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US Opposes G8 Climate Proposals
elrond writes "The US appears to have summarily rejected draft proposals for G8 members that would have agreed to tougher measures for controlling greenhouse gas emissions. The BBC reports that leaked documents have indicated the positions of the various world powers, from the timetable-setting of Germany to the US's intractable stance. Red ink comments on the documents hint at the US's irritation: 'The US still has serious, fundamental concerns about this draft statement. The treatment of climate change runs counter to our overall position and crosses 'multiple red lines' in terms of what we simply cannot agree to ... We have tried to tread lightly but there is only so far we can go given our fundamental opposition to the German position.'"
This world is fragile in our hands.
surely its only a matter of time before europe imposes trade tarrifs on US goods? Otherwise they are basically subsidising US industry, operating with far looser environmental standards. I'm sure the US will complain and 'retaliate', but I don't see any other option in the long term.
The overall position of the US at this time is that people and dinosaurs lived together in harmony and that soon George the idiot and all his money-grubbing pals will fly into the sky up to heaven. Global warming and the changing environment is a problem for those of us LEFT BEHIND to deal with. So as dubya says "What me worry?"
Hey, you think your house is cool?
this news is sadly unsurprising.
when will the US finally step up and take something other than short-term, economic driven decisions concerning the environment?
~~~ Paf. Le chien.
The US still has serious, fundamental concerns about this draft statement.
Correction: The US Government.
Here's a related bit of news that may make you feel better.
An investigation at the Department of the Interior (Manages US wildlands) has resulted in numerous resignations and may result in real domestic reform.
Accusations from leading scientists include:
Elimination of data regarding imperiled species in resource rich areas
Rubber stamping of logging permits on public lands without due process
Improper contact between dept administrators and corporate interests including the allowance of corporate influence on impact assessments
All of the allegations center around administrators who were placed by the Bush administration. Several highly placed scientists have left for the private sector and there may be an expose published. The elimination of data was egregious. Apparently data was not only removed from official reports, but other data was *actually* changed and whistleblowers were railroaded out.
Bet you five bucks this becomes a campaign issue if Gore decides to run.
We don't suppose you can spare some rice and some oil, by any chance? Only the desert now stretches from the West Coast to Chicago and we have a bit of a food problem. And the Canadians have built a big fence along the border and won't let us in as none of us want to mow their lawns or harvest their oranges.
We can offer plenty of stuff in exchange. How about some strategic nuclear missiles? Or some fighter aircraft? We've got plenty of them. Unfortunately, turns out they don't work too well if you want to invade another country and make people grow food for you.
Pining for the fjords
That's exactly right. I read a Gore Vidal essay explaining how Regan was absolutely convinced that the biblical end of times would be within his lifetime. It's scary to think how such beliefs influence national policy. Vidal also proposed that no president should be elected who holds a literal view of the bible. I wonder how much the Christian Right influences Bush's environmental policy.
Why bother looking out for future generations if the leader of the free world believes we'll all be getting beamed up in a few years?
The thing is not inly if "greenhouse gasses" affect the climate. It's also about outrageous and irresponsible use of resources. It's about pollution.
You don't pollute your own house, so stop polluting this world.
Although I don't live in your house and couldn't care less about what you do there, I and about 6 billion people live in this world so let's keep it clean.
Privacy is terrorism.
"... why should we wreck our economy over something that not everyone can agree on..."
Who says it would wreck the economy? Automakers cried wolf in the same fashion in the 70's and 80's when rasied MPG requirements and imposed the environmental standards that required catalytic converters and cleaner fuels. "Oh," said they, "it will cause the collapse of the industry as we know it and cause irreparable harm to the US economy."
Didn't happen.
At worst cleaning up our act and imposing higher CAFE standards "might" impact corporate profits for a quarter or two. But in return we get a cleaner environment, less polution, and less dependence on foreign oil imports. Not to mention spawning new industries to provide those solutions and technologies.
And that's a bad thing... how?
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
I mean, why don't they listen to the USA. Our position is that since the earth is only 3000 years old, there isn't enough long term data to determine if climage change is even being caused by humans. Not only that, why would God let the planet get too hot? It just doesn't make any sense.
As the single biggest waster of energy in the world and a country where average miles per gallon figures are actually dropping, I would hope that a bigger stick would be applied to the US.
Do you hassle all your neighbours equally, or just the ones who are letting their dog shit on your lawn?
Even if we come up with a huge breakthrough on the energy production front,
How about just improving the efficency of your economy to the same level that other people have?
China and India will both be producing 5-10 times more emissions than they are today
Gothcha, two wrongs make a right.
They aren't covered by this agreement at all.
Oh, I thought you said you didn't know the specifics of the agreement.
global warming still just as much of a problem and the developed world has no economy left,
Hey, crazy thought, but couldn't you just not buy all that crap China is producing? I mean, if you're that worried about their economy overtaking yours maybe you should stop paying them to do it? Plus, since they're a totally corrupt and evil country, you'd even be acting ethically. Just a thought. We could all make a small start by not sending any teams to the Chinese Olympics.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
The funny thing is, that Christianity has been perverted to a big degree, I dont know where those groups derive their believe from, it cannot be in the words written down.
Lets sum those words up, there was a guy 2000 years ago, he went into confrontation against people who had strict religious rules, he sided with hookers poor people etc, and called the rich ones being not his people. He went into opposition against things which would make the life miserable for ordinary people, and he was in his core message not really a very capitalistic guy (some people nowadays probably would call him communistic, I just would say he puts the people in the core of his message not the money)
He also was absolutely opposed to any war or violence whatsover even dismissing defense as valid form of violence.
