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Book Review: 'Windfall' by McKenzie Funk

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From politicians to profiteers, some people look at the effects of climate change and see dollar signs.

Jan.  28,  2014  6:39  p.m.  ET

The  changes  occurring  in  Earth's  climate  appear  to  present  an  unfair  fight,  between  themajestic  forces  of  Nature  and  we  minuscule  humans,  scurrying  to  protect  ourselves.  Butwhatever  we  may  or  may  not  have  done  to  heat  up  our  planet,  the  polar  ice  is  melting,  themercury  seems  to  be  rising  and  for  those  with  an  eye  on  the  main  chance,  there  is  moneyto  be  made.  Once  you  have  contemplated  the  mind-­boggling  variety  of  bets  that  nations,businesses  and  politicians  are  placing  based  on  predicted  global  temperatures,  the  choiceof  which  gas-­hybrid  SUV  to  buy  will  seem  trivial.

In  "Windfall"  McKenzie  Funk,  an  intrepid  American  journalist,  reports  on  the  lesser-­knownvictims  and  profiteers  of  climate  change  brings  a  dizzyingly  abstruse  phenomenon  downto  a  more  human  scale.  Mr.  Funk  leads  us  away  from  the  rarefied  air  of  Al  Gore  and  hislethal  PowerPoint  slides,  to  mingle  with  the  militiamen,  inventors,  politicians  and  activiststrying  to  find  their  way  through  an  era  of  turmoil.  Bad  news  for  flood-­stricken  Bangladeshis,it  turns  out,  is  good  news  for  Greenland's  separatists,  hoping  to  break  free  of  Denmarkand  profit  from  an  Arctic  mineral  boom.  Russians  are  taking  their  lead  from  PresidentVladimir  Putin,  who  has  observed  that  the  warming  of  his  country  means  "we  shall  saveon  fur  coats."  Melting  sea  ice  and  permafrost  would  expand  Russia's  agricultural  land,improve  its  fishing  stocks  and  make  it  easier  to  extract  minerals  from  Siberia.  A  Chinesecompany  has  signed  a  lease  to  farm  5%  of  Ukraine,  some  7.5  million  acres,  to  grow  foodfor  its  home  market.

In  Africa,  though,  the  Sahara  is  expanding  and  a  torrent  of  immigrants  heading  north  toescape  the  drought.  The  late  Col.  Gadhafi  used  to  hold  this  gun  to  Europe's  head.  "Whatwill  be  the  reaction  of  the  white  and  Christian  Europeans  faced  with  this  influx  of  starvingand  ignorant  Africans?"  he  asked  the  Italians.  "We  don't  know  if  Europe  will  remain  anadvanced  and  united  continent  or  if  it  will  be  destroyed  as  happened  with  the  Barbarianinvasions."  His  threats  worked.  In  2009,  Italy  agreed  to  pay  Libya  250  million  euros  a  yearfor  20  years  in  return  for  joint  infrastructure  projects,  oil  contracts  and  aid  in  stoppingAfricans  from  crossing  the  Mediterranean.  Giant  camps  were  built  in  the  Libyan  desert  tohold  the  thwarted  emigrants.  The  deal  unraveled  after  Gadhafi's  fall,  and  last  year  morethan  30,000  immigrants  were  smuggled  from  Libya  to  Italy  aboard  rickety  boats.

The  African  Union's  answer  to  desertification  is  a  4,000-­mile  tree-­planting  project,laughably  called  the  Great  Green  Wall—a  scrubby  line  of  saplings  stretching  from  Senegalto  Somalia.  Some  enterprising  foreigners  are  betting  that  doesn't  work  out.  Mr.  Funktravels  to  southern  Sudan  with  a  New  York  money  manager  hoping  to  win  over  the  localwarlords  who  control  thousands  of  acres  of  rich  farmland—"a  kind  of  double  bet  on  chaos,on  national  fragmentation  plus  international  food  crisis,"  as  Mr.  Funk  describes  it.  It  is  hardto  tell  who  is  more  desperate,  the  fund  manager  struggling  to  justify  his  dealings  withwarlords  or  the  indigent  locals  fighting  for  rather  than  profiting  from  the  natural  wealtharound  them.

