Will humans survive climate change?
Over the last few years, climate change has constantly been in the news, whether it’s in the form of land being lost to rising tides, or yet another protest causing havoc in the streets. The argument is that with our use of current technology and industry, will we change the atmosphere to a point where humans can no longer live here, or at least create a world so different that humanity is constantly suffering?
A short answer to whether will humans survive climate change would be yes, as even with our current usage the chance of us being wiped out completely is almost impossible, but this doesn’t mean we can’t mess up our planet in an extreme way.
What exactly is climate change?
Our planet is surrounded by an atmosphere made up of certain gases. When sunlight hits these gases it passes through them and reaches the earth, warming both the ground and the air, but this heat can escape back through the atmosphere and into space. The types of gas considered pollution are much thicker than those that make up our normal atmosphere, and they absorb much more heat and stop the rate at which ground heat can escape back through the atmosphere. All these extra pollutants in the atmosphere trap heat and raise the overall temperature across the planet.
What effects will climate change have on our planet?
The main threat from rising global temperatures is the melting of the polar ice sheets. There is enough water currently in the form of ice that it would be able to cover millions of square miles of land if it all melted. There are various estimates out there since no one knows for sure, but most of the numbers for how much the seas will rise average about 75 meters.
(Antarctica contains 30 million cubic kilometers (7.2 million cubic miles) of ice, enough to wipe out several countries if it melted)
If this estimate were accurate, this would mean that many countries around the world would cease to exist. Low-laying countries like Bangladesh, Denmark, and the Netherlands would just disappear. Other countries like the US would lose entire states, and anyone living within one hundred miles of the coast would be in serious danger.
It would take a long time for this to happen and it’s likely the planet will never get hot enough for all the ice to melt, but if it does we’ll lose around one-third of the earth’s current land surface.
Will humans be able to survive climate change?
As a species we’ll almost certainly survive, but at great cost. If the sea levels rise a huge amount, this will happen over several hundred years and many wars will be fought as the land changes over time, but ultimately we’ll survive.
Mass starvation and overcrowding will be the biggest problems when the land starts to sink below the waves. We will have to deal with a population of around 10 billion people by the time the waters are at their maximum height, and with at least a third less farmland than we have now.
What will we be able to do to avoid this?
The unfortunate answer is nothing at all. To reduce or even reverse the effects of global warming, the entire planet would have to work as one, which simply won’t happen. The UK is currently responsible for under 1% of global emissions, so even if the entire country didn’t create a single particle of harmful gases, it wouldn’t make any difference to our fate. The only thing we can do as a species is try and slow down the inevitable.
Extreme attempts to reverse the problem
One interesting suggestion to reverse the problem would be to spray millions of tons of sulfate particles about 60,000 feet above the north and south poles. It would take 100 planes about 4,000 flights each year to deliver the amount required, but people seem to be convinced it could work.
(The North and South Poles contain a dangerous amount of water and would devastate millions of miles of land if they completely melted)
The idea would be to spray these sulfate particles into the atmosphere above the poles to thicken them to the point where only a tiny fraction of sunlight could get through. This will lower the temperature around both poles by several degrees, which is enough to not only stop the ice from melting further, but also to freeze extra ice from the seas to stop rising sea levels, or even lower them slightly. If something like this were to be attempted, it would not only be very expensive but would also have to be done just right. It could work too well and end up bringing in a new ice age to the planet or have adverse effects on global temperatures.
