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A Dire Emergency Regarding Climate Change

Written by Dave Winter, a founding member of
Humanists for Revolutionary Socialism, in December 2008

To Anyone Who Wants to Fight for the Survival of the Human Race
and of Our Planet as We Have Known It for 10,000 Years:

I recently completed some extensive research into recently published data and analysis on climate change. Because of what I have learned, I feel compelled to issue this statement of dire emergency about the situation.

I will first summarize my conclusions very briefly. Many of the best scientists have reached the conclusion that we either have already passed the tipping point of no return with regard to climate change, or are passing it now. [1, 2, 3, 4] This means that even if we stop emitting most greenhouse gases immediately, planet Earth will still undergo drastic climatic changes, and the human race will have to live with the effects of this change for centuries. On the other hand, if we continue emitting greenhouse gases at today's levels, even for as short a time as 10 years, we could face absolutely catastrophic changes in the climate, and the human race — not to mention many other species — will face extinction.


Why do I say this? The Arctic ice is disappearing very fast. The average temperature in the Arctic has already risen 9 degrees Farenheit (5 degrees Centigrade). [5] Many scientists predict that in the near future the Arctic ice will be entirely gone in the summer. [6, 7] Even now, a much greater portion of the surface of the vast Arctic ocean melts to open water in the summer, rather than remaining covered with ice. [6, 7, 8] This causes it to turn a much darker color, and thus to absorb more heat from the sun, resulting in a positive feedback loop of increased warming. [1, 5, 6, 7, 9] And it is not just surface temperatures that are rising in the Arctic. The temperature at the bottom of the Arctic ocean is also rising fast. Last year's research found it to be only a few degrees below freezing.[9, 10]

Meanwhile, at the bottom of this ocean lies a time bomb of unimaginable proportions: a huge amount of methane that accumulated via organic decomposition 630 million years ago. Methane is a greenhouse gas that is many times more powerful than carbon dioxide. [9, 10, 11] Scientists worry that as the temperature at the bottom of the Arctic ocean rises closer to the freezing point, a massive amount of this methane will be released into the atmosphere. In fact, in the last couple of years methane has started to bubble up from the bottom of the Arctic ocean at an increasing rate.[9, 10]

If the methane at the bottom of the Arctic ocean is released, the effect of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere will increase to at least 20 times greater than it is now. [9, 10] This can happen as fast as the flip of a switch, in geological terms — which means in decades, or perhaps as short a time as several years.[9, 10, 11]

This has happened in the past — not once, but twice. About 630 million years ago, most of the earth was frozen, and the temperature was rising very slowly. This slow rise in temperature was transformed very suddenly into an extremely rapid one because a massive quantity of methane was released from the ocean into the atmosphere. [9, 11] When this happened, the earth was transformed in a matter of decades from an ice-covered planet into a tropical one. [11] Tropical climatic conditions reached into the Arctic. When the temperature cooled again, the plants in the Arctic all died and decomposed, causing the deposit of a massive amount of methane, much of which still lies at the bottom of the Arctic ocean.

A recent scientific study of the mass extinction of life on this planet 250 million years ago (the Permian Extinction or "Great Dying") reveals a similar pattern. It is now known that it took only a 10-degree rise in global temperature to kill 95% of life in the ocean and on land. It all started with a huge volcanic eruption in Siberia that covered the earth with huge clouds of ash and dust. That was enough to raise the planet's temperature by 4 or 5 degrees Centigrade. This was not enough to cause the mass extinction directly, but it was enough to accelerate global warming to the catastrophic point of no return. It is now believed that the initial temperature rise of only a few degrees started a snowball effect, whereby the world's oceans warmed up to the point at which methane started being released from the ocean in ever-increasing quantities. This then led to an out-of-control vicious cycle of rising amounts of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, which ultimately raised the planetary temperature 10 degrees centigrade — enough to kill 95% of life. This natural process took 80,000 years to reach its climax, because it took thousands of years to reach the initial, critical 4-to-5 degree rise in temperature that triggered the positive feedback cycle and thus pushed global warming past the point of no return.[12]

Compare this with the temperature increase of 3.6 to 5.4 degrees Centigrade that scientists believe will likely occur within the next 50 years. The speed at which humans, under capitalism, have managed to cause global warming is unbelievable, in comparison to the length of time this would take as a natural process. Industrial capitalism has compressed a process that took tens of millenia into mere 50 years. At this rate, life has no chance even to try to adapt to the changing conditions in its environment.

