MODERN TIMES

Art Hobson

ahobson@uark.edu

NWA Times 14 Oct 2006

The Debate Is Over and It’s Time for Action on Global Warming

It’s been a long time comin’, but we’ve reached a national tipping point on public opinion about global warming. This was evident from the large turnouts and fervent praise for Al Gore’s film “An Inconvenient Truth” about the reality of human-caused global warming. Informed citizens and intellectually honest political leaders recognize this truth, inconvenient though it may be.

This tipping point would have been reached ten years ago were it not for the destructive influence of the U.S. oil lobby, led by Exxon and General Motors. Scientists reached a consensus on this issue long ago, at least by the time of the 1995 Second Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The rest of the world reached a consensus by 1997, when the Kyoto Protocol on climate change was signed by about 180 nations. The oil interests, knowing that the only way to prevent serious political action was to cast doubt on the validity of the science, enlisted a few “hired guns” to lobby Congress and raise trivial doubts about the science.

The oil lobby can congratulate itself on its ten years of success, a success that our grandchildren will experience as increased climate devastation and greater risk of irreversible catastrophe. Exxon and General Motors must be proud.

Finally, serious action is beginning. But, since our President seems incapable of realism on this or practically any other issue, and since Congress is unable to find a voice of its own, that action has been left to the states. Due to fortunate historical circumstances, California has been able to fill the vacuum created by Washington.

In 2002, California passed a bill requiring automakers to cut carbon dioxide emissions from new vehicles by 30 percent over a decade, beginning in 2012. Predictably, automakers have mounted a monumental legal and public relations battle over this law for three reasons: Because California was regulating smog prior to the 1967 federal tailpipe emissions law, it is the only state allowed to write rules for auto emissions that are tougher than what Congress requires. Second, California is such a huge automobile market that it tends to set the national standard. Third, once California has adopted a tailpipe standard, other states can choose to follow it even though it’s tougher than federal standards. I’m sure it’s frustrating for the oil lobby (poor things) to be able to control Congress and the President, yet unable to control California and thus the nation.

The California tailpipe emissions law has so far been adopted by 10 other states: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington.

In June of 2005, Governor Schwarzenegger signed an Executive Order establishing climate change emission reduction targets for California. He declared that “the debate is over. We know the science. We see the threat. And we know the time for action is now.” His order called for a reduction of California’s greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, amounting to a 25 percent reduction in emissions. Furthermore, the order called for emissions to reach 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.

Last month, Schwarzenegger signed a bill to guarantee meeting the 2020 goal. That bill places a cap on greenhouse gas emissions from the bulk of the non-automotive sources in the state, comprising electric power, oil and natural gas extraction, oil refining, cement manufacturing, and solid waste landfills. The bill appoints a state agency to put together rules that, when combined with the tailpipe emissions standards, will achieve the required 25 percent emissions reduction by 2020. The cap will be achieved by market-based emissions trading permits. Far from harming California’s economy, the new bill is expected to save businesses and individuals $43 billion in utility costs by 2013, and create 83,000 new jobs and increase personal incomes by $4 billion by 2020.

The European Union is already well on its way toward their Kyoto Protocol goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions to eight percent below 1990 levels by 2012. Under President Clinton, the U.S. goal had been seven percent below 1990 levels. Under President Bush, however, our nation has withdrawn from the Kyoto Protocol, currently emits 13 percent above 1990 levels, emits 20 percent of the world’s human greenhouse gas emissions despite having only four percent its population, and has per capita emissions two times larger than other industrialized nations and 10 to 20 times larger than India and China.

While we dawdle, the world approaches the brink. James Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, stated in a December 2005 speech, “The Earth’s climate is nearing, but has not passed, a tipping point, beyond which it will be impossible to avoid climate change with far ranging undesirable consequences.” These consequences would, he said, “constitute practically a different planet” and include sea level rise, heat waves, drought, more intense hurricanes, decreased crop yields, water scarcity, and the spread of infectious diseases.

The IPCC and many other scientists have voiced similar fears. We are approaching a point of no return for triggering irreversible melting of the Greenland and West Antarctica ice sheets and raising sea levels by up to 14 meters; for massive methane releases from arctic permafrost; for complete failure of the ocean algae, an important greenhouse gas absorber; and other disasters having planet-wide implications.

The tipping point in public opinion has come none too soon. Lots can be done to solve this problem, but we’re flirting with disaster by waiting. It’s time for a new Congress, a new President, and a new sense of urgency.

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