Who gains from global warming?

Who gains from global warming?

John Jackson The environmental transformations the world is experiencing are more complicated - and in some respects may be more beneficial - than is often understood, says John Jackson.

17 - 12 - 2007

It seems that the climate of our planet is reverting rapidly to that which has persisted for much of the last 300 million years. Average temperatures and sea levels were higher, there were no polar ice-caps and temperature differences between poles and the equator were lower. The rate of this reversion, certainly in so far as it is connected with greenhouse gases, is being accelerated by humans and their activities and to such an extent that their must be a risk of "overshoot" into a situation which is entirely new.

The fossil record gives us some idea of what life (and there was a lot of it) was like at different points in those past warmer times but little idea of what it will be like this time round with the present configuration of continents and oceans and humans - a very recent and significant arrival - continuing to use the planet and its resources in a destructive and predatory way.

The significance of humans is brought out in the United Nations Human Development Report 2007-08, released on 27 November 2007. Put starkly, there are already too many humans on the planet who, in the pursuit of our material aspirations, are putting growing demands on its finite air, land, water and mineral resources. We are doing so in an inefficient and wasteful way. Moreover, even if that problem is addressed by discipline and scientific advance (e.g. via GM technology and nuclear power), it is probable that, if every human being is to have what he or she regards as a fair share of resources to meet reasonable material aspirations, there is simply not enough to go round.

The entirely reasonable attempt by the "have-nots" to catch up with the "haves" and the unwillingness of the "haves" to give up what they have taken (let alone cease demanding more) is what is driving climate change, water shortage, land degradation and diminishing biodiversity. Nobody in their right mind believes that this impetus can be wished away. It will continue. Some of the damage already done is, for all practical purposes, irreversible. Further, it has "knock on" consequences of its own. Like the sorcerer's apprentice we cannot stop what we have started. The broomsticks have lives of their own.

If left unchecked and out of control the combination of all these adverse developments will put at severe risk the survival of human and many other species. And possibly quite quickly. It was not difficult to foresee most of this and there has been much sweeping under political carpets. Even given some present willingness to be honest with ourselves, it is more difficult to see what can be done about it.

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Obs: O Ambiente será a esfera de acção para onde convergem todas as políticas públicas neste séc. XXI. E o mais curioso é que foi Al Goore, um norte-americano, que já foi Vice-Presidente dos EUA, a pressionar o actual establishement a inverter caminho em Bali, na Indonésia. Veremos, doravante, como se comportam as emissões mundiais, não descurando aqui o comportamento da "oficina" e do "escritório" do mundo, a China e a Índia - e ver como compatibilizam medidas ambientais com medidas de crescimento económico. Numa palavra: como se fará a quadratura do círculo neste 1º quartel do séc. XXI em relação às grandes políticas públicas que afectam directamente a qualidade de vida do nosso Planeta Terra.