Global warming is no joke -- It demands serious attention

By Walter Simpson Copyright 1998 Buffalo News December 20, 1998

Like so many others, I enjoyed the unseasonably warm weather the first weekend of this month. My kids and I rollerbladed and biked around the neighborhood wearing shorts and T-shirts. After all, the temperature was 70 degrees.

The warm weather sparked numerous jokes about global warming. While no one can be sure if a specific warm weekend is the result of global warming, summer weather in December does get us thinking. Should we welcome climate change or worry about it?

In late 1995, a distinguished international panel of 2,000 scientists concluded that global warming was not only likely but that it had probably already begun. In terms of global average temperatures, the 10 warmest years since 1860 have occurred within the last 15 years.

1997 was the warmest year on record. 1998 may soon surpass it. Eleven out of the last 12 months have been the warmest on record. The anticipated overall impacts of global warming are not positive. Fueled by carbon-dioxide emissions caused by fossil-fuel burning, global warming promises to usher in a series of very undesirable consequences.

Scientists are predicting as much as a 5-degree Fahrenheit increase in global average temperature by 2050 unless something dramatic is done to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions. This will result in climate change that will place severe stress on ecosystems and natural habitats. Forests may die as appropriate climates shift northward.

Hotter, dryer conditions may turn "grain baskets" into "dust bowls." Tropical diseases could reach temperate latitudes. Sea levels may rise, while Great Lakes water levels fall. Extreme weather events like Hurricane Mitch, which left 10,000 people dead, are likely to proliferate.

On a per-capita basis, Americans are consuming two to three times as much energy as comparably affluent Germans and Japanese, and 20 to 40 times as much as people in developing countries. Our economy and our lifestyle epitomize energy waste.

Most of the energy we waste is fossil fuel-based and results in carbon-dioxide emissions. Reducing fossil-fuel use by conserving energy would be easy. The energy a new house uses for heating could be reduced by 50 to 75 percent with a modest investment in additional insulation and southward orientation of windows to take advantage of sunlight. Electrical consumption for lighting could be reduced in most houses by 75 to 90 percent by switching to sensible light fixtures and compact fluorescent lighting.

Cars that get 40 miles per gallon have been available for years but few are purchased. Instead, 50 percent of new vehicles are minivans, pickups and gas-guzzling sport-utility vehicles, which often get less than 20 mpg.

As Pogo used to say: "We have met the enemy and he is us." It's time for a major overhaul of our lifestyle choices and of the direction we give our political leaders, whose current approach to global warming is disastrous.

The recently negotiated Kyoto treaty doesn't go far enough to stop global warming. Yet it is adamantly opposed by congressional Republicans and their fossil-fuel industry sponsors. And the Clinton administration is undermining the treaty by seeking compliance through the purchase of "emission-reduction credits" from other countries instead of conserving energy and reducing emissions here.

That warm weather should be a wake-up call for all of us.

WALTER SIMPSON is an energy professional and environmental activist. He lives in Amherst.

For writer guidelines, send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to Opinion Pages Guidelines, The Buffalo News, P.O. Box 100, Buffalo, N.Y. 14240.

Comments on this posting?
Click here to post a public comment on the Trash Talk Bulletin Board.
Click here to send a private comment to the Junkman.

Material presented on this home page constitutes opinion of Steven J. Milloy.
Copyright © 1998 Steven J. Milloy. All rights reserved on original material. Material copyrighted by others is used either with permission or under a claim of "fair use." Site developed and hosted by WestLake Solutions, Inc.