For decades we have either ignored climate change or treated it as a problem to solve later. Making matters worse, the issue has been dragged into politics and become a marker of which side you are on. A lot of people have decided it is not real, or not serious, or not our doing. That doesn’t necessarily come from stupidity or bad faith. Humans are remarkably good at discounting problems that are inconvenient or expensive to solve. Climate change’s slowness makes ignoring it even easier. When danger arrives all at once, it triggers a jolt of urgency that demands action. Our minds are not built to address a threat that unfolds across many decades. This article is not about polar bears or glaciers. Instead, it is about engineering. It is about how this disaster is already testing the physical limits of Fayette County and how today’s actions will impact our future. Everything we build is designed for a particular range of conditions. Our water systems, our storm drains, our roads, and our building codes are sized for a span ranging from the worst drought to the worst flood and from the coldest snap to the hottest stretch on record. We take the range the past hands us and build to its edges. That works until the future stops cooperating. As the climate shifts, the record of what a place has already lived through stops being a reliable guide to what it can do now. The range widens. Rain lands harder than the drains were built for. Dry spells run longer than the reservoir was…
*This content (including text, artwork, graphics, photography, and video) was provided by the third party(ies) as referenced above. Any rights or other content questions or inquiries should be directed to such third-party provider(s).
