Buone notizie sul fronte globale - gz
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By: GZ on Giovedì 08 Dicembre 2005 14:05
Mentre in Italia siamo bloccati un poco dappertutto a cominciare dalla Val di Susa (non solo niente alta velocità, ma anche autostrade bloccate mentre i verdi francesi di la dal confine dicono:" ...ma volete il traffico dei camion per sempre ? noi abbiamo qui l'alta velocità e siamo contenti..") per fortuna nel resto del mondo le cose non vanno così male.
Ad esempio a Montreal alla mega conferenza sul riscaldamento globale ^si è di fatto abbandonato Kyoto#http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/04/weekinreview/04revkin.html^ come spiega il NY Times perchè si è dovuto prendere atto che negli ultimi anni Sudamerica, Asia e dozzine di paesi emergenti consumano energia a più non posso
Ad esempio in tutti i paesi del medio oriente in molti paesi asiatici la benzina è sovvenzionata dal governo (da noi c'è all'opposto un 75% di tasse) per cui costa solo qualche centesimo di euro al litro. C'era ieri la notizia che Teheran è chiusa per due giorni, nessuno va a lavorare, perchè con la benzina che non costa niente e nessuna misura sulle marmitte lo smog sta uccidendo la gente. E gli iraniani sono 60 milioni di persone con un reddito da petrolio crescente.
In Indonesia il governo ha un deficit statale fuori controllo e sta per fare crac perchè sovvenziona il prezzo della benzina che in pratica è gratis. In Cina pure il governo paga lui in modo che tutti consumino di più... Figurarsi poi mettersi a mettere restrizioni, tutta l'Asia SOVVENZIONA IL CONSUMO DI ENERGIA del pubblico...
L'Italia, paese masochista, nazione simpatica ma in declino economico, si è assunta l'impegno IN PROPORZIONE MAGGIORE DEL MONDO di taglio di emissioni (più di qualunque paese europeo e dato che sono solo gli europei ad applicare Kyoto di conseguenza siamo i primi nel mondo!). Ma mezza Thailandia o un paio di provincie cinesi bastano a compensare i sacrifici imposti alla nostra industria.
Bene, la storia è che a Montreal si è preso atto di tutto questo, che Kyoto non ha senso, un mega accordo mondiale che danneggia gran parte dell'industria occidentale in declino che, anche quando venisse applicato da tutto l'OCSE, taglierebbe percentuali minime di emissioni mentre il resto del mondo fa esplodere il consumo
(senza contare che negli ultimi 100 anni il clima si è riscaldato di uno 0.6 di grado, mezzo grado, ma lascio perdere su questo tasto...)
Si è ripiegato su un approccio di accordi bilaterali o tra gruppi di paesi con legami e interessi comuni e sviluppo di nuove tecnologie che suona molto simile a quello ^proposto dagli Stati Uniti#http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asia_Pacific_Partnership_on_Clean_Development_and_Climate^
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On Climate Change, a Change of Thinking
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
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Today, in the middle of new global warming talks in Montreal, there is a sense that the whole idea of global agreements to cut greenhouse gases won't work.
A major reason the optimism over Kyoto has eroded so rapidly is that its major requirement - that 38 participating industrialized countries cut their greenhouse emissions below 1990 levels by the year 2012 - was seen as just a first step toward increasingly aggressive cuts.
But in the years after the protocol was announced, developing countries, including the fast-growing giants China and India, have held firm on their insistence that they would accept no emissions cuts, even though they are likely to be the world's dominant source of greenhouse gases in coming years.
Their refusal helped fuel strong opposition to the treaty in the United States Senate and its eventual rejection by President Bush.
But the current stalemate is not just because of the inadequacies of the protocol. It is also a response to the world's ballooning energy appetite, which, largely because of economic growth in China, has exceeded almost everyone's expectations. And there are still no viable alternatives to fossil fuels, the main source of greenhouse gases.
Then, too, there is a growing recognition of the economic costs incurred by signing on to the Kyoto Protocol.
As Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, a proponent of emissions targets, said in a statement on Nov. 1: "The blunt truth about the politics of climate change is that no country will want to sacrifice its economy in order to meet this challenge."
This is as true, in different ways, in developed nations with high unemployment, like Germany and France, as it is in Russia, which said last week that it may have spot energy shortages this winter.
Some veterans of climate diplomacy and science now say that perhaps the entire architecture of the climate treaty process might be flawed.
The basic template came out of the first international pact intended to protect the atmosphere, the 1987 Montreal Protocol for eliminating chemicals that harmed the ozone layer, said Richard A. Benedick, the Reagan administration's chief representative in the talks leading to that agreement.
That agreement was a success, but a misleading one in the context of climate. It led, Mr. Benedick now says, to "years wasted in these annual shindigs designed to generate sound bites instead of sober contemplation of difficult issues."
While it was relatively easy to phase out ozone-harming chemicals, called chlorofluorocarbons, which were made by a handful of companies in a few countries, taking on carbon dioxide, the main climate threat, was a completely different matter, he said.
Carbon dioxide is generated by activities as varied as surfing the Web, driving a car, burning wood or flying to Montreal. Its production is woven into the fabric of an industrial society, and, for now, economic growth is inconceivable without it.
Developing countries - China and India being only the most dramatic examples - want to burn whatever energy they need, in whatever form available, to grow their economies and raise the living standard of their people.
And the United States - by far the world's largest producer of greenhouse gases - continues to say that emissions targets or requirements would stunt economic growth in both rich and poor nations. All this has turned the Montreal meeting, many participants have conceded, into, at best, a preliminary meeting on how to start over in addressing the threat of global warming.
Indeed, from here on, progress on climate is less likely to come from megaconferences like the one in Montreal and more likely from focused initiatives by clusters of countries with common interests, said Mr. Benedick, who is now a consultant and president of the National Council on Science and the Environment, a private group promoting science-based environmental policies.