"URGENT: IMMEDIATE PROACTIVE

GRASSROOTS ACTION  REQUIRED!”

Diane A. Davis, M.S., Ph.D. Cand.

Article Series Author

                                Copyright Claimed ©June 22, 2011

Noted in the preceding Article Ten, “the other problem: CO₂” continues to be the world’s biggest and most urgent challenge   -    demanding proactive and immediate action at the grassroots level by all peoples throughout the world to apply pressure on their respective governments to stop the assault on our precious Planet Earth by the production of 22 million tonnes per day (8,030 trillion tonnes per year [ 8.03 X 10¹²]) of CO₂  alone! 

A bird watcher who had witnessed sudden genetic anomalies in the American Bald Eaglet babies being born with genetic absurdities such as no wings, only one foot, one eye, blind and even worse, a crossed beak preventing their being fed and consequential exile from the mother’s nest[1]), began to record his observations c. 1939. This was the first time in recorded history that such observations began to appear and be noted in the written form.  Shortly thereafter, various scientists among disparate disciplines began to see genetic anomalies, tumors and cancers in dolphins and whales that would be washed ashore.  Similarities of afflictions and diseases among avian, marine and land wildlife species were beginning to present.  Autopsies and recorded findings of these various afflictions and diseases mimicked those which were plaguing humankind.  By 1950 individual scientists began to make a link between genetic anomalies and diseases presenting in both wildlife species and humans suddenly presenting. A search for a common denominator that linked the genetic anomalies and diseases throughout species and humans was attempted to be made.

By the early 1970s autopsies of dead wildlife species, toxicological analyses of the air, marine and soil resource contents by ecological and marine scientists, environmental engineers, biologists and medical doctors began to associate these various untimely deaths, the autopsies and the diseases and genetic anomalies with the toxic pollutants being emitted through our waste gas stacks, chimneys and vehicle waste pipes.  The conclusion was that these emissions were  detrimental to the environment, lower species and humans.

Pressure was put on the U.S. Federal Government to pass legislation that would ameliorate environmental degradation.  Certain new laws were initiated and passed by the U.S. Congress such as the Clean Air Act and later the Clean Water Act.[2]  Also, during the 1970s Oil Embargos, President Jimmy Carter enacted an Executive Order for the U.S. to conserve energy, as a national policy. 

The cost of this new environmental regulation and added R&D for technological advances the tenants of the Executive Order and the new U.S. Energy BOCA Code that satisfied the constraints of a national policy of conservation  - or cutting back on use consumption -  resulted in a number of economic recessions, loss of jobs, loss of homes, break-up of nuclear families, homelessness,[3] but somewhat helped to slow down the environmental degradation. 

But the next period of history, the 1980s during the Reagan Era, America would see a boom in the economy and a wane in the thermonuclear fission technology industry.  Afraid of public opposition and unrest, more oil and natural gas-fired powerplants were built to pick up the slack in the power production and energy requirements of the U.S. economy, in need of more BTUs: electricity generation, process steam manufacturing and transportation fuels.   Environmental degradation would continue and by the 1990s (one-hundred years of the Industrial Revolution behind us) the world began to see the phenomena called “global warming” now referred to as “global climate change” in full swing.

At present time, scientists the world over regardless of their individual disciplines, all of their in-field and clinical study results are echoing one another throughout the scientific, biological and medical, veterinary spectrums:  CO₂ produced by human activities is the world’s public enemy number one. Fossil fuel produced CO₂ is proving to be the biggest challenge that we must overcome in the next 10 years if we expect Planet Earth to be capable of supporting the life of all species by 2050 – 2070: the dawn of the Third Millennium, “Year 3000,”[4] as spoken of in Dr. Susan Solomon, etal’s recent U.S. NOAA – STADT studies, as well as other scientists, who’s research conclusions are  reported in Articles One, Nine, Ten, Twelve of this online series.

What will this present to our children, grandchildren, great grandchildren? Will they have a Planet capable of sustaining life with clean air, clean water and soil capable of producing nourishing crops that are capable of growing in a toxic pollutant and overburdened CO₂ -challenged environment, plentiful enough to support the world’s population expected to be 6,000,000,000 by 2050 -2070, perhaps 9,000,000,000 by the end of the 21^st Century? These are serious questions that not only scientists, but also economists and engineers and even medical doctors, are asking right now in the most recent study period of 2008  - 2011.

