Lessons from 56 million years ago
Steven Earle examines a past geological episode to help us understand the very real dangers of changes caused by the runaway climate facing our planet today—and what we need to do about it.
August 06th, 2024
Author Steven Earle, PhD, participates in climate change research and community engagement with climate change solutions. He lives on a sustainable farm on Gabriola Island.
“We got ourselves into this mess,” says author Steven Earle, “and we can get ourselves out. The consequences of not doing so are frightening. There isn’t much time.”
Reviewed by Graham Chandler
At least 70,000 publications relating to climate change were released in 2022 according to Nature magazine. And like the topic of Steven Earle’s clever book, Runaway Climate, that figure is growing exponentially. Climate changes has clearly become a hot topic.
How to sort through all the evidence? There’s so much of it out there now that a special international conference of top climate researchers was held in Berlin earlier this year to address that very question. Called “What Works: Climate Solutions Summit,” its aim was to synthesize the mountains of evidence to arrive at what is of topmost importance today.
But until the Summit’s results are summarized and released, how do we, as concerned citizens, filter through what’s important to know and understand about climate change? As well, what can we be doing in the meantime? An excellent starter is to read this book by earth sciences lecturer and author, Steven Earle.
To help understand the causes of our present global warming threat, Earle’s Runaway Climate uses an analogy: a geological episode called the Paleocene Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), a rapid climate-heating episode from the past, its dramatic impact on life on Earth, and lessons for our climate future.
Greenhouse gasses being emitted into the atmosphere by factories.
The analogy is meaningful. Although the PETM happened 56 million years ago, Earth experienced a period of intense warming during this era resulting in a rapid global temperature increase of about 7°C. Triggered by natural geological processes over thousands of years, and magnified by strong climate feedback loops, the PETM lasted for about 200,000 years and drastically altered life on Earth. And here’s the rub: “Yet in only a few short decades we’ve pumped similar amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, making the PETM an unsettlingly apt analogy for our current predicament,” Earle writes.
The book is conveniently and logically split into two parts: what happened in the past; and where we are heading if we don’t change course. Much of the first part will be entertaining to younger kids while maintaining scientific accuracy. For example, can you imagine the delight of a six-year-old when they read of a housecat-sized horse, called the Sifrhippus, trotting about at the end of the PETM? Interested grownups will appreciate things like the eminently readable explanations of geological timescales and processes.
Runaway Climate book jacket.
The book’s second part speaks not only of where we are heading if we don’t change course, but ventures beyond that. Therein lies its central usefulness. Earle discusses the causes of the PETM which include volcanism, orbital cycles, extraterrestrial sources, carbon sources and methane gas releases. And critically, Earle describes how it could happen again if we don’t smarten up.
“The changes that we know are coming over the next several decades will have dramatic implications for how we live on this planet… if we do not take decisive action to reduce our climate impacts over the next decade, then it is possible that the changes we have caused will tip us into a PETM-like runaway climate early in the next century,” writes Earle. He paints a dire, almost unliveable picture should that happen—including a dramatic drop in world population due to extensive agricultural land losses.
However, he continues, “if we can make a sufficiently sharp reduction in our emissions, one that restricts temperature rise to 2o C above pre-industrial levels, it may be possible to avoid the strong feedbacks that could push us over the edge into a PETM-like world.”
Chapters follow a logical order and have understandable, clear introductions and ending summaries. Earle conveniently rounds out the volume with useful endnotes, appendices and copious scientific sources.
Appropriately, the final chapter is titled What Do We Need to Do? Here’s where readers might breathe more easily, depending on their willingness to act. It’s not too late, reckons Earle. But we need to do something, and “we need to do it now. Not soon. Now!” he writes. In this chapter he provides a comprehensive discussion on actions each of us can be taking, ranging from making “quick decisions to modify our lives in ways that will have immediate effect” to electing governments “that are genuinely open to actually taking action on climate change.”
Don’t know where to start? No problem. The book closes with a handy “quick and dirty calculation” chart to estimate your personal carbon footprint for a year and how you can reduce it.
So read this book. And get busy on your actions. Now.
9780865719897
*
Vancouver-based freelance writer Graham Chandler has written over 700 articles on various topics including scientific issues. He holds a PhD in archaeology from the University of London.
Leave a Reply