Whether or not global warming is indeed occurring, and whatever the causal reasons, most people would agree there have been changes in the global weather patterns. All but one of the world’s glaciers are in remission and continuing to do so at fairly substantial rates. Latest reports also indicate that the North Polar region could be ice-free by late-summer this year.
These events bring to bear the true complexity of the global weather system and our inability to reasonably model it or predict future patterns or trends, even on a relatively gross macroscopic scale. This modeling inability rationalizes the lack of action on a secondary item, and that being our response to these trends. The recent flooding in the Midwest and the failures in the levee system in many areas reflects mankind’s inability to protect our property from severe weather excursions.
Also, the string of devastating hurricanes in 2005 has not resulted in many structural responses to protect property in these areas as well. A great many theories were proposed about rebuilding protective natural areas that might offset some flooding, but none of these were implemented either, primarily due to the lack of an effective modeling system that could give some sort of idea on the true value of these expensive systems.
The net result is that we sit and wait for the next global-warming related weather event to occur. We will likely rebuild the levee system to pretty much the same level that was done in the past. We won’t implement the rebuilding of any Mississippi Delta marshlands. And we won’t drastically modify the building codes or materials used in the rebuilding of those structures affected by the effects of these primarily water-related events. The rationale for this lack of action in the past has been that these were 100-year events. Unfortunately, many people have now experienced two or more 100-year weather events in the past 10 to 20 years. The weather changes have also changed the rules and we should change as well.
