Climate change; a little less conversation please.

For all of the concern about climate change, bad examples continue to be set by those who say change is necessary.

Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne just held a Pan-American summit on climate change in Toronto.  Prime Minister Couillard of Quebec was there, along with Governor Jerry Brown of California.  The three leaders have entered their respective jurisdictions into a carbon cap and trade program with each other over the past year.  Governor Brown is extremely aware of the effects of climate change, having served twice as governor of a state known for smog and more recently, serious drought.  Former US Vice President and former almost President turned climate change activist Al Gore was there too.  Not surprisingly, nobody from Canada’s Conservative government showed up.  They are too busy trying to deny things like climate change and economic recessions.

Climate change exists.  The facts are with us every day in weather, news, and academic reports to prove it.  The causes can of course be left for debate, but the scientific community has largely concluded so called greenhouse gases from air pollution caused by the burning of fossil fuels, whether it’s to fuel a car or fire the furnaces of a steel mill is the big contributor.  Measures have to be taken by citizens, governments, but most importantly corporations to be better prepared for the effects of climate change, but to also significantly reduce or outright eliminate sources of greenhouse gas pollution. 

However, when a group of politicians and activists gets together to talk about climate change, it annoys me.  In fact, it really annoys me when any group of experts, be they self-proclaimed or have earned the title, get together and talk about any issue with the only result being lofty, broad, sweeping generalizations that end up as 10 second clips on the news.  All I have heard from the event in Toronto is the “need to do more,” “governments must act,” and with all of the invariable clichés such as; “we owe this to our children,” “and at the end of the day…,” and “green economy.”  Why did thousands of dollars have to be spent to assemble these people in a hotel meeting room to establish the fact there is a problem and something needs to be done about it?  Think of how much pollution from fossil fuels was released into the atmosphere because of airplanes, trains, buses, and automobiles used to transport attendees to and from Toronto.  The sustainable approach would have been to make use of the great methods of electronic communication we have in our time and hold the discussion that way.  It would have been much less exciting, but it would have achieved the same results.  The real action on climate change needs to come at the local level from citizens.  Even more though, it needs to come from the corporations involved in industries responsible for much of the greenhouse gases.  Summits, conferences, symposia, and workshops are mostly talk.  Talk is cheap and easy.  Real action speaks much more loudly.