I hope this answers some of Randy Katro’s March 12 letter in the Joliet Herald concerning global warming. As to what happens when oil is pumped out of the ground, the surface does sink. The same thing happens when gas and water are removed. The space between particles is filled with the fluid and-or gas under the pressure of all the rock above the strata. As the pressure is released by the drilling process (ever see an oil gusher on TV?) the space between the particles gets smaller. The thicker the oil-bearing strata and the type of rock, the more surface will sink. Houston is the great example I used in teaching geography labs in college.

Yes, rain does clear the air of pollutants. Nature’s quickest way to cool the earth is a huge volcanic eruption putting sulfuric gas and billions of tons of ash into the air. Both will reflect the light rays keeping them from reaching the surface. The term “little ice ages” coincides with huge eruptions. One affected the Northeast by lakes freezing over in the summer and killing the crops.

Nature can clean CO2 if it isn’t overwhelmed by turning it into a particle which sinks to the bottom. We are overloading the oceans and they are becoming so acidic that shellfish are having trouble with their shells.

As for your comment indicating a little extra heat doesn’t make a difference, you are so wrong. The Earth’s atmosphere allows life to exist on a knife edge composition of gases. Mars once had an atmosphere and Venus’ so out of balance the surface is hundreds of degrees. We know CO2 and methane requires only a microscopic increase or decrease to cause massive changes. We have known this for 150 years. CO2 levels have increased from under 300 ppm to over 400 on half of the increase in the last three decades. That’s our fault!

The news keeps saying we need to keep the world’s average temperature under three degrees by 2100. Those degrees are Celsius which is 5.5 degrees Fahrenheit. A third of the rise has already been reached. What if we can’t stop at three?

Humanity isn’t prepared for the consequences of a runaway climate change. We are having problems dealing with the initial changes caused by one degree. Just in our country, 100 year storms are occurring almost weekly. 120 degree days used to be just in Death Valley, and coastal cities are being flooded with high tides. Storms are becoming more common and more intense. In spite of the recent polar vortex that was probably caused by warmer Arctic water, our winters aren’t killing off insects which allow infestations to move farther North destroying trees and crops.

With population growth to 12 billion by 2100, I am very pessimistic about humanity’s survival.