environment: denialism glaciers
by Warren
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Month 9, Day 20: Damoclean Living
The Washington Post ran an article on a small town in France that is well worth reading.
The people of Saint-Gervais daily confront a very precarious situation. Perched above their heads is a huge mass of liquid water trapped inside a slowly melting glacier. If things get too warm, a catastrophic flood could wipe out their village with only a few moments’ notice. Adequate risk assessment and amelioration are all but impossible; nobody has ever seen a situation like this before. The proposed solutions present problems of their own, posing almost as much risk as inaction — and many of Saint-Gervais’ citizens, finding it too uncomfortable, simply deny the facts of the crisis. It is rare to find such an elegantly eerie microcosm of our planetary condition; with the terrifying threats of global climate change looming over us, we have all become citizens of Saint-Gervais, our population — and our peril — amplified a millionfold.
Warren Senders
environment: Barack Obama economics Elizabeth Warren
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Month 9, Day 19: POTUS
Everybody’s talking about the Elizabeth Warren appointment. As a Warren myself, I think it’s fine news. And it provided me with a hook for another “capitalizm iz teh suck”-type letter. Yippee.
Dear President Obama,
Your recent appointment of Elizabeth Warren is good news for all of us normal people who have been hoping against hope that your administration would follow through on its promises to help America’s suffering middle class citizens.
There is another promise which needs to be kept and built upon. The rescue of our middle class won’t amount to a hill of beans if the environmental wealth of our country and the world is so depleted and damaged that it can no longer sustain our population. Although it is not usually framed that way, climate change is as much an economic issue as an environmental one; it is obvious to anyone who’s paying attention that market capitalism is based on profoundly and fundamentally flawed assumptions. At first, the ethos of naked and unrestrained greed merely damaged our nation’s financial systems — but in the years to come we will increasingly see its effect on the natural world which makes our lives possible.
If greed is good, then short-term profits outweigh long-term sustainability; to hell with our grandchildren and their grandchildren, as long as we have a good quarterly profit! But contrary to the thinking of your economic advisor Mr. Summers, a finite planet cannot support infinite growth. We cannot continue to lay waste to the environment in the name of economic instant gratification!
This is why it was so terribly disappointing that your advisors turned away Bill McKibben and his small group of student activists when they tried to get you to reinstall solar panels on the White House roof. There are responsibilities that accompany citizenship in a world superpower — and your determination to turn the White House green would have helped all of us understand them. Instead…well, it’s just another opportunity lost in the name of a “deliberative process.”
Too bad. Especially since we don’t have another decade in which to procrastinate. We must act immediately if we are to have any impact. And not only must we stop burning coal and oil, we must rethink the economic models that have led us to this pass. Whether we like it or not, market capitalism has been a disaster for the planetary systems upon which all life depends. If we don’t end our reliance on this deeply flawed way of thinking, we may, instead, just end.Yours Sincerely,
Warren Senders
environment: Arctic ice melt media irresponsibility Walruses
by Warren
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Month 9, Day 18: I Always Liked Walruses
USA Today ran an AP article on the Walrus beachings. Naturally, the comment thread is full of denialists. What will it take for these people to wake up?
In discussing the tragic beaching of thousands of walruses, Seth Borenstein hides the true horror of the event. First noting that scientists call this phenomenon “unusual,” he then writes that “…it has happened at least twice before, in 2007 and 2009. In those years Arctic sea ice also was at or near record low levels.” In other words, an “unusual” event isn’t “unusual” any more. This paints a gloomy picture for one of the world’s most fascinating sea creatures. The existential threat posed by climate change is exacerbated by our media’s inability to address the problem directly; Borenstein’s phrasing makes it easy to dismiss a devastating ecological tragedy from our minds. Writing, “Three times in the last four years, melting sea ice caused by atmospheric warming has made thousands of walruses beach themselves,” would be truer to the facts and to the nature of the danger we face.
Warren Senders
environment: Proposition 23
by Warren
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Month 9, Day 17: Classic Koch
The LA Times ran an article about the oil industry’s deep pockets and attempts to raise enthusiasm for California’s Proposition 23. In the course of the piece, the following gem emerged:
On Tuesday, Charles Drevna, president of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Assn., issued an urgent appeal for funds to back the measure. “I am pleading with each of you — for our nation’s best interest and for your company’s own self-interest,” he wrote in a confidential e-mail to the industry group’s 416 members.
“The money raised so far,” he wrote, “is not enough to win the fight against environmental zealots led by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who seems hell-bent on becoming the real-life Terminator of our industry.”
That’s right. Ahhhhnuld is an Environmental Zealot, presumably because he acknowledges the existence of the problem.
