By ERNESTO VELAZQUEZ
Ranking high on the list of “existential risks” such as hostile artificial intelligence, destructive biotechnology, or a natural pandemic, we have global warming. The Union of Atomic Scientists, earlier this year, set the “Doomsday Clock” at Two Minutes to Midnight, based on what this group of distinguished scientists says is a “catastrophically dangerous world.” The last time the clock was set this close to midnight was at the height of the cold war.
The earth’s current atmosphere is a delicate balance of nitrogen (78.09%), oxygen (20.95%), argon (0.93%) and carbon dioxide (0.04%), in addition to a variable level of water vapor and small amounts of other trace gases. Carbon dioxide (CO2) and water vapor are the main atmospheric gases necessary for supporting Earth’s relatively mild climate, and without these gases, the earth would simply freeze into a solid ball of ice. Carbon dioxide has been in the atmosphere since the Earth condensed from a ball of hot gases approximately 5 billion years ago.
This primordial gas was an abundant component of the planet’s early atmosphere, along with nitrogen and water vapor. Earths first life forms, microbes, thrived in this CO2 rich atmosphere until some 2.5 billion years ago when plants evolved along with photosynthesis, shifting atmospheric gas composition from CO2 dominant to oxygen dominant.
As plant life evolved, the CO2 levels eventually settled to an average of 300 million parts per million. This level of atmospheric CO2 has remained relatively constant for approximately 20 million years. Carbon dioxide is a colorless gas that consists of a carbon atom covalently double-bonded (paired) to two oxygen atoms. Carbon dioxide is produced via natural processes such as volcanic eruptions, combustion of organic materials, and by all aerobic organism and by humans using fossil fuels.
With human population growth, came deforestation and industrialization. Humans started to inject massive amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere, primarily to produce energy via consumption of fossil fuelsand concurrently accelerated the pace of deforestation and grassland degradation, reducing carbon sinks (holding places). The problem is not CO2 but the current unprecedented level of CO2 that we have in our atmosphere and the projected levels that we will have if we don’t get off carbon. The year 2017 and 2018 have seen an increase in C02 levels above 400 particles per million, levels that have not existed for millions of years. Since our species has been around for approximately 200,000 years, no humans have lived in an atmosphere with this level of C02 concentration.
One can only wonder, why do we lack the political and social will to react to CO2 levels with determination. We have the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Kyoto Protocol, the Paris Agreement and the Climate Summit of 2019, and the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report. Yet, CO2 levels continue to rise. Short of a multinational “catastrophe response”approach to the problem, involving a rapid transition to renewables, restoration of natural carbon sinks and development of CO2 extraction technologies, we will soon reach a tipping point, past our ability to mitigate the problem.
We wake up every morning to “existential randomness,”and the warmer that our planet becomes the more random our existence.
Ernesto Velazquez is an environmental activist residing in Philadelphia with an interest in disruptive green business practices, organic food production and distribution. He is currently pursuing graduate studies in Sustainability and Environmental Management at Har