That we must overcome this tremendous challenge of toxic pollution we are daily spewing into our immediate atmosphere must be eliminated within the next few years.  This  is no longer an option or subject to bureaucratic debate if humans and all species are to continue life on Planet Earth past 2070.

This huge worldwide challenge demands all peoples at the grassroots level of all nations to proactively demand the immediate gross reduction toward near-term cessation of burning fossil fuels within the next decade by bringing online more sophisticated intellectual technologies that will not produce GHG toxic pollutants and will actually help to clear up the immediate atmosphere by burning clean without emissions.[5] 

Warming Ocean Temperatures, Expanding Ocean Bodies, Rising Sea Levels, Loss of Species, Coastal and Inland Flooding:

In the short period of time after writing Articles Nine and Ten of this online series, the most recent studies have been published by very concerned scientists, all of whom are urging action to reduce CO₂ production if the Earth is to remain capable of supporting life. 

Several of these scientists include Dr. Susan Solomon, senior scientist of the U.S. Government Agency NOAA, together with her collaborating study authors.[6] The NOAA study results were compiled from both in-field measurements as well as their running many different electronic models to support the understanding of their aggregate data. Their study included focus on drying of particular regions and on thermal expansion of the ocean due to the fact that the most recent observations suggest that humans are contributing to changes that have already been measured.[7]  NOAA understands and predicts irreversible irrevocable changes in the Earth's pre-naturally geo-engineered environment, from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, including our coastal and marine resources – at present all at risk.

Dr. Solomon, together with her study authors reached a powerful conclusion about climate change caused by continued and near future increases of carbon dioxide: to a large extent, “there’s no going back.”[8]  But now we know that the CO₂ problem is of immediate and dire concern to everyone because the destruction that we incur on Planet Earth by our continued fossil fuel burning with consequential CO₂ and GHG (more especially methane [CH₄]) daily production being emitted into the ambient atmosphere is not reversible and is irrevocable for a minimum of 1,000 years from the date of emission. 

Dr. Solomon etal’s findings appeared during the week of January 26, 2011 in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.  Led by Dr. Solomon, this pioneering study shows how changes in surface temperature, rainfall, and sea level are largely irreversible for more than 1,000 years after carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions are completely stopped - worldwide.

In her presentation at the Symposium Proceedings, Dr. Solomon stated:

“Our study convinced us that current choices

regarding carbon dioxide emissions will have

legacies that will irreversibly change the planet.

It has long been known that some of the carbon

dioxide emitted by human activities stays in the atmosphere for thousands of years, but this new

study advances the understanding of how this

affects the climate system.”[9] 

The study examined the consequences of

allowing CO₂ to build up to several different peak levels beyond present-day concentrations of 385 parts per million and then completely halting emissions after the peak. The authors found that the scientific evidence is strong enough to quantify some irreversible climate impacts, including rainfall changes in certain key regions, and global sea level rise.

If CO₂ is allowed to peak at 450-600 parts per

million, the results would include persistent

decreases in dry-season rainfall that are

comparable to the 1930s North American Dust

Bowl in zones including southern Europe,

northern Africa, southwestern North America,

southern Africa and western Australia.

The study notes that decreases in rainfall that

last not just for a few decades but over centuries, are expected to have a range of impacts that differ by region.† Such regional impacts include decreasing human water supplies, increased fire frequency, ecosystem change and expanded deserts. Dry-season wheat and maize agriculture in regions of rain-fed farming, such as Africa, would also be adversely affected.

Climate impacts were less severe at lower peak

levels. But at all levels added carbon dioxide and its climate effects linger because of the ocean [sic. acidification].

“In the long run, both carbon dioxide loss and

heat transfer depend on the same physics of

deep-ocean mixing. The two work against each

other to keep temperatures almost constant for

more than a thousand years, and that makes

carbon dioxide unique among the major climate

[sic. warming] gases,” said Dr. Solomon.

