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President Obama's climate change speech falls short
I was glad to hear that President Obama was going to take a stand against climate change and announce his administration’s Climate Action Plan for cutting carbon pollution. After all, I had been looking forward to some action on his part since he was elected.
But President Obama’s speech left the citizens of this country – our residents, our farmers, those who support land free of oil spills – just as concerned about the environment as they were, or should have been, previously.
Firstly, the President, or his speech writers, don’t seem to realize that increasing the amount of fracking – the horizontal drilling process through which natural gas is extracted from the Earth below us – will not support a climate plan or support a healthy future for anyone. Personally, however, my worry is that they do realize.
Secondly, President Obama said that the proposed Keystone XL pipeline would only be approved if it “does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution,” falling short of saying the pipeline would be rejected. What does “significantly exacerbate” mean? Those words leave lots of room for energy companies to come in and argue for over-running some of America’s most beautiful lands so they can transport oil from Canada to Texas for export to China.
It is true that if you compare the daily emissions from coal and natural gas humans already breathe worldwide, the emissions the pipeline would generate are estimated to be less than half of 1% of that.
But the pipeline would transport up to 35 million gallons of oil a day into the U.S. from Canada’s tar sands — one of the dirtiest energy sources in the world. It would not decrease U.S. dependence on fossil fuels and, according to the Center for Biological Diversity it would threaten at least 20 imperiled species (from the whooping crane to the pallid sturgeon), pristine wildlife habitat and a massive Midwest water source.
Those who claim the pipeline would create tons of jobs, the State Department says the project would actually result in just an estimated 20 permanent, operational jobs in the United States and 2,500 to 4,650 temporary jobs. While, as Christopher Helman argued in Forbes Magazine, no one can say that the Keystone pipeline would “significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution’ worldwide,” I have to wonder, as I hope my fellow citizens must, does this mean this pipeline project will be approved?
Christopher Zurcher
New Haven
Christopher Zurcher is editor & publisher of CT Environmental Headlines.
But President Obama’s speech left the citizens of this country – our residents, our farmers, those who support land free of oil spills – just as concerned about the environment as they were, or should have been, previously.
Firstly, the President, or his speech writers, don’t seem to realize that increasing the amount of fracking – the horizontal drilling process through which natural gas is extracted from the Earth below us – will not support a climate plan or support a healthy future for anyone. Personally, however, my worry is that they do realize.
Secondly, President Obama said that the proposed Keystone XL pipeline would only be approved if it “does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution,” falling short of saying the pipeline would be rejected. What does “significantly exacerbate” mean? Those words leave lots of room for energy companies to come in and argue for over-running some of America’s most beautiful lands so they can transport oil from Canada to Texas for export to China.
It is true that if you compare the daily emissions from coal and natural gas humans already breathe worldwide, the emissions the pipeline would generate are estimated to be less than half of 1% of that.
But the pipeline would transport up to 35 million gallons of oil a day into the U.S. from Canada’s tar sands — one of the dirtiest energy sources in the world. It would not decrease U.S. dependence on fossil fuels and, according to the Center for Biological Diversity it would threaten at least 20 imperiled species (from the whooping crane to the pallid sturgeon), pristine wildlife habitat and a massive Midwest water source.
Those who claim the pipeline would create tons of jobs, the State Department says the project would actually result in just an estimated 20 permanent, operational jobs in the United States and 2,500 to 4,650 temporary jobs. While, as Christopher Helman argued in Forbes Magazine, no one can say that the Keystone pipeline would “significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution’ worldwide,” I have to wonder, as I hope my fellow citizens must, does this mean this pipeline project will be approved?
Christopher Zurcher
New Haven
Christopher Zurcher is editor & publisher of CT Environmental Headlines.
posted by Matt DeRienzo at
7:40 AM
1 Comments:
Get a grip! Forests have doubled in size in the last 100 years. Walk in any forest in Ct and you'll see stone walls that used to be farms. We feed twice as many people on 1/2 the land as 50 years ago. The air is pristine even compared to the country before Columbus because the Indians burned many of the forests. Animals have been going extinct forever but now many are being saved ,tigers are not endangered in America. Oil, natural gas, and coal put precious life giving CO2 into the air. Fossil fuels ,which are in abundance, take up less of the earth surface then "alternatives". Wind uses 300 sq miles to replace one 1000mw coal plant while chopping up birds not to mention how much land is consumed by bio-fuels. Global warming is s fraud and every day science is proving it. If you want a good environment get rid of environmentalists. Have a great 4th of July the world is not coming to an end it's getting better.
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