The AJC’s Jay Bookman gives a sober report on global warming
May 21, 2007 at 12:41 pm by Scott Freeman in NewsIn February, I asked what the deal was with the AJC and global warming. In an attempt to explain our balmy January weather, the lede of a story had flatly stated that “global warming, it’s not.†It’s not? Then, a few days later, the paper ran a story quoting a UGA professor about how global warming is still a “natural variation.” That story conveniently didn’t mention that the UGA prof is at odds with hundreds of international scientists.
In today’s AJC, Jay Bookman writes a very sobering column on what scientists predict could happen in Georgia, and it’s not pretty:
In fact, scientists who have studied the potential impact of climate change warn that this region’s ecosystem is more vulnerable than most to disruption.
According to Ron Neilson, a renowned bioclimatologist with the U.S. Forest Service, “the southeastern United States appears to be among the most sensitive regions in the world to increasing temperatures.” As the climate changes, he warns, our forests will disappear “through drought, insect infestation and massive fire,” to be replaced by open savannas.
In fact, we may be seeing just such a change occurring in South Georgia, where wildfires have raged for weeks. There’s no concrete proof those fires are related to climate change, but they are certainly consistent with what Neilson and others have predicted for this region, with fire clearing vast swaths of land and permanently altering the landscape.
Wow. Is it too late to move?
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