The scientists emphasize that increases in

CO₂ that occur in this century “lock in”

sea level rise that would slowly follow in

the next 1,000 years. Considering just the

expansion of warming ocean waters—

without melting glaciers and polar ice sheets

—the authors find that the irreversible global

average sea level rise by the year 3000 would

be at least 1.3–3.2 feet (0.4–1.0 meter) if CO₂

peaks at 600 parts per million, and double

that amount if CO₂ peaks at 1,000 parts per

million.†

“Additional contributions to sea level rise from

the melting of glaciers and polar ice sheets are

too uncertain to quantify in the same way,” said

Dr. Solomon. “They could be even larger but we

just don’t have the same level of knowledge

about those terms. We presented the minimum

sea level rise that we can expect from well-

understood physics, and we were surprised

that it was so large. Rising sea levels would

cause “…irreversible commitments to future

changes in the geography of the Earth, since

many coastal and island features would

ultimately become submerged,” the authors

wrote.[10]

Dr. Solomon, etal’s study and conclusions echo the urgent concerns of the October 2008 “Monaco Declaration” by the group of 150 worldwide marine scientists and the previous studies by TEAM TARA and the U.K. Royal Navy’s studies in late 2008 – early 2009 regarding the fast-track thinning and melting of the ice shelves of  the Arctic and Antarctica, the permafrost coastlines of Alaska.

Rising Sea Levels and Flooding

                Throughout the World:

Rising sea levels and flooding of real property assets is causing shelter and socio-economic loss and hardships for families, municipalities and coastal villages throughout the world – from Bangladesh, India to Quebec, Canada, to Chicago, Illinois and further south to the Gulf Coast States of the U.S.

In the black carbon soot studies reported in Article Ten, as the black carbon soot appeared near the surface of land or oceans or on the ice shelves it insulates the surface and thereby causes the surface to heat.  As the altitute of the black carbon soot lowered closer to the ground surface, which is where most waste gas stack and tail pipe emissions occur, the warming effect of the land, ice shelves or ocean surface increased.  In addition to temperature changes, black carbon soot also had varying effects on precipitation.  It increased precipitation in the lower atmosphere and decreased it in the upper atmosphere, as a result of changes in atmospheric stability. "The Arctic is the critical defense shield for Earth’s climate system. The Arctic has warmed >2.5° C. (or 36.2° F.) over the last century with carbon dioxide (CO₂) and mehtane (CH₄) having increased the most of all the greenhouse gases (GHG) over just the last 15 year period, causing not only the Arctic to warm and melt but also the snow and ice on top of the Himalayan Mountains to warm and melt” stated Dr. Jacobsen in his study report. [11]

As we have recently seen since early January 2011 here in the U.S., six weeks of continuous raining has caused flooding well over the 25, 50 and 100-year peak flooding throughout the world, levels of flooding never before seen.  Coastal areas, now under water, resulting in loss of land mass and the necessity for coastal villagers to move their homes and temples to higher ground in Bangladesh, wherever that higher ground may be found.[12],[13]

Rising sea levels due to melting of once frozen coastlines and ice sheslves is echoed in two studies recently published that Arctic coastlines respond to climate change with increased erosion, causing an average of about half a meter per year.  The effects are most severe in the Laptev Eastern Siberian and Beaufort Seas, where coastal erosion rates reach more than 8 meters (~ 24’-0”) per year in some areas.  More importantly, more and more coastlines are being exposed to the effects of climate change.  Two-thirds of these coastlines are composed of frozen substrate called permafrost, which is much more susceptible to erosion than rock.  Scientists concluded that these effects will cause substantial changes for Arctic ecosystems near the coast as well as the human populations living there.[14]

The two carbon soot studies reported in Article Ten,  the two studies reported in Article Nine reiterating the Royal Navy’s in-situ submarine sonar test measurements of the actual thickness and hardness of the Arctic and Antarctic ice shelves in late  2008 - early 2009, together with TEAM TARA’s††† findings of the melting glaciers and ice caps now found to be occurring in the Canadian Arctic Islands,[15] sea level rise due to this “insulative carbon black soot generated by waste stack and tail pipe CO₂ emission aerosols” is of much greater concern to scientists worldwide than what was believed just two years ago, echoing the same urgent concern of Dr. Susan Solomon etal of the NOAA study.

The 2004 - 2009 study of the Canadian Arctic Islands lead author Alex Gardner, stated: “from 2004 – 2006, the region lost an average of 7 cubic miles of ice shelves per year, which increased to 22 cubic miles per year from 2006 – 2009, adding one milimeter to the height of the world’s oceans.  This is a big response to a small change in climate.  If the warming continues and we start to see similar responses in other glaciated regions, it is safe to say that this is very worrisome.”[16] 

During the study above, in particular, University of Michigan scientists performed numerical simulations and then used two different satellite-based techniques to independently validate their model results.  Experts projected that sea levels will rise a minimum of one meter (~ 3’-0”) by the end of the century, displacing tens of millions of people living in low lying areas, poisoning aquifers, and amplifying the impacts of storm surges and violent tsunamis upredictable at the time of design and construction of mega projects, similar to that witnessed in the Fukushima area of the Japan islands ealry in March, 2011. 

