I have been a (relatively) silent spectator to the various goings on of these much hyped climate talks in Copenhagen recently. But now that the circus is over, I thought I would jot down my thoughts on the issues raised there.
There are still sceptics in this world who question whether climate change exists and whether it is a man-made phenomenon or something that occurs naturally. There are also people out there that question whether one Charles Darwin was high on some really good crack when he came up with the idea of evolution. But we will leave Mr. Darwin out of this one. Let me say that I believe that climate change is happening and that it is man-made. That is not to say that I completely understand the science behind it all, but I can say that I trust the people who say that change exists and I believe they are credible and worth listening to. In case you're wondering what I am not sure about, or interested in finding out about, I am curious to know how they measure green house gas emissions for one... its not like you can catch it in a closed container and measure its volume at standard temperature and pressure or something... but that is a tangent we shall leave alone for now.
The lead up to the conference was quite the event. All the world's media and all the world's politicians were doing their bit to get noticed. A bunch of guys in the Maldives decided to conduct the business of making and amending laws under water to show what might happen to them if climate change is not dealt with decisively. Various Canadians ranted and raved about how the Europeans have made cuts and how they are successful and how we are not doing our fair share and falling behind and so forth. Still others insist that we are a northern country and an industrialised one at that and need to heat our homes and power our industries and thus need to generate a lot of energy and are thereby expected to pollute. Others were out defending the oil sands of Alberta, now something of a stigma and a shame for all those green-savvy liberals. Many people are concerned about the polar bears and their vanishing habitat. I see a sign every day on the skytrain with a polar bear that has zebra like skin markings that says evolution is not an option. I agree.
Still others play games with numbers. Some guy was saying we only generate 2% of the world's emissions. That actually sounds reasonable until you do the Math. We are a country of a little more than 30 million people. Assuming the world is still at 6 billion human beings, we are 1/200th the size of the world's total population. And yet, we produce an astonishing 2% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions! If we were to play with the numbers a bit, China and India could pollute on massive scales and still get away with it. Some think they are.
Whatever side you are on, whether you believe the world has actually accomplished something worthwhile at Copenhagen or just wasted our tax payer money and their time... the reality is this: climate change isn't waiting for Obama or any other messiah to sort itself out. With our development as a species and with our social progress as nations, we are polluting more. It seems that the majority of the world has its heart in the right place. On the grand scale, I think most of the industrialised and recently industrialised countries agree that green house gas emissions are something that needs to be curbed and perhaps reversed. But no one is willing to take the first step because they don't want to be at an economic or political disadvantage. Nor is anyone disagreeing on the fact that less developed countries should be allowed to develop. With better technology so they don't pollute as much. But this too is debated to death with no firm conclusion.
Most of this makes sense to me. I think largely, the populations of the world are also in agreement on this matter. We all want to live with a clean conscience, we all want to not have our great grand children or whoever suffer from the lack of action on our part. But, very few of us are actually willing to do anything about it. It is amazing to hear the amount of criticism heaped on the Canadian government by all sorts of people and organisations. Do they deserve it all? Sure, some of it is well deserved. Signing an agreement and then doing absolutely nothing to meet its obligations is rather shameful. Both federal parties in Canada that were and are in power are guilty of that. It irks me to see that. But what bugs me more is the impending sense of doom that many people parrot but these same people will not do one thing to reduce climate change or their own impact on the environment. Let's be honest: when Canada pollutes, it is us 30 million or so Canadians that pollutes. Sure, there are industries... but they are not some magical entity that is at fault here. Canadians work in these industries, Canadians use the products of these industries. It seems all right to blame the oil sands for making us look bad but remember that the oil sands also pay vast taxes to the Canadian governments and employ many people who in turn pay income tax and send kids to school and what not. It also produces fuel which we use to drive and fly about this country.
I suppose, if you're an armchair follower of politics, it makes a lot of sense to be angry at the Conservative government we now have and shake our heads at how out of step they are with Canadians on this matter. But what would be better in my opinion would be for Canadians themselves to just change the ways they live, change the way they consume energy and change the way they pollute. If we can change, I am sure the government will come around to it. I mean, sure if 10 people decide to bike to work 3 days a week, in the grand scheme of things, nothing has really changed. But perhaps the government will see that 10 people are making a change in lifestyle and maybe build bike lanes or give you a tax break for not driving a polluting car. I don't know if that would happen... but we shouldn't be doing it for monetary incentives anyway. We should be doing it because we feel it is the right thing to do.
