Whole Travel Blog

The Obama administration released a report last week that outlines anticipated temperature, rainfall, sea level and other environmental changes for the rest of the century. Not only does the report cover the usual agricultural and food production problems, it discusses heat-related illnesses and deaths, weather patterns, wildfires, and flooding. What is currently predicted as a 100-year storm will likely occur every 10 years, significantly overcoming our engineering safety designs. One section reads:

“Escalating exposures to catastrophic weather events, coupled with private insurers’ withdrawal from various markets, are placing the federal government at increased financial risk as insurer of last resort.”

Every 10 years instead of every 100??

With all the political noise-making recently about global climate change, let’s hope the world gets a plan in place to help mitigate these risks and potential impacts. You can download the entire report here.

The United States Global Change Research Program, a joint venture of 13 federal agencies and the White House, released a study this week confirming that even if the nation takes significant measures to reduce carbon emissions, the impact of global warming is expected to become more severe in upcoming years. Some of the impacts expected are already being seen, including more powerful tropical storms and erosion of ocean coastlines.

Where's my iceberg?

Thomas Karl, director of the National Climatic Data Center at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), stated, “What we would want to have people take away is that climate change is happening now, and it’s actually beginning to affect our lives.” He did continue to say that if we implement controls and measures to reduce our environmental footprint these effects could be significantly smaller.

The study is posted here: http://www.globalchange.gov/publications/reports/scientific-assessments/us-impacts. We encourage everyone to give it a browse if you have time - it’s 188 pages but has good summaries of the effects we’re having on our planet.