Why I Wrote “Moving to Higher Ground”
April 6, 2021
Today is publication day for my newest book “Moving to Higher Ground: Rising Sea Level and the Path Forward.” Why did I write it?
My first inspiration to write about climate and sea level came during a night in Greenland in August 2007. The planet was measurably warmer and becoming more so every year. That meant less ice on land, higher global sea level, which would alter coastlines around the world. If I could tell the story of those four connected points, based on good science, and speaking in very clear language, I hoped the book would help people understand our situation and accept the new reality.
By all accounts I succeeded with the first book. More than twenty five thousand copies of High Tide On Main Street have been sold, a minor miracle among “science books”. In the nine years since, I’ve given hundreds of briefings and keynotes. Well over a half million people have watched videos from my TEDx talk to the Royal Institution in London.
Yet, in 2021, we still are putting more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere eah year than ever before. The rate of planetary warming, ice melting, and sea rising is still accelerating. The forecast is ominous. The need for a clearer understanding of warming, climate change, and sea level is perhaps even greater today than nine years ago.
Yet most people still hope for a magic solution. They grasp at any solution, now or in thirty or forty years. “Technology will save us.” Few are willing to recognize the truth. It is going to be incredibly hard to slow the warming and FAR harder to stop it. Excess heat already in the oceans guarantees severe weather and rising seas for centuries. We are forced to be more resilient in the face of extreme weather events because they happen to us now.
We need to bring that resiliency to a world we can yet scarcely imagine. We must begin to adapt to meters, not inches, of sea level rise.
We have to begin serious planning to move to higher ground in the coming decades. There is no alternative. If we start “now” we might manage it. But delay is deadly and means certain disaster. And that is what we are doing. We are trying to cling to every bit of shoreline that we have come to love. We are raising roads by inches, when we should be aiming FAR higher.
We need to tell the truth and stop the wishful thinking that we can avoid climate change and rising sea level. We need to put things into social, economic, political and psychological context, finding a new positive picture. There can be hope. The challenge of this century will be adapting to severe climate change and rising sea level. We must begin by accepting the facts and the truth.
That is why I wrote this new book. We need to repeat the truth, and the facts, and help people understand how serious the situation is. We are warming faster now than even I thought when I wrote High Tide almost a decade ago. If you find the message of Moving to Higher Ground helpful, please share it with folks of all ages and ‘pay it forward.’
John Englander, Boca Raton, FL April 6, 2021
LAUNCH DAY APRIL 6, 2021
Moving to Higher Ground, Rising Sea Level and the Path ForwardA major new book with shocking insights
into the real effects and causes of global warming.
Find out why we can’t “solve” climate change, can’t stop severe
weather, and can’t stop sea level rise.
Find out why we must move to higher ground.
On-Sale Tuesday, April 6, 2021
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