As lawmakers and scientists from around the world gather in Copenhagen, Denmark Dec. 6-18 to hold the most important global climate negotiations since Kyoto in 1996, President Obama is planning to commit the United States to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by around 17 percent by 2020.
So far, Obama has stepped up his level of commitment from uncertainty about attending the talks, to coming to the beginning events, to coming to the closing events instead and finally, to preparing to make a statement with goals similar to those of the two climate change bills currently in the House and the Senate.
Clearly the Climategate e-mails, in which hackers found records of thousands of leading scientists and politicians, including Al Gore, reportedly discussing the downplaying or removal of statistics that oppose global warming, do not seem to be distracting the Obama administration.
This so-called scandal has given momentum to global-warming skeptics and even led some Republicans, including Sarah Palin, to call on Obama to boycott the upcoming climate talks.
But how many times have we heard about the opposite, of science being edited to belittle the threat of global warming, especially during the Bush administration? It only seems fair for the other side to get their chance to exaggerate, too. Yet scientists who are under scrutiny, including those who are part of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), have claimed that the allegations are an unjustified cherry-picking of information taken out of context.
By now it feels like we should follow the scientific consensus on climate change and greenhouse gases, but our media still manages to make it seem like there is some big controversy. Newsweek recently reported that Americans’ belief in global warming has dropped from 71 percent in 2007 to 57 percent in 2008, and the percentage believing that humans are the cause of global warming fell from 47 percent to 36 percent during the same span.
If we were living in one of the developing nations that struggle with 75 to 80 percent of the consequences of climate change like rising sea levels and increased tropical storms, we would have a little more trouble shrugging off the science.
I think we should applaud Obama’s intentions going into Copenhagen, but we shouldn’t assume they will lead to results or, even if they do, adequate results. How, and if, the United States follows through on a commitment to reducing greenhouse gases is more important than reducing 17 percent of greenhouse gases by 2020.
India has recently decided to announce intended reductions of 20 to 25 percent and China and Indonesia are coming up with ambitious targets as well. Yet, what really matters is how fast we are willing to transform our economies and make these goals a reality.
Recently James Hansen, a leading climatologist for the NASA and the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), said he hopes the talks collapse since nothing discussed in Washington or Copenhagen will enact adequate changes, only solutions relying on inefficient cap-and-trade schemes that are essentially “green-wash.”
Although some critics argue that such a bill would halt economic and job growth by making people pay more for power and gasoline, it would more likely encourage innovation in renewable energy making it a cheaper option. Furthermore, when efficiency measures and return savings on long-term investments are accounted, consumer spending should rise over time. Rushing into an international or national agreement to create a binding treaty could be disastrous.
Currently, many international carbon offset projects involving forest conservation, hydroelectric dams and biofuel have displaced rural and indigenous populations in Brazil and Kenya. Offsetting carbon emission projects are often not adequately monitored or followed through and can carry their own environmental consequences, like ‘reforesting’ rainforests with mono-crops of a single tree.
While it appears that no binding international agreement will result from the upcoming talks, negotiators plan to set an interim goal, followed by signing a binding treaty sometime in 2010. This seems to be for the best at this point.
Hopefully, the over 190 countries planning to attend the talks, especially the United States, will be ambitious in setting their own goals for emissions reductions and helping each other achieve them. Then we will all have a year to learn from these approaches and bring the best options to the table next year.
Jeremy Aaron ‘10 (aaron@stolaf.edu) is from St. Louis Park, Minn. He majors in enviromental studies.
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