AN AMAZING DISCOVERY
Farther in the park, a porch could barely be made out, with steps indistinguishable in the snow and flanked by two lanterns forming a halo where snowflakes could be seen blowing in all directions. Above it, a man came and went in a room behind an illuminated window. He sat at his desk and took one of many tablets bearing cuneiform inscriptions piled around him. Running his hand delicately over the clay to remove a few grains of sand from a distant country, he recalled the story of its discovery. In 1933 in Syria, men wearing turbans and long coats, accompanied by camels, walked to a mound to bury a deceased Bedouin of their tribe. They began to dig and discovered a statue. When the French authorities, who were then in control of this nation, heard about it, archaeologists from the Louvre came to this site. Soon a temple was discovered, and then a whole city, that of Mari. In a palace with more than 260 rooms, 20 000 of these cuneiform tablets were found.The Professor of Assyriology and Babylonian literature at Yale University, whose name is William W. Hallo, then immersed himself in the mysterious succession of signs impressed by a hand four millennia ago (deciphering of cuneiform script has been known since 1851). Deciphering symbol after symbol, he soon realized that he had made a sensational discovery. The text recounted the itinerary of a trip in Mesopotamia (a geographical area between the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers, corresponding to present-day Iraq as well as parts of Syria, Turkey, and Iran. It was here where the first civilizations appeared, including the Sumerian, Babylonian, and Assyrian empires, between the 5th millennium and the 6th century BC). The text mentioned the capital, Tell Leilan, of a country whose existence was known only thanks to tablets that had been found in the ancient city of Babylon. It also indicated the distances between various points of a journey. Converted to a modern map, this itinerary permitted determination of the spot where this city, buried beneath the sands, should have been situated. But some archaeologists had doubts about its existence. "At the time nothing was definite,” remembers Harvey Weiss, a specialist in Middle Eastern civilizations at Yale University. Yet, in 1978, this archaeologist traveled to Syria, to the place indicated on the map by the text found in Mari. He started digging in a mound located between two trails and discovered a temple with columns magnificently decorated, and then found another. Later he found a 15 meter (50 foot)-high and 18 meter (60 foot)-thick surrounding wall. In 1981, Dr. Weiss explained to a New York Times journalist that he "hope[d] to finish the excavation by next summer" [i]. Since then decades have passed and the paper of the article has yellowed. But the archaeologist is still on his Tell Leilan site. The reason is that the site had yet to reveal secrets before Harvey Weiss could leave it. His excavations have shown that this city was suddenly abandoned. What prompted its inhabitants to move? The same appears to have happened in other cities of this Akkadian empire, which then collapsed.
THE EGYPTIAN EMPIRE TURNED TO ANARCHY
A CURIOUS NASA REPORT
A NASA report about climate change and its implications for U.S. national security predicts that the United States will one day have to build such fortifications to hold back refugees [ii].
"IN 2025, THE EUROPEAN UNION NEARS COLLAPSE."
The NASA report projects that in 2025, the European Union will nearly collapse. Chinese internal conditions will deteriorate dramatically, leading to a civil war. Chinese and U.S. naval forces will be in direct confrontation in the Persian Gulf. Australia and the United States would build defensive fortresses around their countries to protect them from starving immigrants from the Caribbean islands, Mexico, and South America. The United States and Canada would ally, the two countries becoming one. Nuclear weapons would proliferate. Pakistan, India, and China—all armed with nuclear weapons—would skirmish at their borders over arable land, a situation that could degenerate into even more disastrous war scenarios for humanity.But let’s go back to antiquity. Other societies have collapsed as a result of climate change. Four hundred years after the end of the Akkadian civilization, the same happened to the Tiwanaku civilization in the Andes. The reason again was lack of rain. The level of Lake Titicaca, located in this area, dropped by 10 meters (33 feet).The collapse of the Mayan civilization in the 9th century AD coincides with the longest and most severe drought of the millennium. The droughts related to these civilization collapses were more important than those that happened during the 19th and 20th centuries.
