Mother Earth Has a Fever
Global warming: the name itself is almost gentle, like a slowly heating tap ready to be turned down whenever need be. Unfortunately, as much as we would like to believe anything else, climate change isn’t so simple, and time isn’t on our side.
At the heart of the issue is the desperate need for legislation. Scientists have gathered the facts and the technology. Environmentalists have shown the individual how to live responsibly, pleaded with corporations, and hung messages from the world’s dirtiest smoke stacks. Every bit makes a difference, there is no doubt. If most individuals held some standard of consideration for the environment as they went about their lives, we would be well on our way to a secure future. Experience, however, tells us that as long as consciousness on the issue remains a choice, or a short term economic woe, oil companies will continue their reign for as long as the Earth is in one piece, and consumers will carry on swimming in plastic shopping bags until the effects of their actions are made all too clear.
And so the United Nation’s climate summit in Copenhagen takes its first breaths. Diplomats from 192 nations have assembled from December the 7th to 18th in Denmark, a leader in environmental progress.
A new treaty is not intended to be made, but proposed extensions of Kyoto, the last conference to receive widespread attention, are plentiful and oozing with potential. Deforestation, accounting for 18% of greenhouse gas release, is being considered as part of the United Nation’s resistance to climate change for the first time. Of course, central to it all are the new pledges and targets being constructed. In another, greater departure from Kyoto, developing nations are also being included in these reduction goals. Developed nations, particularly the US, are being called upon to pull their own weight as well as aid others. When it comes to warming contributions, the US has only recently been topped by China. We currently unload 6.4 billion tons of greenhouse gases annually, and China 6.8. Do note, though, that the per capita rate for China is a meager quarter of the US’s 20.1 tons per year. Neither of the nations, which together make up half of the world’s emissions, had signed the Kyoto treaty.
Nestled within the Bali Action Plan, an agreement of what all future endeavors should be centered on, and among its three other “building blocks” that are mitigation, technology and finance, is a spotlight of the climate change effort we’d hoped would never be required. Adaptation. The effects of post-industrial living are catching up, and quickly. Nations least prepared to adapt to rising waters, changes in weather patterns, and other burdens are those expected to be hit the worst. The United Nations feels a duty to help relieve these problems, and is asking funds again of developed countries, which, after all, have more to do with these temperature rises than the African or island nations most swayed by them. The African Union jumped onto this stance, already demanding billions per year from developed nations. Regrettably, finance appears to be less of a building block itself than a force binding the rest together. Fears of diving into agreements on the whole stem from economic anxieties.
Many a plan and concern about climate change recently has been based upon the 2 Celsius degree (3.6 Fahrenheit) increase in average global temperature since the beginning of industrialization that has been labeled by many scientists as a major tipping point where we will start seeing more dramatic effects of the change. According to Reo Knutti, professor at the Institute for Atmosphere and Climate at ETH Zurich, “The behaviour of CO2 in the atmosphere is best described as a full bathtub. The inflow of the bathtub is large, but the drainage is small. The CO2 emissions are increasing every year, but the CO2 is only removed from the atmosphere very slowly. To not let the bathtub overflow, the inflow must thus be stopped early enough.” So it actually is akin to that warming tap. But one that is hard to turn off, and flowing at full speed into a tub with limited space. Reductions in greenhouse gas output necessary to even narrowly dodge this crossroads are daunting and elusive for a planet full of mixed interests. They are far from impossible, but will not come at the wave of a finger. Predictions vary, but most authorities say that a cut to 50% below 1990 levels by 2050 would be required to skirt immediate trouble. If emissions remain unabated, estimates of the total change by the end of the century, again since industrialization, range from four to six Celsius degrees.
The U.S. plans to cut emissions to 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, 30 percent by 2025, and 83 percent by 2050. The world generally measures emission cuts in terms of 1990 levels, in which the 2020 goal for the US is only close to 4% -- not even meeting the Kyoto guidelines that the Senate never ratified. This compares weakly to the 20-30% by 2020 that the European Union is setting -- 30% being contingent upon whether other wealthy nations make similar promises. President Obama is scheduled to attend the summit on December 18th, the last and possibly most action-packed day.
As of December 9th, Copenhagen queries had topped Google’s “most discussed” list for the US, surpassing even the Tiger Woods scandal. It has been depicted as no less than a make-or-break, a turning point, and a genuine opportunity. The descriptions only reflect what this period in history is in and of itself. Never before has mankind thrown itself into this kind of conundrum. Only time will tell whether we will sink, or swim.
Jordan Mlsna
December 15, 2009
For more news on everything Copenhagen, visit the official site: cop15.org.
