In an effort to raise awareness of the need for action to counter climate change, US paleontologist and best-selling science author Dr. Peter Ward of the University of Washington has taken a unique approach in his most recent book, “Flooded Earth: Our Future in a World Without Ice Caps.”

Dr. Ward, who has extensively researched previous mass extinction events on Earth, describes through a series of graphic vignettes the dangers that could befall civilization from sea levels rising as he helps readers envision their potential Earthly devastation.

He warns that at current rates of global warming, even if human-made carbon dioxide emissions were halted today, oceans would still increase a meter by 2050. In fact, over time sea levels could rise by 20 meters or more, triggering such disasters as massive emergency migrations and epidemics of tropical disease.

In one of the book’s scenarios, the city of Miami in Florida, USA is described as having become an island where fresh water must be collected in swimming pools during hurricanes and septic systems no longer function due to the overwhelming sea level rise.

Many thanks, Dr. Peter Ward, for your creative application of scientific insights to help people understand the consequences of inaction. Let us all awaken to the need for rapid action toward sustainable lifestyles to save our precious world. Supreme Master Ching Hai has often reminded of the need to protect our planet from the imbalances caused by global warming, as in the following March 2009 videoconference in California, USA.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128290660
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/books/2012083437_br11flooded.html
http://objectivistindividualist.blogspot.com/2010/06/peter-ward-flooded-earth.html