There  are  many  bizarre  and  wonderful  stories  in  Mr.  Funk's  book.  Who  knew  that  Israelis

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Windfall

By  McKenzie  Funk  (The  Penguin  Press,  310  pages,  $27.95)

were  the  masters  of  artificial  snow-­making?It  turns  out  to  be  a  lucrative  byproduct  oftheir  experience  desalinating  seawater  toirrigate  Israeli  farms.  Now  their  machinespump  snow  all  over  the  Alps  and  will  be  inaction  at  Sochi  for  the  Winter  Olympics.  InHolland,  engineers  are  rubbing  their  handsat  the  prospect  of  bringing  a  version  of  thedam  system  that  protects  Rotterdam  topost-­Sandy  New  York.  And  in  Seattle,  anex-­Microsoft  scientist  is  scheming  to  pumpsulfur  into  the  stratosphere  to  shield  polarice  from  the  sun.  These  geo-­engineersbelieve  technology  can  work  more  quicklythan  global  protocols  in  addressing  climatechange.

"Windfall"  is  not  concerned  with  the  causesof  climate  change,  only  its  effects,  both  realand  imagined.  The  Arctic  melt,  for  example,is  well  under  way.  Elsewhere,  countries  andinvestors  are  betting  on  climate  outcomesbased  on  varying  degrees  of  probability.What  unites  the  characters  in  this  book  isthat  they  share  a  "simple,  cynical  premise"about  global  warming:  "we  won't  stop  it

anytime  soon."

In  climatically  benighted  Bangladesh,  Mr.  Funk  talks  to  the  country's  leadingenvironmentalist,  Atiq  Rahman,  who  tells  him  of  the  four  horsemen  of  salinity,  cyclones,flooding  and  sea-­level  rise  menacing  his  country.  As  more  of  the  country  is  flooded,  hepredicts,  more  people  will  move  to  the  cities  risking  more  overcrowding  and  more  civilunrest.  All  because,  he  says,  the  first  world  wants  its  cars  and  refrigerators.  On  a  recentvisit  to  Los  Angeles,  Mr.  Rahman  says,  "I  told  the  Americans:  I  want  a  piece  of  California.  Iwant  a  piece  of  Texas.  I  want  a  piece  of  Maryland  for  my  people  that  you  are  inundating."

At  the  same  time,  global  efforts  to  impose  change  might  only  penalize  smaller  nations  andtheir  emerging  economies.  Mr.  Rahman  has  particular  contempt  for  systems  that  proposeto  pay  polluters,  whether  companies  or  countries,  to  reduce  their  emissions.  The  pollutersget  paid,  while  those  who  suffer  from  pollution  while  polluting  little,  like  Bangladesh,  receivenext  to  nothing.  He  describes  what  he  calls  "the  nightmare  scenario  on  climate  change"  toMr.  Funk:  "a  lot  of  zero-­carbon  technology  being  transferred  to  places  that  alreadyproduce  virtually  zero  carbon.  And  nothing  happens.  For  the  poor,  absolutely  nothinghappens."

It  turns  out  that  climate  change  is  rather  like  the  financial  crisis.  Those  who  may  havecaused  it  with  their  emissions  are  likely  to  profit  most  from  it,  and  the  gulf  between  theworld's  rich,  who  can  protect  themselves  from  its  worst  effects,  and  the  poor,  who  cannot,will  only  widen.  It  is  an  ugly  truth,  but  one  well  worth  recognizing  as  we  ponder  what  do  ifMaine  turns  into  Tuscany  and  the  Marshall  Islands  vanish  beneath  the  sea.

Mr.  Delves  Broughton's  latest  book  is  "The  Art  of  the  Sale:  Learning  From  the  MastersAbout  the  Business  of  Life."

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