Adaptation Time
As the Climate Summit at the National Academy of Sciences progresses today, it is increasingly clear that a broad swath of mainstream climate scientists agree: not only are humans unequivocally warming the planet, serious impacts are inevitable. It is time to start preparing adaptation plans. (A topic this blog has addressed before.)
The preoccupation with adaptation among scientists here is sobering. Politicians may debate climate impact and mitigation proposals, but the scientists have moved on. We need legislation, but we must also prepare for more frequent and intense storms, rising sea levels, species relocation and disappearance, drought, and flooding (perhaps repeatedly of the Red River?).
I won't recapitulate what the scientists said today. If you want a taste, just look up the papers done by today's presenters including Susan Solomon of NOAA, Stephen Schneider of Stanford University, and Henry Jacoby of MIT.
Remember that scientists tend to understate conclusions and depolarize language. Nowhere are these tendencies more evident than in the technical presentations here that one after the other showed -- to use the scientists' word -- just how "robust" their conclusions are.
A lawyer, a politician, or a citizen might be tempted to read between the lines today and substitute words "alarming" or "overwhelming."
Is a National Climate Service Enough?
At the National Academy of Science's Climate Summit today, the new head of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Administrator (NOAA) Jane Lubchenco endorsed the idea of creating a National Climate Service.
This new organization, to be housed within NOAA, would act as a one-stop aggregation point for all of the government's climate science data and information. It would ideally provide policy makers and the public better information on climate change.
On the one hand, Lubchenco's support is good news to the climate science community. It would bring organizational coherence -- and probably more dollars -- to the key environmental threat of our era. Along with an expanded role for PCAST and the Academy study being launched today, this is another welcome sign of the elevation of climate science and policymaking inside the new Administration. House Science Committee Chair Bart Gordon (D-TN) has expressed support for the creation of the NOAA Climate Service.
On the other hand, some scientists and former federal officials may think this measure does not go far enough. One group called for the creation of a so-called Earth Systems Science Agency in Science magazine last year (subscription required). The super-agency would combine the U.S. Geological Survey and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration into one, while establishing strong links with an independent NASA.
Jane Lubchenco is one of the very best scientific appointments the President has made. An ecologist, she has both a distinguished academic background and a history of global leadership in addressing ecological threats to the planet. I was pleased to serve with her on an Academy board in the 1990s. But if Administrator Lubchenco is thinking about federal reorganization better to marshal science for climate benefit, she and her new colleagues, such as President's Science Adviser John Holdren and Energy Secretary Steven Chu, might give this second, more impactful concept a careful review.
Science Comes to Washington
Editor's Note: Frederick Anderson is blogging from the National Academy of Science's Summit on America's Climate Choices.
The head of GM is out, but science and technology are in, and the National Academy of Sciences convened today with Congress's blessing a Summit on America's Climate Choices. The purpose of the two-day meeting is to kick off the development of a scientifically-credible "framework for a national response to climate change."
Look at this effort the way Congressman Alan Mollohan (D-WV) invited participants to do a minute ago: this Academy study will lay down a science marker for Congress and policy makers going forward.
Earlier today, I had an opportunity to spend some time with Albert Carnesale, Chancellor Emeritus of UCLA and Chair of the Academy study, before he opened the summit. We talked about black carbon, abrupt climate change, how to capitalize homeowner energy efficiency, the green aspects of the stimulus, and the prospects for an expanded and reinvigorated role for science and scientists in aid of government action. These and many many more issues will be addressed over the coming months by the study's four panels: mitigation, adaptation, improving climate science, and a tricky one -- a panel on "informing decisions and actions" related to climate.
There is a lot of excitement in the scientific community about the Summit. Indeed the auditorium contains the Who's Who of climate science and climate policy. Between the Academy study and these administrative changes, I believe much can be achieved.