The government can make changes. I am not sure people will like it though. I drive a car from time to time. I am well aware of the price of fuel in British Columbia. We have a fuel surcharge added to every litre of fuel we use for our vehicles... a tax to pollute, sometimes referred to as a carbon tax. No one likes to pay it. But that is one way government can try and help. Now, what concerns me is what happens to all that money. Does it actually go to be used to improve the environment in some way? A utopian notion of that would be the government building windmills with carbon tax money. Or does it go into general revenue and the government allocates it as it sees fit? I don't know. But knowing that if I pay 3 cents per litre and spend 60 cents per fill up on the carbon tax... and then magically 60 cents gets spent on something to reduce green house gas emissions takes place, that will make me feel less unhappy about paying the tax. Better still, if I could somehow measure all the carbon emissions I cause as I do my day to day things, I could try harder to reduce the things that are truly the worst of the lot. This sort of thing can work. If you tell me that I can climb Grouse Mountain (a local mountain in Vancouver) in 55 minutes, I will try and beat that time the next time I go up. Its just in our nature to be competitive. If you tell me I release 10 litres of x type of green house gas by driving to work in my car today, maybe I will drive less knowing that 10 litres of x type of gas are not going into the atmosphere because I biked to work. Providing this type of information to people will allow them to make more informed decisions. Sort of like calorie counts on food items.
I realise its a lot easier to complain about things rather than actually do something about them, but if we as a world are serious about climate change, then I don't think we should wait for governments, lawyers and technocrats to show us the way. Rather, I think we should get going and hopefully, they will get the message and catch up. So, does anyone know how I can reduce my green house gas emissions? I have the obvious ones covered. I take public transit or walk as much as I can. I try and eat less animal based food (apparently, those flatulent cows are pretty bad for the earth), I turn off stuff I don't use (from monitors to lights to stuff that's just plugged into the wall for no good reason). But what else can I do to make this a better world? Remember, the cuddly polar bears are losing their homes. And your grand children's future is in the balance.
There are still sceptics in this world who question whether climate change exists and whether it is a man-made phenomenon or something that occurs naturally. There are also people out there that question whether one Charles Darwin was high on some really good crack when he came up with the idea of evolution. But we will leave Mr. Darwin out of this one. Let me say that I believe that climate change is happening and that it is man-made. That is not to say that I completely understand the science behind it all, but I can say that I trust the people who say that change exists and I believe they are credible and worth listening to. In case you're wondering what I am not sure about, or interested in finding out about, I am curious to know how they measure green house gas emissions for one... its not like you can catch it in a closed container and measure its volume at standard temperature and pressure or something... but that is a tangent we shall leave alone for now.
The lead up to the conference was quite the event. All the world's media and all the world's politicians were doing their bit to get noticed. A bunch of guys in the Maldives decided to conduct the business of making and amending laws under water to show what might happen to them if climate change is not dealt with decisively. Various Canadians ranted and raved about how the Europeans have made cuts and how they are successful and how we are not doing our fair share and falling behind and so forth. Still others insist that we are a northern country and an industrialised one at that and need to heat our homes and power our industries and thus need to generate a lot of energy and are thereby expected to pollute. Others were out defending the oil sands of Alberta, now something of a stigma and a shame for all those green-savvy liberals. Many people are concerned about the polar bears and their vanishing habitat. I see a sign every day on the skytrain with a polar bear that has zebra like skin markings that says evolution is not an option. I agree.
Still others play games with numbers. Some guy was saying we only generate 2% of the world's emissions. That actually sounds reasonable until you do the Math. We are a country of a little more than 30 million people. Assuming the world is still at 6 billion human beings, we are 1/200th the size of the world's total population. And yet, we produce an astonishing 2% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions! If we were to play with the numbers a bit, China and India could pollute on massive scales and still get away with it. Some think they are.
