Put a price on carbon -- your grandchildren will thank you later
When I think of last Friday’s Earth Day, I think of my grandchildren’s future and how I have failed them.
Today’s children face a seven times greater chance of experiencing severe weather than their grandparents. In Georgia, already 100,000 people are at risk of coastal flooding. Higher water levels erode beaches, submerge lowlands and exacerbate coastal flooding. The sea level is rising about one inch every decade. Atlanta warmed at 0.65 degrees Fahrenheit a decade between 1961 and 2010 and is still warming. The number of unpleasantly hot days is increasing, along with the risk of heatstroke and other heat-related illnesses. The pollen season is becoming increasingly long and intense.
Georgia will become warmer in the coming decades, and the state will probably experience more severe floods and drought. Even today, more rain is falling in heavy downpours.
If now, we put a price on the carbon produced by the fossil fuel industry, decades from now, our grandchildren will thank us – well, maybe – you know how grandchildren are!
DAVID GREENLAND, SANDY SPRINGS
Politicians, parents rail against school issues that do no harm
As of last week, over 1,000 children less than 18 years old have died from COVID. In the same period, the number of children who died from hearing the word “gay” was zero; the number of children who died from reading certain books was zero and the number of children who died from learning that their grandpa may have burned crosses on the top of Stone Mountain was, well, yes, zero.
Guess which scenarios are deemed so dangerous we must guard our children against them by passing laws restricting our teachers even more. It’s not the scenario that can inflict actual harm, a threat consistent with our concerns about measles, mumps and other childhood diseases. Instead, we saw parents screaming at school boards and teachers about wearing a simple mask. And now politicians spread fear about words, stories and history while teachers wonder a little more about why they teach.
MICHAEL BUCHANAN, ALPHARETTA
