David Suzuki’s Editorial Comments

The topic of David Suzuki’s editorial is based on how waiting to fight the climate change is not an option anymore. He talks about how the sea levels are rising drastically, and how it’s impossible for us to stop global warming, but how we can slow it down.

The authors look at coral reefs as a good example of a valuable ecosystem under serious threat from climate change. The authors say that preventing severe damage will require a long term target of temperatures no more than 1 degree C above 1990 levels. According to the authors, a realistic goal in terms of carbon dioxide concentration is 450 ppm, which will still result in temperature increases of between 1.2 and 2.3 degrees C over the next 100 years. Although this goal will not fully protect reefs and other ecosystems, the authors point out that it may prevent whole-scale disruption of the climate system, which could result from the disintegration of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet or the shut-down of density-driven ocean currents such as the Gulf Stream. How does Kyoto fit into all of this? Well, the authors look at the chances of meeting a 450 ppm target using both the Kyoto emission reduction scenario and a delayed scenario, where we wait until better technologies are available to reduce emissions faster later on. They conclude that waiting a decade before starting to make significant reductions will make it very difficult and prohibitively costly to reach a 450 ppm target.

The purpose of this editorial is to show us that waiting to fight the climate change won’t help us anymore, because by waiting longer to fight, all we’re doing is making the climate change worse. By waiting, we’re letting the climate change affect the Antarctic Ice Sheet melt itself away, which will raise sea levels by four to six meters, which will definitely flood most of the Canadian population. The climate change is also affecting the coral reefs. This editorial, though it’s based on climate change, is mainly directed on coral reefs and their effects against climate change.

The criticism of this editorial is based on not completely stopping or reversing climate change. “The point is that the immediate goal is not to completely stop or reverse climate change. That may prove impossible. Instead, the goal, according to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, is to stabilize concentrations of greenhouse gases at levels to “avoid dangerous anthropogenic interference” with the climate – a phase that’s hard to say and even harder to define.”