Mother Nature is having some problems.
One day early last week was almost 60 degrees, then a few hours later it was 9 degrees. Before that, it had snowed. The weather was erratic, to say the least. Many scientists believe such weather patterns are due to climate change.
Some global-warming naysayers have taken to social media and the airwaves to say the recent Arctic blast is evidence global warming is a myth. To them I say: Check your facts.
Winter weather doesn’t mean that global warming isn’t real. Even polar vortex freezing weather doesn’t mean global warming isn’t real. Extreme weather is part of climate change.
Even Donald Trump, who became a scientist overnight, weighed in. He tweeted: “This very expensive GLOBAL WARMING bull**** has got to stop. Our planet is freezing, record low temps, and our GW scientists are stuck in ice.”
That’s always the argument — that preventing human-generated climate change is expensive. It very well may be. But it’s more expensive — in the billions of dollars — to clean up and rebuild after extreme weather, recoup lost economic activity from closed businesses and shelter people made homeless.
We have had some climate refugees in NYC. The Staten Island neighborhood of Oakwood Beach doesn’t exist as it once did, a victim of superstorm Sandy’s wrath. Most residents there have decided against rebuilding in a coastal zone. They’ve concluded that it’s easier to give up on the formerly vibrant neighborhood because they fear that dangerous once-in-a-lifetime stormsmay become more common.
I live up on a hill in Inwood, so I’m not even in an evacuation zone. Worst-case scenario for me is that extreme weather floods the neighborhood below where I live and I end up with waterfront property.
But reality tells me that as much as I hope that a storm as destructive as Sandy never recurs, I know it could.
I can’t help those who choose to ignore climate-change science because of ideology or politics or whatever (Donald Trump).
But it will become increasingly hard to deny when the waters come lapping at their doors.
