I am so glad that we had the discussion in class yesterday about weather and climate. I have seen lots of articles, including on this site, about strange and random weather occurrences going on all the time, and how they were all linked to the changing climate. That’s the thing, though; weather is random. Weather fluctuates often due to multiple factors, and events change all the time. Climate, however, is a constant trend of weather events that gives detailed explanations of what happens in different regions. this is what should be taken into account when talking about climate change.

I hear about freak weather occurring often around where I live. Last winter, Eugene got minus-zero temperatures and inches of snow. Everyone freaked out about climate change. A balmy 50 degrees in February? Climate change. Tulips sprouting up earlier than they’re supposed to? Climate change. It gets kind of annoying after a while. These, however, are just random events.

Climate is different. Climate is the pattern of prevailing conditions in an area over a long period of time. Eugene usually gets more rainfall per year than Bend, Oregon. That is climate. The beaches of Newport tend to be colder year-round  than the ones in Southern California. That is climate.

I am aware of the changing climate, though. The rise in the amount of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. The increasing temperatures in our oceans. I’m not trying to deny the existence of climate change. I’m just saying that people shouldn’t be fussing about it when just one big storm hits one of our cities.

Professor Siperstein said we could write about our idea for the Final Project and ask for feedback from you guys. It took me a while to figure out what aspects of climate change I wanted to tackle, but over the course of the last few days, I kept coming back to the question: Why does no one seem to care about climate change?

Over the course of the term, I’ve noticed that the biggest reason for “not caring” is linked to the fact that people do not understand how climate change will affect their lives–even though climate change has already started to. The Global Weirding website definitely struck a chord with me because it transformed the information in the IPCC Climate Report into something tangible and easy to understand. So my question is: What is the most effective way to get people to start caring about climate change? Should we play on people’s fears like Mitchell does? Or is it better to just stick to the facts and let people interpret them for themselves?

I pose those questions because I want to create a video that helps educate people on climate change and ultimately acts as a call-to-action for people to write their congressman about increasing federal funding towards climate change solution research. The video will be a catalyst for a larger climate change public service announcement-esque campaign. I want to touch on the information within IPCC Report, but frame it in a way that resonates with every day people. People need to understand that impacts that our generation will have on future generations. And with that understanding and awareness in mind, I truly believe people will start to act.

That being said, I haven’t figured out the fictional narrative element of the project. I could somehow incorporate a fictional family or person who is living in a “climate changed” world. It would help build empathy for the cause because people will see themselves as that fictional character or family.

I would love to hear everyone’s thoughts on which approach would work best with getting people to care about climate change. Is it simply that they do not understand the facts and how the effects will change their lives? Or is there something else I’m missing that is more important?

Thanks!

When reading the article So Hot Right Now: Has Climate Change Created A New Literary Genre?, I admired Nathaniel Rich’s emphasis of the role of a novelist. Unlike a scientist’s point of view of climate change, the novelist doesn’t obtain the responsibility to just write about climate change to get people’s attention. However they have the creative advantage to see what climate change/ global warming do to people in the modern world; what they do to the human heart. He also mentions to read the entire book of Odds Against Tomorrow, and you will not find one climate change phrase. “Climate change as a phrase, is cliché. Global warming is a cliché”(Rich). Contine reading →

There’s no chance people can’t attribute at least a tiny percent of the weather this past winter to climate change. It’s a very unusual winter across the country and it has been slowly building over the years as we continue to increase the amount of greenhouse gas emissions. New England’s massive snowstorm, Oregon’s unusually dry and sunny months. Climate change has to be some sort of answer somewhere along the line.

When the groundhog sees his shadow, it’s six more weeks of winter. New England is going on it’s fifth straight week of snow and rain storms. Yes, they are calming down, but the snow is still pilled up, accumulating an astonishing 60.7 inches over the five weeks in Boston, Massachusetts. Snowstorms Juno and Marcus rank 6 and 7 respectively in Boston’s top 10 snowstorms of all-time. And it is still going. Contine reading →

In class this week we have been reading the novel “Odds Against Tomorrow” by Nathaniel Rich which has brought to my mind what would happen if different areas were to flood. In the novel a class three hurricane hits New York City, and then the two main characters wonder around the city in a canoe viewing different parts of the city and the devastation that the storm has brought. We see that the subway system is completely submerged, many buildings destroyed, and much of life has been destroyed, including that of people.

I grew up on a small town that was built originally next to a lake, which has been since drained and turned into farm land. Mitchell, the main character in this novel discussed how New York City was built on top of what used to be many water ways, which is what made me think of my home town. Every winter what used to be the lake bottom floods again, and in its way also floods some homes. This happens just about every year, and so the people in the area are prepared for when the rains come, and nature reclaims its land. However cities such as New York City that was also build on water ways does not expect this water to come and devastate all that exists. This brings to mind, how do other areas react to flooding and if they are prepared for the floods or not.

