OPINION: Climate change threatens the joy of snow days

Photo by Laila Zouaki

By Emily Davis (MA ’22)

Over 12 inches of snow fell in parts of the Big Apple before midday on January 29 this year, and enthusiastic New Yorkers made do, using cookie sheets and inner tubes to sled through Central Park. 

These aren’t your great-grandmother’s snow days. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) reports that twice as many extreme snowstorms hit the U.S. between 1950 and 2000 than in the 50 years before that. They attribute this doubling to warmer-than-average sea surface temperatures of the Atlantic Ocean, caused by climate change. It’s counterintuitive, but well-researched, that warming oceans promote more winter storms in the United States and other midlatitude regions, such as Central and East Asia. 

These trends of more frequent and intense winter storms pose serious threats. Snow, ice, and wind make travel dangerous, but staying warm at home poses its own challenges. Two days before this megastorm hit the East Coast, government officials visited Woodside Houses in Queens, New York where public housing residents have suffered from heating and hot water outages for five months. 

From Queens, New York to Houston, Texas, people across the country are increasingly buying freestanding electric generators to power their appliances during outages. These devices release carbon monoxide, a deadly gas, and kill an average of 70 people in the U.S. each year. 

Even in areas accustomed to winter storms, extreme snowstorms pose a threat to the environment. Low temperatures and high winds can knock down and kill trees and plants, releasing carbon into the atmosphere and decreasing a forest’s ability to pull carbon from the atmosphere. The elimination of damaged plants also reduces the food supply for local wildlife. 

Following storms, rising temperatures melt snow and pose a flood risk. Flooding spreads pollutants like oil, pesticides, and plastics into waterways and local ecosystems. Similar to the aftermath of hurricanes, flooding from winter storms creates an opportunity for mold and fungus growth, both of which pose public health risks. 

Climate change is affecting other natural disasters aside from just severe winter storms. 2021 set records for extreme heat, wildfires, and devastating storms and floods worldwide. This is a devastating new normal. 

Growing up in California, raging wildfires shut down my elementary school for a few days. The red bandana fastened around my head to stave off smoke was new and exciting at the time; I had never had a fire day before. When my teachers were suddenly being evacuated from their homes, it wasn’t exciting anymore. My parents also purchased a fire evacuation ladder around this time.

When these fires hit during my college years and classes were canceled, I invited my friends over to make my grandma’s mac and cheese. We spent hours together decompressing and laughing in that apartment, where the windows didn’t close all the way and I could see the ash on the window sill and feel the smoke in my lungs. Already chronically ill, I was scared. That fire burned 745 acres of land just two miles from me.

Today, I hold those stolen moments close to my heart. Amidst such tragedy, my joy felt like a betrayal. Particularly for young people, looking towards the future feels bleak. Preliminary results from a worldwide study of 10,000 people ages 16 to 25 show that 95% expressed worry about climate change. This preprint published in The Lancet and covered by Nature shows that climate change makes two-thirds of participants feel sad or afraid. Like me, over half feel guilty.

Waking up to a foot of snow the morning of January 29, New York City came alive and parks overflowed with activity ranging from skiing to snowball fights.

Just 50 miles away, twice that amount of snow fell in Long Island, and four residents were killed by winter storm-related activity. As the storm worked its way up the coast, 99 mile-per-hour winds knocked out power for 130,000 people.

In the face of such hardships, award-winning author, historian, and activist Rebecca Solnit explains that “Joy doesn’t betray but sustains activism.” 

In a world where tragedy finds us no matter the circumstances, and there is always a greater cause to be fighting for, we cannot deprioritize ourselves in the name of progress. That is why, when the snow rolled in, I was the first out of bed, charting fresh footprints and launching myself down the biggest hill I could find. It’s why I look so fondly on all those New Yorkers and people everywhere making do and finding joy among the disasters.

Emily Davis is a student in Columbia Climate School's M.A. in Climate and Society program.