HEALTH OF
THE PLANET
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HEALTH OF THE PLANET
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The Kyoto protocol calls for all countries to reduce their CO2 emissions to 95% OF THEIR 1990 LEVELS. Today's rate shows an increse of 20% rather than a reduction of 5%.
By
now, everyone living in a developed country has heard about pollution,
global warming, the ozone hole, deforestation, diminishing fossil
resources, the disappearance of species of plants and animals,
overpopulation, breathing allergies and other self inflicted calamities. It
is only too obvious that our industrial civilisation has had a dramatic
impact on the environment. E.F. Shumacher, in the 1960s, already pointed
out the imbalance of our economic system and the lack of wisdom that led
to burn huge quantities of fossil energy (called assets in accounting
terms) to sustain our self created needs. Today,
we are aware that we are well into the process of self-destroying our
civilisation. As more and more countries join the industrial world, they
too join this process and the phenomenon reached exponential proportions
since the 1970s. With over 6 billions inhabitants today, the Earth cannot
take it any more. The
threats faced by our planet are: overpopulation, the increase of
greenhouse effect gases, water pollution, dramatic climatic changes that
will have a huge impact on the economy, the destruction of primary
environment, fauna and flora and the increasing presence of man made
chemicals that are not biodegradable.
The
1750 level of CO2 was 270ppm. Today’s
level is 360ppm. Scientists expect the level to reach 500ppm before any
hope of stabilisation. Such
a level would increase the planet’s average temperature by 2 degreesC,
with local extremes of 4 to 5 degreesC. This would also mean a rise of the
level of the oceans of 0.50 metre and more frequent extreme weather
phenomenon. Limiting
the CO2 increase to 500ppm would mean a production level of 4T per person
on the planet. Today, an American (USA) generates 20T, a Western European
6T, a Chinese 2.6T and a central-African 0.2T. The
huge gap between the USA and Europe shows a much higher energy efficiency
level in the EU since both have similar levels of development. There are
no short term hopes since Mr Bush junior, president of the USA, has
clearly showed he was in favour of short term financial profit rather than
taking appropriate action to safeguard our future.
Solutions
include generating clean energy using solar and wind power, biomass and
other clean solutions. Natural gas, although cleaner, is not a solution
since it is a fossil fuel and generates CO2. Nuclear power proved to be
extremely expensive, dangerous (remember Chernobyl and Three Miles Island)
and creates more problems than it solves (long life waste, disused plants,
very low efficiency). Solar
PV generation has the advantages of being flexible, independent, clean,
reliable and long lasting. Since building can be self-powered, it reduces
the need for ugly and expensive power lines across most countries and lets
people in control of their energy needs. Together
with energy efficient solutions (low power lighting, better appliances and
a reduction in energy wastage) and windpower, PV is the answer for the
21st century. |