Gobar Times Magazine (Environment for Kids Monthly) - Centre for Science and Environment

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C O V E R S T O R Y

GLACIERS & GLOBAL WARMING

Leftovers from Ice Age

GHGs…what’s the source?

All this sounds pretty familiar, right? Even though we have been talking in the future tense, the world already seems to be in the throes of this catastrophe!

Are we prepared to deal with this crisis? Have we, the global community, taken some steps already? But before we take stock of that, lets find out a little more about the main culprits—the greenhouse gases.

climate change GHGs are produced by carbon-based ‘fossil’ fuels like coal, gas and oil. And as we all know, these are the fuels which run factories, cars and power stations around the world. In other words, they drive the economy of every country in this planet!

Scientists trace the phenomenon of glacial retreat to the Industrial Revolution, which began around 1760. Before the industrial era (1750-1800) the CO₂ concentration in the Earth’s atmosphere was 280 ppm (parts per million) and today it is around 375 ppm. Add to this the presence of the other GHGs and you can begin to gauge how explosive the situation really is.

Warm terms

Kyoto Protocol – A rulebook signed and adopted under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 1997 in the CoP in Kyoto, Japan. It laid down a timetable for industrialised countries to reduce their GHG emissions.

The UNFCCC is a global effort to combat global warming and the Conference of Parties (CoP) comes under this institution; it consists of 150 member countries that have ratified or approved the convention. For details, log on to www.gobartimes.org and refer November 2002 issue.

The belching rich
Also, the richer a country, the more it emits. Because, the use of fossil fuels is, unfortunately, closely linked with economic growth and lifestyle. As a nation grows more prosperous, its consumption of fuel — for transport, power generation and various other so-called ‘necessities’ of life — zooms up, too.

So, in today’s world, any limit on carbon emissions amounts to a limit on economic growth. No wonder the ongoing interna-tional negotiations under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change ( UNFCCC) see box on Warm Terms) — aimed at cutting down GHG emissions — have turned into a tug of war between the developed (read rich) and the developing nations (ranging from middle-class to poor). While the rich are unwilling to tone down their lifestyle, countries in the opposite camp refuse to take on emission cut at their current stage of development.

But most importantly,
We, that is, the entire global community, must no longer allow carbon-based fuels—petrol, diesel, coal—to drive our lives. Research, policy-making, business deals—all must be done with only one aim in mind: reinventing the world’s energy system. To cut down emissions and to focus on renewable sources. It is really a matter of life and death. Not only for the mighty glaciers but for the tiniest organism that lives in this planet.

Developing countries like India, are demanding their space to ‘grow’. Asking them to reduce carbon emissions now, amounts to asking them to freeze their standards of living as they stand today. This, in fact, amounts to freezing global inequality. Because, in that case, some countries will always be more developed than the rest. Why should they accept that?, Especially since the Unites States — the largest emitter of them all — still refuses to make a firm commitment to cut its use of carbon-based fuels.

So the stalemate continues. But the heat is on. Not only on the glaciers, but on every living organism in this planet. What can be the way out of this carbonmess?

The richer nations must take more responsibility, and cut down carbon use drastically. Because in a way, global warming is their creation. Every human being in this planet has an equal right to atmosphere, and the people in these countries have used more than their share of absorptive capacity. Just sample this. In early 1990s (when the world community first began to pay heed to the alarm signals) the GHG emission of one US citizen was equal to 19 Indians, 30 Pakistanis, 17 Maldivians and 107 Bangladeshis!

Since the Earth’s cleansing capacity belongs to every human being on Earth, the carbon sinks must be divided among them equally. So the ‘sinks’, specially the oceans, which do not belong to any particular country, but are ‘common property of mankind’ should be apportioned on the basis of the country’s share of population. This would encourage the developing countries to cut emissions too, but on their own terms...

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