The global warming debate is shifting from science to economics.I sincerely hope that the WSJ editorial page reads this article.
For years, the fight over the Earth's rising temperature has been mostly over what's causing it: fossil-fuel emissions or natural factors beyond man's control. Now, some of the country's biggest industrial companies are acknowledging that fossil fuels are a major culprit whose emissions should be cut significantly over time.
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The broadening, if incomplete, consensus that fossil fuels are at least a big part of the global-warming problem signals real change in the environmental debate. The biggest question going forward no longer is whether fossil fuel emissions should be curbed. It's who will foot the bill for the cleanup --- and that battle is heating up.
We are now experiencing a tectonic shift in the political landscape on the issue of climate change. The skeptics are disappearing --- both in numbers and in influence. At the same time, the debate is shifting from "should we do something" to "what should we do?"
2 comments:
Hey Andy,
I got pretty depressed listening to the State of the Union last night. Since the White House staff had allowed a little buzz to build that there might be something interesting in Bush's comments. In the end, climate was almost an afterthought in his list of reasons why we should have a very minimal reduction (or maybe just no growth) in gasoline use. However, this morning the Times had a little chart that allowed you to see where in the seven state of the union addresses various words had cropped up. It turned out that this was the first time he'd mentioned "climate" at all. So maybe it's progress. Anyway, it'll be interesting to see if Congress can put together something serious this year, and then, to see if Bush vetos it...
Dan
hi Dan-
I avoid depression by simply accepting that nothing on this problem will happen until 2009. Surprisingly, it does work.
Regards
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