This same thing is threatening to happen again, unless we take drastic and immediate action. If the Arctic ocean keeps on warming, methane will start being released into the atmosphere in ever greater quantities. If that happens, the planet will experience such a swift, massive rise in temperature that human civilization will have little or no chance to survive.

Obama has pledged to achieve an 80% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. I do not believe that a reduction of that magnitude is possible under capitalism. The profit system and the free market cannot and will not take the drastic steps necessary to achieve it. But even if a miracle happens, and Obama's pledge is fulfilled, it will still be much too little, and way too late. This is a dire emergency. The human race needs to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions almost entirely within the next 10 to 20 years if it wants to survive.

The bottom line is that a successful socialist revolution within 10 years is the only way to stop the threat that capitalism poses to all living beings on this planet. If the working class waits to overthrow capitalism for another 30 or 40 years, it is likely to be too late. After the socialist revolution, we will have to take immediate action to avert the catastrophe. The planned economy will have to impose draconian measures against greenhouse gas emitting industries, and retool all of our energy generation and consumption to run on green, environmentally friendly, sustainable technology. This change will have to be implemented extremely rapidly, and will require the involvement of practically everyone on the planet, if we are to prevail. Moreover, humanity will have to accomplish this task under conditions of severe hardship and scarcity, due to the dramatic climate changes that will already have occurred by then.

The current crisis of capitalism presents an opportunity for us to spread the message to the struggling working class about the gravity of the situation. We must tell the workers, and every middle class and progressive person who supports their struggle, that time is running out. The working class must combine its struggle against capitalist exploitation, and against the current economic crisis, with environmental consciousness. It must fight for workers' control of industry in order to implement dire emergency measures to transform the current, outmoded technology of industrial production to totally green and sustainable technology.

Ultimately, this urgently necessary transformation can only be accomplished if the working class and its allies get rid of capitalism via the socialist revolution. Every living soul that cares about our planet and the fate of humanity, please be aware: The game of trying to "reform" capitalism must come to an abrupt end. The stakes are no longer socialism or barbarism. They are socialism, or else the end of life on this planet as we know it.

References (click links to view online in new window; "[back to text]" to return to earliest reference in text):

  1. NASA: Danger Point Closer Than Thought From Warming, ABC News, 5/29/07 [back to text]

  2. Global Warming "Tipping Points" Reached, Scientist Says, National Geographic News, 12/14/07 [back to text]

  3. Global Warming: Beyond the Tipping Point, Scientific American, October 2008 [back to text]

  4. Global warming: passing the 'tipping point', The Independent, 2/11/06 [back to text]

  5. Arctic Ice Melting at Alarming Pace as Temperatures Rise, US News & World Report, 12/16/08 [back to text]

  6. Warming Oceans Contributed to Record Arctic Melt, National Geographic News, 12/14/07 [back to text]

  7. North Pole May Be Ice-Free for First Time This Summer, National Geographic News, 6/20/08 [back to text]

  8. Arctic Melting Shows Global Warming Serious—Expert, Reuters 9/4/08 (as reproduced online by planetark.org) [back to text]

  9. Melting Arctic Ocean Raises Threat of 'Methane Time Bomb', Yale Environment 360, 10/30/08 [back to text]

  10. A Storehouse of Greenhouse Gases Is Opening in Siberia, Spiegel Online International, 4/17/08 [back to text]

  11. Could Methane Trigger a Climate Doomsday Within a Human Lifespan?, Wired Science, 5/28/08 [back to text]

  12. Permian extinction [back to text]:

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