by frog
After 28 years of doing nothing significant on climate change National and Labour are now positioning the climate and the economy in opposition to each other. ‘We can’t do anything about the climate now,’ they say, ‘the good times are over and it’s time to bunker down and protect the economy’. Luckily it’s not an either-or choice.
The only way to save the economy is to save the climate with it. As Johann Hari in The Independent notes:
The Wall Street Crash hadn’t happened for 80 years. The Arctic Crash hasn’t happened for three million years: that’s the last time there was watery emptiness at the top of the world. The Arctic is often described as the canary in the coal mine. As one Arctic researcher put it to me this week: the canary is dead. It’s time to clear the mine, and run.
This isn’t a problem that we can, to quote John Key out of context, ‘put on the backburner’ while we resolve the issues surrounding our share portfolios and family trusts.
But time is exactly what we don’t have. The key to understanding why lies in grasping the difference between a two-degree celcius rise in global temperatures and a three-degree rise. At first glance, neither sounds like a big deal. If you go out for a picnic and the temperature rises by three degrees, you take off your jacket. But if your body heats up one or two degrees, you get sick and take to your bed. If it heats by three degrees and doesn’t go back, you die. The ecosystem isn’t a picnic; it’s more like your body. Small variations in global temperatures have vast consequences. The last Ice Age was only six degrees colder than today. A global rise of just 0.8 degrees has melted the Arctic.
Published in Economy, Work, & Welfare | Environment & Resource Management by frog on Tue, October 21st, 2008
Tags: , arctic, climate change, economy, frogblog, green party
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
Also from the Independent:
A ‘Green New Deal’ can save the world’s economy, says UN
Top economists and United Nations leaders are working on a “Green New Deal” to create millions of jobs, revive the world economy, slash poverty and avert environmental disaster, as the financial markets plunge into their deepest crisis since the Great Depression.
From Scientific American:
Crunch May Put Price Tag on Environment
Under standard economics, nations can boost their GDP — briefly — by chopping down all their forests and selling the timber, or by dynamiting coral reefs to catch all the fish. A rethink would stress the value of keeping nature intact.
Rockstrom said bank bailouts totaling hundreds of billions of dollars might “change the mindset of the public…if we are willing to save investment banks, why not spend a similar amount on saving the planet?” he said.
Coincidentally, Chrysler, Ford and GM received their first US$25bn bailout to belatedly “green” their cars on the back of the Wall Street rescue, while poor Tesla struggles to stay solvent.
Like or Dislike:
0 
0 (0)
Or, as the New Scientist editorial says in the latest amazing issue focussing on “The Folly of Growth” says: “When the human population was counted in millions and resources were sparse, people could simply move to pastures new. But with 9 billion people expected around 2050, moving on is not an option. As politicians reconstruct the global economy, they should take heed. If we are to leave any kind of planet to our children we need an economic system that lets us live within our means.”
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/mg20026782.500-editorial-t ime-to-banish-the-god-of-growth.html
Like or Dislike:
0 
0 (0)