Throughout this semester, I will be reading and discussing 5 books: Climate Change: A Very Short Introduction by Mark Maslin, A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here And There (A Sand County Almanac) by Aldo Leopold, Environmental Ethics: A Very Short Introduction by Robin Attfield, The Ecology of Wisdom: Writings By Arne Naess - selected essays (The Ecology of Wisdom), and Regeneration: Ending the Climate Crisis in One Generation (Regeneration) by Paul Hawken. This week and the following four, we will focus on Climate Change: A Very Short Introduction and A Sand County Almanac.
Climate Change: A Very Short Introduction is a crash course on the scientific, economic, and political challenges around climate change. In the preface, Maslin explains that "[c]limate change is one of the four defining challenges of the 21st century, along with environmental degradation, global inequality, and global insecurity." (p.xix) However, upon examination, we can see how all of these challenges affect and/or compound each other. He also points out that failure on the part of the world's leaders has led to a doubling of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere over the last 30 years, which runs opposite of the change they knew was needed to mitigate the worst effects of climate change. We needed to be cutting carbon emissions during this crucial time. As for our own country, "the USA [is] the second largest emitter with around 15% of global emissions." (p.xx)
In chapter one, Maslin describes the science behind the Earth's natural greenhouse effect. He explains that our primary greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrous oxide (N2O), methane (CH4), water vapor, and ozone are necessary in order to keep our planet warm enough to sustain life. However, increasing these gases traps more heat in our atmosphere; and, if we continue this process, we could warm the planet to levels that are not as compatible with the life that currently exists on this planet. There is a natural balance, and, as we add more greenhouse gases, we are tipping the scales. Maslin goes on to explain that one of the primary differences between human-induced climate change and natural climate changes of the past is the rate of change. This rate of change, how fast the warming happens, has the ability to outpace many species' ability to adapt and can cause extreme weather events as the planet tries to regain equilibrium.
The author expounds on how humans have been increasing greenhouse gases since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution by adding ancient energy from the sun to the current energy balance. We do this by releasing ancient sun energy that is trapped in trees when we cut and burn them and ancient algae, bacteria, and plants when we dig up fossil fuels and burn them. Maslin states that "[a]ccording the IPCC, the primary source of CO2 is the burning of fossil fuels: over 85% of the global CO2 emissions comes from energy production, industrial processes, and transport." (p.7) Furthermore, "North America, Europe, and Asia emit over 90% of [this] global, industrially produced CO2." (p.7) And, "[t]he second major source, accounting for 10-15% of global CO2 emissions, is land-use changes. These emissions come primarily from cutting down forests for the purposes of agriculture, urbanization, or building roads." (p.9)
One of the most harrowing statements in this chapter is as follows:
We have put nearly half a trillion tons of carbon into the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution, but this is only half of our emissions. The other half has been absorbed by the Earth -- with 25% going into the oceans and 25% going into the land biosphere. Scientists are concerned that this uptake of our pollution is unlikely to continue at the same level in the future. This is because as global temperatures rise the oceans will warm and will be able to hold less dissolved CO2. As we continue to deforest and convert land for farming and urbanization, there will be less vegetation to absorb CO2, again reducing the uptake of our carbon pollution. (p.10)
In chapter two, the author discusses the history of climate change. He begins by explaining the early science behind our understanding of how greenhouse gases (GHGs) affect the Earth's surface air temperature. It is absurd to know that as early as 1896, "Swedish physical chemist Svante Arrhenius calculated how much the Earth's temperature would change given variations in GHGs...He concluded that anthropogenic CO2 emissions resulting from the burning of fossil fuels would be great enough to cause global warming." (p.13) However, as Maslin explains, it was not until the late 1980s when global temperatures began to steeply rise that the science of global warming became prominent. Alongside the rise in global temperatures, the 1980s also saw the rise of environmental awareness and large-scale environmental movements. Maslin also discusses the role that economists and the media have played in facilitating the debates around climate change since the early 2000s. However, though we can debate the ways to address the climate crisis, the science behind climate change is settled.
A Sand County Almanac is a collection of writings by Aldo Leopold. Aldo Leopold (1887-1948), is said to be 'the father of wildlife ecology' in the United States and is credited with the creation of 'land ethics.' In the introduction by Barbara Kingsolver, she discusses how Leopold's down-to-earth style of writing and talking, his respect for hard work, "love for life in all its forms," and his enduring humility could provide us with "a pathway to detente, [or m]aybe even progress." (p.xiii) Kingsolver states: " A Sand County Almanac charts the path he [Leopold] walked from woodsman to environmentalist, and at every turn we can still hear the kid with a fishing pole over his shoulder." (p.xx)
From the very beginning, in the forward of the book, Leopold is a man after our hearts. He writes: "There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot. These essays are the delights and dilemmas of one who cannot." (p.xxi) He explains that the book is divided into three parts: part one focuses on his and his family's lived experiences at 'the shack,' part two focuses on events in his life that helped him realize that there were environmental issues that must be addressed through conservation, and part three is where he introduces his 'land ethic.' Leopold states:
Conservation is getting nowhere because it is incompatable with our Abrahamic concept of land. We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect. (p.xxii)
In part one, the almanac, there is a section for each month of the year, beginning with January. In each section, Leopold writes with such vivid imagery that one can almost see what he sees in the mind's eye and feel the emotions that he means to convey. In January, he follows the tracks of a skunk and describes the interplay between a field mouse and a rough-legged hawk. He explains how the mouse is saddened by the thaw because his carefully designed tunnels from one food source to another have been exposed. He writes: "The mouse is a sober citizen who knows that grass grows in order that mice may store it as underground haystacks, and that snow falls in order that mice may build subways from stack to stack: supply, demand, and transport all neatly organized. To the mouse, snow means freedom from want and fear." (p.4) But, the hawk who swoops down and grabs the little mouse is delighted by the thaw. "The rough-leg has no opinion why grass grows, but he is well aware that snow melts in order that hawks may again catch mice. He came down out of the Arctic in the hope of thaws, for to him a thaw means freedom from want and fear." (p.4) He never does figure out quite what the skunk was up to, but the walk was not wasted.
In February, Leopold discusses an old oak that died from a lightning strike and will be used as firewood. There are several impactful moments in this section. First, Leopold opens by writing: "There are two spiritual dangers in not owning a farm. One is the danger of supposing that breakfast comes from the grocery, and the other that heat comes from the furnace." (p.6) Many of us may suffer from modern conveniences in this way. Second, is a more poetic look at the ancient sunlight that we mentioned earlier in a much more scientific way. Leopold states about his old oak that it "lived to garner eighty years of June sun. [And,] it is this sunlight that is now being released, through the intervention of my axe and saw, to warm my shack and my spirit through eighty gusts of blizzard." (p.7) Third, and last, is how he recounts the years that the old oak has seen as he cuts through its growth rings. This discussion reminded me of the novel Overstory in wonderful and terrible ways. It is very emotional to think of the long periods of time that an individual tree can silently witness.
In March, Leopold explains how the geese returning to his farm were a sure-fire way of knowing that spring had arrived. He writes:
A cardinal, whistling spring to a thaw but later finding himself mistaken, can retrieve his error by resuming his winter silence...But a migrating goose, staking two hundred miles of black night on the chance of finding a hole in the lake, has no easy chance for retreat. His arrival carries the conviction of a prophet who has burned his bridges. (p.17)
His words have a way of making the reader want to be in nature and see it as he does; they can make us fall in love with skunks and mice and hawks and geese. Maybe if everyone could fall in love with nature in this way, it would not be such a fight to protect it.
Next week we will pick up with both books where we left off this week.
