DaytonDailyNews.com

COLUMBUS — The impact of climate change on Ohio could be perilous unless action is taken to curtail greenhouse gases, a conservation group warned.

Ohio faces a future of extended droughts and extreme heat, loss of important species and increased pressure from agricultural pests, among other things, said the group, Nature Conservancy.

Saturday, representatives from 190 nations meeting for a U.N. climate conference in Bali overcame divisions and agreed to reach a deal by 2009 to fight global warming.

The two-week meeting ended with the United States dropping opposition to a request from developing nations for more technological help to fight climate change. The new deal sets an agenda to find ways to reduce pollution and help poor countries.

Denise Franz King, director of government relations for the Nature Conservancy in Ohio, said Ohioans will feel global warming through changes in weather, the economy and in plant and animal diversity.

The conservancy's report, which also concluded that the Buckeye State can look forward to periods of intense rain and flooding like last summer's northwest Ohio floods that caused nearly $30 million in damage, is based on projections from published scientific literature including papers from the International Joint Commission on the Great Lakes, a U.S.-Canadian organization that monitors transboundary environmental agreements, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a scientific body formed by the U.N. and the World Meteorological Organization and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and former Vice President Al Gore were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts to generate awareness of climate change.

According to King of the conservancy, Ohio could within decades also experience:

• Diminished water supplies for agricultural, municipal and residential use. Competition for diminished water supplies will be increased by more demands for irrigation because of drought.

• The migration of southern agricultural pests into Ohio, such as the corn earworm and bean leaf beetles.

• Lower lake levels, threatening the Great Lakes shipping industry and creating substantial expense to taxpayers for dredging harbors.

• Loss of popular game fish species as cold-water species, including walleye and muskellunge, migrate north.

• Expanded low-oxygen "dead zones" in the Great Lakes, killing fish and other aquatic life.

• Loss of valuable hardwood species from Ohio's forest, limiting Ohio's forest products industry.

• A 50 percent loss in the number of neotropical migrant species including warblers, tanagers and other songbirds that breed in Ohio.

"We've had a taste of what those predictions show," King said. "We have to decide if this is the future we want to will our children."

Bob Brecha, a University of Dayton physics professor who specializes in environmental and energy issues, said that as extreme changes unfold in Ohio, it will be very difficult for humans to turn the trend around.

"The earth system is a very slow system and it's like trying to turn around an ocean liner with a paddle," he said.

"My hope is we realize this is a long-term project. We need to start doing something now. We need to realize from Bali that we are among the few industrial countries that have not been proactive. We don't want to stand alone because it is a global problem."

Marianist Sister Leanne M. Jablonski, director of the Marianist Environmental Education Center at the University of Dayton, said that because Ohio generates 1 percent of the world's carbon dioxide emissions, the state has a moral responsibility to act.

Public awareness of the seriousness of the situation has increased recently, noted Jablonski, who also is author of the Ohio Sustainable Energy Charter of the Interfaith Climate and Energy Campaign.

Huntting W. Brown, Wright State University's new director of sustainability and a lecturer in the university's Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, said WSU is working on a plan to make buildings more energy-efficient and to upgrade its recycling program.

WSU intends to use greener cleaning products and educate its faculty, staff and students on how their lifestyles can impact the environment. "We hope to act as a model for the community," Brown said.