FOSSIL FUELS: So what if climate changes?

Several recent misguided letters have tried to condemn President Trump for expanding the use of fossil fuels because of the threat of climate change. We might even (horrors) raise global temperatures three or four degrees. 

So what if we do? Most people do not know that the natural range of planetary temperatures ranges from around 30 degrees higher than today to enough lower to plunge us into repeated ice ages. The Ice Ages ended only about 20000 years ago. In fact, 30 million years ago — which is less than 1% of the earth’s age- mangoes and bananas grew wild in Oregon. In fact, the planet has been cooling for the past 80 million years. It may be time for some warming.

Further back in time, there was no oxygen in our atmosphere. In time, bacteria learned photosynthesis, and generated the air we breathe today. There have also been several occasions in the past where our planet froze from the poles to the equator (iceball earth). 

Mentioning all this is to raise awareness that our climate is not stable, and the range of natural variation is much greater than what humans can cause or control. Someday, nature will change the climate again. To survive as a species, we will need to have an advanced and prosperous civilization with the technology to cope, not one which has bankrupted itself on measures that don’t solve anything.

It is also noteworthy that the UN committee on climate change has recently (and quietly) declared that climate change is not a threat to our planet.

BARRY McELMURRY

Coeur d’Alene