Environmental Issues Will Diminish As $$$$ Increase

When environmental issues start hitting people in the pocketbook,when they have to start making individual sacrifices and when they see their world neighbors doing diddly squat you will see voter concern about the environment diminish...maybe not in public but at the ballot box. I don't see the groundswell of support.......

[Star Poll]
Will the latest report on climate change prompt you to make changes in your lifestyle?
Yes 499 49%
No 507 50%


February 3, 2007
EDITORIAL: OK, what's this gonna cost us?

It would be nice if our politicians would listen to what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said yesterday, before giving us their pat little speeches.

Particularly since the IPCC said nothing new. All it did was state more strongly its view, which it has held for more than a decade, that global warming is real and that human activity is causing it.

This time, it said mankind's responsibility for modern global warming is "very likely." In 2001, it said it was "likely." In 1995, it said the influence of humans on global climate was supported by "the balance of evidence."

The more significant conclusion reached by the IPCC -- and it isn't new, either -- is that man-made global warming and its effects on climate will continue for centuries, no matter what we do, because of how long greenhouse gases remain in the atmosphere.

Thus, even as we cut emissions going forward, the Earth's temperature will continue to rise and its effects on our planet in the forms of more violent and unpredictable weather and rising sea levels, will continue to be felt long after we, our children and their children are gone.

This raises the issue no political party has thus far addressed in the midst of all the hysteria about whether Canada can meet its 2012 Kyoto targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. (Short answer -- no.)

What we now need to know from Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Environment Minister John Baird is this: How much more is it going to cost us than it already does for heat, gasoline, electricity and most consumer goods?

As many environmentalists have long pointed out, correctly, price sensitivity is the only way to get people to change their lifestyles quickly and dramatically.

So, how much more is this all going to cost us, prime minister, and don't forget the indirect costs, since higher prices corporations are hit with as part of your efforts to discourage the burning of fossil fuels, will be passed along to consumers eventually.

Finally, since these policies will need to be maintained for decades, even centuries, we need to hear from the Liberals, NDP, Bloc Quebecois and Green Party, their plans for dealing with these issues.

Because until they are addressed, everything else our political leaders have to say about global warming, is just so much hot air.