Archive for August 6th, 2008
100 months to save the world?
I have a little grand daughter - I want her to have a world. Yet my mind has been sharpened by reading the prediction of the Onehundred months group (http://onehundredmonths.org/) that in just 100 months time, if we are lucky, climate change will reach an irreversible stage. It’s frightening to think how little governments, international organisations, and you and I have internalised this message. The group’s message is clear: the level of carbon dioxide is the highest ever due to human activity, as 1,000 tonnes of CO2 are released into the Earth’s atmosphere every second, yes, second. If we do nothing, the earth’s climate will be shifting into a more volatile state with catastrophic consequences, yet the British are building a third runway in Heathrow and opening a new generation coal-fired power station at Kingsnorth, while the US presidential hopeful Barack Obama is reversing his policy over petrol prices, promising not to reduce American dependence on fosil fuels, but rather on Middle East oil.