Glass Sky (44 page)

IT TOOK FIVE years and eight rewrites to create Glass Sky. If you enjoyed this novel please give it a good review on Amazon or Facebook.

Glass Sky is based in reality. The space technology – dimensions, acceleration, payload capacity – corresponds with next-generation heavy-lift rockets (although I admit that SpaceX may be a game-changer in this area). Scenes on the lunar surface draw from the writings of the brave men who’ve been there, and from the actual Apollo transcripts. The moon base, mass driver, and mining technology are based on current proposals to use the moon in support of a manned mission to Mars.

The climate change predictions are also real. Of course it is impossible to guess the exact shape of the catastrophe now unfolding. But I’ve read thousands of pages of climate research, and tried to do it justice. Nothing in Glass Sky goes beyond current models (except sea levels, which I pushed forward a few decades in the interest of a good story). Methane is already melting out of the Arctic. The North Pole ice cap is nearly gone. We are losing biodiversity at an astonishing 10,000 times the historical rate. By the end of the century, fully 50% of Earth’s species will be extinct.

To make matters worse, there are hidden tipping points – natural feedbacks that add to climate change’s velocity. As the North Pole ice cap melts, the ocean traps more heat. As the permafrost melts and methane leaks out, the atmosphere gains powerful new greenhouse gasses. And if marine clathrates melt… well… whatever survives us will have to tell that story.

The last time atmospheric CO2 levels were at the current 400 ppm, the sea was 15 meters higher. That’s what we’ve signed up for already. Yet in 2015, governments worldwide spent around $600 billion subsidizing fossil fuels. That’s $600 billion spent keeping us away from clean energy. If we continue at this rate, then by 2050, we could be locked into an eventual 100-meter sea-level rise. That sea level rise will take centuries. But that’s still faster than we can adapt. A few meters drowns New York, Holland, and Bangladesh. A hundred meters will change our entire civilization.

This is why some scientists now consider geoengineering our best hope. Atmospheric sulfur is the leading candidate, because it’s relatively cheap, and nature has already tested it through volcanic eruptions. The downside, as described in Glass Sky, is that reflecting sunlight to compensate for CO2 doesn’t work that well. Computer models that incorporate atmospheric sulfur show major changes to weather patterns, including disruptions of the Asian monsoon.

And while space shields have also been discussed, the technology to aim sunlight is fictional. Tania Black and Tian Jie had a path out. We shouldn’t count on a benevolent author.

We need to be more than just bacteria, blindly multiplying until we overrun our Petri dish. We must change the way we think about our planet and our economic system. My own opinion is that we should institute a steadily increasing global carbon tax. The tax should be simple: no exemptions for special interests; no grandfathering of favored industries. And the proceeds of this tax should be split between citizens, with governments keeping nothing.

Because the price of carbon-intensive activities would rise at a predicable rate, private enterprise could make better longterm bets. Who would build a coal plant today, knowing that in ten years the cost of carbon would triple? Money would flood into clean energy research instead. And maybe, just maybe, we’d find a way out of this mess.

Many people are working on solutions. Brilliant visionaries like Elon Musk. Companies like Google. Organizations like the Gates Foundation. The Earth Policy Institute maintains Plan B, an up-to-date blueprint for saving our planet, from which I’ve drawn many ideas for Pax Gaia.

Become informed. Contact your elected representatives. Support the excellent team at 350.org. We are in this together. And we are out of time.

Niko Perren

Calgary, Canada

November, 2015

A book of this complexity is only possible with the help of many people. The team at California Times Publishing helped pull the Glass Sky out of self-published obscurity. Lara Arnott edited multiple drafts and convinced me not to give up. Gerrie van Ieperen proofed three drafts. Suzette Mayer provided the first outside feedback. Rosemary Nixon edited draft three and gave me a writing education. Glenn Cuff, Claire Gougeon, Rachel Appleby, Anthony Ap-pleby, and Jason Lewis provided feedback on draft four. Jason McLeod, Margaret Drummond, Jesse Martin, Brad Roulston, Craig Strukoff, and Ineke van Ieperen provided feedback on draft six. Paul Bjar-nason copy edited draft seven. Dan Pach gave me a lesson in typography. Joyce He helped with some of the Chinese translations. Al Gore’s TED talk con-vinced me of the urgency of the climate crisis. His dedication to this cause is what got me started.

NIKO PERREN LIVES in Calgary, Canada. He holds dual degrees in Computer Science and Pure Mathematics, and works as a software researcher. He balances his geeky tendencies by being a long-time participant at Burning Man, where he builds art, volunteers as a Black Rock Ranger, and helps run a theme camp.

Niko's love of the outdoors started with alpine climbing, and progressed into expedition cav-ing, snowboarding, and canyoneering. His travels have taken him to some of the world's most re-mote and beautiful places.