Oy. Californians…don’t let this thing pass!
It’s amusing to hear Governor Schwarznegger described as an “environmental zealot” by Charles Drevna, president of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association. Given the oil industry’s abysmal record on cleaning up the messes they make, lying about the size and impact of the disasters they cause, and minimizing the degree to which their activities are damaging the Earth, it is an open question as to why anyone could find Mr. Drevna’s assessment convincing. Indeed, it would be more accurate to describe Drevna, along with other petroleum spokespersons, as an “anti-environmental zealot.” California has led the nation for years in the implementation of reality-based environmental policy — a position now threatened by Proposition 23, a thinly-disguised handout to the nation’s largest polluters. Obviously, any initiative heavily bankrolled by the likes of the Koch Brothers isn’t intended to benefit anyone other than the fossil fuel industries and their subsidiaries.
Warren Senders
environment Politics: Ed Markey EPA heroes
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Month 9, Day 16: One Of The Good Guys
Very tired. Looked through lots of newspapers but their coverage was all about the primary elections, with nothing I could link to climate. So I decided to send a fan letter to my Rep.
Dear Representative Markey,
I write to thank you for your ongoing efforts in the vital area of climate change. Two things are becoming more and more obvious. First, the upsurge in unusual and extreme weather all over the world is a consequence of the increased concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere — an increase directly caused by human activity. Second, the Republican Party is now the home of climate-change denialism. For example, an examination of voting records and public statements shows that every single GOP candidate for a Senate seat is a climate-change denier. Every one; no exceptions.
Because of the growing urgency of the problem, this is an exceptionally troublesome development. Never before in our nation’s history has an existential threat of such magnitude been treated with such indifference by so many. It is not, of course, just Republican Senatorial candidates who are “climate zombies;” some Democrats as well have fallen prey to an anti-science mindset that bodes ill for the futures of our nation and the world.
Given that robust legislative action is unlikely to happen in the current political environment (I can only imagine your frustration at watching the Markey-Waxman bill languish without action from the Senate) it is absolutely essential that any effort made to curtail the regulatory power of the Environmental Protection Agency be rejected. The EPA needs as much power as possible if we are to have a hope of accomplishing the needed regulation of greenhouse gases from American industries and consumers.
Please continue your work in this area. Generations to come will thank you for standing up for their right to sustainable lives on a healthy planet.
Yours Sincerely,
Warren Senders
environment Politics: EPA idiots
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Month 9, Day 15: Bastards.
Your Dysfunctional Senate in Action. Another attempt to gut the EPA by cutting off its funding. This just makes my blood absolutely boil. The letter below will be faxed to all Democratic members of the Senate Appropriations Committee.
Dear Senators,
Voting to limit the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency is a profoundly wrong-headed thing to do. In the absence of genuinely robust legislation to address the looming threat of climate change (a threat already made real, for example, to the residents of Pakistan), the EPA is one of the last defenses against climate catastrophe.
The financial and environmental irresponsibility of large energy corporations is obvious to any thinking citizen — as is the fact that these entities are ready to invest staggering sums of money, not in cleaning up after the results of their incompetence, but in maintaining their own freedom to pollute. After BP’s astonishing demonstration of ineptitude and venality, is it really such a good idea to limit the EPA’s regulatory capacity? After observing the unethical and callous behavior of Massey Coal, can we really say with a straight face that the energy sector needs less regulation?
Given that the Senate is highly unlikely to provide the climate bill we need, a stronger EPA is all that’s left to protect this country’s ordinary citizens from the environmental depredations of the world’s largest polluters.
When the matter comes up in committee, please vote against any amendments which would limit the Agency’s scope or cut its funding.
Warren Senders
environment Politics: China
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Month 9, Day 14: Shut ’em Down!
China appears to be getting its shit together. Does this mean that if we are to solve the climate problem, we must abandon the ideals of participatory democracy? It’s beyond me to figure that one out.
After years of being one of the planet’s most environmentally irresponsible nations, China now seems anxious to make up for lost time, reinforcing investment strategies focusing on renewable energy technology with stricter accountability standards for greenhouse gas emissions. Would that America could do likewise. While there are many bugs remaining in the Chinese bureaucratic systems, the fact is that imposing strict limits on emissions is the right thing to do, at all levels from local to global. Economic health requires environmental health; the idea that these two are necessarily in opposition is a profoundly damaging notion. China’s policy-makers seem to be figuring this out, and in the process offering an example to the rest of the world. The United States, alas, is held captive by the denialists in the Republican party, who seem determined that we will be left behind in the worldwide move to reality-based climate and energy policies.
