Old Poison by Joan Francis Page B

turned and looked directly at me. “For
instance, Mrs. Shimmerhorn, our Midwest will become too arid to
produce crops. What would the folks in your area of Story City,
Iowa, do if there was no rain for crops, and no crops to feed
people and livestock? Across the world in Mali the people already
face that plight. Since the 1970s an entire region of lakes has
dried up, and people who were once self-reliant farmers and
fishermen now face famine. Desertification is happening in dozens
of places all over the globe, right now.”
    I gave him no answer but sat in stunned
silence. How did he do that? I was too far away for him to read my
name tag. Had he memorized all the photos in the computer roster,
or did he simply know exactly who I was? He held me in his gaze for
a few seconds as a slight smile played on his lips. It might have
been simple geniality, or it might have been a Cheshire cat,
“gotcha.”
    “Situations like the one in Mali are part of
what your UN money goes for, David, part of where our excess grain
goes. If our Midwest turns to dust and desert, the famine will
become worldwide because our Midwest plains are the world’s bread
basket.
    “On the other hand, it could mean good news
for Canada and Russia. As our latitudes are overheated and turn to
dust, Canadian and Russian prairies may warm just enough to become
the new producers of the world’s grain. That would certainly make a
change in the world trade balance, wouldn’t it? It could even
affect our position as numero uno.”
    Consternation registered on David’s face as
Nate scored a bull’s-eye. “David, the goal here is not to shut down
oil wells or cattle ranches, but to devise plans for our nation’s
continued prosperity. That means finding better answers than
turning up the air conditioner.
    “Kay, if the world mean temperature goes up
three degrees Fahrenheit by 2100, your mean summer temperature in
Tucson will be one hundred degrees. That is not your high, but your
average. Your highs would fall between a hundred and thirty to a
hundred and forty. How many of your seniors would survive that kind
of heat? How far would your water and power stretch under those
conditions?” Kay sat down heavily with no more comment.
    “Sven, ever since 1999 heat and drought have
contributed to horrific annual forest fires that have destroyed
hundreds of thousands of acres of trees throughout the west. If the
world continues to warm there will be great loss of temperate
forests. That is not only tragic to loggers, nature lovers, and
animal life, but it makes fewer trees to absorb less of the CO2 we
dump into the air, which makes it hotter yet. The hotter it gets,
the hotter it gets.
    “Kyle, Mary Beth, both of you cover areas
that have serious coastal erosion problems. There is now very
frightening evidence that the great ice sheets of Antarctica and
the arctic may be melting rapidly. The European Space agency is now
warning of the collapse of the Wilkins ices shelf. As they melt and
the ocean water warms and expands, the world’s mean ocean levels
are rising. The optimists have been predicting six feet, the
pessimists thirty feet. Now international climate scientists are
beginning to think sea levels could rise three times that of the
official worst-case estimates. That could completely wipe out some
small island nations. With the invading seas you can expect damage
to our fresh water supplies, sewage facilities, and loss of our
most expensive real estate. Even at that, we could be getting off
light. At the end of the last ice age, world oceans rose three
hundred feet. One can only guess at how many ancient coastal
habitats are buried three hundred feet beneath the sea.”
    He had more than caught their attention. He
had touched each individual where he lived.
    “How bad will it get? We don’t know. Could
it all start cooling off again? Possibly, but not likely. David,
you said this world has warmed and cooled many times. That’s true,
but according to the