Rethinking strategy in the battle against climate change
Published in the Boulder Daily Camera, 5/4/2014
Whether you believe that the science is "settled" or still in flux, everyone should be worried about climate change. As goes the old adage, there's plenty of smoke, so we should be worried about the fire. Until we have reason to think otherwise, governments, companies, and individuals need to take action to reduce their greenhouse gases emissions.
The biggest problem we seem to have is that the environmental activists who are leading this charge are doing a bad job of putting forth ideas for addressing climate issues that are acceptable enough to effect change. Even worse, many of the causes they back in the name of climate change are counterproductive. There are no easy solutions to reducing greenhouse gases on a scale that fits the modern world. What has become increasingly apparent is that, en route to a long-term goal of a more carbon-free economy, we need to find things that help now. Many environmental activists don't seem to buy that idea and, as a result, they are leading us down paths that are causing more, not less, greenhouse gases. While not their intention, it is the result, and it is not helping our environment one bit.
For example, high on the environmental activist hit list is nuclear power. So, I guess they got a win a few weeks ago when Japanese industry stated their intent to replace the electrical power that has been produced by nuclear reactors with power produced by coal plants. While everyone can understand how the Fukushima nuclear power plant incident caused by a tsunami would lead people to question nuclear power plant safety, researchers who investigated the matter extensively did not find levels of radiation exposure that are likely to affect anyone. The incident made a mess, that's for sure, but everything that creates electricity makes a mess somewhere down the line, whether it's a leaking oil well, mine tailings, or the footprint of the windmills that, per watt produced, take up roughly 100 times the acreage of nuclear power plants.
Nuclear power is a near carbon-free source of energy and there is enough nuclear fuel on earth to power the world's electrical needs for as long as the sun is expected to shine. Sounds pretty sustainable to me, and it certainly sounds like nuclear power is at least an interim solution and maybe one of the long term solutions to human-caused climate change. But, one of the the world's largest economies just decided to replace nuclear power - their largest carbon-free energy source - with coal, the carbon-heaviest energy source around. Nice win guys, unless you care about global warming.
Also high on the activist agenda has been stopping the Keystone Pipeline. It doesn't seem to matter that all the research has confirmed that the oil that would otherwise be shipped through the pipeline will still find it's way to markets at a cost of greater greenhouse gas emissions and decreased safety. Still, environmental activists are lining up to lie down on the tracks to stop this one. "All oil is bad oil" is not a basis for sound environmental thinking at this point in history. It just adds to the public's perception that environmentalists are too myopic to be trusted with big economic decisions.
Closer to home, consider the consequences of Boulder's electrical municipalization being done in the name of a better environment. The decision by Boulder to reject Xcel's offer to build new windmills that would have provided electricity equal to 93 percent of Boulder's use has led to the ongoing release of about 1,000 additional tons of CO2 per day. So far, all we've got out of municipalization has been about half a million tons of additional carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and a green debt that continues to mount as Boulder begins legal proceedings that will last years.
Even the reduced carbon footprint resulting from natural gas production through fracking is under widespread attack by environmentalists. Sure, we all want carbon-free energy, but replacing coal with natural gas is making an enormous positive impact on our carbon footprint today and deserves to be celebrated by enlightened environmentalists, not vilified.
All of us should support the march to sustainable, safe, and environmentally pristine energy sources. But, while we work towards that end, we should not keep fighting the incremental improvements that are offered to us. If you believe that climate change is a threat today, you should support today's solutions, not just tomorrow's aspirations.
Whether you believe that the science is "settled" or still in flux, everyone should be worried about climate change. As goes the old adage, there's plenty of smoke, so we should be worried about the fire. Until we have reason to think otherwise, governments, companies, and individuals need to take action to reduce their greenhouse gases emissions.
The biggest problem we seem to have is that the environmental activists who are leading this charge are doing a bad job of putting forth ideas for addressing climate issues that are acceptable enough to effect change. Even worse, many of the causes they back in the name of climate change are counterproductive. There are no easy solutions to reducing greenhouse gases on a scale that fits the modern world. What has become increasingly apparent is that, en route to a long-term goal of a more carbon-free economy, we need to find things that help now. Many environmental activists don't seem to buy that idea and, as a result, they are leading us down paths that are causing more, not less, greenhouse gases. While not their intention, it is the result, and it is not helping our environment one bit.
For example, high on the environmental activist hit list is nuclear power. So, I guess they got a win a few weeks ago when Japanese industry stated their intent to replace the electrical power that has been produced by nuclear reactors with power produced by coal plants. While everyone can understand how the Fukushima nuclear power plant incident caused by a tsunami would lead people to question nuclear power plant safety, researchers who investigated the matter extensively did not find levels of radiation exposure that are likely to affect anyone. The incident made a mess, that's for sure, but everything that creates electricity makes a mess somewhere down the line, whether it's a leaking oil well, mine tailings, or the footprint of the windmills that, per watt produced, take up roughly 100 times the acreage of nuclear power plants.
Nuclear power is a near carbon-free source of energy and there is enough nuclear fuel on earth to power the world's electrical needs for as long as the sun is expected to shine. Sounds pretty sustainable to me, and it certainly sounds like nuclear power is at least an interim solution and maybe one of the long term solutions to human-caused climate change. But, one of the the world's largest economies just decided to replace nuclear power - their largest carbon-free energy source - with coal, the carbon-heaviest energy source around. Nice win guys, unless you care about global warming.
Also high on the activist agenda has been stopping the Keystone Pipeline. It doesn't seem to matter that all the research has confirmed that the oil that would otherwise be shipped through the pipeline will still find it's way to markets at a cost of greater greenhouse gas emissions and decreased safety. Still, environmental activists are lining up to lie down on the tracks to stop this one. "All oil is bad oil" is not a basis for sound environmental thinking at this point in history. It just adds to the public's perception that environmentalists are too myopic to be trusted with big economic decisions.
Closer to home, consider the consequences of Boulder's electrical municipalization being done in the name of a better environment. The decision by Boulder to reject Xcel's offer to build new windmills that would have provided electricity equal to 93 percent of Boulder's use has led to the ongoing release of about 1,000 additional tons of CO2 per day. So far, all we've got out of municipalization has been about half a million tons of additional carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and a green debt that continues to mount as Boulder begins legal proceedings that will last years.
Even the reduced carbon footprint resulting from natural gas production through fracking is under widespread attack by environmentalists. Sure, we all want carbon-free energy, but replacing coal with natural gas is making an enormous positive impact on our carbon footprint today and deserves to be celebrated by enlightened environmentalists, not vilified.
All of us should support the march to sustainable, safe, and environmentally pristine energy sources. But, while we work towards that end, we should not keep fighting the incremental improvements that are offered to us. If you believe that climate change is a threat today, you should support today's solutions, not just tomorrow's aspirations.