THE CLIMATE SINCE YEAR 1000
The stone here, far from representing its weight, expresses vertical momentum in columns that seem too light to bear the huge weight of the vaults suspended at dizzying heights. Through the stained glass windows, rays of light, made visible by specks of dust in the air, create colored patches of light on the floor. Men, seemingly tiny in this architecture of spectacular size, are now lifting onto their shoulders a support bearing a Black Virgin statue. The procession leaves the church, going from cool air to the scorching heat of the summer, from the shadowy light to the blazing sun, the penitents suddenly splashed by light. The clerics, wearing cassocks and richly ornamented cappa magna and holding banners and crucifix, which seem to sparkle in the sun, walk in front of the faithful. The procession crosses the town, arrives in the country, passes between fields with crops destroyed by the drought, and then arrives at the seaside. There, the Virgin statue is delicately lowered from its support and churchmen carry it to the water before bathing it. This is one of many French processions carried out during the Ancien Régime (period before the revolution) to satisfy the wrath of God, which was seen as the cause of extreme weather events. Other means were used, including prayer and witch hunts. Despite these efforts, the archives of this period mention many floods, with bridges swept away, and avalanches crushing houses. The most sophisticated database in the world in this domain exists in Switzerland. Named EuroClimHist, it contains more than 1.5 million entries. France is also in the process of establishing such a resource within the framework of the RENASEC (Les REfus de la NAture. Sociétés et Extrêmes Climatiques: Refusals of Nature. Society and Climatic Extremes) project. The documents dealing with climate information are listed, including harvest dates (grapes, hay, etc.), meteorological processions just described, and temperature measurements taken by the Paris Observatory since 1656. Sunspot variations are also taken into account, the latter reflecting activity of the sun. In France, departmental, municipal, and national records are sifted. "The registers of municipal deliberations are particularly useful," notes Emmanuel Garnier, the historian assigned to the OPHELIE (Observations PHEnologiques pour reconstruire le CLimat de l’Europe: Phenological Observations for Reconstructing Europe's Climate) and RENASEC projects.
Indeed, these documents were begun in 1450 and record, among other information, the weather. "It is because meteorological events have an economic impact. For example, in the case of drought, there was less water in the rivers, which means that it was no longer possible to use mills equipped with paddle wheels. So the grinding process halted and therefore flour was no longer on the market. Then, there was a risk of riot," continues the researcher. Administrative sources are also used, such as those concerning the bridges and roads, the forestry commission, and the navy. As part of the OPHELIE project, private individuals were also asked to send their own records related to climate. "We received many copies of diaries referring to climatic events,” remarks Emmanuel Garnier. These diaries were sometimes kept for 50 years (several members of a family would take turns making entries). In Switzerland, monks’ diaries have been searched. Another example of documents used by EuroClimHist are records of Stockholm’s port that exist from 1543 to 1893. As they indicate when a vessel entered or left the port, it is possible to deduce from them the periods during which the port was frozen.
"THERE WERE MORE HURRICANES IN THE 18TH CENTURY THAN DURING THE 20TH."
It would be wrong to imagine, as suggested in An Inconvenient Truth, that the Earth's climate has only recently been affected by extreme events because of global warming. Dr. Christian Pfister, a climate historian at the University of Berne in Switzerland, who has set up the EuroClimHist database, notes that "the largest Rhine River flood during the second millennium occurred in 1342. All the bridges were destroyed, and in Frankfurt the water surface was at roof level, 7 meters [23 feet] higher than the second most important flood in this area! "
The coldest winter during the last millennium occurred in 1364. "There was a 4-meter [13-foot]- thick layer of ice on the Rhone River," says the professor. Year 1473 was the hottest and driest during this millennium. "The conditions were such that all trees shed their leaves in August,” continues the historian. Hurricanes are also events that took place in the past. For example, in 1999, the French, Swiss, German, and Danish forests were devastated by a hurricane called Lothar. A very similar phenomenon happened in 1739 with about the same route and barometric pressure (measured at the Paris Observatory). In France the Fontainebleau castle was damaged, roofs were swept away, and trees fell. In a forest in Mulhouse 8 000 oaks collapsed. "To state that history repeats itself corresponds to a reality about the storms," says Emmanuel Garnier. While the idea of an increase in the number of storms as a result of global warming is often presented in the media, or even that storms are a very reliable climate change indicator, this professor thinks that "these assumptions are wrong. For instance there were more storms and hurricanes in the 18th century than in the 20th!” Christian Pfister confirms that "The past century is atypical by the fact that, in Central and Western Europe, few extreme weather events have occurred compared with other centuries." On the idea that the damage generated by the environment is more important today, Emmanuel Garnier thinks that "in many cases it was not climatic risk that increases but vulnerability." The concept explained in Al Gore’s documentary film that the climate is changing is not new. For example, in the 1820s–30s, the French mountains were less snowy. "There was then a consensus comparable to the present one, including official speeches, stating that there would be a disruption of the seasons, winters with less snow," notes Emmanuel Garnier. The climate change issue has been in vogue at other times, for example, during the 16th and 17th centuries. "We must be wary of the popular sense, because people forget climate history very quickly. After 20 years, a climatic catastrophe is blotted out. For example, few people today remember the 1976 heat wave!"
