Earth Protect Blog

Different Actions=Different Futures

Dr. Jonathan Harrington Journal Entry, July 1, 2030:

My wife Kathy and I are having a wonderful time at Glacier National Park. Yesterday, my daughter Kela, her seven-year-old daughter Maria, Kathy, and I rode in a hydrogen-powered tour bus along Lake McDonald. We were on our way to the newly built Glacier Lodge. The old one burned down during the Great Montana Fire of 2027 when 50 percent of the National Park’s forest was destroyed. Dark brown swaths of dead trees still linger in the distance. The mountains still stand tall, majestic reminders of God’s handiwork, but the Park’s alpine ecosystem is under severe stress. The lake level has also dropped over the years because of declining snow pack and glacial runoff.

As we walked around the grounds of the lodge Maria asked me, “Waigong, [Chinese for “grandfather”] where did they get the name Glacier Park?” I responded, “Well Maria, Glacier Park used to have glaciers. They were beautiful sights, and could be seen right here from the road.” She inquired, “Like the ones they used to have on Mount Shasta?” “Yes,” I responded.

“Did I ever tell you about the first time I visited here?”

“Yes, Waigong you did,” she said, thinking to herself, “here we go again, another boring story! “

I continued. “What do you think happened to the glaciers?”

She answered, “It was probably global warming. I heard all about it in school. The teacher said that in the olden days people used to use too much coal and oil and it made things warmer. Everyone knew that this was hurting Mother Earth, but they did not do anything about it until it was too late.”

Curious, she then asked, “Grandpa, did you use too much oil?”

“Yes, I did. We all did. We tried to stop, but old habits die hard.”

Maria added, “I really don’t like global warming. All the trees around our house are sick. The Orca whales are almost gone. I saw a video at school about all the little children around the world who do not have enough food to eat or water to drink because the hot air has made the water float up into the sky and turned their land into desert. Hurricanes are getting bigger and more dangerous every year. I’m scared. Are we going to die?”

That last comment reminded me of something that Kela said to me almost twenty-five years before. We had gone to watch a movie about global warming called An Inconvenient Truth. After the show I asked Kela. “What do you remember most about the movie?” She had been especially affected by a graphic showing what would happen to Shanghai if sea levels rose by twenty feet. She blurted. “We are going to die. We live on an island. And what about Grandma and Grandpa in Shanghai? They will drown!”

I reassured her that our house was high enough on the hill that it would not be swallowed up by the lake we live on, Lake Washington. As far as Shanghai was concerned, I told her that people there would probably try to build a big wall around the city to protect it. She responded. “Baba, do you mean like the one in New Orleans?” I did not know how to answer.

Finally, I reassured her. “Well, they can come live with us.”

Twenty-five years later, little Maria wondered out loud. “Grandpa, when will the glaciers come back?” I grimaced. “I don’t know, honey. It could be a long, long time.”

Is this the future we want? I remember when I was in high school, we constantly worried about the great and powerful weapons of mass destruction invented by the “Greatest Generation.” Politicians, East and West, kept building more and nuclear bombs, and threatened to use them. The World we knew stood at the precipice of destruction. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed. Nuclear weapons are still around, but the likelihood that they may be used to destroy the planet is remote.

Well, a new generation faces an even more threatening crisis; and one not of its own making. Despite overwhelming scientific evidence that human-created greenhouse gas emissions are warming our World, causing mass extinctions and destroying global ecosystems; captains of industry, politicians, parents and consumers continue to hoard, pump, scrape and extract the Planet’s dwindling resources like there is no tomorrow.

Stoking the fires of global warming is a bit like shooting craps in Las Vegas. On a good day you might win a few bucks, but the longer you play, the greater the chance you will roll snake eyes. In the end, the House usually wins. Well, humanity has been playing the global warming game for almost two centuries. Yes, it is true that past generations have benefited from cheaper energy and resources. But now our luck is running out.

We need to step away from our game of ‘cosmic dice’ before it is too late. Some scientists say the upward march of global water and air temperatures may become irreversible in as little as ten years. But we still have a window of opportunity to change the way we live; to reduce our use of fossil fuels, buy less, conserve more, recycle and reuse, take public transportation etc. to save the World that we know. I am filled with hope that my daughter’s generation can take the lead and forge a better, more sustainable future. But time is short. We need to act now.