Earth Day 2006

Melting our icy hearts

A conservative approach to global warming

By John Romano
From the April 2006 Print Edition

Fellow conservatives, I have some bad news for you: Global warming is indeed happening. Many of us like to dismiss it as paranoia and exaggeration, which is easy to do when you see outrageous movies like The Day After Tomorrow, or hear Senators John McCain and Hillary Clinton deliver the shocking news that, in the middle of July, ice in Alaska is melting. But, unfortunately, global warming is a real phenomenon.

This is a statement that five or ten years ago could not have been made. Additional research, along with improved methods, has yielded indisputable evidence that, over the last 150 years, the earth has been slowly heating up. What is still unclear at this point is the degree to which this warming period is being caused by humans — specifically by greenhouse gases.

Many scientists believe that natural factors may be at least partially responsible for the temperature increase. For example, it is believed that during the late Middle Ages (1200-1300s) there was what is described as a “little Ice Age,” during which temperatures dropped dramatically. The rise since the 19th century could be nature adjusting to normal.

Another possible explanative is solar output. The amount of energy the sun emits varies over time, as well as being cyclical. Some believe that an increase in solar output has caused at least some of the warming we see now.

And so, a root difficulty is that we don’t know exactly what the cause is. It could be all of these things. It could be none of them.

Greenhouse gases do appear to be an important contributor, but scientists aren’t positive. In the 1980s, a hole grew in the ozone layer. Research at the time indicated that this was due to the use of chlorofluorocarbons, which were used in things like refrigerators and hair spray. CFCs were globally banned and within the next ten years the hole had shrunk.

Success, right? It had been, until recently, when new research indicated that the banning of CFCs was not the main reason the hole was shrinking. New research done by the German science team based out of the German Aerospace Center’s Institut für Physik der Atmosphäre in Wessling, Germany discovered that the shrinkage may be due to a drop in the solar intensity, not the banning of CFCs1. This emphasizes the point that we do not fully understand what occurs in the atmosphere.

Liberals, I have bad news for you, too: Yes, global warming is occurring, but there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.

The biggest policy change suggested by most on the left has been a reduction in the emissions of greenhouse gases. As I just discussed, that may or may not help slow global warming, but it’s likely that it will, so we will assume so. But how much should greenhouse gases be limited? The Kyoto Protocol could actually be a good place to start. The agreement, negotiated in the late 1990s, forces countries to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 5.2 percent of the 1990 levels. So why won’t this work?

The answer is simple: economics. The primary reason the United States never ratified Kyoto is that it would cost entirely too much to enforce it, decimating the United States economy. Even those countries that did ratify it are having problems meeting the standards while maintaining their economies.

But let’s assume that every signatory, including the United States, were able to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. It would not stop the effect of global warming. This is because companies will simply go to a country — like China or India — that does not have the same restrictions that Europe and the United States do, and continue to produce large amounts of greenhouse gases. If China agreed to limit its emissions, then the companies would go to a different country, either one that did not have regulations or one where the regulations could be bypassed.

So the end result is that the United States, Europe, and any country that limits greenhouse gases is economically weakened; China, India, and any country that does not limit greenhouse gases is economically strengthened; and global warming continues.

So what do we do? Research. We cannot hope to stop something we do not fully understand. Continuing research into both the natural and human-induced causes of global warming will give us a better understanding of what exactly the cause is. Further research may also yield ways to mitigate global warming without sacrificing economic sustenance.

Unlike in movies produced in Hollywood, the potentially disastrous effects of global warming will not all occur within a week, but rather over the course of decades, or possibly centuries. Continuing to conduct research, continuing to be open-minded, and continuing to approach the issue reasonably will all help find a solution to this bipartisan, global problem.

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