Much of Luzon island in the Philippines has been underwater the past few days, brought about by Typhoon Parma (Pepeng). The growing consensus is that this is an effect of climate change. Climate Change 2001, has published the scientific basis for climate change. A BBC news article had quoted theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that humans is very likely the cause, projecting an increase of temperature by 1.8 to 4 degrees celsius by the end of the century.
The US Global Change Research Program, the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment concurs with the IPCC. The European Academy of Sciences and Arts, the InterAcademy Council, the International Council of Academics of Engineering and Technological Sciences are some concurring organizations that human activity is likely responsible for climate warming.
A full list via wikipedia is here.
Business have largely gone green. It doesn’t just make good economic sense, but delivering technology for instance that uses less power but does more is great for the consumer. Like Apple reframes the green debate, backs it up with new data or how Apple and other companies quit the US Chamber of Commerce because that august body criticized legislation to reduce US greenhouse gas emissions.
While it is likely that Human activity may have accelerated climate change, a salient fact needs to be remembered is that the Earth is a dynamic system. There have been several, major and minor extinction events through out Earth’s history. Just to name two, one is the Permian-Triassic extinction event. It was called “The Great Dying”. It killed 83% of life on Earth and paved the way for the dinosaurs to rise. Another example is the more famous K-T extinction event that ended the Dinosaurs’ reign on earth and 75% of species on Earth became extinct.
Of course it would be disingenuous to say that “Climate Change” was the root cause of those changes. Confluences of events have contributed to those events and whether it is oceanic overturn, plate tectonics, continental drift, some nearby star, or humans being the cause of extinction, the point is: the Earth is a dynamic and ever changing environment and in Darwinian fashion, we must adapt or die.
On October 8, 2009, Manolo Quezon wrote a most interesting article. He talked about the long view of ignoring plans. he mentioned that city planers for Metro Manila had already noted where potential areas of concern would occur. Likewise, he quoted New Zealand social and environmental historian greg Bankoff who published a map in 2003 about flood prone areas, which was spot on, mlq3 said with what happened with Ondoy.
Those city plans were largely ignored. and Bankoff, hardly in the news then. So Ondoy hit and boom. Manila sunk.
In a related topic, Sparks’ made a post on “The Philippines in the Red”. It is a mapping study by a Canadian Research Center and the Philippines is most vulnerable to climate change.
The cynic in me says, in a few months people will forget Ondoy. The optimist in me believes the tide can change, if we the people want it bad enough.
In The Day After Ondoy, I wrote that the answer for our nation’s capital, Metro Manila is to unify the governments of the various cities under it. Our metropolis needs a coherent, unified plan to prepare for disaster, especially post disaster rescue and relief. We need to focus on adapting to the conditions of our environment as much as unification can help bring about one solution for various infrastructure needs of the city. Of course, it isn’t to say it will sit well with the politicians who will lose their jobs. That’s the thing isn’t it? That’s the bitter pill that needs to be taken.
If there is anyone who is at fault for the tragedy Ondoy visited on Metro Manila it is decades of ignoring the writing on the wall. This is just for flooding. What more Earthquakes?
Up north, our friends and family are tragically subjected to worst situation than what Metro Manila had experience a few weeks ago. Landslides in Baguio, much of our western coastline underwater and millions of pesos worth of crops destroyed. We can not just blame it on lack of preparation or lack of knowledge from the absence of a Doppler system. Though, it would have helped reduce grief if we did have information.
The tragedy of Luzon as Pepeng drowned it with rain is mind boggling. You can go checkout, United States Pacific Command as they provide disaster relief aid (not just to the Philippines, but through out the Pacific) for a sample of the devastation and the effort extended.
Various local governments would need to identify problem areas and adapt too. On the larger scale, the National Government must invest in technologies, and infrastructure to make relief and rescue operations, second nature. We can not stop the storms from coming or hope for their intensity to subside. It is like saying we can stop the sun from shining. There are things we can do.
We need better and more serious Infrastructure.
We need better Disaster Prevention, Relief and Rescue planning and coordination. We need to do better. We need to learn. That means we use every available technology to get things done in a non political way. Sure it’ll take years to build the infrastructure but we got to be savvy. We got to be ready for the next disaster. Not to mention a rethinking of the relationship between Local Government and National Government in delivering key relief and rescue.
We need to better manage our crops so as to reduce damage caused by typhoons.
There is a difference between working hard and working smart. We need the latter for obvious reason that our country isn’t rich.
Let’s not forget we need comprehensive planning for earthquakes, not so much as preventing tragedy (we can enforce tighter building codes) but providing for relief and rescue post earthquake tragedy. Tsunamis and Volcanic eruptions too and we need worst case scenarios and plans adapted to meet those tragedies.
Lastly, it is important to note that being pro environment—- building environmentally conscious technologies, especially power efficient ones that emit less greenhouse gas is economically sound. Meaning, it doesn’t matter if Climate Change is caused by humans. It doesn’t matter if you subscribe to the notion that Climate Change is marketing to sell to normal people. It just makes perfect sense to be environmentally friendly. You get more bang for processing muscle per watt is great, in any calculation for example. Being environmentally friendly is also being economically friendly and in my book the latter makes the greater sense to justify the former.
In my humble opinion, the question whether Climate Change is real or not no longer matters. It is like fighting the last war. The debate isn’t whether humans is the root cause of our climate problem. The debate is, how do we adapt? We need to build technologies that let us be more “one” with nature. If that means discovering new process for storing solar energy based on photosynthesis to power our digital tomorrow that would be great right? if it means building cars like the tesla or aircraft that doesn’t use fossil fuel, it would just be awesome. If it means building cities that are more environmentally attuned then that’s what we need to do.
Begun, Climate Change has. We must adapt or we perish. Choose.
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*updated to include link to US Pacific Command.
**update-2 Flow had an interview with WWF CEO Jose Maria Tan and posted his take on blog action day.
*This also serves as my post for 15 October 2009, Blog Action Day
“Begun, Climate Change Has”, was first posted on Filipino Voices. If you wish to comment, please feel free to visit us there. Thank you.