Such an example would be that present condition very close to home in the USA. A city-funded study in Chicago found that increasing rainfall attributed to climate change would overflow Chicago’s sewer system and cause it to drain into Lake Michigan, the drinking water source for the seven million people.  The study showed that the amount of storms with more than 2.5 inches of rain per day, the amount necessary to trigger sewage dumping into  Lake  Michigan,  will  increase 50 %  by 2039,   and

160% by the end of the 21^st Century.  Officials at the Metropolitan Warter Reclamation District and City Hall have hired engineers to assess the effect of increased rainfall on the existing sewer system.  While Chicago has developed a plan to capture rainfall before it reaches the sewers,  it has also pledged to reduce emissions of greenhousegases (GHG) by making buildings more energy efficient, using cleaner sources of energy and  expanding mass transit.[17] 

This brings to mind my first semester of structural engineering when Dr. Y.S. Lee, Ph.D. Structural/Civil Engineering who advised: “you can never over design for the forces of Nature,” [sic. water will go where water will go and it seeks the path of least resistance]. Similar to New Orleans during the horrific 2005 hurricane season, Chicago may yet be inundated with flood waters, despite the measures instituted today, if we keep burning fossil fuels and emitting GHG, especially CO₂ and CH₄.

Clearly the research from many different scientists have reported global climate change is advancing ten-times faster than at any period from 65 million years ago, and the damage is irreversible because the GHG and especially the CO₂ react with the U.V. daily and remain trapped within the lower atmosphere for the next 1,000+ years from the day that we stop emitting the waste gases worldwide into the immediate atmosphere.

Temperature Rise As The Earth’s Response To Daily Trapped GHG, CO₂ and Heat Inversion In The Lower Atmosphere:

The second point of Dr. Susan Solomon etal’s most recent study findings and their urgent cautioning had to do with the temperature rise in the lower atmosphere due to this CO_2, N₂O and SO₂  from GHG generated by human activity: burning fossil fuels and the carbon black soot aerosol ”fines” and “superfines” generated from waste gas stacks and tailpipes, worldwide. 

Carbon soot and all GHG may be arrested the day we stop burning fossil fuels and rely on domestically-generated clean-green thermonulcear fusion and fission energy produces no greenhouse gases as it does not rely on fossil fuels for its fuel elements. Thermonuclear fusion is based on heavy water or the isotopes of hydrogen that will burn clean in a self-sustaining burn once a sustained ignition is achieved and a “burning” plasma (e.g. the fourth state of matter) blanket  becomes the venue for sustainable thermonuclear fusion energy.††

Another case in point is the more recent study discovering that the banded morwong, a long-lived fish species for thousands of years, is experiencing a stunted growth due to a two-degree Centigrade temperature rise in the Tasman Sea over the past 60 years.  “By examining growth across a range that species inhabit, we found evidence of both slowing growth and increased physiological stress as higher temperatures impose a higher metabolic cost on fish as the warm edge of the range,” stated Ron Thresher, marine ecologist and co-author of the study.  He also stated that sedentary fish, like the morwong, are most likely to be affected by the rising temperrature, since they do not move further south into cooler waters.  The study incorproated data on the morwong dating back to 1910 that focused on bony structures called otolilths, annual growth rings that are similar to the growth rings in trees, to assess the growth rates of the fish.  The scientists concluded that the drop in growth could be related to higher stress levels from rising temperatures, increased oxygen consumption, and a decreased ability to swim for long periods.[18]

          “Warming ocean waters are pushing some fish

living in the Tasman Sea beyond their comfort

zone, say Australian and New Zealand scientists.

