Cover image for This is the way the world ends : how droughts and die-offs, heat waves and hurricanes are converging on America
Title:
This is the way the world ends : how droughts and die-offs, heat waves and hurricanes are converging on America
ISBN:
9781250160461
Edition:
1st ed.
Physical Description:
xvii, 316 pages ; 25 cm.
Contents:
Introduction: Harbinger -- Part 1: The truth. Einstein's warning ; Species on the move ; The third pole ; Collapse of the pollinators ; The "evil twin" -- Part 2: The ecosystems. Regime shift ; The Sahel ; Ocean colonies -- Part 3: The impacts. Dome of heat ; Category 6 ; The displaced ; Vanishing icons -- Part 4: The geopolitics. Seeing around corners ; The water economy ; Saudi Arabia ; Yemen ; Syria ; Jordan ; Somalia ; Pakistan ; India ; China ; Environmental diplomacy -- Part 5: The blueprint. A path forward ; Disruption ; Waking the behemoths ; The anvil -- Part 6: The future. Political morality ; Our next gate.
Summary:
The world itself won't end, of course. Only ours will: our livelihoods, our homes, our cultures. And we're squarely at the tipping point. Longer droughts in the Middle East are causing extreme water shortages. Growing desertification in China and Africa is creating a severe food-security challenge. The monsoon season is shrinking in India, perhaps upending a century-old water cycle. Amped-up heat waves in Australia re making part of the continent unlivable. More intense hurricanes could devastate entire cities in America. Water wars in the Horn of Africa are now the root of armed conflict. Rebellions, refugees and starving children across the globe are becoming commonplace. These are not disconnected events. These are the pieces of a larger puzzle that environmental expert Jeff Nesbit puts together. Unless we start addressing the causes of climate change and stop simply navigating its effects, we will be facing a series of unstoppable catastrophes by the time our preschoolers graduate from college. Our world is in trouble--right now. [This book] tells the real stories of the substantial impacts to Earth's systems unfolding across each continent. The bad news? Within two decades or so, our carbon budget will reach a point of no return. But there's good news. Like every significant challenge we've faced--from creating civilization in the shadow of the last ice age to the Industrial Revolution--we can get out of this box canyon by understanding the realities and changing the worn-out climate conversation to one that's relevant to every person. Nesbit provides a clear blueprint for real-time, workable solutions we can tackle together. --
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