Global Warming T-shirt

This is my new design at my Cafepress shop, WRW Color by Design. I thought of the idea when I was wondering about buying a cute little batik stamp with a sun design on it, but at first I didn't think I'd use a worried sun. (Batik stamps are amazing — every expression you can imagine is on a sun face.) And then I thought, "What would a sun be worried about?"

This is a drawing rather than using a scan of the actual copper tjap, like I've done before. I did it in a brighter yellow and orange color, which works on white tees too, and light colors like the organic tee. But I like the lighter color too, which looks more like batik on the darker tees, like this green.


Long ago I was an Oceanography major. The idea of a few degrees warmer temperatures in the oceans sounds minimal and is catastrophic. Plankton, which are the basis of most food chains in the sea, live at specific temperatures. They can't migrate.

Warmer water holds less oxygen for fish & invertebrates to use. Stopping the sinking of cold, oxygen-rich water around Antarctica doesn't just mean stopping the climate conveyor belt that warms Europe. It means those deep seafloor waters have less oxygen. And it stops the upwelling of cold nutrient-rich water off South America that used to support major fisheries. Fisheries are already crashing all over the world, mostly from overfishing.* This won't help.

*And penguins are starving both from lack of fish due to overfishing (in the Falklands), and from icebergs blocking their path to the sea (in Antarctica). Warmer seas mean more icebergs breaking off. And nutrient-poor water means less plankton and even fewer fish.

No wonder the sun is worried.