I'm talking about thirteen federal agencies, not the politicians. The agencies predict that if significant steps are not taken to rein in global warming, the damage will knock as much as 10 percent off the size of the American economy by century’s end. The UN produced a very similar report recently.
The US report lays out the devastating effects of a changing climate on the economy, health and environment, including record wildfires in California, crop failures in the Midwest and crumbling infrastructure in the South. It's possible that our exports and supply chains - especially trade and agriculture - could be disrupted, agricultural yields could fall to 1980s levels by mid-century and fire season could spread to the Southeast.
Climate change could slash up to a tenth of gross domestic product by 2100, more than double the losses of the Great Recession a decade ago. The report projects costs of $141 billion from heat-related deaths, $118 billion from sea level rise and $32 billion from infrastructure damage by the end of the century.
The change will affect every part of the country. More people will die as heat waves become more common, the scientists say, and a hotter climate will also lead to more outbreaks of disease.
What can be done? The report offers three main solutions: putting a price on greenhouse gas emissions, which usually means imposing taxes or fees on companies that release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere; establishing government regulations on how much greenhouse pollution can be emitted; and spending public money on clean-energy research.
No comments:
Post a Comment