I realize it may seem strange to be writing about the sun and climate change while newscasts show much of the Eastern United States in a deep freeze, saturated with snow.

Simultaneously, however, the Arctic, Asia, Africa, the Middle East and South America are experiencing temperatures more than a dozen degrees warmer than 20th-century averages. 

Moreover, 2023 was the hottest year on record, globally. More than 170 million Americans were placed under heat alerts, including in Santa Barbara County. Heat-related deaths rose more than 95% in the United States alone.

With all of this happening, polls show that climate change remains 13th on the list of issues that voters care about.

I’m hoping that asking voters to think about the sun in relationship to climate change might move climate up the list on voter concerns.

The sun is the source of energy that drives the Earth’s climate system. Its solar radiation warms the atmosphere. When temperatures remain in the 100-degree range for days, it’s the sun and its ultraviolet (UV) radiation that’s baking us.

While it is common knowledge that climate change is caused by heat-trapping gases like carbon dioxide, we don’t include the fact that, behind the consensus on fossil fuel emissions causing global warming, a far deadlier process is unfolding: the relationship between the sun and global warming.

The sun is getting brighter and hotter over time. The record-breaking rise in global temperatures that began in the 1970s, 0.8 Celsius ( 33.4 Fahrenheit), was impossible to explain without including the advent of greenhouse gases.

As global temperatures rose, more water evaporated from the Earth’s surface into the atmosphere, trapping the sun’s heat and driving climate change storms and wildfires.

This sun-water greenhouse effect heating the planet will keep going long after we stop burning fossil fuels, if we ever do.

All the climate models show that, eventually (in some 150 million years), Earth’s greenhouse effect will spin out of control, vaporizing all our planet’s water and ending life as we know it.

So, why should we worry about 150 million years from now? The answer is because we care about the future of our planet and humanity beyond the lives of our children and grandchildren.

However, there is a more immediate, individual concern. The sun-global warming relationship is causing a rise in cancers.

More people in the United States are diagnosed with skin cancer — 9,500 every day — than all other cancers combined.

186,680 cases of melanoma were diagnosed in the United States alone in 2023. More than two people died of the disease every hour.

Because of climate change and the power of the sun, melanoma cases are predicted to rise in the United States by 27% in this year.

Heat, too, is a major cause of skin cancers. As the Earth’s temperature rises, as a result of the climate change-sun relationship, the increased heat causes carcinogenesis directly in the skin.

And, when it’s warmer outside, people wear less clothing and spend more time outdoors absorbing UV radiation.

The “heating” of our planet has made wildfires a “normal” part of our existence. Nationally, there were 53,685 wildfires that burned 2.61 million acres.

Canada had the worst outbreak worldwide, with 45.7 million acres burned. And, we all watched Lahaina, Hawai‘i, burn to the ground.

All of these fires were attributed to climate change-related heat events. All of them released cancer-causing chemicals that interacted with human skin, triggering inflammation and carcinogenesis.

California “only” lost 324, 917 acres to wildfires in 2023, and Santa Barbara County was spared a major wildfire.

Nevertheless, Santa Barbara County is wildfire country, with the Thomas Fire having burned 281,893 acres in December 2017. Santa Barbara is also “Sun City” with a plethora of beach, outdoor activities and sun exposures.

Last August, the National Weather Service issued a heat advisory for Santa Barbara County with temperatures in the mid-90s and reaching more than 100 degrees for several days.

Ventura County was ranked as the fastest-warming county in the lower 48 states, closely trailed by Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties.

The Environmental Protection Agency lists California as having high skin cancer rates, with Santa Barbara County having 24.8 cases of skin cancers per 100,000 people, up from 22.9 in 2022.

Science links such rates to the sun’s interactions with climate change. Concern for ourselves, our children and their children should cause us to vote for leaders who are committed to reducing global warming.

On a broader scale, there is a much more profound reason. We are stewards of an Earth with a limited life span. Eventually the sun’s fuel, hydrogen, will run out and the sun will begin to die, as do all stars.

The expected time for the death of our star is several billion years from now. However, sooner than that, about 1.3 billion years, the Earth, due to the sun’s natural evolution of becoming a red giant, will become unlivable for most organism, including humans.

While 1.3 billion years may seem like a long time, in cosmic terms it is not. As good stewards, during our time on Earth, we should care for it.

Our stewardship of the Earth includes not only our survival, but that of the animals and plants we share the planet with.

Scientists predict that if global warming proceeds apace, it will cause more than a third of the Earth’s animals and plant species to face extinction by 2050, and up to 70% by the end of the century.

And while climate change is not predicted to cause us to go extinct, studies conclude that if the average temperature increases by 1 degree C (1.8 F), life expectancy at birth will decline by 0.44 years.

And as our planet heats, it will become more and more inhospitable to life as we know it.

The 2024 elections (local, state and national) will decide whether we can stop climate change. Fulfilling our role as stewards of the Earth requires electing officials who understand the dangers of global warming.