While effective climate change policies have yet to be implemented in most places, there do seem to be signs that environmental consciousness has established itself in the popular discourse. No doubt, this owes a lot to how serious people – both scientists and policy-makers – have continued to stress what a major issue climate change is, and how vital it is to address it.
One sign of that high level of visibility comes from this week’s posts on The Onion, a satirical newspaper:
- EPA: Stubborn Environment Refusing To Meet Civilization Halfway
- Jupiter’s Liberals Worried About Their Ammonia Footprint
- What are we composting?
- Alternative Energy Projects
- Sierra Club Withdraws Support Of Controversial Fern
No doubt, this level of prominence owes something to the ongoing disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Nonetheless, maybe this kind of deep cultural penetration actually bodes well for environmental policy in the long run.
Report: Global Warming Issue From 2 Or 3 Years Ago May Still Be Problem
November 10, 2010 | ISSUE 46•45
WASHINGTON—According to a report released this week by the Center for Global Development, climate change, the popular mid-2000s issue that raised awareness of the fact that the earth’s continuous rise in temperature will have catastrophic ecological effects, has apparently not been resolved, and may still be a problem.
While several years have passed since global warming was considered the most pressing issue facing mankind, recent studies from the Center for Atmospheric Research, the National Academy of Sciences, NASA, the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, and basically any scientific report available on the issue confirmed that it is not only still happening, but might also be worth stopping.
“Global warming, if you remember correctly, was the single greatest problem of our lifetime back in 2007 and the early part of 2008,” CGD president Nancy Birdsall said. “But then the debates over Social Security reform and the World Trade Center mosque came up, and the government had to shift its focus away from the dramatic rise in sea levels, the rapid spread of deadly infectious diseases, and the imminent destruction of our entire planet.”
“I was a bit surprised by our findings, because I, along with the rest of my colleagues, thought that the process of fixing climate change ended soon after [2007 rock concert] Live Earth,” CGD assistant director George Oliver told reporters. “But it turns out that the things needed to stop it, like substantive energy legislation, worldwide cooperation to reduce carbon emissions, and a massive cultural shift toward sustainable living actually didn’t happen at all.”
“We kind of just assumed that the threat of total annihilation spurred everyone into action back in ’07 and that everything got better,” Oliver added.
Oliver said his group is making several recommendations to elected officials, some of which include fully comprehending the fact that human beings—actual human beings just like themselves—will be living on the planet when climate change begins to destroy it. The document also suggests that taking steps to prevent the earth from becoming completely unlivable should, for the moment, take precedence over tasks that do not do that.
We Need To Do More When It Comes To Having Brief, Panicked Thoughts About Climate Change
By Rhett Stevenson
September 6, 2011 | ISSUE 47•36
The 20 hottest years on record have all taken place in the past quarter century. The resulting floods, wildfires, and heat waves have all had deadly consequences, and if we don’t reduce carbon emissions immediately, humanity faces bleak prospects. We can no longer ignore this issue. Beginning today, we must all do more when it comes to our brief and panicked thoughts about climate change.
Indeed, if there was ever a time when a desperate call to take action against global warming should race through our heads as we lie in bed and stare at the ceiling, that time is now.
Many well-intentioned people will take 20 seconds out of their week to consider the consequences of the lifestyle they’ve chosen, perhaps contemplating how their reliance on fossil fuels has contributed to the rapid melting of the Arctic ice cap. But if progress is what we truly want, 20 seconds is simply not enough. Not by a long shot. An issue this critical demands at least 45 seconds to a solid minute of real, concentrated panic.
Report: Global Warming May Be Irreversible By 2006
GENEVA—A new report from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned Monday that global warming is likely to become completely irreversible if no successful effort is made to slow down the trend before 2006.
Unless greenhouse-gas emissions are drastically reduced by then, the report concludes, it will be too late to avoid inflicting a grave environmental catastrophe upon future generations.
“We have absolutely no time to waste,” said Dr. William Tumminelli, lead author of the report, which stresses it is utterly crucial the world cut its carbon footprint in half by the year 2000. “If we wait until 1998 or even 1995 to really start doing something about climate change, our planet’s rising temperature will already have set in motion a series of devastating and irreparable long-term consequences. We need to have strict international rules in place well ahead of 2006 or, to be blunt, many of the earth’s inhabitants will be doomed.”