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The US Is the Biggest Carbon Polluter in History (nytimes.com)
Justin Gillis, and Nadja Popovich, writing for The New York Times: The United States, with its love of big cars, big houses and blasting air-conditioners, has contributed more than any other country to the atmospheric carbon dioxide that is scorching the planet. "In cumulative terms, we certainly own this problem more than anybody else does," said David G. Victor, a longtime scholar of climate politics at the University of California, San Diego. Many argue that this obligates the United States to take ambitious action to slow global warming. Against that backdrop, factions in the Trump administration are engaged in a heated debate over whether to remain a party to the 195-nation agreement on climate change reached in Paris in 2015. President Trump promised on Wednesday to announce his decision at 3 p.m Thursday in the White House Rose Garden. A decision to walk away from the accord would be a momentous setback, in practical and political terms, for the effort to address climate change. Several news outlets, citing people in the administration, reported on Wednesday that the US is likely to pull out of the agreement.
Winner of Project Consored top 25 articles for 2009 - 2010 news stories: Pentagon's role in global catastrophe
By Sara Flounders
In evaluating the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen -- with more
than 15,000 participants from 192 countries, including more than 100 heads of
state, as well as 100,000 demonstrators in the streets -- it is important to
ask: How is it possible that the worst polluter of carbon dioxide and other
toxic emissions on the planet is not a focus of any conference discussion or
proposed restrictions?
By every measure, the Pentagon is the largest institutional user of
petroleum products and energy in general. Yet the Pentagon has a blanket
exemption in all international climate agreements.
The Pentagon wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; its secret operations in
Pakistan; its equipment on more than 1,000 U.S. bases around the world; its
6,000 facilities in the U.S.; all NATO operations; its aircraft carriers, jet
aircraft, weapons testing, training and sales will not be counted against U.S.
greenhouse gas limits or included in any count.
The Feb. 17, 2007, Energy Bulletin detailed the oil consumption just for the
Pentagon's aircraft, ships, ground vehicles and facilities that made it the
single-largest oil consumer in the world. At the time, the U.S. Navy had 285
combat and support ships and around 4,000 operational aircraft. The U.S. Army
had 28,000 armored vehicles, 140,000 High-Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled
Vehicles, more than 4,000 combat helicopters, several hundred fixed-wing
aircraft and 187,493 fleet vehicles. Except for 80 nuclear submarines and
aircraft carriers, which spread radioactive pollution, all their other vehicles
run on oil.
Even according to rankings in the 2006 CIA World Factbook, only 35 countries
(out of 210 in the world) consume more oil per day than the Pentagon.
The U.S. military officially uses 320,000 barrels of oil a day. However,
this total does not include fuel consumed by contractors or fuel consumed in
leased and privatized facilities. Nor does it include the enormous energy and
resources used to produce and maintain their death-dealing equipment or the
bombs, grenades or missiles they fire.
Steve Kretzmann, director of Oil Change International, reports: "The ... The war emits ... This information is not readily ... because military emissions abroad are exempt from national
Iraq war was responsible for at least 141 million metric tons of carbon dioxide
equivalent (MMTCO2e) from March 2003 through December 2007.
more than 60 percent of all countries.
available
reporting requirements under U.S. law and the U.N. Framework Convention on
Climate Change." (www.naomiklein.org, Dec. 10) Most scientists blame carbon dioxide
emissions for greenhouse gases and climate change.
Barry Sanders in his new book, "The Green Zone: The Environmental Costs ... the Armed
of Militarism," says that "the greatest single assault on the
environment, on all of us around the globe, comes from one agency
Forces of the United States."
Just how did the Pentagon come to be exempt from climate agreements? At the
time of the Kyoto Accords negotiations, the U.S. demanded as a provision of
signing that all of its military operations worldwide and all operations it
participates in with the U.N. and/or NATO be completely exempted from
measurement or reductions.
After securing this gigantic concession, the Bush administration then
refused to sign the accords.
In a May 18, 1998, article entitled "National security and military
policy issues involved in the Kyoto treaty," Dr. Jeffrey Salmon d
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
And the first country to have a jackoff in the White House who turned the EPA into the enforcement arm of the fossil fuel industry and prohibit it from performing its core function.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The Sun's activity is actually down, while temperatures have soared.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/pl...
"one" of the worst??? I understood that per capita, it was *the* worst. There are worse countries overall, but they have a greater population than the USA.
No, they're not the worst on a per capita basis. If you look this page you'll see there are a few others ahead of the US. The top three are Qatar, UAE and Kuwait, since they have so much oil. However, given their small populations (they total about 12 million), their contribution is less important than that of the US.
Why does a person have to be in some group or another's pocket to make a decision?
Because groupthinkers can't imagine anyone deciding anything independently.
Those are factors, but for example lots of European countries have fairly big temperature swings over the year but still use a lot less energy because their homes and buildings are well designed and insulated. In fact many European governments had some kind of scheme,either tax or industry funded, to get homes properly insulated at little or no cost to the owner.
Europe also has requires appliances to be much more efficient. That really helps combat the "bigger = better" mentality that consumers have, e.g. vacuum cleaners with 3000W motors that generate a lot of heat but don't clean any better.
All that and several EU countries have higher standards of living and quality of life compared to America, so it's not an either/or choice.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC