Warming to the Inconvenient Facts
Interesting article in the Washington Post. Seems that American’s now accept that global warming is a reality, but don’t want to take the responsibility to do something about it.
Global warming is having its moment in the sun. The climate crisis is on “60 Minutes” and in Tom Brokaw’s new documentary, on the cover of Time and Newsweek, and in Al Gore’s new movie and best-selling book. But while polls show that most Americans now believe that global warming is real and significantly manmade — in 100-degree Washington last week, it felt more real than ever — they are much less concerned about the issue than non-Americans, and much less willing to support dramatic action to address it.
Unfortunately, it seems to me, that it is easy to blame the Americans. But we Aussies are doing our bit too to screw up the planet too.
Simply put, the Inconvenient Truth that Al Gore is warning us about means that we are going to have to make some serious, dramatic and inconvenient changes to the way we live our lives if we want to maintain a habitable planet earth.
I hope that Americans do the one good thing and put Mr Gore into the Presidency. Then we have a chance that one man’s voice can make a difference.
September 7th, 2006 at 6:39 pm
Dez:
Actually, there are many of Americans that are worried about global climate change, smog, acid rain, mercury emissions, and the tiny particles that are released into the atmosphere from burning fuel sources like coal, diesel oil, and residual oil.
There are even some that are trying to do something about it by taking action - albeit rather slow, deliberate action - to restore nuclear power as an electrical power option. Right now, 50% of our power comes from burning coal (a bit less than Australia’s 80%) and that source of carbon dioxide and other nasties accounts for a major portion of our contribution to air polluting emissions.
According to our Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 19 different projects have indicated that they are making preparations for submitting license applications for a total of 27 new nuclear power plants. There are many more projects that are also in the planning stages but do not yet want to begin paying NRC fees (which amount to about $250,000 for an application plus $210 per bureaucrat-hour.) Once they are closer to fruition, they too, will make their announcements.
What are you Aussies doing to reduce your emissions?
(BTW, my co-host on The Atomic Show, Shane Brown has mentioned your podcast to me several times. He is a big diver and a big fan.)
September 7th, 2006 at 9:12 pm
Hi Rod, thanks for posting. I hope you didn’t think I was criticising Americans and not Aussies. I was criticising both. I agree with you that Australia is dragging the chain on reducing emissions, and we need to do something about it.
What I was trying to say is that every American can make a difference, or hopefully will have the opportunity to do so, by voting Gore in. We don’t have that choice.
Your show is very cool, by the way.
October 13th, 2006 at 6:09 am
I’m an American, and although I oppose the current administration’s heel-dragging on the global warming situation, there’s a limit to what the government can do. It’s a cultural thing, which the Aussies share, to some extent. Most Yanks don’t have access to public transportation, and we’re really attached to our cars.
One thing that the government can do is to increase taxes on petrol — if you make it more expensive, then the public will demand more efficient or alternatively-fueled vehicles.
My first big dive adventure after certification was on a liveaboard out of Cairns, and listening to your show is one of my favorite passtimes. I wish the episodes would resume!
Kevin