Brown looks long-term on impending climate crisis
by Brian Leubitz
Gov. Brown, in this go-round as governor, has hardly been spending willy-nilly. Now he says that he has another reason:
“It doesn’t look like the people who are in charge are going to do what it takes to really slow down this climate change, so we’re going to have to adapt, and adapting is going to be very, very expensive,” Brown said. “That’s another reason why we have to maintain some budget discipline.”
Brown, who has urged lawmakers of his own party to resist spending despite the state’s improving revenue outlook, said weather is “becoming more intense” as a result of climate change and will “cost a lot of money and a lot of lives.”(SacBee)
Now, I actually find this pretty persuasive. Climate change will hit California particularly hard. Drought and fires will be increasingly common. Our fertile Central Valley will not be so fertile when we have no water for what is basically a semi-arid climate. Snowpacks will cease to become good water reserves as they melt too early in the season. In short, Gov. Brown was probably underselling the costs of adaptation to climate change.
That is not to say that we shouldn’t be continuing to work to slow climate change. We need to rethink our fossil fuel usage, and how we are assisting in that dependence. (Ahem…for starters: fracking and LNG pipeline) And yes, planning for budgeting long-term to address the changes inherent in catastrophic climate change should be part of the overall adaptation process. That being said, it would be interesting to see how money is being specifically directed towards that planning.
Brian, I have not commented here for a long time. I could not agree more with the statement. It is key to the understanding of what we need to do. Time and again it has been shown that the money spent on climate mitigation…. or in plain English the effort to avoid catastrophe, is far less than what we will have to spend on adaptation.
To begin with, the pursuit of the peripheral tunnel approach for “securing our water supply” could be considered climate adaptation except that it would be money thrown away. The end of the tunnels would be at the Tracy Pumps and those will eventually be under water due to sea level rise. Without a solution to the sea level rise problem, there will be no delta and no need for any tunnels.
Brown say the right words to keep some environmentalists voting for him, but he does not really understand basic ecology and how we are all in this together. Just consider that his position on fracking…. loves it for Monterey Shale…. is absolutely going to increase the amount of money Californians will have to spend for adaptation. But what does he care, he and I will both be long gone before anyone acts.