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The headless chicken of climate change mitigation

Back in the 1960s and 1970s, one of the biggest threats to the planet was pollution.

The massive growth in motor-vehicle use, combined with an ever-increasing demand for electricity meant that we were spewing so much junk into the atmosphere we risked choking ourselves to death in some areas.

Fortunately, we woke up to the dangers that air pollution posed to our health and the wellbeing of the planet before it was too late.

Just a few decades later, the acid rains that bleached the forests of Europe have gone and even Californians can breathe freely while commuting down their freeways.

Unfortunately, there has been a price to pay for that earth-saving move -- it's called climate change.

The cause of climate change may be open for debate but its effects are harder to deny.

Every year it appears that our weather patterns are becoming more extreme with wild temperature fluctuations and massive storms bringing death and destruction across the face of the globe.

Just as we did with air pollution however, we have a plan...

All we need do is cut carbon emissions and our climate-change problems will be over, or at least mitigated to some degree.

Well at least that's the theory -- but now I'm wondering if those making these decisions are actually thinking far enough ahead.

I wonder because of this article.

It would appear that in cleaning up our air pollution problems, we've actual aggravated the climate change issue.

The more we clean up our atmosphere through the introduction of strict emission controls covering things such as particulates and aerosols, the more sunlight reaches the surface of the planet -- and thus the more it warms.

It would appear that, in slashing air pollution, we have jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire.

All those bits of soot and other airborne pollutants were actually creating an artificial "global dimming" that kept the planet somewhat cooler than it otherwise would have been. Take away the effects of global dimming and suddenly we've got to find a way to reduce our carbon emissions by another 50 million tonnes.

So what do we do?

Could the answer to climate change be as simply as lighting up a few smoke-pots at regular spacings around the planet and introducing a whole bunch of particulate matter into the atmosphere so as to stop some of the sun's radiation before it warms the surface?

Or maybe we ought to just ditch this whole electric car and hybrid concept, returning instead to those old bangers of the 1960s which belched smoke every time you pulled away from the lights.

What I do hope we've learned from this is that we can't save the planet by simply dealing with each "crisis" in isolation. It's crucial that we look at the longer-term "big picture" and take a more holistic view of the planet before rushing to implement "fixes" for the environmental challenges we face.

For instance, what happens when, as a result of significantly reduced carbon emissions, the rate of plant growth is negatively affected? How will we survive if we discover that plunging CO2 levels are harming food crops, forests and other critical components of our biosphere?

Might the next global crisis be famine brought about by lack of CO2 in the air?

If we're not careful, could we find that CO2 levels plunge unexpectedly quickly and effectively knock out a key link in the food chain, perhaps resulting in the death of all multi-cellular life on planet earth?

Right now I bet most people are thinking "rubbish, that could never happen".

Well how many of those who thought they were doing good by clearing the skies over California and other parts of the globe would have listened if you told them that their actions would contribute to massive global temperature rise in just 30-40 short years' time?

The earth's ecosystem is a very delicate thing and the more we stuff around with it, the greater the risk of catastrophe. Right now we're playing whackamole with the problems we face. We need to stop and think further ahead before we precipitate even worse problems as a result of the unintended side-effects of our "quick fix" solutions.

Need more proof?

Well remember that huge ozone hole that threatened us a while back? Remember how we banned CFCs in an attempt to patch up that hole?

Guess what? The hole is being repaired but in doing this we are once again amplifying the effects of climate change as an unintended side-effect.

Our present response to these threats appears to be not dissimilar to the response of a chicken on finding that it's just had its head cut off. We're running around like madmen suggesting and implementing "solutions" without fully understanding the problem, its cause and the long-term effects of our repairs.

Not good, not good at all.

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