"IT WAS POSSIBLE TO CROSS THE RHONE RIVER ON FOOT"
Regarding violent weather events, if these studies do not confirm what one would have expected, another point is also disconcerting: temperature change. ”When I started my research, the view was that the last 500 years were marked by the Little Ice Age, i.e., a cold period that would have lasted from the early 14th century until 1850," explains Emmanuel Garnier. While he noticed cold periods, as shown for instance by the fact that the Seine and Rhone rivers froze, he also discovered very hot times with droughts. In 1480 in Lyon, the population was parched and died of heatstroke because of such a weather event. “The body of artisanal trades was decimated. A doubling of mortality was recorded from August to September while it was possible to cross the Rhone on foot,” observes the researcher (The Rhone is one of the major rivers in Europe). From 1705 to 1725 there were also scorching periods and terrible droughts lasting four or five months in the Paris region. In Languedoc-Roussillon (a region in southern France along the Mediterranean Sea) they lasted for one to two years. "These are phenomena similar to those seen today in the Sahel with problems of access to water and a desertification of the country," adds Emmanuel Garnier. This led to displacement and ethnic conflicts. For example, in 1612 in Narbonne, a city situated in the Languedoc-Roussillon, the Berber community—native to northern Africa—was accused of being the cause of a drought by generating the wrath of God before being expelled to Africa by boat.
"OUR VIEW OF PAST CLIMATES WILL HAVE TO CHANGE."
Christian Pfister confirms this point: "Our view of past climates will have to change. The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) reconstructions are based among others on dendrochronology(the study of patterns of growth of tree rings. For reconstructing past climates, it is estimated that the more the trunk grew between rings, the warmer it was). This technique gives information only about the time during which plants grow, i.e., 30–40% of climatic variation during a year. If one also has data for cold seasons, climate reconstruction will be different. "For example, in Western and Central Europe, the 12th century was warmer than what these curves show," adds Professor Pfister. We address the much talked-about controversy of the hockey stick, MBH 99. MBH is an abbreviation for the names of the three scientists who developed this curve, and 99 stands for the year of publication in the scientific journal Nature. In 2001, MBH 99 was included in the 3rd IPCC report, before being brought into the limelight.
MBH 99 as presented in the media, here from the front page of an important French daily dealing with economic and financial issues and published last year. Note that the graph ends in 2000. If we extrapolate this curve for 2009, it shows very hot temperatures...
Various criticisms, mostly unfounded, have been leveled against it regarding the statistical techniques used, the validity of some series resulting from dendrochronology, the number (deemed to be too low) of series used and their geographical distributions (sometimes described as not representative of the Northern Hemisphere).
Christian Pfister summarizes his views: "The MBH 99 curve probably has parts that do not represent actual temperatures for different times. The authors did not have the data necessary for such a study.” Other scientists have other opinions. For instance, Dr. Philip D. Jones, a climatologist at the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom, who modeled curves similar to MBH 99, thinks that "new information will not significantly change our conclusions about past climates.” For this IPCC member, it is rather the use of archives about which one has to be wary: "The problem with these sources is that they tend to focus on the extremes but not on the small differences in average conditions.” He admits, however, that there may be questions regarding the quality of the data used in these reconstructions. "We must be careful about how we put datasets together, not only for surface measurements and weather balloons, but also for satellites.” Indeed, the latter are not designed to study variations over several decades because of changes in measurement instruments that have occurred over the past 50 years. For satellites, their orbits degenerate (i.e., they get closer to Earth) so they observe different parts of the globe during their rotation as time goes by. "Paradoxically, all these improvements, including the observations from space, create many problems," comments Dr. Jones.
