Northeast susceptible to global warming

Editor’s Note: These articles are the kickoff of a New England Futures Project aimed at identifying 21st century challenges facing the six-state region. Citizen reaction and participation, leading to a shared regional agenda, are key to the project. Comments are welcome at www.newenglandfutures.org. Journalists Neal Peirce and Curtis Johnson have reported for newspapers on unique strategic issues facing two dozen metropolitan regions nationwide. Peirce is a syndicated columnist. Johnson is a public policy analyst and former community college president and Minnesota government official.

Weather, New England and change aren’t strangers; as Mark Twain astutely noted, “One of the brightest gems in the New England weather is the dazzling uncertainty of it.”

But what of today’s red flag issue: global warming?

First, is it real? Some skeptics and the oil industry dismiss it, but the vast majority of scientists now believe the past century’s sharp increases in key greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide, triggered by the burning of fossil fuels (coal, oil and gas), are raising the Earth’s temperature.

A sea change in attitudes is likely to build in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, counsels John Topping, president of the Climate Institute.

“The United States is one of the most vulnerable nations in the world to climate change. The peril is extreme on the Gulf Coast. But the whole Atlantic Coast is very vulnerable. We’re likely to see more superhurricanes, Category 4’s becoming Category 4.5 or 5’s, for example, and a lot more rain even from moderate storms.”

Even before global warming became an issue, New England faced periodic storms costing many lives, inflicting vast damage, including the brutally damaging hurricane of 1938, which produced winds of up to 138 mph and killed nearly 700 people, and storms of immense severity in 1954, 1955, 1960, 1985 and 1991.

A rise in sea levels – perhaps 1 to 2 feet – is virtually certain, meaning storm surges also 1 to 2 feet higher, says Topping. “Boston and other areas along New England’s coast could be underwater.”

But what’s the bigger picture for New England? A careful, sobering assessment was published this year by the environmental group Clean Air-Cool Planet. Using data from the University of New Hampshire’s Climate Change Research Center, it showed clear trends toward warmer temperatures, longer warm seasons and shorter winters, and increased overall precipitation despite decreased snowfall. Sea temperatures have risen; ice-out on lakes is occurring earlier. Sea level at Boston has risen 8 inches since 1856.

And average New Englanders are starting to note change, says Bill Burtis of Clean Air-Cool Planet. More ozone alert days. Troublesome asthma rates, even in coastal Maine. Very heavy local rainfalls with erosion and local flooding. The peak of fall foliage, formerly around Columbus Day in most of northern New England, has retreated a week or so, nipping tourism. And there are fears the region’s forests will actually switch from fabled maple and birch to more oak and pine, making today’s vivid fall colors, a New England trademark around the world, mere memory.

Boston-based writer Jane Holtz Kay recently wrote for the American Planning Association Magazine that we’re now faced by “threatened shorelines, sinking islands, drought-hit farms, undermined species, and melting glaciers.”

Some say global warming is a worldwide problem, beyond local control. But the Conservation Law Foundation warns that New England’s 14 million people produce, cumulatively, more greenhouse gas emissions than 92 developing nations with a half billion or more people.

So what’s to be done? The region’s leaders, pushed along by activist groups, have begun to act. A Climate Change Action Plan – strong on goals, weak on implementation – was approved by the New England governors and the Eastern Canadian premiers in 2001. In 2003, New York’s Gov. George Pataki invited all nine governors from Maine to Maryland to develop a regional program with clear state-by-state goals to cut carbon dioxide emissions. Individual states have been working on an implementation formula.

Some businesses and electric companies cry foul. The Edison Electric Institute foresees a “major impact” on electricity prices. Advocates reply that with the federal government asleep at the switch on global warming, states and regions need to take the initiative, that in the long run cutting carbon dioxide emissions will reduce energy needs and costs. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, for example, commercial and institutional buildings use $80 billion worth of energy each year and contribute about 20 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions – a problem state and local leadership and regulations could address directly.

In California, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has set a goal of cutting California’s greenhouse emissions in five years to less than the levels of 2000: “We know the science, we see the threat; the time for action is now,” he declares.

And the Californians are clearly ahead of the pack with their recently enacted, toughest-in-the-nation emission standards for new cars, SUVs and light trucks. Oregon and Washington appear to have withstood the pressure of the auto lobbyists and decided to join California.

Will New England go along? Latest reports indicate Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont and Maine, plus New York and New Jersey, have determined to set vehicle emission standards identical to California’s. Rhode Island is uncertain, and New Hampshire – at latest report – was resistant. New England may need some serious interfamily counseling to straighten out its act for fast-changing times.