Whatever side you are on, whether you believe the world has actually accomplished something worthwhile at Copenhagen or just wasted our tax payer money and their time... the reality is this: climate change isn't waiting for Obama or any other messiah to sort itself out. With our development as a species and with our social progress as nations, we are polluting more. It seems that the majority of the world has its heart in the right place. On the grand scale, I think most of the industrialised and recently industrialised countries agree that green house gas emissions are something that needs to be curbed and perhaps reversed. But no one is willing to take the first step because they don't want to be at an economic or political disadvantage. Nor is anyone disagreeing on the fact that less developed countries should be allowed to develop. With better technology so they don't pollute as much. But this too is debated to death with no firm conclusion.
Most of this makes sense to me. I think largely, the populations of the world are also in agreement on this matter. We all want to live with a clean conscience, we all want to not have our great grand children or whoever suffer from the lack of action on our part. But, very few of us are actually willing to do anything about it. It is amazing to hear the amount of criticism heaped on the Canadian government by all sorts of people and organisations. Do they deserve it all? Sure, some of it is well deserved. Signing an agreement and then doing absolutely nothing to meet its obligations is rather shameful. Both federal parties in Canada that were and are in power are guilty of that. It irks me to see that. But what bugs me more is the impending sense of doom that many people parrot but these same people will not do one thing to reduce climate change or their own impact on the environment. Let's be honest: when Canada pollutes, it is us 30 million or so Canadians that pollutes. Sure, there are industries... but they are not some magical entity that is at fault here. Canadians work in these industries, Canadians use the products of these industries. It seems all right to blame the oil sands for making us look bad but remember that the oil sands also pay vast taxes to the Canadian governments and employ many people who in turn pay income tax and send kids to school and what not. It also produces fuel which we use to drive and fly about this country.
I suppose, if you're an armchair follower of politics, it makes a lot of sense to be angry at the Conservative government we now have and shake our heads at how out of step they are with Canadians on this matter. But what would be better in my opinion would be for Canadians themselves to just change the ways they live, change the way they consume energy and change the way they pollute. If we can change, I am sure the government will come around to it. I mean, sure if 10 people decide to bike to work 3 days a week, in the grand scheme of things, nothing has really changed. But perhaps the government will see that 10 people are making a change in lifestyle and maybe build bike lanes or give you a tax break for not driving a polluting car. I don't know if that would happen... but we shouldn't be doing it for monetary incentives anyway. We should be doing it because we feel it is the right thing to do.
The government can make changes. I am not sure people will like it though. I drive a car from time to time. I am well aware of the price of fuel in British Columbia. We have a fuel surcharge added to every litre of fuel we use for our vehicles... a tax to pollute, sometimes referred to as a carbon tax. No one likes to pay it. But that is one way government can try and help. Now, what concerns me is what happens to all that money. Does it actually go to be used to improve the environment in some way? A utopian notion of that would be the government building windmills with carbon tax money. Or does it go into general revenue and the government allocates it as it sees fit? I don't know. But knowing that if I pay 3 cents per litre and spend 60 cents per fill up on the carbon tax... and then magically 60 cents gets spent on something to reduce green house gas emissions takes place, that will make me feel less unhappy about paying the tax. Better still, if I could somehow measure all the carbon emissions I cause as I do my day to day things, I could try harder to reduce the things that are truly the worst of the lot. This sort of thing can work. If you tell me that I can climb Grouse Mountain (a local mountain in Vancouver) in 55 minutes, I will try and beat that time the next time I go up. Its just in our nature to be competitive. If you tell me I release 10 litres of x type of green house gas by driving to work in my car today, maybe I will drive less knowing that 10 litres of x type of gas are not going into the atmosphere because I biked to work. Providing this type of information to people will allow them to make more informed decisions. Sort of like calorie counts on food items.
I realise its a lot easier to complain about things rather than actually do something about them, but if we as a world are serious about climate change, then I don't think we should wait for governments, lawyers and technocrats to show us the way. Rather, I think we should get going and hopefully, they will get the message and catch up. So, does anyone know how I can reduce my green house gas emissions? I have the obvious ones covered. I take public transit or walk as much as I can. I try and eat less animal based food (apparently, those flatulent cows are pretty bad for the earth), I turn off stuff I don't use (from monitors to lights to stuff that's just plugged into the wall for no good reason). But what else can I do to make this a better world? Remember, the cuddly polar bears are losing their homes. And your grand children's future is in the balance.
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