"THERE ARE ALSO FINANCIAL ISSUES"
This controversy has also brought up another issue about studies of past climates: who can have access to the data? Though in science all information is normally made public so that other researchers can verify results, in this domain this policy is not necessarily implemented. For example, regarding temperature reconstructions for the last 1 000 years, two scientists, Warwick Hughes and Steve McIntyre, had difficulty obtaining the data from the scientist who had modeled the curves in question, Professor Philip Jones. He argues that it is not the universities’ role to make such data available before explaining that "[he] signed agreements with countries that stipulate that [he] would not give such information to third parties. Most European nations have restrictions on such dissemination of data." This is not the only case where scientists have had such problems. French researchers are struggling to access information from the EuroClimHist database. For his part, Christian Pfister explains that he invested 20 years of work in this study as well as personal money. "I want this to be credited to me within the framework of scientific publications," he remarks. As noted by Professor Garnier, there are also economic issues behind such information. "Insurance and reinsurance companies seek information for estimating the costs they will have to bear for damage generated by climate change.” (A reinsurance company acts as insurance for an insurance company. It guarantees a certain sum of the risk borne by insurance companies for a percentage of their premiums. This allows insurance companies to assume risks beyond the financial capacity covered by their funds and to avoid having to pay all the damages they insure in the case of a serious disaster and therefore to avoid bankruptcy in such a situation.) Yet this historian has decided that ''his'' database will be made entirely public, so it will then be possible for everyone to see past climatic extremes, for example, for the region where he or she lives. (I will give the link for the site of the database once it exists).
The criticisms expressed by these historians in relation to MBH 99 and changes in violent weather events do not mean that they are questioning the fact that the present climate change is a reality. Professor Pfister emphasizes that the past changes he observes are different from those he sees now: "In the Middle Ages, during warm periods, important changes often happened during the summers and winters, with colder and damper weather than today." In relation to antiquity, Harvey Weiss thinks that it was also different from the present situation. "These changes involve modifications in precipitation. Currently, there is an increase in temperature that is causing problems in terms of melting ice and rising sea levels. The current change is unique in the history of mankind. It is a frightening element."
AND THE FUTUR?
Beyond satisfying our curiosity to know about past climates, what's the point of such studies for our society? What makes these events interesting is that they document the resilience and vulnerability of large complex civilizations to environmental variability. Such societies have the capacity to cope with such problems, but they cannot adapt indefinitely. After a certain point, the established order collapses to make way for a new organization more in line with the new climate. "Climate changes forced the reorganization of many political structures," notes Harvey Weiss. We saw above that different societies, including the Mayans and the Egyptian Old Kingdom, collapsed when climate changes took place. More recent examples also exist, like the French Revolution. Spring 1788 was extremely hot, and thunderstorms devastated much of culture of the kingdom of France. "The consequences of this situation left a mark on the market from May, during the soudure, i.e., the transitional period between old and new crops. The Estates General was assembled by the king of France in 1789 to deal with the issue of a better representation of the people in politics. Its results were considered unsatisfactory, as evidenced by popular events linked to the high cost of wheat. Women marched on Versailles, taking by surprise the National Guard (police headed by Lafayette as commander in chief) and the National Assembly’s elected representatives (established during the Estates General, the National Constituent Assembly took as its mission to provide France with its first constitution). They were hungry and wanted food for themselves and their children," explains historian Emmanuel Garnier. Lafayette tried to contain the crowd and forced the king to return to Paris. Once the sovereign in the capital, this had the effect of significantly weakening his power, in that he was continually threatened by the riot, and this contributed to the collapse of the monarchy. Philip Jones also points out that the Vikings did not survive in northern and western Norway in the 14th and 15th centuries, probably because they failed to adapt to colder temperatures. Finally, the dinosaurs are not absent from this pattern! Alongside the famous meteorite hypothesis, another states that a colder period could have led to their extinction. "Humanity will have to adapt quickly, because climate change will certainly take place in the future faster than it did in the past. We should take this into account when designing buildings, crops, etc.," considers Dr. Jones. Renaud Crassous, a researcher at the Centre International de Recherche sur l’Environnement et le Développement (International Center for Research on Environment and Development) in France thinks that "In twenty years Earth will be affected by famines. We do not currently have sufficient stocks of food to cope with a climate change." Christian Pfister also observes that the worst impacts on populations occur when the change is not anticipated. "A climate change can happen very quickly, as was the case around 1300, when a colder climate suddenly settled. Our societies should have a greater safety margin in anticipation of such events. We are not currently ready." In the future three interdependent problems will arise: food, water, and energy shortages. “In addition, the price of fossil energy will increase. It is a very dangerous situation for a society,” continues the researcher. As for Emmanuel Garnier, he thinks that history has a role to play in the establishment of adaptations for land use, buildings, roads, etc.: "During the Ancien Régime, there were urban areas that were used for absorbing and spreading the floods. This no longer exists today," he remarks. Observer networks were set up, for example, upstream of a river to announce a flood. "In Lyon, debacles were feared when there was a very harsh winter because of pieces of ice coming from the Rhone Glacier in Switzerland. There were observers in the Alps who warned the city. Bridges peopled with residents and merchants were evacuated," he continues.