While a slight increase of water temperature can

boost fish growth and reproduction living in   cooler waters, laboratory studies [sic. confirming the

first study we have undertaken] have shown that fish stop growing and reproducing, and can

eventually die, if temperatures rise too much.”[19]

Another researcher in Dr. Thresher’s study stated that fish in the cooler waters off the coast of Australia might be stimulated, the fish living in the waters off the coast of New Zealand were decreasing in size because they had already adapted to a 2 degree increase in the water ecology (now exceeding 17° C. to 18° and 19° Centigrade during the spawning season (= 60.8° to 64.4°, 66.2° F. respectively), but once the ecology temperature reached 16° C. (60.8° F.) the fish were now consuming 44% more oxygen and can’t sustain the swimming speed needed to spawn and go into anaerobic stress because they can’t breathe fast enough[20] (sic. heralding the end of their specie). 

To test what the scientists were seeing in the wild, they conducted an additional study to identify the effect of increased water temperatures on the morwong’s spawning behavior. 

"This is the first time we've been able

 to show … the stresses are actually

happening in the wild and … there's a

physiological cost associated with

[climate change]," stated study

co-author,  Dr. Jeremy Lyle.

“Red morwongs, or red moki

(Cheilodactylus spectabilis),  inhabit

temperate reefs in waters between 10

and 50 meters (e.g. 30 to +/- 150 feet)

deep. Living for up to 100 years, they

tend to stay in the same environment

throughout their life despite changes

in their environment.”[21]

In the prove-disprove second study, the researchers analyzed the fishes’ otoliths (e.g. bony structures that fish use for orientation and detection of movement) that show incremental changes in fish growth over long periods of time.    The scientists then compared the growth rates of the fish to the annual mean temperature recorded at each of the five sites since the turn of the 21^st Century.

Results of the preliminary study indicate that once water temperatures reaches 16° C. (60.8° F.) and above, the fish consume 44 per cent more oxygen, can't sustain the swimming speed needed to spawn, and go into anaerobic stress.

Dr. Jeremy Lyle from the University of Tasmania's Institute of Marine and Antarctic Studies stated warming oceans have implications for fish reproduction and long-term productivity of fisheries, especially along the northern margin the fish's range.

The sad thing is:

"We won't see fish die because of water

temperatures," Dr. Lyle stated, "but the

population in those areas will become

less productive and really very dependent

upon young fish moving into those areas

and replacing them.” …  "If that's not

occurring then what we might see is

contraction in the range of the fish at

the warm end [of the distribution]."[22]

These results will spell the end of the specie altogether.

Another very recent study determined that over the last 25 years, the average wind speeds over the oceans have risen significantly, as have wave heights.  Researchers stated that these changes are not necessarily a result of climate change.  However, the higher wind speeds could lead to greater evaporation, adding to the increase from global warming, which in turn could increase precipitation worldwide.  The average speed was increased about 0.25 percent for the past two decades, whereas the mean increase of .75 percent annually in wave heights was not as significant.[23]

Further, this absorbed U.V. heat that is trapped closer to the ground’s surface (e.g. in physics: “temperature inversion,” vs. the natural mechanical physics of the  second law of thermodynamics, where the hotter more concentated air mass would naturally rise into the upper atmosphere and further into the stratisphere to a cooler, less concentrated air mass* is inhibited from functioning normally) would also account for the heightened temperature of the winds, especially in regions such as the Middle East and Africa, who’s populations already have difficulty in adjusting to the extreme heat[24] of their summer months which can realize 125°+ F.   Not only does this trapped heat create more violent wind storms but when it blows off the land and meets with the cooler temperatures of the great oceans, more active and violent hurricanes form in the Atlantic Ocean, as we saw in the 2005 Hurricane Season in the USA and placed underwater most of New Orleans, neighboring communities and contiguous states along the Gulf Coast. [25] 

In a very recent follow-on study consisting of an international team collaboration of scientists from the U.S., EU, Norway, Russia, Germany, Italy and China, a month-long research project to study the impact of black carbon soot particles in the Arctic, where surface temperatures have increased about twice as fast as the global average in the past 100 years.[26] 

The main sources of black soot in the Arctic come from burning both forests, such as that we are now witnessing in the State of Arizona in the month of June 2011, as well as the traditional fossil fuels, auto and truck engine emissions, aircraft emissions, wood and coal-burning stoves in North America and Eurasia.  The study took place in Svailbard, Norway, tracked the movement of carbon soot through the atmosphere, its deposit on snow and ice surfaces, and its effect on warming  in the Arctic. The study was undertaken through the implementation of two unmanned aircraft which collected aerosol soot in the air, while a second craft studied the reflectivity of the surface.  The Arctic Council, consisting of the eight countries bordering the Arctic, will use the study’s results to decide whether or not to seek reductions in soot from other nations. The study concluded in May, 2011.

