{"id":4408,"date":"2012-05-10T05:43:54","date_gmt":"2012-05-10T13:43:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.canyoncountryzephyr.com\/blog\/?p=4408"},"modified":"2012-05-10T05:43:54","modified_gmt":"2012-05-10T13:43:54","slug":"from-the-nytimes-game-over-for-the-climate-james-hansen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.canyoncountryzephyr.com\/blog\/2012\/05\/10\/from-the-nytimes-game-over-for-the-climate-james-hansen\/","title":{"rendered":"(from the NYTimes) ‘Game Over for the Climate’ James Hansen"},"content":{"rendered":"

AN EXCERPT:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

GLOBAL warming isn\u2019t a prediction. It is happening. That is why I was so troubled to read a recent interview with President Obama<\/a> in Rolling Stone in which he said that Canada<\/a> would exploit the oil<\/a> in its vast tar sands reserves \u201cregardless of what we do.<\/p>\n

Canada\u2019s tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire history. If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to burn our conventional oil, gas and coal<\/a> supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now. That level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the ice sheets would accelerate out of control. Sea levels would rise and destroy coastal cities. Global temperatures would become intolerable. Twenty to 50 percent of the planet\u2019s species would be driven to extinction. Civilization would be at risk.<\/p>\n

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