Saturday, November 15, 2008

Climate Wars

In a bit of coincidence, I happened to find Gwynne Dyer's book Climate Wars in the library a few days ago. The coincidence is finding this book and the recent issue about carbon taxes that I discussed in a recent post as well as the election of a US President who just might reverse 8 years of climate change denial and put America on the road to action in dealing with this impending crisis.

Gwynne Dyer is a well-known author and journalist with a long experience in world events who is now turning his writing skills on the growing climate change crisis. In a series of hypothetical scenarios set some decades into the future, various outcomes for us and our world are examined, based on the science as we know it now and as we think it will be at that future time.

The book was only just finished, containing many interviews with noted scientists and policy-makers done only a few months ago.

It's a pretty compelling story as it sets out the situation we find ourselves in and what our (increasingly limited) options are.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

While I agree that Obama will likely be more willing to enact some kind of cap and trade scheme for CO2 (or tax, which is what I prefer, but is politically impossible even though it essentially makes no difference to consumers), the thinking that it was just Bush who kept the US from taking action is a common mistake. The Senate (Democrat-controlled at the time, IIRC) voted 99-0 against signing the Kyoto protocol. Will all those Dems be willing to vote for it now?

Mtn Goat said...

True enough. I'm just concerned that the "leader", supposedly the one with the vision, the person who should be articulating what's important, has insisted in being in climate change denial, much as Regan did with acid rain (he suggested that acid rain was caused by pigeon poop). Politics is enough of a problem without ignoring the science that's available.

Anonymous said...

Agreed. I'll believe Obama is different when I have some evidence, though, besides a whole lot of hype and high expectations.