Stated Dr. Quinn, co-leader of the study on behalf of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and a study research participant explained the movement of the black carbon soot, (a further example of naturally occurrring second law of thermodynamics):

          “The Arctic serves as the air conditioner of the

Planet. Heat from other parts of the Earth moves

To the Arctic in circulating air and ocean water,

and some of that warmth can radiate into space. 

At the same time, some of the incoming heat from

The Sun’s U.V. rays tend to be absorbed in other

Locations, is reflected by the (sic. white)  ice and

snow, which allow the polar regions to serve as

cooling agents for the Planet” of the heat from

the sun that tends to be absorbed in other

locations, is reflected by the ice and snow,

allowing the polar regions to serve as cooling

agents for the Plant.”[27]

The surface air temperature in the Arctic has

Increased about twice as fast as the global

Average rate over the past 100 years,” stated

Dr. Quinn.  “Over the past 50 years, annual

Average surface air temperatures have increased

From 2 to 3° C. (3.6 to 5.4° F.) in Alaska and Siberia.

The annual average temperature globally has

increased by about  0.7° C. (1.3° F.)  over the same

tiime period.”[28]

The warming problem is compounded because,

When the highly reflective snow and ice melt,

The dark surfaces of land and ocean that were

Beneath absorb more heat, further heating the

atmosphere.[29]

The Arctic warming has resulted in an earlier Spring melt, a longer melt season, and a decrease in the extent of sea ice extent, Dr. Quinn stated.  This has raised concerns among scientists for polar bears, which depend on ice to hunt.

According to these scientists, the thin black layer of  carbon soot in the form of “fines,” “superfines” and larger on the Arctic ice is causing the ice shelves to absorb more heat on the ice surface below, further heating the atmosphere, rather than reflect it back into space as it would if it were white, the natural color of the ice shelves.

Warming Ocean Temperatures And Changing pH Content Of Concern To Scientists About Precious Marine EcoSystems:

The great oceans of Planet Earth, covering 70.8% of the Earth’s surface supply 90% of our drinking water support 50% of all species on Planet Earth (i.e. 5 – 6,000 marine species).  As explained in Article Ten previously, when the naturally alkaline ocean waters acting as a gigantic heat sink and carbon storehouse when it rains or snows the acidic toxic pollutants from the clouds traveling around the circumference of the Earth on the “horse” and “Tradewinds,” the CO₂ of the toxic polluting GHG, is released into the ocean waters.  The mix of the CO₂ and the alkaline water results in carbonic acid.  More importantly, this carbonic acid depletes the hydrogen and calcium ions naturally found in alkaline water.  Because all shell-forming marine animals including corals (which responsibly build the coral reefs which 50% of the Earth’s species depend upon for a habitable shelter and food) other marine species which build shells for their protection such crabs, oysters, shrimp, lobster, many planktonic organisms, squid, all mullosks and even some fish species could be gravely and irrevocably affected, as many are beginning to be, noted above.  Many marine species may not be able to adapt to the more acidic environment as one steessor in combination with a second stressor as in rising water temperatures of their marine ecology.  The delicate Pteropod, a small shelled almost microscopic organism, upon which not only all these shell-forming species feed, but also the great whale feed would also become extinct through their inability to breath and spawn to the next generation, unable to adapt to the more acidic chemistry and warmer habitat. 

The snow crab and shrimp, for example have already migrated to the parts of Alaska where the temperature is cooler and the hydrogen and calcium ions in the richer more alkaline marine ecology offer these species a healthy environment in which to thrive and regenerate to the next generation. “The ecosystem has not seen snow crabs there for hundreds of years, stated one scientist who works for the U.S. National Fisheries Service, State of Alaska Fisheries Science Center,  Kodiak Laboratory.“[30]^{, [31]}

Equally worrisome is the fact that as the oceans continue to absorb more CO₂, their capacity as a carbon storehouse would naturally diminish, over time. That means more of the carbon dioxide we emit will remain trapped within the atmosphere, further aggravating global climate change with the onset of ever-increasingly more catastrophic flooding and droughts resulting in loss of land mass, loss of life and economic welfare for all peoples of all nations, especially those island-nations which rest at sea level, worldwide.

