they have class traitors, they have crazy tech, they have the NSA and CIA/FBI. But we have all the power that matters - our labor and numbers. The only thing we lack is a mass class consciousness and the mass will to take on these enemies. The task that has been dumped unceremoniously on your entire generation's head - and on the working class as a whole - is not an easy one, but it is doable and you can help right now by talking to your friends about socialism, about the Green New Deal, about who our enemies are, etc. Even little things like recycling, going vegetarian/vegan for environmental reasons, participating or organizing a climate protest can help - but they can also make you feel better when you're feeling anxious and overwhelmed.
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