Hyperbole, 4tl. You think the Economy will hard by Action, wait and see how it's hurt by Inaction.
Originally posted by: Genx87
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: Genx87
Originally posted by: sandorski
It is an answer, in fact, it is The Answer. Sorry.
Take it to the masses and watchout how fast your answer is deemed wrong.
Not "Wrong". Perhaps "Rejected", but that's an entirely different thing.
I am afriad when you want industrialized countries to gut their economies over a man made crisis you are in the wrong. How many people will die from losing their air conditioners alone each year so you can let China and India consume the rest of our manufacturing base? I'd also like to know how we are going to feed ourselves with Farms required to cut output by 80%. Farms are very energy intensive.
You are wrong. It is achievable if you want it enough. We can reduce emissions by 99% within one year if we all just eat bullets (1% cover decaying corpses) and for the future of the planet I beg that we all must do this. Only problem then being who will pay the poor countries for their other distresses.Originally posted by: Genx87
With a goal of each nation reducing its emissions by 80%
I knew a lot of these people were out to lunch. But a reduction by 80%? They arent even trying to appear to based in reality anymore.
So how does chance make me responsible for someone else's illness. Oh right, it doesn't.Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: Praxis1452
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: Nebor
Originally posted by: sandorski
It is an answer, in fact, it is The Answer. Sorry.
Ha, dream on. No one will go for this. Looks like we'll be choosing the "wrong answer." Freakin' hippies.
Then they are Fail. Personal Responsibility is not just a Slogan.
Funny how quickly you reject personal responsibility when it comes to healthcare. It needs to be supplied to everyone because not everyone has the ability to afford it. Many times it's the choices that people make that causes to be unable to afford it, but of course they need to have it anyway. lol
Utter Fail. Choice is only part of what makes one Healthy. Even people who make all the best Choices will get Sick, get a nasty Disease, and simply require Healthcare.
USA won't participate. We already have a domestic energy scheme set up that is poised to make the power players very rich. They aren't willing to share.Originally posted by: yllus
For us in Canada, a net exporter of energy to the world, abiding by the Kyoto Protocol would have been a qualified financial disaster. The followup to Kyoto, the Copenhagen Treaty, appears (via its circulated early drafts) to be even worse.
The shortlist on how Copenhagen screws us:
- With a goal of each G8 nation reducing its emissions by at least 80%, Copenhagen rewards nations that currently have less efficient infrastructure and punishes those who have already modernized. We here will have a far more difficult time upgrading our industry than those countries with infrastructure already due for repair.
- We pay the world for the honour of letting them buy our energy: From the treaty directly, "industrialized countries are to commit 'at least 0.7%' of their annual GDP, above and beyond existing foreign aid commitments, to compensate the developing world for lost dignity and other distress." And what happens if other nations increase their oil consumption? We, the energy source, pay the resultant emissions fees, not the consumer.
- The U.N. gets to set our environmental policy: "Paragraph 200, Annex 3b, for example, requires signatories to submit to the UN their plans to reduce emissions, which 'shall be reviewed as part of the annual compilation and accounting of emission inventories and assigned amount.'"
- We can kiss free and fair international trade goodbye: "So, although China might impose duties on any Canadian steel it imports, if it can show we have fallen short on carbon dioxide reductions, Canada could not do the same to Chinese concrete imports."
- The method in which this treaty addresses helping the planet is by forcing the cost of oil and other energy sources to skyrocket; as it's not very likely that Canada or other oil producers are about to take these new fees and just swallow them, everybody's bill is going up.
Climate 'debt' comes due
On "Climate Reparations"
The Kyoto Protocol -- which expires in 2012, and which Copenhagen is intended to replace -- was in some corners accused of being a covert wealth-transfer plot, since it required rich nations, unable to reach difficult targets, to buy carbon indulgences from poorer ones. "A socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations" was Stephen Harper's assessment, long before he became Prime Minister.
With Copenhagen, however, there is no hidden agenda: Its authors say transferring wealth is exactly what they aim to do. Though its draft form is a menu of optional language and policies intended to be narrowed in the lead-up to the conference, and at the conference itself, the spirit of the document is unmistakable.
It proposes in plain language an arrangement that will see nations such as Canada guarantee to send billions of dollars every year for decades to the developing world as payment of a "climate debt" owed for our long history of emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
There is, of course, some talk of emission-reduction targets, maximum carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere, limiting global temperature increases, and plans to adapt to inevitable climate shifts, with most of the details remaining to be hammered out. But as much as anything else, the Copenhagen treaty calls for the payment by rich countries of what can probably best be described as climate reparations.