When the CO₂ mixes with the natural alkaline chemistry of the great ocean bodies to produce carbonic acid thus reducing the amount of calcium and hydrogen ions in the marine water environment that shelled marine species rely upon to produce their own protective shells.  Thus the erosion of the crab’s protective shell has been documented by the unprecedented 25% loss of alkalinity, moving toward a more acidic chemistry of deep ocean water as a result of climate change that is destroying the thickness and hardness of the crab’s shell.[32] Unable to protect itself from predators, the crab will fall prey to being consumed by its predators higher on the food chain before it can take nourishment and reproduce the next

generation of its specie.  And yet, another major marine specie will have become extinct.  Continuing up the food chain ladder, it is reasonable to assume that the next higher predator would also become extinct because its food source has disappeared from the marine ecosystem. That specie may not have the ability to move to another ecosystem, more habitably favorable.

In U.S. economic terms, taking the blue crab for example, as just one delicate genus of a specie endangered, that has been plentiful until 2004 – 2005[33] when crab and fish stocks at netting harvest dropped 85%.  Endangered species that not only provide a mainstay food for many but also livelihoods that  represents USD$156,894.[34] annually in 2008 revenues, with a portion contributed to streams of local, state and federal tax revenues that are diminishing and may not be available in the future for municipal infrastructure improvements and maintenance costs. This latest figure contrasts with the higher 2005 USD$159.242, the 2003 USD$170,890. and the 2000 USD$186,036.[35]

The second consideration to the loss of the specie as food for involves the families sustained by the harvesting livelihoods of the blue crab who depend upon just this one genus of the crab specie alone.   Without the plentiful harvesting of this region-specific specie-genus, these industry workers will face a cut back in the number of jobs available, perhaps losing their livelihoods altogether.  In turn they will cut back in their spending in the local community, becoming more reliant on unemployment benefits or welfare subsidies.  They may even lose their homes if not able to pay the mortgage or monthly rental fee.

In terms of intrinsic values, for those of us who love to scuba dive† and explore the great oceans worldwide, this marine habitat loss will represent another tragic loss to the majestic underwater world of marine biological diversity of species found in the natural ecology of coral reefs and shallow caves during our underwater diving. This is the scuba diver’s R&R.  While the cost of taking time off from our jobs, travel and accommodation expenses to and from the dive site, special equipment and air rental and tank refills can all be quantified, how can one put a dollar value on the enjoyment, psychological and spiritual renewal experienced when we witness first-hand the majestic beauty of the thousands of biodiversified and uniquely colorful species found in and aroundon an underwater coral reef? 

The American General Electorate has failed to recognize the urgency of the present challenge to all of us.  The General Electorate, having failed to make its voice heard in Washington and without a significant impetus from their Constituents, both the 110,^th 111,^th and 112^th U.S. Congress has also failed to act in an accountably proactive manner by increasing the funding for thermonuclear fusion energy here in the USA with a mandate to the R&D community that will bring a powerplant technology online immediately.  In-field, simulated and in-laboratory studies concur:  the toxic pollutants (CO₂) that we emit from waste gas stacks and tailpipes today will stay in the immediate atmosphere to our own detriment for >1,000 years or more.  We don’t have another 20 – 30 years for government discourse and argument, agreement-disagreement as to whether or not we are experiencing global warming or global climate change that may or may not involve further scientific R&D![36]

Changing America’s energy paradigm[37] to a program that will arrest advancing global climate change due to GHG emissions and in particular CO₂ and CH₄ emissions is easily achieveable right now, when we bring online advanced sohpisticated generation of thermonulcear energy. 

Newly available advanced generations of thermonuclear fission technologyworking  together with our U.S. national intellectual asset of thermonuclear fusion energy is a paradigm available right now. 

Working in tandem this highly sophisticated “Generation V” technology America could produce a  non-polluting clean-green domestically-fueled commercial electricity for all our space heating, cooling, industrial and commercial electricity needs in addition to generating by-products that are also clean-green and sustainable fuels for all our economy’s transportation sector requirements.  This new energy paradigm would generate no GHG, no PCBs, or CFCs, and no black soot that has been causally-related to ten-times accelerated melting of the Earth’s ice shelves and permafrost bulkhead erosion defining the great ocean bodies.  No  pollution would be produced and/or emitted into the ambient air atomosphere, marine bodies, agricultural crops or  livestock grazing  soil.†

What You Can Do To Arrest Global Climate Change:

The urgency and the moment of the environmental, socio-economic and political challenge cannot be overstated or underestimated and therefore deserves repeating.  I cannot urge you strongly enough to take advantage of your democratic privilege and duty, acting responsibly proactively contacting your respective U.S. Congressional representatives, making your voice heard and your demand known that you want to stop global warming, arrest this vicious cycle of extreme weather patterns caused by climate change by undertaking the following:

·        bringing online green-clean self-sustaining thermonuclear fusion energy for electricity generation and the production of by-product

 clean-green self-sustainable hydrogen now!

