Smith: Do extreme weather phenomena like Hurricane Sandy help or hinder a productive conversation about climate change?
Executive Director of the Centre for Global Studies and CIGI Distinguished Fellow
Sandy certainly ought to help engender a serious conversation – one which moves us to action – on climate change. Climate experts have been clear. We will have more extreme weather events. We are having them. Records were broken with Sandy – the lowest pressure ever recorded in the New York area is one. Thinking this is just a once-in-a-hundred-years freak storm is a clear indication of someone with their head in the clouds. But will an action oriented conversation occur soon? I doubt it.