[Coral-List] Reporting CO2 to the public

[John Ware]

Dear List,

I fail to see how reporting CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere or 
translating CO2 concentration changes to changes in Watts per square 
meter or providing information on how many gigatons of C as CO2 are 
being emitted per year is going to have any impact on the publics 
perception of the problem.

I propose an alternative approach which attempts to relate CO2 emissions 
to their impact on a charismatic ecosystem = coral reefs.  With a large 
number of assumptions and gathering information from many sources, I 
concluded that (very roughly speaking) each metric ton of C emitted as 
CO2 kills about 0.5 square meter of coral reef.

Whether the number is correct or not almost doesn't matter.  It is the 
idea of relating emissions to an impact that is understandable to the 
public that is important.

And, of course, given sufficient information, similar impacts on other 
ecosystems could be related to emissions.

John
ps: I submitted the paper to Coral Reefs and it was rejected, without 
review, as not being pertinent to the aims and content of the journal.  

-- 
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    *                      John R. Ware, PhD                    *
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