The U.S. Joins the Fight Against Global Warming
The United States has Promised to Reform Climate Change Policies
Dec 13, 2008
President-elect Barack Obama promised in November of this year that the world could expect to see the U.S make solid contributions to reducing global greenhouse gas output at the recent UN climate summit. It looks as if this promise has been kept as Senator John Kerry (head of Obama's Senate Foreign Relations Committee) has stated that the world can not only expect to see the U.S. participate in regulating CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions under President Obama but in fact lead the world in the issue.
Previous U.S. Stance on Climate Change
The United States has long been criticized for its inactivity in relation to climate change issues and it has become an area of American politics long neglected. Under the Bush administration of the last 8 years the economy has taken precedent over the environment and as a result very little has been done to curb the nations current large output. Not only this but the U.S. has seemingly taken a back role to others on the issues by refusing to sign such environmental treaties as the Kyoto Protocol. This treaty was developed in 1992 at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro and to this day only the U.S has not ratified the agreement of the world's largest industrialized nations. The Bush administration has also stated that under no circumstance would it ratify the agreement as it stands predominantly due to the exemption of China (the world's current largest gross emitter of CO2) and the cost to the economy.
The U.S. currently emits approximately 183 metric tonnes per million dollars of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of greenhouse gases each year (2002 US Environment Protection Agency estimate), the highest per capita ratio of any country on Earth. This equates to approximately 7.2 billion metric tons of greenhouse gases emitted per year and yet very little was being done to reduce this figure.
The Obama Goals for Climate Change Reforms
During the Obama campaign in the parliamentary elections his cabinet created a number of goals to be achieved once the president-elect Obama took the presidency. These include creating 5 million green collar jobs (positions in energy efficient industries), increase the percentage of American energy coming from renewable resources to 10% by 2012 and 25% by 2025, put 1 million hybrid cars on American roads and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050. In order to achieve this the government plans to invest in excess of $150 billion in various sectors.
Achieving these Goals through the Global Economic Crisis
In order to achieve these goals the government will need to spend billions of dollars and in a time of global economic crisis many are speculating how this can be achieved. The Obama government maintains that the solution to both the economic crisis and climate change can be found by investing in energy efficient industries which will not only provide renewable sources of energy but provide millions of jobs. They also believe that the injection of this money into the economy will serve to stimulate America's ailing economy and help reduce the current huge debt.
Whether or not the many promises the Obama cabinet has made in relation to climate change are feasible or will be achieved remains to be seen. However, it is certainly positive that the world's largest economy is finally joining the fight to steer Earth towards an energy efficient future.
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