UN climate panel: Fix is within reach
A new report says humans can easily limit global warming without cooling the economy
By Laurie Goering
Chicago Tribune foreign correspondent
May 5, 2007
BANGKOK – The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which up to now has laid out some doomsday global warming scenarios, had some good news Friday: Climate change can be limited, and at what scientists said would be a reasonable price.
Just as important, existing technology will do most of the job, as long as policymakers make sure it is quickly adopted. And average citizens can make valuable contributions by making small lifestyle changes without waiting for governments to act.
But skeptics, including the Bush administration, said that the most stringent recommended measures could strain the world economy. (((Morons who have never been right about any important public issue and have lost all credibility even among their own supporters.)))And others doubted that the worst-polluting nations would have much incentive to cooperate. (((You mean incentives other than dying horribly? The "worst-polluting nation" is the USA. You really think China would dare to drown every major seacoast city on the planet in order to keep up their WalMart contracts? The Chinese would be destroyed.)))
The panel's latest report, released Friday in Bangkok, "addresses a fundamental concern of Americans: Can we do something about this?" said Peter Altman, a climate expert at the National Environmental Trust. "The answer is a resounding yes."
By rapidly ramping up the use of renewable-energy sources like solar, wind and hydroelectric power, making cars, homes and factories more energy efficient, producing electricity with natural gas rather than coal and sequestering carbon dioxide below ground, the world could hold temperature increases to around 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above preindustrial-era levels, low enough to avoid potentially disastrous droughts, severe storms and sea-level rise, the report's summary said....
