Climate scientist steps out of the lab and into the wind
After spending a career researching climate change, former NOAA scientist David Goodrich set on a cross-country bike trip to talk with everyday Americans about global warming.
David Goodrich
Courtesy of Concette Goodrich
Boulder, Colo.
When David Goodrich retired from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, he decided to combine his dual loves of cycling and climate. In 2011, the climate scientist began a cross-country bicycle tour of the United States, talking with people about global warming along the way. Dr. Goodrich鈥檚 book about the trip, 鈥淎 Hole in the Wind,鈥� came out this summer. The Monitor鈥檚 Amanda Paulson recently caught up with him in Boulder, Colo. Some excerpts follow: 聽
蚕:听What inspired your trip?聽
I鈥檝e been a bicycle commuter for a long time.... [But as] I got closer to retirement, I thought: Wow, I could go across [the country] and talk to people about climate.
Q:聽What did you learn from those conversations?
I found that the word 鈥渃limate鈥� has been defined as a political issue. It was always a science issue for me. You can talk about the latest drought that鈥檚 going on, or the big heavy rains we鈥檝e been having, and on the coast you can talk about, 鈥淏oy, there鈥檚 been a lot of flooding.鈥� But if you say, 鈥淚sn鈥檛 that climate change?鈥� or 鈥淚sn鈥檛 that sea level rise?,鈥� there鈥檚 this wall that goes up.
Q:聽What did you find inspiring?聽
I come from a science community ... but it鈥檚 not like these people are ignorant. I talked to a couple of farmers in Kansas, in the middle of the drought of 2011 鈥� a pretty big drought 鈥� who said, 鈥淢y yield is down, I have fuel bills, seed bills.鈥� They say, 鈥淵ou鈥檝e got to get big to survive. I don鈥檛 know if this is going to work.鈥� In a lot of ways, they know the weather better than I do.
Q:聽What鈥檚 different about traveling by bike?聽
It鈥檚 what you hear that you don鈥檛 hear from a car. I was in all that wind in Kansas, and the wind in a wheat field makes a hiss. I remember listening to the hiss. In Wyoming in the middle of sagebrush country, I was hearing a caw like a crow, and there were no birds.... around there. I looked out into the sagebrush, and there鈥檚 an antelope. It鈥檚 their distress call.聽
Q:聽Are you optimistic? 聽
When I first rode across Kansas in 2011, it was amazing how much wind I was getting and how few wind farms there were. That has changed completely....聽 There鈥檚 been a huge growth in wind farms across the Plains. Oklahoma is competing with Wyoming for who鈥檚 got the biggest wind project; Texas is the biggest wind-producing state. These places are not where you would necessarily find people saying climate change is real, but they鈥檙e a huge part in the move toward renewable energy. You don鈥檛 necessarily have to buy into climate change to be a part of the solution.