THE FUTURE: BACK TO THE PAST?
What will be the consequences of climate change on our societies? Emmanuel Garnier thinks that it could lead to organizations similar to those that existed in Europe during the Middle Ages! At that time disasters were taken care by religious aid, with secular payment beginning in France in 1650. Although the king was officially a Christian, being crowned in Reims by the pope, he gradually marginalized the Catholic Church. This occurred through specialized administrations that led investigations and paid compensations directly to the disaster victims. Gradually, climatic risk was no longer seen as a manifestation of the wrath of God but as a rational phenomenon that can be anticipated and handled. "Helping victims is a way to show that there is a central power and that it is better to rely on it than on local or religious authorities," explains Dr. Garnier. “This is a view that the United States’ federal government dropped beginning in the Reagan era. About Katrina—a hurricane that raged in the United States in 2005, where the most serious consequences were in New Orleans, Louisiana, which was then flooded—I was appalled when I saw the following scene: after 5 days, military trucks arrived with pastors from Christian fundamentalist sects. Instead of food they distributed bibles! The message was: if this area is flooded, it is because you are being punished by God. The interest for the central power is not to investigate climatic risk." For this scientist this is a turning point that also begins to emerge in France. "While in the 15th century there were flood markers, this practice has now been partially given up. As there is no flood marker, it is a way for the state to off-load the blame on elected representatives and owners in case of disaster." In his opinion, such a situation would lead the population to withdraw into their own communities, leading to a new social organization characterized by population segmentation, where individuals recognize only the authority of a small minority or group of people. At the level of nations, a lack of international solidarity could lead to regional wars motivated by the instinct of self-preservation. To put it bluntly, it would mean the return of societies similar to those of the Middle Ages. Knowing that these societies were also characterized by hunts for scapegoats, such as so-called witches, this situation can only send a shiver down the spine!
In terms of the energies used, this could not be more glorious. While one often speaks about trendy alternative energies such as wind turbines and solar panels, Hubert Kieken, a scientist at the Institut du Développement Durable et des Relations Internationales (Institute of Sustainable Development and International Relations) in France thinks that ”If there were no more oil in 10 years, the solution to the energy problem would be coal. It is possible to use this fuel to operate power plants and heaters and one can even create oil with it through a process called Fischer-Tropsch!” For this researcher, coal will retain a dominant share nuclear power in the next 50 years. The reason is that one needs to be able to quickly provide huge amounts of energy, for example, for China. The idea to use essentially nuclear energy in France works because this country is surrounded by nations with a different development pattern for their nuclear facilities. Thus France can export electricity to neighboring countries most of the time and import it during the winter. "This example is not reproducible on a large scale in other conditions. Moreover, with the current generation of nuclear power stations, we would soon face the problem of uranium depletion," concludes Dr. Kieken.
Gaëtan Dübler
[i] "Diggers Find Imperial City of Assyrians." The New York Times. October 18, 1981.
[ii] For more information, see http://oco.jpl.nasa.gov/pubs/Abrupt_Climate_Change_Scenario.pdf
Articles
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire