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It may not be Earth Day yet, but the standing-room-only crowd in the Provost's Conference Room gave its full attention to this year's Earth Day theme of renewable energy at a brown bag lunch on February 29. Richard Delaney, director of the Urban Harbors Institute and a founding member of the University's Sustainability Initiative, wanted to "expand the focus" of Earth Day by co-hosting this lunch, which featured four guest speakers. Each speaker spoke passionately about how using fossil fuel leads to global warming.
Pulitzer-Prize-winning author Ross Gelbspan, a journalist whose career includes working as an environmental reporter with The Boston Globe, discussed examples from his book The Heat Is On. Gelbspan found that global warming is a far more serious problem than has been reported. Melting ice shelves, small South Pacific islands swallowed by the rising sea, and extreme weather activity are just some of the results of the increased temperature.
There is more to global warming than increased temperature. Extreme weather changes can take a toll on public health. Paul Epstein of the Harvard Center for Health and the Global Environment pointed to the loss of human life caused by typhoons, flooding, and droughts. The problems Epstein associates with these events are myriad: homelessness, destruction of crops, cholera, and dysentery, as well as mosquito-borne diseases. He also made a connection between rising asthma rates and global warming.
Curtis Olsen, director of UMass Boston's Environmental, Coastal, and Ocean Sciences Program, pushed the need for more research by the Department of Energy. His previous work with the DOE has given him keen insight into the problem and what research needs to be done. He pointed out that "fossil fuels release 6.1 billion tons of CO2 per year into the atmosphere," and that not all of that is reabsorbed back into the atmosphere, leaving scientists wondering where the "missing CO2" has gone.
MASSPIRG energy associate Michelle Toering stressed the need to put more pressure on the state legislature to adopt the clean energy agenda.
We should all take Delaney's final words --"Get involved!" -- to heart. To participate in the Sustainability Initiative, or for more information about Earth Day events, call 7-5574.