September 30, 2008

Election Issues

On the subject of the environment, many of the best minds on the issue are calling for a war like response. Mr. Harper on the other hand prefers the misguided approach: decreasing the tax on jet fuel and diesel is his latest offering.

He is obviously playing to the numbers. The environment has fallen to a distant third as an election issue, pushed back most recently by the economy, which has been stumbling of late due to the sub-prime debacle in the United States (“Economy on minds of most voters, not the environment,” The Edmonton Journal, Sept. 22).

As a consequence, Mr. Harper assumes – and with reason – that the average voter would rather put off any meaningful action on the environment. But postponing action on the environment because of the economy is like postponing fundamental repairs to a house because the SUV needs a tune up.

We need to reconsider the environment. This issue, too, threatens to blow up in our face, and if it does it’ll make the sub-prime mess look like an air bubble.

Emission Rates

There’s no denying that Canada’s per annum rate of CO2 emissions as percentage of the world’s seems insignificant, but to use this figure to justify inaction on the environment or as reason to absolve ourselves of responsibility is ludicrous (“We’re powerless to help”, Letters, The Edmonton Journal, Sept. 24).

According to Dr. James Hansen, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, the responsibility for global warming is proportional to cumulative CO2 emissions (the amount a nation has emitted over time), not to current emission rates. On this scale the United States ranks number 1.

When examined on a cumulative per capita basis (the amount a nation has emitted per capita over time), of the eight nations with the largest total emissions, the UK ranks first at about 330 tons of carbon per person, the US second at 310 and Germany third at 280. What will surprise many people is that Canada ranks fourth with 210 tons of carbon per person, seven times that of China, which comes in seventh with about 30 tons per person.

Clearly we have a responsibility on this issue, and unless we do our part, we’re in no position to convince anyone else to do theirs.

September 24, 2008

Sounding Alarms

In a recent column Paula Simons sounds the alarm over a U.S. law prohibiting any federal agency from buying synthetic fuel from non-conventional sources (“Alberta blindsided by U.S. fuel law,” The Edmonton Journal, Sept. 16). The alarm should indeed be sounded, but not for this piece of legislation. In a much broader context, a more worrisome notion has started to work its way into the fossil fuel debate.

Anyone who read past the headline of Tuesday’s front page story on the tar sands must have stopped for a moment to ponder the implications of a statement attributed to Paul Monaghan, head of sustainability and social goals at Co-operative Asset Management, a UK investment house specializing in ethical funds: “The worry is that, within five years, [climate change] will be unstoppable.” (Oilsands under fire in U.K., The Edmonton Journal, Sept. 15.)
This statement undoubtedly stems from comments made by Dr. James Hansen, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the scientist who first alerted the general public about global warming in a landmark appearance before the US congress more than 20 years ago.

From a 2006 article in The London Independent: “We have to stabilise emissions of carbon dioxide within a decade, or temperatures will warm by more than one degree. That will be warmer than it has been for half a million years, and many things could become unstoppable.” (1)

From 2006 article posted on his website: “We are near a tipping point, a point of no return, beyond which the built in momentum and feedbacks will carry us to levels of climate change with staggering consequences for humanity and all of the residents of this planet.” (2)

At a climate change conference in California, November 2006: “I think we have a very brief window of opportunity to deal with climate change ... no longer than a decade, at the most.” (3)

And in June of this year, to mark the 20th anniversary of his testimony to Congress: “The next President and Congress must define a course next year in which the United States exerts leadership commensurate with our responsibility for the present dangerous situation. Otherwise it will become impractical to constrain atmospheric carbon dioxide . . . to a level that prevents the climate system from passing tipping points that lead to disastrous climate changes that spiral dynamically out of humanity’s control.” (4)

For our part, this election we’re in could very well be the last opportunity we’ll have to stop runaway climate change, In which case the only real choice is this: a carbon tax, a cap and trade, or both. With all due respect to our Prime Minister, aspirational, intensity-based targets just won’t cut it.

1. http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change-on-the-edge-466818.html
2. http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/2006/NewSchool_20060210.pdf
3. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14834318/
4. http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/2008/TwentyYearsLater_20080623.pdf