A new study, covered in New Scientist, predicts that 50% of the unique climates on earth will be destroyed by the end of the century due to climate change. 30% of all species will be extinct with a catastrophic affect on the biodiversity that serves as a leveling mechanism for the planet’s climate. Add in a 50% growth in human population by 2050 and we start to look more like a virus than a viable part of the planet’s ecosystem.
Click the image for a map set of disappearing climates.

According to the International Herald Tribune, New York City has a real problem and there is no simple solution. In this article about NY’s reaction to rising ocean levels, a few facts stood out (note that I referenced ‘facts’ not speculation). First, all of the home insurers are changing their business models radically to protect against flood and hurricane losses. For example, Allstate will no longer renew homeowner’s policies in eight downstate, waterfront counties including the NYC area. This may represent the most concentrated chunk of premium waterfront residential real estate in the world. They’re no longer taking that bet. Last fall I drove down the Jersey shore from Atlantic City and the housing is impressive. Also impressive is the fact that all of it is built practically at sea level on what are obviously reclaimed dunes and salt marshes. Now it is increasingly difficult to insure this property which, in turn, means you can’t mortgage it.
The second fact is that lower Manahattan is built on sand so fine you can’t pile it up on a table- it just slides off. For the many older buildings whose foundations rest on sand (like all the brownstones) this means that a single flood event could wash away their foundations, leaving them uninhabitable. With a five inch rise in ocean levels predicted by 2030 and increasingly intense hurricane seasons this is a real possibility.
The ’solutions’ are equally drastic. A thirty foot high wall wide enough for a four lane highway around Manhattan? I doubt those who paid a very high premium for waterfront property are going to go for that.
New York is one of my favorite places. If you haven’t been, you have to go- it’s an amazing testament to the vitality of humanity. However, when you look at it from the perspective of climate change it is a very vulnerable place. Things could change there very quickly.

I recently added another category for my posts, Green Business. You can see the categories in the ‘cloud’ in the right hand column. These clouds are a new way of displaying information. Each category’s font size grows as more posts on that subject are added. Green Business is in teeny tiny type right now because its a new category and I have not gone back and tagged old posts with it. I suspect that if I did, it would be one of the most prominent in the cloud.
The cloud fascinates me because it shows how interrelated these subjects are- I almost never have one subject assigned to a post. The cloud also embraces some subjects that are not listed. You don’t see Iraq War as a category, nor do you see Bush Cheney, even though I frequently post on these subjects. That’s because I feel that Energy is a unifying issue in these subjects: We fight in Iraq because of a terrible fear in the executive branch that if we don’t get an oil-rich country for ourselves, we’re screwed. The fact that Bush Cheney both come out of the fossil fuel cloud isn’t lost on anyone at this point.

Walter Reed and War Spin
Perhaps the best example of how things have changed politically since the election is the scandal over treatment of wounded soldiers (they’re not veterans until they are discharged from the military). Every time a Democrat votes to defund the war the right sends the message that they are hurting our troops. Yet the reality uncovered in the Walter Reed scandal is that the neo-conservatives don’t give a damn about the troops- all they care about is pursuing their oil wars. They have made a decision that it is worth paying a price in human suffering to get a foothold in oil country.
Is this too cynical and harsh? Read the stories of how impossible it is to live as a wounded soldier. Now look at the wealth accumulated by the Rumsfelds and Cheneys, not to mention the oil executives and Halliburtons of the world. This is all about short term gains.

Why They Block Innovative Energy Technology and Efficiency Standards
This is simple. The wealth the oil policies generate is so great that the beneficiaries are establishing a ruling class of legacy wealth that will outlive any disasters, wars, climate calamities, etc. Bush is already an example of such a royal clan as are Cheney and Rumsfeld. Their descendants will never have to deal with anything but the best.
If we enforce efficiencies and develop clean, cheap alternative energy sources this destruction of the middle class will fail. Cheap energy is a great democratizing force no matter where you live in the world. Blocking cheap energy and raising prices short term through wars is a way of destroying the middle class and building a world aristocracy.

Don’t get the wrong idea- I’m not a socialist, I’m a capitalist who believes in free markets and a global economy. Free markets cannot exist when a small power group are politically manipulating things to benefit their own agenda. The Democrats need to hit them hard on these points- it’s a winning strategy.

“In France, the projected climate changes threaten the very definition of wine, says Bernard Seguin, a climatologist with the French National Agronomy Institute. Each one degree increase in temperature in France is equivalent to moving 200 kilometers (or 124 miles) north, he says. By the end of the century, with current warming predictions, the north coast of France will be experiencing weather that today is common for the south of France.”

Napa Valley a desert? Fine wines from Denmark? This comprehensive article from AZCentral.com tells the story of how wine growing regions are already experiencing measurable changes, some positive, many negative, due to global warming. Germany’s wines are improving in quality, southern French growing regions are now using irrigation for the first time in history and the countries of northern Europe are experimenting with viticulture.
While many growers are experiencing great vintages because of warming, there is also great concern at the pace of change. Vintners need to plan far ahead, as much as fifty years, because it takes a long time to establish vines. They are unable to accurately plan for future vineyards.
Upstate NY, particularly the beautiful Finger Lakes region just south of Rochester, is a grape growing area with hundreds of small vineyards and wineries. We’ve been limited by our climate to only a few strains of vinifera grapes, the gold standard in fine wine grapes. That is changing as we warm. The surest indicator is found in land prices. An acre in Napa can go for $200,000. while Finger Lakes land was around $2000/acre. Now it has doubled in value. I’m not surprised- the region has large lakes, incredible views and is easily accessible. One of those lakes, Canandaigua, has the highest freshwater property values in the country.
Wine, like amphibians, is an early indicator of change.