Snowshoeing across the hills by my house last week, I pondered global warming once again. So much snow has been a rarity over the last decade. Was this just an aberration of a rapidly warming global climate or a sign that things might be returning to “normal”?
Two recent stories came to mind. One was about the huge Arctic ice shelf that broke away from Ellesmere Island in the Canadian Arctic, alarming climate scientists. The other was an interview with a British skeptic who insists rising temperatures are part of just another climate cycle and no cause for worry.
It made me wonder how we would react if we knew we were experiencing a mere weather cycle, not the dramatic change most scientists fear. Should we act on the ecological problems facing us regardless of whether or not they result from climate change? Can we reach some consensus about how we should treat our environment, no matter what we believe about warming?
For example, auto emissions are clear culprits in ozone depletion and increased greenhouse gases. But our dependence on the automobile damages us in other ways. It requires us to rely on countries we don’t trust, and who often don’t like us, for a major strategic resource essential to our economy and our lives.
Even if global warming doesn’t alarm you, our vulnerability to often-hostile countries should. That concern argues for cutting our foreign oil consumption through conservation, development of alternative fuels and energy sources and investing in research to create new technologies that put our future back in our own hands.
Traffic congestion is another negative effect of relying on oil-dependent cars. The “extreme commute” is all too common, not so much because of the distance between home and job but because the huge volume of cars on the road. Believe in climate change or not, reducing the number of cars on our highways by investing in public transit will improve our lives, and reduce emissions into the atmosphere.
Here in Colorado, the pine beetle is destroying vast areas of forest. Extreme cold, such as we used to experience in winter, kills beetle larvae. With the warmer winters of the last decade, summer beetle hatches are more frequent, greatly increasing the volume of insects attacking trees. Even those who don’t believe in global warming are worried about the rapidly advancing beetle devastation.
Whether this is just a weather cycle or a permanent climate change, the voracious beetle is damaging to Colorado. Millions of acres of dead pine trees can fuel huge forest fires, destroying homes and wildlife habitat, hunting and fishing, hiking and forestry, all key to our economy. Finding solutions to this scourge matters to all of us. If changing our habits slows the pace of warming and the beetles’ reproductive cycle, we all benefit, whatever our beliefs.
As we move into 2007, with many threats to our way of life, it makes sense to focus on how we solve problems we all recognize, whatever we believe the cause to be. Strategies such as energy conservation, research into alternative energy sources, public transit and telecommuting solve vexing problems and reduce greenhouse gases.
For example, Brazil has become energy self-sufficient by building its bio-fuel technology and capacity. Figuring out how to turn cooking oil and agricultural products into bio-fuels efficiently will reduce our own dependence on foreign oil, eliminate waste and create jobs. We should all be able to commit to this.
While it’s important to understand the reasons for threats and calamities, it’s equally important to focus on solving those problems rather than just arguing about their causes. Most of us can agree that many problems resulting from weather change, whether natural or human- made, require immediate action. We can’t afford to fight and wait.
Gail Schoettler (gailschoettler@ email.msn.com) is a former U.S. ambassador, Colorado lieutenant governor and treasurer, Democratic nominee for governor and Douglas County school board member.
