The Jury’s In – Climate Change is Real.

I’ve talked climate change previously and indicated that this Administration is serious about doing something about it (though by the time we sweep to power, it could be too late). The issue though is topical again, in light of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) meeting in Paris last week, Labor’s increasing pressure on our government in this area and the mainstream popularity of Al Gore’s movie ‘An Inconvenient Truth’.

The IPCC confirmed last week that “global warming was a reality, and that the burning of fossil fuels over the past 250 years, together with the destruction of tropical rainforests, was largely to blame for increases in atmospheric temperatures” If emissions of carbon dioxide continue at present rates, the panel says, the result will be rising sea levels, more powerful tropical storms and more intensive droughts in sub-tropical countries. That all sounds both familiar and dire. Such a meeting comes at a time when global warming sceptics are getting inordinate media coverage and high ranking officials help perpetuate the myth that climate change due to CO₂ emissions is a ‘theory’.

Nowhere is this scepticism more evident than in the Liberal government. PM Howard was recently quoted as saying that the "jury was out" when it came to the link between greenhouse emissions and climate change. He later claimed to have been misunderstood, but his lack of leadership on this issue is staggering. New Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull promises to be no better, labelling Labor climate change "fanatics", and continuing to play down its importance. To their credit, Rudd and Labor are directing many of their efforts toward bringing the Government’s ambivalence on environmental issues into the public eye.

If by chance you remain unconvinced, you should look no further for the facts than Al Gore’s feature film, an Inconvenient Truth. It summarises, in a few hours all of the key issues in the Global Warming debate. I won’t even try and do it justice here by giving details but a couple of points jumped out at me and are worth noting:

1)Australia are all too often mentioned as a rogue nation when it comes to the environment. Of the developed nations, only the US and Australia have failed to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. It’s bad for our international image, to say the least.

2)There is no myth of climate change. Some 928 peer reviewed journal articles support the idea that greenhouse emissions are heating the globe and raising sea levels. In contrast over 50% of media coverage suggested there was no definitive link. The media are misleading us, again – don’t be fooled.

3) Protecting the economy is no argument against changing our polluting ways. All the money in the world won’t buy us a new planet. Protecting industries like automobile makers is not only unsustainable but not working. US Auto firms are making record losses, and can’t sell their cars in China, because they don’t meet emission standards in that developing nation. It’s a baseless policy, which is helping neither the environment nor the economy.

Anyway, watch the movie for yourself, its compelling. It made me think that the world would be different, in more way than one if Gore had of won the presidency in 2000. It will leave you in no doubt that our earth is in serious trouble, and we have only a short time to reverse the trends. The Howard government has recently shown a penchant for policy change – corresponding to opinion poll change (all of a sudden they are outraged by David Hick’s imprisonment). So protest long and loudly – the era of the barefoot, tree-hugging greenie is over; and the era of mainstream environmental activism is upon us.