Though it's not new, I found a great gem from
Business Week Online. Though you'd think that science has nothing to do with business, BW Online seems to carry a lot of articles that touch on aspects of computers, even Linux, for instance. It's a long article but is well worth the read:
The idea that the human species could alter something as huge and complex as the earth's climate was once the subject of an esoteric scientific debate. But now even attorneys general more used to battling corporate malfeasance are taking up the cause. On July 21, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer and lawyers from seven other states sued the nation's largest utility companies, demanding that they reduce emissions of the gases thought to be warming the earth. Warns Spitzer: "Global warming threatens our health, our economy, our natural resources, and our children's future. It is clear we must act."
The maneuvers of eight mostly Democratic AGs could be seen as a political attack. But their suit is only one tiny trumpet note in a growing bipartisan call to arms. "The facts are there," says Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.). "We have to educate our fellow citizens about climate change and the danger it poses to the world." In January, the European Union will impose mandatory caps on carbon dioxide and other gases that act like a greenhouse over the earth, and will begin a market-based system for buying and selling the right to emit carbon. By the end of the year, Russia may ratify the Kyoto Protocol, which makes CO2 reductions mandatory among the 124 countries that have already accepted the accord. Some countries are leaping even further ahead. Britain has vowed to slash emissions by 60% by 2050. Climate change is a greater threat to the world than terrorism, argues Sir David King, chief science adviser to Prime Minister Tony Blair: "Delaying action for a decade, or even just years, is not a serious option."
Indeed, since the article was posted, the EU and Russia have officially signed on to Kyoto as has Canada and Japan. The US, as usual, is the holdout.
Ontario is also considering whether to join in the lawsuit against the power utilities.
What's interesting is despite the Bush administration's refusal to sign onto Kyoto or even acknowledging human-caused global warming, states are individually moving forward:
Warning of flooded coasts and crippled industries, Massachusetts unveiled a plan in May to cut emissions by 10% by 2020. In June, California proposed 30% cuts in car emissions by 2015. Many other states are weighing similar actions.
And power companies are also accepting in some cases even taking forward-looking measures to develop technologies that contribute less to global warming. And surprise, surprise, they're discovering that in doing so they're saving money!
The article also discusses carbon-trading which works like this:
The basic idea: mandatory reductions or taxes on carbon emissions, combined with a worldwide emissions-trading program. Here's how it could work: Imagine that each company in a particular sector is required to cut emissions by 20%. The company could meet the target on its own by becoming more energy efficient or by switching from fossil fuels to alternatives. But it could also simply buy the needed reductions on the open market from others who have already cut emissions more than required, and who thus have excess emissions to sell. Under a sophisticated worldwide carbon-trading system, governments and companies could also get sellable credits for planting trees to soak up carbon or for investing in, say, energy efficient and low-carbon technologies in the developing world. As a result, there is a powerful incentive for everyone to find the lowest-cost and most effective cuts -- and to move to lower-carbon technologies.
Those companies that still pollute more can do so but not without a cost, buying carbon credits. Thus, the environment is helped by the best system of regulation that works in a business environment,
capitalism.
For those that are worried about the fight against global warming damaging the economy, I found this quite enlightening:
A British government panel, for instance, concluded that the cost of its share of the task of limiting the level of CO2 to 550 ppm would be about 1% of Britain's gross domestic product.
Compare that, says Sir David King, with the cost of a single flood breaking through the barrier in the Thames River -- some 30 billion pounds, or 2% of current GDP. "Common sense says that it's time to purchase some low-cost insurance now," says economist Paul R. Portney, president of Resources for the Future.
