Florida's Govenor Goes Green
I would like to take a moment and thank Gov Christ for his bold decision and immediate action today to sponsor a true reform on Florida based Greenhouse Gasses…I applaud the move and thank you for your clear direction in this important effort.
Recognizing that the nation is lead by State actions is critical to making things happen, and your decision to reduce emissions from our power plants, shift over to renewable energy for 20% of our power, and call for all automobiles sold in Florida to match the standards set by the State of California is leadership that we will grow and benefit from.
I am with you Governor Christ…and all of the United States needs to take note.
Did the G-8 Meeting do enough?
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who shepherded the deal as the G-8 summit's host, said Thursday that the climate-change agreement represented "very great progress and an excellent result."
President Bush and other G-8 leaders said they are committed to "substantial" cuts by 2050 of greenhouse gas emissions, which are caused by the burning of fuels such as gasoline and coal. But critics note that the deal has no binding caps, only a pledge to "consider seriously" a 50% cut by mid-century.
Greenpeace USA was one of several groups to say the agreement "fails to provide clear targets for how we deal with the threat" of global warming.
Greenpeace and other groups blamed Bush, who has long favored voluntary reductions, for blocking the 50% cut sought by Merkel and British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Merkel and Blair also suggested a target of keeping global temperature increases to less than 2 degrees Celsius by 2050, which is not part of the deal.
So, what do you think? Can we really wait another 43years to see if we can make a positive difference?
Creating a ‘Deflective Screen’ for the G-8 meeting later this month.
President Bush has spent the last six years ignoring the Kyoto Accord. In fact, as we have all seen, he keeps getting his 'Yes Men' to question the problems while he has worked to ignore Global Warming issues to this point.
And now, with the G-8 meeting around the corner…and the top issue to be discussed (Germany is pushing it) is the release of Greenhouse Gasses, the President has created a Deflective Screen by declaring that he will host a meeting later in the year to begin exporing the greenhouse gas questions. In fact he is hoping that this will allow him to refer to his plan during the G-8 meeting and then to say he is doing something about Climate Change. What have been his motives and agendas?
Agenda 1…support the petrochemical industry…
Agenda 2...delay action, short term personal (he and his friends) gain
Agenda 3…make it look like he is finally doing something of merit.
More positive steps are being lead by Germany who wants us to take action…they have the lead on a European Proposal that calls for all nations to reduce their Greenhouse gasses to 50% or less of the emissions released in 1990 by the year 2050. Now let’s consider this. The world is changing, and we will not get instant satisfaction on this…stop the gasses now and we still have decades of warming before we begin to see improvement. So as an instant gratification society...at least from Mr. Bush's point of view...shouldn’t we just continue to ignore it? After all, we can’t fix it immediately so we should just learn to live with it….right? Sure!
Or I guess we could take a more Global and Going Concern approach…reduce the gasses, back to manageable levels, and maybe in 75 to 150 years we will regain balance…so our children and their children and those to follow will have a habitable world that they can effectively manage.
George…it isn’t about us. Our parents and their parents…and yes indeed …US…that is us for you and me and US for the United States…yes indeed, we have helped to pollute our world to the point of warming and we are the cause of the change in global weather. Oh yeah, if we don’t get a handle on it we will find that we can’t feed our people and the rest of the world will be in the same situation.
Fix the world, do it now, pass it on!
So what is the question?
There is no debate among scientists about the basic facts of global warming.
The most respected scientific bodies have stated unequivocally that global warming is occurring, and people are causing it by burning fossil fuels (like coal, oil and natural gas) and cutting down forests. The U.S. National Academy of Sciences, which in 2005 the White House called "the gold standard of objective scientific assessment," issued a joint statement with 10 other National Academies of Science saying "the scientific understanding of climate change is now sufficiently clear to justify nations taking prompt action. It is vital that all nations identify cost-effective steps that they can take now, to contribute to substantial and long-term reduction in net global greenhouse gas emissions." (Joint Statement of Science Academies:
Global Response to Climate Change [PDF], 2005)
There are those who ask if it is man made...and if so, why are we interested in changing it? Well, that remains the debate...
But consider again the quesiton of polution and reduced ability to grow food and harvest fish, or raise stock all for the purpose of feeding the Billions of people on this planet...Pollution is the issue, and if it is causing Global Warming...well, then when we reduce pollution than we will be addressing Global Warming...but in any case we need to end pollution as best we can.
And in doing that we will begin to address the scientific quesitons related to global weather.
Environmental Issues that must be addressed…
So, what is more important? Clean air or clean water? Or is it the Global Warming thing? Many of my friends and associates tell me that they don’t believe that we have environmental issues, and they are especially opposed to the concept of global warming, after all…just because Al Gore says it is happening does not make it so!
Well, it isn’t Al Gore guys, it’s the increasing level of warming factors and the decidedly different atmospherics that we are seeing that should be telling us that the weather patterns are changing, and it is the lack of historic parallel…throughout the life of the planet…that should be raising concern.
We are forcing Mother Earth into a corner and we all, that is every nation on earth, we all need to take steps to slow the change…correct the problems and return our planet to balance.
Stopping the pollution should be our goal, after all it must be achieved. And that is why I am sorely disappointed in the Congress of the United States. We should be taking the lead, not thinking about whether or not we are going to act at all, and though we might agree that we can be in parallel with Europe and Asia…we should not be sliding backwards as this administration has allowed us to.
Clean Water…Clean Air…and the whole Global Warming thing are critical…and there is so much more. Reduction in solid waste pollutants…in ocean dumping…in nuclear waste management…all of these things need to be addressed and we need to be in the lead.
Write your Congressional Representatives and Senators, even if the President will not act our government can pass laws …with or without him we can recover the Green.
You would think that the Solar Energy Center in support of Florida's State initiatives would be the best in class...or at least the best University program...but I think we have a long way to go to meet that level of performance.
But you know...if they really wanted to hit the ball out of the park they still could...all they have to do is be creative. Sadly thought, at least as observed by me during a recent visit, there have been very few changes since last year and the program seems to be moving along at a snail's pace.
Too bad...as an advocate I would have expected this part of the University of Central Florida to have some legs.
Take a look and see if you think I am incorrect...I hope you find something that I missed.
The applications are available...and you should get there now if you want the support!
Florida, land of sunshine and sun burns...we of all states have what it takes to make the solar engergy leap...but we are not funding the program exceptionally well. So if you want to get some support on putting in solar energy you need to move now...or miss the opportunity at least for this year.
Application forms for incentives:
Solar Energy Systems Incentives Program Rebate Application DEP Form 62-16.900(3). pdf doc FAQ - Solar [pdf]
Where is Congress going ?
Hey, we may have elected Democrats to lead the House and Senate...but we are not seeing them push forward on Environmental issues. The truth is that our
Governors are doing a better job of sorting out the pollution issues today than either Congressional body, and they are being more
Presidential about it then the President.
Washington, Oregon, New Mexico and Colorado have all joined California in pushing the reduction of
GHG emissions on our West Coast and I believe that there will be more to follow. What we need however is a national policy that counts.
It is time, Mr President...and all of you in Congress...to take a meaningful stand on environmental issues...before your feet are getting wet from the melt down!