When looking at large storms a real storm that took place that many of us are familiar with is that of Hurricane Katrina. After Hurricane Katrina there was large areas of New Orleans that was flooded, and knowing that this area—being near the Gulf Coast is a possible area for large storms or hurricanes one would thing that they would have a plan against flooding, and after viewing what occurred it is hard to think that there was a plan in place. Experts say though that “The flood protection system in New Orleans was flawed from the start because the model storm it was designed to stop was simplistic, and led to an inadequate network of levees, flood walls, storm gates and pumps”₁. Here we see that the city did have a plan in place but that it was flawed. The system if not having been flawed may have helped after the hurricane to decrease the damage done, but this does show that other cities are thinking of what might occur and are preparing for flooding.

Flooding is a topic often brought up when discussing climate change which is why it is important for at least coastal cities to have a plan in place for flooding. Flooding is brought up with climate change because of the discussion of the ice caps melting causing the ocean levels to raise, causing flooding. Although we cannot predict what will cause the next flood in the world, flooding will occur again and again and so cities need to have a plan in place. Do many in the class live in coastal cities and know what their plan is for flooding or if they have a plan?

1. http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/h/hurricane_katrina/index.html

Things appear to be finally progressing in terms of the recognition of climate change. I think this is due to the noticeable differences in temperature, as was pointed out in class, it’s sunny and sixty degrees in the middle of February. I myself was quite surprised at the speed symptoms of climate change are beginning to appear. Flowers are already beginning to bloom, it seems like it didn’t rain nearly half as much as it usually does for Oregon during the winter. Another alarming revelation to appear in the news was a prediction by climate scientists of future “mega-droughts” manifesting in the United States around the year 2050. These mega-droughts would specifically hit the southwest and great plains regions. A typical drought lasts around 7-10 years. One of the most famous droughts that occurred in the United States was the “Great Dust Bowl” which lasted around a decade. The “Great Dust Bowl” caused widespread crop failure and initiated mass migration to cities due to the lack of farming jobs. A mega-drought would hold similar conditions to a normal drought, but could last as long as 35 years.

The reasons these mega-droughts could occur in the near future would be due to the excess evaporation of water vapor from the soil due to changes in temperature and precipitation from climate change in the future. The south-west is currently going through a drought right now, but there is a 12% risk with current carbon composition of the atmosphere that a mega-drought could occur somewhere in the near future. If the atmospheric composition of carbon continues to rise at its current rate, which predicted to hit 1370 parts per million by 2100, the risk of mega-drought could rise to as high as 80%. Even if great efforts were made to curb carbon output, the risk of mega-drought is still expected to be nearly 60% in the future.

With all these risks, one would think that people would be immediately motivated to take action, especially in the regions where these climactic events would occur, yet it seems other issue continue to take the forefront on the news. Even though it finally seems like most people generally now accept that Climate Change is both real and directly correlated with the release of fossil fuels in the atmosphere, it seems to be continually downplayed, with more focus being put on adapting to the changing conditions instead of actively changing them. The future of the planet seems very obscure. No matter what is done now, things have been permanently altered by carbon emissions. With all the disaster related fiction we’ve been reading in class, I am very curious as how humanity will adapt in the future to the new conditions. I hope that no group or class of society will be damaged or discriminated against in adapting, but judging by human nature, I know that this is simply not the case. Dramatic action must be taken to address these climatological threats, otherwise the disaster fiction we read about could become reality.

While looking at the various articles on Hurricane Sandy, I had flashbacks of turning on the television and constantly seeing the news coverage of the storm and the devastating toll it was having on the people of New York. Although I was watching this coverage from the comfort of my own home in sunny California, I thought of those individuals in New York that had to handle this treacherous storm. I can only imagine the panic and complete frenzy I would be enduring.

Yet while I read Nathaniel Rich’s novel, Odds Against Tomorrow I did not feel the same way. Although Rich discusses the immaculate hurricane that the people of New York are enduring he does it in a way that is extremely aesthetically pleasing. Which is odd because usually even the thought of a hurricane brings nothing but horrid and saddening images to mind. However through Rich’s vivid figurative language he does a great job at erasing the images seen in the articles regarding Hurricane Sandy and shines a light on bright colors and images. For example, “Out of this murkiness the larger shapes emerged first: the curved seat of a wicker chair; a strip of rubber insulation curled like an octopus’s tentacle; an inflated red yoga ball, like a candy apple; and the smooth black hull of a plasma television, bubbles coalescing and darting on its screen as it rocked in the current”(Rich 166.) As Rich explains the scenery while he is canoeing down the street flooded with water, he chooses to describe mundane everyday items such as a wicker chair, or a television and highlights the beauty and delicacy of them. Which makes me wonder if he does this to romanticize the tragedy of this storm.

Although he is making this storm sound and seem much more pleasing than it is, it makes me question that he points out these everyday items to make a point of the intensity of the storm and its effect on things that we see everyday, and take advantage of. I personally think that Rich does a wonderful job at displaying the effects of this Hurricane, because it allows us to be put in Mitchell’s shoes. And rather than being absolutely terrified as we are on a tiny little canoe roaming to safety, we are engaged in the scenery and the emerging objects all around.

Overall I think that Rich’s novel does its job as a climate fiction novel, it highlights the effects of climate change on natural occurrences such as hurricanes. Hurricanes are inevitable because of the unpredictability of our weather, yet things like higher sea levels, and extremely warm temperature can escalate these hurricanes, which is very scary. But Rich makes a point that these storms can effect and overtake a whole city, and I would certainly be nowhere near as prepared as he is. Which is even more frightening.