UK's Prime Minister Tony Blair is expected to soon announce that Great
Britain will reduce their carbon emissions by 60% by the year 2050. Given
that the scourge of industrial capitalism originated in Europe, and Britain in
particular, and threatens to lay waste to the Earth; it is appropriate that the
UK take the lead in addressing the problems they have largely created. As
Blair commits the UK to a low carbon future, the Toxic Texan could give a damn
and is instead focused on World conquest (or at least oil rich areas).
February 2003 Archives
I have said it before and I will say it again - no economy without ecology. The
global ecosystem is the baseline physical reality upon which human
advancements are utterly dependent. Increasingly economists are becoming
aware of the financial risks with exposure to heavily polluting industries that
cause climate change. Rather than developing methods to hedge and protect
themselves, this concern must be channeled into mandatory emission
reductions, investments in energy efficiency and conservation, and a
huge "Manhattan" project for renewable energy.
The times (and climate), they are a changing. And not for the better. Here
is a follow-up article from Nature regarding findings that "drought that gripped
the United States, southern Europe and Southwest Asia between 1998 and 2002
was linked to ocean temperatures in the tropical Pacific and Indian oceans." A
major planetary experiment of unprecedented proportions is occuring as the
human race overruns the Earth's ecological systems. There are ecological
processes and cycles we know little or nothing of - but we require for survival -
that we are impacting and in many cases eliminating.
