A new report released by the Obama administration puts in frank language the contrasting futures faced by our planet, based on whether or not we take immediate action to reduce global carbon pollution.
The report, entitled, Climate Change in the United States: Benefits of Global Action, is a product of the CIRA project (Climate Change Impacts and Risks Analysis), one of the first attempts at quantifying the benefits of global action on climate change. The report compares two future scenarios - one in which we take drastic action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the other in which no action is taken. And the differences are startling.
"The report finds that we can save tens of thousands of American lives, and hundreds of billions of dollars, annually in the United States by the end of this century, and the sooner we act, the better off America and future generations of Americans will be," EPA Administrator, Gina McCarthy says.
The analysis quantifies differences in health, infrastructure, and the impacts to ecosystems within the two scenarios, revealing dramatic differences in dollar amounts, based on which future we choose for our planet.
Significant global action on climate change could mitigate future extreme whether events, saving a projected 12,000 death each year across 49 U.S. cities. The benefits of such measures, if started today, could lead to greater benefits over time, saving approximately 13,000 deaths in 2050 and 57,000 deaths in 2100 due to poor air quality.
The study also examined the effects of inaction on infrastructure, which could cost an extra $7 billion annually by 2100 in road maintenance alone. And not all areas of the U.S. will be impacted equally. California will face increasing drought, the Rocky Mountains could see significant increase in wildfires, and the Southeast could be impacted by sea level rise and storm surge, if no action is taken to reduce global emissions.
Now that we have the numbers, we will wait to see how our nation's leaders react.
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