These are some of the understandings proposed in the treaty's current working version: Industrialized countries should compensate developing nations for not just the cost of preventing and adapting to climate change, but for "lost opportunities, resources, lives, land and dignity" triggered by it; industrialized countries are to commit "at least 0.7%" of their annual GDP, above and beyond existing foreign aid commitments, to compensate the developing world for lost dignity and other distress; and that the money will be deliverable to the United Nations, which will be in charge of handing it all out.
"By 2020," the treaty insists "the scale of financial flows to support adaptation in developing countries must be [either] at least US$67-billion [or] in the range of US$70-to US$140-billion" every year. And in the end, because it may only shift carbon-intensive production from cleaner countries to less-efficient ones, the entire exercise may do very little to limit emissions.
On A Loss Of National Sovereignty
Copenhagen entrusts these billions [in climate reparations] to the management of the United Nations. Paragraph 200, Annex 3b, for example, requires signatories to submit to the UN their plans to reduce emissions, which "shall be reviewed as part of the annual compilation and accounting of emission inventories and assigned amount," suggesting that if the UN doesn't like a certain country's plan to cut greenhouse gases (GHGs), it has the power to deny assigned emission allowances until it sees a plan it does -- potentially, he says, leaving countries without full control of their own environmental policy.
On Encouraging Unfair World Trade
It gets trickier: Under the proposed treaty, developing countries -- which would include such Canadian trade competitors as China, South Korea, India, Brazil and Mexico -- are under far looser obligations to reduce emissions than wealthier nations like Canada; they are, after all, generally less equipped to modernize their infrastructure.
But under Copenhagen's paragraph 23, Annex 1, and paragraph 7, Annex 3e, no nation is permitted to impose "any form of unilateral measures including countervailing border measures, against goods and services imported from developing countries on grounds of protection and stabilization of the climate."
So, although China might impose duties on any Canadian steel it imports, if it can show we have fallen short on carbon dioxide reductions, Canada could not do the same to Chinese concrete imports. And while World Trade Organization rules prohibit any foreign government from slapping tariffs on Canadian exports on the excuse that we refused to sign Copenhagen, if we do sign it, and then don't live up to our promises, it could well be legal for our trading partners -- even our NAFTA partners -- to claim that our failure to live up to emission-reduction targets gives us an advantage, permitting them to put barriers up to our goods.
How in the hell are we (G8 nations) supposed to cut emissions by 80% without disposing of the remainder of our non-service industries and vehicles?With a goal of each G8 nation reducing its emissions by at least 80%
Originally posted by: TheSkinsFan
WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT!? Redistribution of wealth on a global scale based on feelings? Oh helllll no... :|"industrialized countries are to commit 'at least 0.7%' of their annual GDP, above and beyond existing foreign aid commitments, to compensate the developing world for lost dignity and other distress."
Originally posted by: Praxis1452
So how does chance make me responsible for someone else's illness. Oh right, it doesn't.Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: Praxis1452
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: Nebor
Originally posted by: sandorski
It is an answer, in fact, it is The Answer. Sorry.
Ha, dream on. No one will go for this. Looks like we'll be choosing the "wrong answer." Freakin' hippies.
Then they are Fail. Personal Responsibility is not just a Slogan.
Funny how quickly you reject personal responsibility when it comes to healthcare. It needs to be supplied to everyone because not everyone has the ability to afford it. Many times it's the choices that people make that causes to be unable to afford it, but of course they need to have it anyway. lol
Utter Fail. Choice is only part of what makes one Healthy. Even people who make all the best Choices will get Sick, get a nasty Disease, and simply require Healthcare.
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: Genx87
Originally posted by: sandorski
Originally posted by: Genx87
Originally posted by: sandorski
It is an answer, in fact, it is The Answer. Sorry.
Take it to the masses and watchout how fast your answer is deemed wrong.
Not "Wrong". Perhaps "Rejected", but that's an entirely different thing.
I am afriad when you want industrialized countries to gut their economies over a man made crisis you are in the wrong. How many people will die from losing their air conditioners alone each year so you can let China and India consume the rest of our manufacturing base? I'd also like to know how we are going to feed ourselves with Farms required to cut output by 80%. Farms are very energy intensive.
Hyperbole, 4tl. You think the Economy will hard by Action, wait and see how it's hurt by Inaction.
Originally posted by: sandorski
Thanks for the info.
Originally posted by: actuarial
I seriously hope Canada doesn't sign this. Other than completely non-industrialized nations, I wonder if anyone pollutes less per square km of land.
Originally posted by: Skoorb
You are wrong. It is achievable if you want it enough. We can reduce emissions by 99% within one year if we all just eat bullets (1% cover decaying corpses) and for the future of the planet I beg that we all must do this. Only problem then being who will pay the poor countries for their other distresses.Originally posted by: Genx87
With a goal of each nation reducing its emissions by 80%
I knew a lot of these people were out to lunch. But a reduction by 80%? They arent even trying to appear to based in reality anymore.