Warren Senders
environment Politics: climate legislation Harry Reid renewable energy standard
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Month 9, Day 12: In Some Parallel Universe, We Got Off Fossil Fuels in 1935.
Well, there are small mutterings that the Senate might try to pass a drastically stripped-down version of climate legislation in the lame duck session post-November. To wit, a Renewable Energy Standard, which would provide specific targets for alternatives to fossil fuels, and encourage them with tax credits.
Sometimes I think that writing to Harry Reid will actually put a jinx on it. Then I remember two things. First: I’m not superstitious. Second: Harry Reid has been wimping out on legislation for far longer than I’ve been writing letters.
Sorry, kids. It’s been fun.
Dear Senator Reid,
Environmentally aware citizens have had a steady diet of disappointment over the course of the past eighteen months. We knew that nothing would happen under a Bush presidency, but we did have hopes that the Obama administration would be able to muster the energy and political momentum to get wide support for meaningful climate legislation. Instead, we have witnessed failures of will from Democrats, exacerbated by failures of conscience and intellect from Republicans.
Now we are simply hoping that a single small crumb remains of what could have been a nourishing meal. What’s left of our aspirations for climate legislation? A Renewable Energy Standard.
Such a standard would be America’s first long-term policy supporting clean energy. Without such a policy, investors cannot plan for the long term; infrastructure cannot be developed; markets cannot be nurtured. When we do finally decide to get serious about climate change, we’re going to need those long-term plans, that infrastructure, those markets.
While we dither, China has left us behind; a recent study confirms that China is now the world leader for clean energy investment — a position that once was ours.
An R.E.S. would trigger investments and create jobs — not just jobs rebuilding older infrastructure, but jobs and opportunities for our country’s workers that will keep growing in the decades to come. We need a clear and unambiguous policy signal from our government: clean and renewable energy is the future of America, and we believe in our country’s future.
Please ensure that a Renewable Energy Standard comes to the floor of the Senate. It’s not what we were hoping for, a year and a half ago. But we’ll take it gladly.
Yours Sincerely,
Warren Senders
environment Politics: Barack Obama Bill McKibben timidity White House
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Month 9, Day 11: Inspiration or Expiration?
An email from Bill McKibben:
Dear friends,
I just walked out of a disappointing meeting with the White House: they refused to accept the Carter solar panel we came to Washington to deliver and said that they would continue their “deliberative process” to discuss putting solar panels back on the White House roof.
My 9/11 letter to POTUS:
Dear President Obama,
I just heard that your staff refused to accept the solar panel that Bill McKibben and his team brought back to the White House after thirty years. Apparently you are going to continue the “deliberative process,” rather than simply saying “yes” to an idea that is obviously a good one — an idea that has broad-based support all over America.
An idea that would motivate thousands of people to get moving and put solar panels on their homes.
An idea that would give a boost to American manufacturers of renewable energy technology — manufacturers who are being left in the dust by China’s advances in this area.
An idea that would demonstrate your genuine commitment to energy independence.
An idea that would help mobilize the nation around the battle against climate change.
Alas, what we get instead is a deliberative process.
A deliberative process that won’t motivate anyone. A deliberative process that does nothing for American manufacturers. A deliberative process that says nothing about energy independence or climate change.
How long will this deliberative process take? Perhaps until after the elections? I have news for you and your team: the Republicans don’t care whether or not you install solar panels; they’re insane, and they’ll pillory you over trivialities regardless.
How hard would it have been to say “yes”?
Yours Regretfully,
Warren Senders
environment: China economics trade policies
by Warren
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Month 9, Day 10: Writing Without Understanding
The NYT ran an article about China’s trade policies and the response of the US Steelworkers’ Union to some of their subsidies. While I tend to glaze over when I read about international economics, this article made a good hook for a letter. If we hadn’t been asleep at the switch, America would be offering to share technology with the Chinese. Instead…
I welcome our coming national move to third-world status.
Questionable trade practices or no, China’s readiness to pick up the slack in renewable energy is an object lesson to American entrepreneurs and politicians. By procrastinating on the restructuring of economic incentives to encourage the development of new sustainable sources of power, we have sacrificed our nation’s role as a technological leader and a worldwide source of innovation. If we are lucky, the next decades will include cooperative programs with China and other countries that have taken the lead in the development of green technology. With an increasing likelihood of catastrophic effects from global climate change in the near future, it is absolutely critical for our long-term species survival that we learn to share technologies and techniques across national boundaries. International cooperation on renewable energy initiatives is the only way we can accomplish the most essential element of a long-term strategy for coping with climate change: global reductions of greenhouse gas emissions.
Warren Senders