via SolveClimate.com.
Last month’s earthquake in Haiti brought out two sides of Bahamians: the all-too-common bigotry that holds tight onto what we’ve achieved over the past forty years and refuses to share our good fortune with others, and a generosity and compassion that signals a possible change in the way we talk about ourselves, our country, and our neighbours.
What struck me, though, was the almost unquestioning subtext of both: the growing-old refrain that we are blessed, we are special, God has smiled upon us, and therefore we must either keep that blessing selfishly to ourselves or spread it more generously than we have done in the past.
And we’ve gone off to thank God, to congratulate ourselves, that we were not so unfortunate as to have had an earthquake here in our land, that we are mostly outside the earthquake zone (except Inagua, which is close enough to the fault that shook Port-au-Prince to have experienced the earth’s shaking at different times in its history).
What I wonder about, though, is the question of why in all our discussions about blessedness, in all our wrangling about who-won-Elizabeth, in all our self-centredness and short-sightedness, no one — not during the debates, not during the discussions on the air, nowhere, not even during the Copenhagen talks last year — has raised the issue that should have every Bahamian deeply concerned: the question of the impact that global warming will have on ocean warming, the melting of the ice caps, and the eventual rising of the seas.
Now it’s possible for us to not-believe all the science about global warming. I myself, while accepting the research and the results, and believing entirely that the earth’s climate is experiencing some major changes, am vaguely sceptical about the stated causes of climate change, and am also not always convinced about the predicted results of it.
BUT. One thing that isn’t in dispute at the moment is that the ocean temperature is currently rising. Or, to be more precise: “July 2009 was the hottest month for the world’s oceans in almost 130 years of record-keeping” (Seas at Risk.Org); and that scientists are noticing a shrinkage of the ice sheets of both Greenland and Antarctica.
Here’s what that means:
If the Greenland ice sheet were to melt, it would raise sea level 7 meters 23 feet. Melting of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet would raise sea level 5 meters 16 feet. But even just partial melting of these ice sheets will have a dramatic effect on sea level rise.Senior scientists are noting that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change IPCC projections of sea level rise during this century of 18 to 59 centimeters are already obsolete and that a rise of 2 meters during this time is within range.
via Melting Ice Could Lead to Massive Waves of Climate Refugees | SolveClimate.com.
Here’s what that means to our country.
The Bahamas is flat, low-lying, with few points on any island that can be considered high ground. Our highest point, way away on Cat Island, is 206 ft (63 metres) above sea level. But what’s perhaps more worrying is that our fresh water sources are universally fresh water lenses, which rely to some degree on the stability of the salt water levels to continue to provide us with fresh water levels. Consider the fact, too, that New Providence gets its fresh water barged in from Andros (having long outgrown/contaminated the local freshwater lens, which was once considerable for a Bahamian island, but which can in no way support Nassau’s population of a quarter of a million people, give or take), and that Andros is one of the flatter, lower islands. We don’t know what impact rising sea levels might have on that.
So it’s not inconceivable that rising sea levels will turn Bahamians back into what for the past three generations we have not been: migrants, refugees, emigrants in search of dry land. It’s not inconceivable that Atlantis, for the past decade or so our “saviour”, may be what we actually become one of these days — a sunken country, our property reclaimed by the sea. One of these days, The Bahamas may become just a memory to be kept alive by those most reviled of us all — our artists.
Just saying.
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The threat has been acknowledged by the current government. They mentioned the matter more than once leading up to Copenhagen. It was covered by ZNS news (and others). The Bahamas government worked with Caricom partners to draw increased attention to the matter. My understanding is that Caricom in turn used the Commonwealth meeting in Trinidad to further push the issue going into Copenhagen.
As the “what ifs” are fairly obvious there was little need for government representatives to speculate publicly about the unpleasant future that appears to await its people. Simply mentioning predicted sea level rises, that this would have significant negative impact on The Bahamas and the efforts to gain the issue global consideration seemed both sufficient and appropriate.
If you are implying that public discussion of the issue could result in a more sensitive, empathetic populace with a more enlightened view of both itself and its neighbors, then you are probably too optimistic.
Clearly I’ve overstated. I wanted to acknowledge Larry Smith’s excellent piece on climate change & Copenhagen as well, and I didn’t, mostly out of laziness.
But is it enough to have this threat “acknowledged” — particularly given the fact that the current government has traditionally been the environmental government? Is it enough to rely on osmosis to galvanize our population into change? Is the probability of being too optimistic a good enough reason not to have public discussion of the issue?
I have observed and heard enough over the past couple of years to come to the conclusion that the Bahamian populace is habitually underestimated and far too often denigrated — that politicians and other policy makers use their own ignorance and lack of urgency as a yardstick to measure others, and thereby miss many opportunities to create positive public discussion. Optimism aside — we can’t know what effect doing the right/best thing can have, ever. The threat posed by climate change on The Bahamas is too severe for us to skate over it for any reason. I’m not letting misplaced optimism be a reason not to suggest that we think about it.
Cheers.
A big problem with the perception of climate is the inevitable media bias. For example, last autumn was universally predicted to be a relatively quiet hurricane season. This was “no news”. One researcher speculated that due to some obscure effect it might be more active. This was front page news. What does the public conclude?
Same with sea level rise: there are large unknowns, and hence a large spread of estimates. Experts I know think 30-80cm is the more likely range., with a smaller but unquantifiable possibility that it could reach 1,20m or so. Again, the media will only report on the more spectacular 2m projections, not on the more conservative estimates. On top of those uncertainties, local sea level change can be very different from the global mean. It is a very complex story, and in my experience most popular media do not like complex stories.
On the positive side: given the energy that is being thrown at the problem – observations, theories, models – I am sure than 10-20 years from now the projections will be much better.
GJ, thanks for weighing in on this. (For those who don’t know, Geert Jan is a longtime friend who’s from the Netherlands, where rising sea levels are a real concern, just as they are here, and who’s moreover a bit of an expert on the subject.) It’s nice to know that the science is not certain in this regard. I know I picked a fairly alarmist perspective to report on; I did it on purpose, because I think we’re too calmly relying on other people’s perspectives in this matter.
My question is: what are we Bahamians doing about it? Are we commissioning research to investigate what impact rising sea levels will have on our archipelago, on our fresh water lens, on our coastlines, on our low-lying islands (like Grand Bahama and Inagua and Andros)? Or are we sitting back and letting other people — like those who wrote the article I linked to and never even mentioned the countries of the US coast — do the work for us (as usual)?
yes the Bahamas could vanish away and we could be the next boat people at the mercy of the world. alarmist or not, it will do us all good to think -and speak – on this a while. sounds like poems to me.
thanks nico.
Hello. I have a point to add about the data — namely, we have no reliable data, except that provided by the very recent Jason and Argo systems. They show no sea level rise on a global scale in the last eight years. That is as far back as the accurate timeline goes. Prior to that, sea level data is compliled from many, many sources which are inconsistent and must be heavily massaged by researchers. There are inummerable opportunities for conscious and unconscious bias to skew the results. For this reason no honest scientist can state that sea levels have risen markedly over 120 years, or project the future from the tainted data. All we can say with certainty is that sea level is not rising now. So chill out, folks. You are not going under. Now start thinking about what happens to your reefs when sea level falls. The fact is, recurrent ice ages have alternately been flooding and uncovering the Bahama platform. There is nothing humans can do to alter this. It is hubris to think otherwise.
Hey Alan, nice to see you & have you weigh in on this.
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