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Evaporation science
I’M WRITING to correct just a couple of the logical errors in Phil Robinson’s global warming op-ed, “Global Warming Not All Negative,” Feb. 7. First, it is true that warmth has been increasing global evaporation and precipitation. But it doesn’t necessarily do both in the same region. For example, the increased evaporation is causing the water levels of the Great Lakes and Mississippi River to go down. Increased precipitation is evident whenever there is a record snowfall or flood — usually in a places that are already wet. Moreover, the difference between evaporation and precipitation — and the change in timing of the precipitation — is leading to reduced runoff in already parched places like New Mexico, causing agricultural stress and economic hardship. Second, it is true that plants breathe in carbon dioxide. But as any farmer could have told Robinson, plant growth is controlled by the scarcest resource, which is almost never carbon dioxide. … In drought-stricken parts of the country, the net result of extra CO2 is to harm plants by making them hotter, drier and more vulnerable to parasites. Just take a look at our burning and dying forests. But as Robinson points out, it’s not all negative. The parasites are thriving. MARK BOSLOUGH Albuquerque
Follow ethics first
MUCH OF THE recent State of the Union speech was wonderful. …I am proud of the president for being outspoken about the reality of climate change and his commitment to actually act to mitigate its disastrous impacts.
The president mentioned that climate change is an ethical issue. As a rabbinic pastor, I agree with him and thank him for saying this publicly.
However, we cannot decrease the amount of carbon and methane in the atmosphere — the two major drivers of climate change — while we continue to support increases in the production and use of coal, oil and fracked gas. …
As this is an ethical issue, let’s remember that we must not “compromise” with the unethical. It’s not about bipartisanship. It’s about doing the ethical thing. … This is not about jobs and economics. New Mexico could become a world player in the renewable energy field. It is about the wisdom and courage of the heart. At this unique and crucial moment, for the sake of our children’s future, let’s urge the president to do what we all know is the ethical thing.
ANDREW GOLD
Santa Fe
Turn to solar energy
AFTER PRESIDENT Obama’s State of the Union address, I was encouraged because he finally addressed an issue he has avoided recently: climate change and solution. Obama even went as far as saying he would reduce pollution and create more sustainable sources of energy, like solar energy, if Congress did not take action.
New Mexico is still dependent on dirty energy sources like coal, which supplies almost 90 percent of our state’s energy and contributes to climate change.
New Mexico is the second sunniest state in the U.S. and growing up in New Mexico, I took for granted how many sunny days we have. And it seems that our state leaders have too. I am writing as a call to action for New Mexico’s leaders to make our state a national leader in solar energy. We need more solar energy to improve our environment!
TINA FARIS
Albuquerque
Not in the real world
PHIL ROBINSON’S op-ed claimed global warming will bring some good things. He opined that more warmth brings more precipitation brings more food. And, he said, since plants love carbon dioxide, more carbon dioxide means happier plants and more oxygen.
If this were as true in the real world as it is in his high school science experiment then we should be seeing huge increases in crop production. After all, for the last century and a half we have experienced increases in both temperature and carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in the history of human existence.
What, then, has happened to crop production in the real world? Crop yields are actually down globally by 2 to 3 percent. Scientists project that with every degree (C) increase in average temperature worldwide, crop yields will decline by approximately 5 percent, leading to great concern about food scarcity in the world as population increases.
And while no one expects climate to be static, the best scientific research tells us that climate change is shifting ever faster toward a scenario of far more frequent and expensive extreme weather events, fires and drought across major swaths of the globe. Wasn’t it interesting that the front page story on the same day as Robinson’s opinion piece was about the ongoing water shortage in New Mexico? …
Robinson’s belief that God will take care of things is not shared by all religious people. Just two days before Robinson’s op-ed, a letter to the Journal detailed efforts by tens of thousands of people of many faiths across New Mexico to get policy-makers to address climate change. …
I share Robinson’s belief that “we should take care of the world the best we can.” But in my opinion, that requires passing legislation to curb greenhouse gasses … and repealing subsidies to carbon polluters.
HEIDI TOPP BROOKS
Albuquerque
We are hurting Earth
I, TOO, believe in God as (Phil) Robinson does, and my God told me He is not responsible for pollution and He resents the slander attributing it to Him. He also asked me how global warming will produce more food for the masses when heretofore it has caused drought. How does this increase the growing season? He asked me if it is not man who has thrown off the earth’s fine-tuning He worked so hard to achieve? But almost as scary as global warming is that Robinson has the opportunity to influence captive young minds.
EFFIE OBSORNE
Rio Rancho
Let Earth recover
PHIL ROBINSON asserts that global warming isn’t all bad. Global warming has apparently become so obvious that those who, a few year ago, denied that it was happening at all, now embrace it— it’s not only happening, but it’s a good thing.
Robinson admits that a warming Earth puts more moisture in the air and claims this increases rainfall, hence crop yields. This might be true if the rainfall were evenly distributed, but, as we see this year in the U.S. wind patterns, mountains and the oceans alter the pattern, resulting in more flooding in wet areas, but no more rain in dry areas such as New Mexico. The result is actually lowered crop yields.
He claims a warming Earth increases the growing season. It does, in Canada, but in southern locations, it’s becoming too hot for many crops. It’s not clear whether this will be a net loss or gain worldwide.
He uses the argument that carbon dioxide (CO2) must be good because it helps plants grow. From the journal Nature: “protein concentrations in grains of wheat, rice and barley, and in potato tubers, are decreased by 5–14% under elevated CO2 .”
He points out that as the Earth warms, natural mechanisms fight back, limiting the warming. Certainly true, but we’re overwhelming those mechanisms. He also thinks the stress on species should be welcome because it will make for hardier species. Again true, if the stress comes slowly enough. A plant will adapt to higher temperatures if they rise over thousands of years, but if you put the plant in a furnace, it dies. Thousands of species are at risk.
Then he throws in the fact that the Earth has warmed and cooled before. Yes, it has. But what matters to us is whether it’s warming now.
The “incredible balance and fine-tuning” of Earth, as he calls it, isn’t up to us. What is up to us is to stop destroying the fine-tuning and let the Earth recover its balance.
JERRY STAUFFER
Albuquerque
Darwin God believer
AMONG THE numerous other errors in Phil Robinson’s op-ed, he draws a contrast between “evolutionists” and those who believe in God. He is presumably unaware that Charles Darwin himself, at the time when he wrote “On the Origin of Species,” believed in God as the creator of the universe although not, perhaps, in Robinson’s God, who fiddles with the thermostat for our convenience.
I can also correct Robinson’s curious impression that heat increases cloud cover. The amount of moisture in the air is actually greater in Albuquerque than in Glasgow, where I now live, but because Glasgow is colder, and because, as Robinson demonstrates (to) his students, hot air holds more moisture, our skies in Glasgow are continually overcast.
PROFESSOR PAUL BRATERMAN
Former Albuquerque resident
Glasgow, Scotland
It’s economic, too
CLIMATE CHANGE is an economic issue. Ask the insurance industry, which paid out $34 billion in 2012 for losses due to drought, fires, floods and storms. Ask the New Mexico tourist industry, ranchers and farmers suffering due to low precipitation. The large trees are dying. Food, fuel and utility prices are rising.
Carbon in the atmosphere is to blame. Oil, gas, coal and nuclear industries all receive billions in subsidies and have for decades. A fee collected on carbon at the wellhead, border or mine will help level the playing field for renewables. Demand action from Congress before it is too late.
CHRYSA WIKSTROM
Santa Fe
