Everyone seems to be green these days, virtually every ad on television is about how green the company is. There are constant reminders of ways you can be a little greener, and everyone seems to be getting on board but despite our best efforts:
"They show that in 2006 emissions did actually fall by 0.1%, but the UN's climate change secretariat said that this tiny dip was statistically insignificant.
The overall underlying trend since 2000 is up, even though the countries in question had promised to cut their emissions.
The worst culprit has been Canada. Its emissions since 1990 have shot up 21.3% - they should have fallen 6%."
Full article at the BBC.
Now it can be hoped that the situation will improve a bit as US President Elect Obama forces Harper to be greener, and bans tar sands oil but even that will not be enough. Everyone doing their own little bit is no longer enough. It's simply not working - it is time for harsh government intervention and sacrifice. This should include a carbon tax
and a cap and trade system. It should also include stronger emissions requirements for vehicles (with no grandfather clause - older inefficient vehicles should be banned from the roads), and other measures that would force individuals and industry to clean up their act. The voluntary
Million Acts of Green type approach is simply not having an impact. (It should also be noted that the CBC 'Million Acts of Green' site was borrowed from
the World Wildlife Fund.) For every little thing that you and I do to improve things there is someone out there (individuals or industries) who is going twice as fast in the opposite direction.
2 comments:
"older inefficient vehicles should be banned from the roads" Have you considered the environmental impact of manufacturing new vehicles to replace these inefficient ones? There's also a huge financial aspect to consider. Are current vehicles that much greener than ones from 20 years ago? Until a clean viable and reliable alternative is ready drastic measures will just be counterproductive.
Obama will not ban tar sands oil. Why would he?
The best way to effect a swing towards greener endeavours is to make the cleaner alternatives cheaper than the rest. Government can do this through taxes and grants. I seem to recall that Canadians did not favour the Green Shift proposed by the Liberal Party.
The switchover's already in progress and the perceived effects are not coming into play quickly enough. Maybe we shouldn't expect the cumulative damage we've been doing since inventing our version of internal combustion engines to be remedied overnight.
As for Obama...I believe he's got an appointment coming in at Senate Energy and Commerce who's got more than a few reasons to rein the Detriot Three's excesses and neglect in, by any means possible and necessary. What was his name again?
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