Now lets face it, if a guy with such a message would go out into the crowds nowadays, how long do you think his life expectancy would be. Probably three years as well, the killer, probably some corporate sponsored guy, or a religious zealot, who wants to the defend the words of jesus (and does in fact do totally the opposite). Jesus probably would go in total confrontation with any right wing cristian groups like he did with the jewis zealots in the past, and probably would call them severe names out of anger, he also would go into opposition with lots of governments including our own, and generally our society of self righteousness while we bring lots of misery onto the rest of the planet.
I dont think the message he would bring us would be very comforting for us!
Further, if the G8 did reduce emissions by 50% by 2050 (below 1990 levels... um... ok, so we reduce our energy consumption by 50% and don't completely destroy our economy how?).
Hey, remember. Emissions!=energy production. I could easily drop our emmissions by 50% and increase energy production. Nuclear power is our friend.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Unfortunately, the political will to make real changes seem to be lacking, not only in the US.
Ultimately, everyone's in favor of doing something to help our environment, but there's nearly always something they care more about, and very few people vote on the basis of a politician's stand on the environment.
And, perhaps more importantly. With democracy the way it is, politicians profit (get reelected) by looking no more than 4 years into the future. Any good they do which doesn't show significant results before the next election simply doesn't matter to the professional politician. Politics is a job, and securing your job is one of the greatest motivations for most people.
Making the drastic changes required to slow global warming significantly has a very high political cost - more unemployment as polluting businesses go out of business, and a great deal of money taken from other posts that will be obvious much earlier, and influence the next election a great deal.
We're all environmentalists, but when the interest rates start increasing, when your house falls in value, and you're in danger of losing your job... You don't vote for environmentalism, you vote for your own short term best interests.
And I fear that by the time the global climate becomes the immidiate problem for a majority of the population, it will be far too late to do anything effective to change it.
I'm a dreamer, the world is my playpen. But hey, I'm a serious person, I can't dream all the time.
Trees are the ultimate renewable resource because the more you harvest, the more area you have to replant them. It's not like, say, fish, where the more you harvest, the less there are to reproduce and replenish their stocks. The reason the world is losing forested area is because sustenance farmers are able to grow food and cash crops on cleared land, while harvesting trees is not as economically attractive. So they burn the trees down to clear land.
The U.S. only accounts for 24% of the world's carbon emissions. The U.S. also accounts for 28% of the world's economic production. In other words, the rest of the world is less efficient than the U.S. at producing value per ton of CO2 released. Europe is by far more efficient and the U.S. should try to learn from them, but these attempts to paint the U.S. as the sole bogeyman are horribly misguided. If the U.S. were to disappear overnight, by the time the world economy grew back to the level it's at today, there would be more CO2 emissions than before the U.S. disappeared!Also, trying to pin blame on a country by country basis makes no sense (aside from a policy perspective) because each nation has a different size and different population. On a per capita basis (CO2 emissions per person), the U.S. is not at the top, and there are several developed nations who are right up there with the U.S.
Finally, in terms of forest and protected forest, the U.S. has far more than all of Europe combined, nearly 1.7x as much in terms of area, and more than 3x as much per capita. In the above hypothetical scenario where the U.S. disappeared overnight, 7.6% of the world's forests and 9.6% of the world's protected forests would disappear as well.
What's needed to get us out of this mess is a systemic plan which address all aspects of the problem, not trying to single out sole nations for blame. If you do that, as we found out with Kyoto, the nation singled out will simply choose not to play ball. The developed nations need to set and meet energy efficiency goals (the U.S., Canada, and Australia especially). They also need to invest R&D money in non-carbon based energy sources. Environmentalists in these countries need to accept that nuclear is a much, much better option than spewing out millions of tons of carbon and other pollutants by burning fossil fuels. Developing nations need to restrict behaviors which are cheap in labor but expensive in carbon emissions (e.g. slash and burn). They will need economic and organizational aid from the developed world to help them establish economies which are not based on these behaviors.
It seems to me that the best way for the rest of the world to react would be to stop negotiating with the US as a country and move to negotiating with the states. Some of them are as large as a reasonably sized country and act as such. California, for example, seems very ready to move on climate change.
The other states, some of which seem to have "rogue governments" that look very much like "axis of evil", can easily be ostracized. Sanctions can be implemented such as travel restrictions for their elected officials or freezing of funds in foreign bank accounts.
Of course military action cannot be ruled out but liberating Texas may be difficult.
Per capita....
Great way to offset the reality.
US: 300 million
China: 1.5 BILLION
Translation, what China doesn't have on a per-capita basis, they make up for in sheer quantity.
What's more, the drive to modernize China will cause a per-capita increase.
Additionally, there are initiatives in the US already to reduce emissions. Sure, they may not move as quickly (the day before yesterday please!) as you'd like. But they ARE in progress.
Yet you want to excuse it because "Oh, they're a developing country!"
Essentially what you want is for us to wreck our economy around the same time China finishes building theirs.
Good idea! (NOT!)
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
For some other sources, check this graphic for per-capita emissions in 2002. For the US, we have about 19.8 tons, while for China it's about 2.2 tons. Using the CIA World Factbook for current population numbers, we get:
Of course, there is also Wikipedia: