It’s a little ironic that I finally getting around to writing about this the day after our weather has returned to more normal temperature, but after a commentator on the news suggested that there may be 2 or more hot spells before we finally leave summer it’s still important.
In Australia as in many parts of the world we are going through some amazing weather. I know there’s a difference between one season of hot weather and hard evidence of climate change but as the infographic (from getup.org.au) below points out it’s been 27 years since the world experienced a month that was colder than average.
This has meant some amazing things, including the Bureau of Meteorology having to add another colour on our temperature spectrum. This has huge implications for so many things in our society including how we deal with bushfires, floods and droughts (sometimes all at the same time). It also has massive implications for our production of food. As if having to transition to a low energy future and replace the industrial (and oil fueled) approach to food production and transport isn’t enough, we also have to do it with a changing climate that will severely challenge our ability to produce food.
Just in our own garden I’m seeing this and suspect that if this is truly to become the new normal I’m going to have to start thinking about shade for the fruit and vegies that usually love the full son and my plans for planting are totally out of whack!
I’m an optimistic person by nature but something’s gotta change significantly or we are heading for a seriously tough time and there are lots of places on the planet that just don’t have the capacity to cope with that. It’s time for us to get really serious about limiting climate change. Let’s do our own bit but also lets make damn sure that when the election rolls around in September that every single candidate gets the message loud and clear that lip service or doing nothing is simply not good enough.
A Life of Treading Lightly 