Cool Planet

By Steve Erario,
Climate Fellow
Clean Air-Cool Planet

 
 
 

Steve Erario, is a Clean Air-Cool Planet Climate Fellow working with Greater Portland Council of Governments and CA-CP staff and to help produce a Maine Energy Efficiency and Climate Change Handbook for communities. A graduate in the Environmental Policy major at Colby College in Waterville, Maine, he has worked to study and improve sustainability in local Maine governments, notably leading to the creation of the Sustain Mid-Maine Coalition. Recently he helped design and write a grant that won $170,000 for an initiative to reduce energy costs in homes and apartments in Waterville and Winslow, Maine.   

I was flying to Sydney in 2008 when the ‘Aussie’ next to me shared a story I’ll never forget.  As he told it, a man in Sydney had just been murdered while watering his lawn with a garden hose during a period of tight water restrictions.

My new buddy continued that the murder didn’t come as a surprise to him.  In his country, tempers often flared between neighbors over water use.  People were so highly emotional because their lifestyles and livelihoods were directly impacted by long-term water scarcity. 

It turns out that Aussies trying to understand the long and unusual lack of rain found their answer in climate change.  In fact, some argue that the previous two Prime Minister elections were decided by voters upset with incumbents’ disbelief in climate change and failure to act seriously enough.

Fast forward time and rewind progress to the US, where 41% of Americans currently think global warming claims are ‘exaggerated’—a larger percentage of the public than any time since polling started.  In this country, it seems, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change science and Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth haven’t done the trick.

First, we can realize that just as Australians relate to droughts, Americans can relate to energy on a very personal level.  Our dependence on fossil fuel energy affects you and me in emotionally provoking ways: it funds al Qaeda terrorism, worsens asthma symptoms for poor little Jimmy, dampens our job markets, and creates devastating oil spills. 

Second, we can see that, in Australia and other countries, climate change is already causing serious and prolonged impacts.  It’s like we’re watching a movie preview telling of climate change impacts to come.  Unless we want to face the gruesome Rated R consequences, emissions need to be reduced NOW and AGGRESSIVELY.  But given the loud chorus of climate change science denialists, Americans’ beliefs likely won’t change quickly enough.

Let’s learn our lessons from the Australians and turn the sad fact that fossil fuel generates 80% of US climate-changing emissions to our advantage.  We need to immediately separate powerful energy issues from misunderstood climate issues in national policy debates.  By doing so, we’ll gain the full support of Americans for immediate and aggressive energy efficiency and renewable energy policy.  This energy policy will have a greater and more immediate impact than a weak or delayed climate policy.

As time passes, we will eventually all clearly see the truth in climate science playing out in everyday life.  And, by the time we get there, we’ll already be on our way to addressing the problem—without even mentioning a word.

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This entry was posted on July 16, 2010 at 2:38 pm and is filed under Advocacy, BP, Carbon Management, Climate Change Skeptics, Climate Science, Energy Efficiency, environment, fossil fuels, Global Warming, government planning, Gulf Coast, oil spill, Policy, Research and Development, sustainability. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments.

Tags: Aussie, Australia, clean air-cool planet, Climate action, climate change, climate fellows, climate policy, drought, Energy Efficiency, environmentalism, farming, fossil fuels, Fuel Efficiency, global warming, global warming skeptics, IPCC, job market, national policy, oil, oil spill, rain, sustainability, Sydney, water scarcity

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