Philanthrocapitalism_ How Giving Can Save the World - Matthew Bishop [66]
The problem of climate change presents an existential threat to the future of civilization. Global warming is caused by increased concentrations of greenhouse gases, principally carbon dioxide and methane. Scientists believe CO2 levels are higher than they have been in 650,000 years. Glaciers and snowcaps are melting all over the world. Severe weather events are increasing. The composition of the oceans is changing, threatening coral reefs and further eroding fish stocks. Diseases once confined to tropical climates are spreading to new areas as the weather warms. Sea levels are rising, threatening to flood coastal areas and displace tens of millions before the century is out. The scientific consensus that climate change is real and caused by man-made activities is overwhelming. The only debate is over how soon really bad things will happen and how bad they will be.
Most man-made CO2 emissions come from burning oil and coal. Most methane emissions caused by humans come from landfills and agriculture, though increasingly methane is being released from long-frozen tundra as a result of global warming. The big increase in emissions began with the discovery of oil and the Industrial Revolution’s need for oil and coal, with most of the emissions occurring in the last fifty or so years, as more nations industrialized and the global population increased dramatically.
Though India and China will soon surpass us, the United States is now the largest emitter of greenhouse gases. With 5 percent of the world’s population and 21 percent of its economic output, Americans account for 25 percent of the emissions. So far, our nation has refused to take serious action on climate change for four reasons: 1) though it is no longer true, too many people still believe a nation cannot become wealthy and stay that way without burning more coal and oil; 2) the old energy economy, rooted in oil and coal, is well organized, well financed, and well connected politically, while the new energy economy is decentralized, disorganized, undercapitalized, and less influential; 3) until recently, oil was too cheap to encourage clean alternatives and conservation, and even today, it is not generally accepted that oil is a depleting resource that experts believe will be used up sometime within fifty to a hundred years; and 4) so far, too many politicians have been resistant to implementing proven strategies to reduce emissions, like emission-trading schemes, high efficiency standards for appliances, lighting, buildings, and automobiles, and comprehensive efforts to maximize the use of clean energy sources.
Al Gore has been warning us of the dangers of climate change for more than twenty years. His landmark book, Earth in the Balance, made a deep impression on me and was one of the reasons I asked him to be my running mate in 1992. When Al won an Academy Award for his fine documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, I was thrilled. America was finally listening to the lecture he’d given me every week for eight years!
In 1993, my first year as president, we included as part of the Deficit Reduction Act a small carbon tax that would have led to more conservation. We convinced the House to pass it, but it died in the Senate. After that, we pursued a partnership with the U.S. automakers to develop a very high-mileage car, took steps to increase energy efficiency in the federal government, which had the effect of taking several hundred thousand cars off the road, increased research, and negotiated the Kyoto Climate Change Treaty to howls that it would destroy the economy. Virtually the entire Senate voted for a resolution opposing the treaty even before