Blog Assignment #1

    Hello everyone I'm Julien Gutierrez, a student intrigued and worried  by the uncertainty of our planet. In this blog I'm gonna write about the most relevant points of the article posted in "The New York Times" called "New York is lagging as seas and risks rise, critics warn". I will also React to a comment of my choice from the " Reader's Picks". I'm doing this because it is my first  blog assignment, and because a glance at reality from time to time only helps.

     This article is about the precautions that we're taking to prevent the damage from future hurricanes/storms. The article starts off by saying that, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg is doing extensive research on the phenomenon that is climate change. However, critics say that New York is still not prepared for potential floods that could happen in the future and hinder transportation, low income districts, and deprive a vast amount of people of their homes. "They lack a sense of urgency about this" said Douglas Hill, an engineer with the storm surge research group. Officials in New York say that adapting a city of 8 million people is an issue of great complexity. "It's a million of small changes that need to happen" said Adam Freed, until august the deputy director of the city’s Office of Long-Term Planning and Sustainability. He also said that “you can’t make a climate-proof city.”  New York has nearly 200,000 citizens living less than four feet above high tide according to the research group climate central. What does this mean?, this means that all these people are at risk if we don't act accordingly. These  people may lose their homes or even their lives due to floods that may occur since they're less than four feet above high tide. And we all know that sea level is rising due to global warming. This will eventually worsen the situation. A 2004 study by Mr. Hill a the storm research group at stony brook suggested installing barriers at certain points of the city. Closing these barriers during hurricanes would prevent floods caused by immense tides. City officials say that they're considering this idea, but others claim that this could interfere with aquatic ecosystem and that the barriers may eventually become obsolete in the future since the sea level is rising. Also the cost of these barriers could reach 10 billion. 

      In the comments section of this article i found one comment particularly interesting written by Jim Gordon, he wrote that our best choice is to transition into clean and renewable energy. Also that building those walls is a mistake, not only because the cost is just ridiculous, but also because it will only pollute more the environment. I strongly agree with Jim, I believe that the only way to get out if this mess is by trying to pollute less or maybe even not pollute at all the environment. We need to eradicate our current sources of energy and move to a new clean one, one that doesn't affect our environment. And we need to do everything we can do to prevent the officials of New York from building those walls. it will be a waste of money, and it will hurt our planet even more. it's like we're fighting fire with fire.