--
Obviously unless an alien race gives us some kind of alternate energy the only way the US will cut emissions by 80% in my lifetime is if there is a huge war and substantial decrease in US population. To say the western world made the mess and has to clean it up is just naive; it's irrelevant. Whoever ought, should, etc. is not going to be worth a damn as an argument when you're asking people to walk to work and 20 people to a room housing, because that's what it would take for an 80% reduction.
It reminds me of an old job I had and every few months the CEO would rally the entire company about all the huge revenue we'd have within a few years. It became a joke. His numbers were so completely moronic and impossible that nobody took him seriously anymore.
Nah, it's ass backwards to think that we can continue current levels of CO2 Emissions.
The longer the delay, the greater we'll Pay. Swift action should have begun 1991, but everyone was just twiddling their thumbs then. By 2001 some were doing somethings, others were still twiddling. 2011 is close at hand and still there are many who want to twiddle.
Show me the smoking gun, Al, and you will have my support.
The UN Copenhagen climate talks are in disarray today after developing countries reacted furiously to leaked documents that show world leaders will next week be asked to sign an agreement that hands more power to rich countries and sidelines the UN's role in all future climate change negotiations.
I'm going to go with scam of the century. More leaks.
"Copenhagen climate summit in disarray after 'Danish text' leak"
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/08/copenhagen-climate-summit-disarray-danish-text
Why is it that for every fellow Canadian who posts something intelligent and informed like the above quote, we have to have an ignorant counterpart like the OP?
I've been attending several climate change conferences over the past few years. I spoke to scientists, NGO representatives and people from Africa, Nepal, India and Tibet. I spoke to climnate scientists, anthropologists, ecologists, ethologists and oceanographers. The signs are there. We're disturbing the balance, by changing the composition of the atmosphere. We're really unsustainable as a whole, and if money is all that we care for, we'll end up much worse than if we act before it's too late.
Would you mind highlighting the part of the OP where I claimed the signs weren't there, or where I stated we are currently sustainable?
If we're going to discuss ignorance, we might first highlight the fact that you are arguing something nobody else in here is. Everyone knows things are changing. What I and others legitimately are concerned about are the systems being proposed to fix what we can.
Why is it that for every fellow Canadian who posts something intelligent and informed like the above quote, we have to have an ignorant counterpart like the OP?
I've been attending several climate change conferences over the past few years. I spoke to scientists, NGO representatives and people from Africa, Nepal, India and Tibet. I spoke to climnate scientists, anthropologists, ecologists, ethologists and oceanographers. The signs are there. We're disturbing the balance, by changing the composition of the atmosphere. We're really unsustainable as a whole, and if money is all that we care for, we'll end up much worse than if we act before it's too late.
Let me ask you this: how many of you have home insurance? The chance of your home being destroyed are (still) very small, and yet you accept to pay a premium every month, and you consider it to be a good investment, when taking into consideration the huge costs of rebuilding.
Why can't you accept that we need a similar initiative at a global level, to protect the biosphere and make our living more sustainable???
It's a question of simple math: if the present levels of industrial consumption and growth remain unchecked, by 2050 we'll need the equivalent of 1.5 our current planetary resources.
We're reaching into the overdraft already, and Copenhagen is yet another attempt to curb the trend. Before it, there was Kyoto in 1997, and Rio in 1992. Nothing came out of those meetings: people yelled they wanted "business as usual" and wailed about the huge economic losses incurred if any measures would be taken - does this sound familiar to you, OP and others of your ilk?. And so, the economy collapsed by itself, last year, not because of the 'treehuggers" you despise, but because of the system itself being faulty and corrupt.
"Business as usual" is the worst path we could take, for the whole of the human civilisation, and possibly for the rest of the animal world. It's the threshold of criminal negligence.
I believe you put the chariot before the oxen.
Canada's problem is that it has put too many eggs in a single basket - the "natural trade" with the US is simply not advantageous. We're exporting natural resources and import finished goods, at a deficit.
We could achieve energetic self-sustainability with nuclear power - and unlike most other countries, we have the means to deal with nuclear waste, while keeping everyday plant operations safe and secure. But the public opinion is too vulnerable to knee-jerk reactions and irrational fears.
Our immigration policy has left untapped huge reservoirs of intelligence - Ottawa has the world's largest number of doctors driving taxis, because they can't find work in their own fields. Same thing goes for engineers. But the political system is not going to attack the status-quo.
Canada could be a model for a future, more globalized-yet-diverse world. It is consistently failing at that, and puts the blame on international efforts like Copenhagen. Meanwhile, Stephen Harper's pet project - the tar sands - is going on, gliding nicely along the same road of destruction as before.
Stop blaming Copenhagen. That was my beef with your OP. Act locally, if you wish, but think globally as well.