·        stopping all fossil fuel burning in America for electricity generation and passenger and municipal car and light truck fuels, (and replacing 77% GDP) with clean-green sustainable by-product fuels generated from thermonuclear fusion energy.

As a Representative-style Democracy our elected representatives are sent to Washington on our behalf to undertake the legislative actions that “We, The People,” want and desire.  Our bicameral Congressional representatives care about our votes and therefore about what we want them to do as we are a self-governed self-determined people.  General Electorate demand (a population of 320 million), making our thoughts and desires for legislative action known to our representatives by contacting them is our own bounded duty and privilege as a self-governed, self-ruled people.  It is our responsibility to direct the decisions taken by U.S. Congress.

We each have one vote and one voice to be heard. That is power! Every elected representative wants to know what his/her constituent wants. It is well within our own power to preserve stop all GHG and especially CO₂ production now.  It is well within our individual and collective power to stop ocean acidification and temperature rise by heat inversion by bringing online the sophisticated thermonuclear energies and stopping all burning fossil fuel burning, now.

Here’s how:

1.    Click on Write Your Representatives, pull down the letter fill in your name, address, date.

2.    Click on Contact Your Elected Representatives, go to the state by state listing for the current Members of U.S. Congress. Fill in the contact information, a letter for each representative and senator in your respective state. Save the letter.

3.    Click on the email address provided for your respective representative and send the letter off immediately to your Senate and House Representative’s office in Washington.

Or, print the letter, sign it and mail it via first class mail.

Of course, you can always compose your own letter in your own words and send it, but still use the contact information as provided above. Be sure to tell your representatives that you want to arrest this vicious cycle of acidification of ocean bodies,  melting of the ice shelves and erosion of the permafrost bulkhead that defines our great ocean bodies, loss of species, loss of livelihoods,  caused by global climate change. 

Tell your representatives that they can easily they can easily stop global warming climate change by:

·        bringing online green-clean self-sustaining fusion energy for electricity generation and the production of by-product clean-green self-sustainable hydrogen now! and

·        stopping all fossil fuel burning in America for electricity generation and passenger and municipal car and light truck fuels, (and replacing 87% GDP with clean – green self-sustainable by-product fuels from thermonuclear fusion energy).

If you think that writing a letter to your elected representatives in Washington is hard or not worth the time and effort, or you’re your voice will not be heard or considered important, consider the alternative of not making your voice heard in Washington:

·        Congress will continue business as usual and protect the Petroleum and Gas Institute cash-rich Lobby with tax subsidies at the expense of your progeny’s sustainability,

·        The amount of ocean acidification will continue to escalate logarithmically, and in another two decades

you, your children and grandchildren would be living in a world without the coral reefs, the food, livelihoods and medicines that their ecosystems and species provides to humans on land.

·        You and your progeny will be living in a world where the great ocean bodies have little or no permafrost bulkhead to define their boundary positions, and ice shelves continue to melt with consequential burial of present-day sea-level island city-state-nations completely beneath water.  Depending on your home’s location, you may be living partially underwater, permanently.

·        You and your progeny will be living in a world without all the unique majestic beauty of thousands of species living and feeding and reproducing their next generation of their specie on healthy teaming coral reefs worldwide! 

Is this what you want to leave your children and grandchildren?  We can preserve what we have, but once lost, it is not within humankind’s power to bring it back. Now is the time to act proactively.

Article Ten                                                Article Twelve

Author, Diane A. Davis, M.S., Ph.D. Cand., Founder and CEO, The International Institute For Thermonuclear Fusion Energy Education, R&D, Regulation, Technology and Public Policy, Inc.

This article filed and registered with U.S. Library of Congress, Office of Copyrights Protection, Washington, D.C. 20559 in July 2011 by author.  All copyrights domestic and international claimed by author.