It was a minor thing, but Jason Box didn't want to talk about it. After that happened, he's been skittish about the media. This was last summer, when he read the cheerful blog posts on the Swedish icebreaker Oden, conveyed by the chief scientist, mapping the Arctic with an international expedition led by the University of Stockholm. "Our first findings were recorded of elevated methane levels, about ten times more than in seawater in the past. We found over 100 new locations of methane seep .... The weather Gods are still on our side as we steam across a Laptev Sea now free of ice ...."
As a leading climatologist who spent many years studying the Arctic at the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center in Ohio State, Box knew that one of the nightmare long-shot climate scenarios was described by this breezy scientific detachment: a feedback loop where warming seas release methane that causes warming that releases more methane that causes more warming, on and on until the world is incompatible And he knew that similar methane releases were happening in the area. He sent out a tweet upon impulse.
"If even a tiny fraction of carbon from the Arctic sea floor is emitted into the atmosphere, we're f'd."
The tweet went viral right away, inspiring a chain of headlines:
"ARCTIC CARBON RELEASE CLIMATOLOGIST SAYS COULD MEAN" We're Fucked.
CLIMATE SCIENTIST AFTER Beginning ARCTIC Exploration DROPS THE F-BOMB.
CLIMATOLOGIST: METHANE PLUMES WE'RE Fucked FROM ARCTIC MEAN.
For years, Box has been outspoken. He did science experiments for Greenpeace, and he participated in the White House mass demonstration coordinated by 350.org in 2011. He made headlines in 2013 when a magazine announced his conclusion that a seventy-foot increase in sea levels was potentially already 'baked into the system' over the next few decades. Now, Box has ventured into two especially risky places with one word. First, the dirty secret of climate change and government climate policy is that they are all based on probabilities, which means that the center of the uncertainty curve is based on the impact of conventional CO2 targets, such as an 80% decrease by 2050. On the curve 's tail, where few scientists and nil lawmakers are able to go, Box had ventured to the darker possibilities.
Worse, he showed emotion, a subject in all science, but especially in climate science, ringed with taboos. Climate scientists have been so distracted and intimidated by the relentless campaign against them, as a recent study from the University of Bristol documented, that they tend to avoid any statements that could get them labeled "alarmists," retreating into a world of charts and data. But Box was capable of resisting all that. In interviews with the Danish papers, where they converted "we're fucked" into their more decorous Danish counterpart, "on our butt," he also chased the media splash, plastering those dispiriting terms across the nation in large-type headlines.
The issue was that Box was now working for the Danish government, and while Denmark could be the most radical climate nation in the world, one of its scientists who distressed the public with dreams of environmental catastrophe was still not kindly welcomed by its officials. Convinced that his career was in danger just a year after he uprooted his young family and moved to a distant country, Box was called to his research institute before the entire board of directors. But now, he doesn't answer it when he gets an e-mail asking for a phone call to clarify his "recent pessimistic comments."
"Five days later:" Dr. Box, if the message below has gone into your junk file, try again. Please email us.
He answers briefly this time. "I think most scientists in a defensive shell of skepticism would be burying open recognition of the horrible realities of climate change (not the same kind of skepticism coming from conservatives, of course). I'm also surprised how few climatologists have brought a message of activism to the streets, demonstrating for any policy reform." But he refuses the phone call order.
A week later, another try: "Dr. Box—I watched your speech at The Economist's Arctic Summit. Wow. I would like to come see you."
But the one thing he does not want to address is gloom. Crawling under a rock is not a choice, "he answers," so it is pointless to be overwhelmed with PTSD-like symptoms. "He cites a Norse proverb:"
"The unwise one is up all night, thinking over and over again. He's still agitated as dawn rises."
Most people don't have an conveniently available proverb like that. So, a final try: "I guess I'm meant to come see you, meet your dad, and make this tale vibrant and intimate."
To figure out how this outspoken American is keeping up, I decided to meet Box. He left his country and took his family up close to see and observe the freezing of Greenland. How does being the one to look most intimately at the grim realities of climate change, day in and day out, affect a person? Of all the scientists most closely interested in this defining question of the new century, is Box representative? In the face of improvements to the world that could make it a different planet, how are they influenced by the responsibility of their chosen work?
Lastly, Box gives in. Come, he says, to Copenhagen. And he also promises to have dinner with the family.
