This is not a new article, but I thought the author makes a good point. Since this is increasingly a hot-button topic, and since also charges of being “ignorant” (or worse) are increasingly aimed at anyone who dares to differ with the Worst Case Scenario, I thought it was relevant:
Global warming has become the obsession of our time. From governments and campaigners meeting for the climate summit in Buenos Aires right now we hear the incessant admonition: making global warming our first priority is the moral test of our age.
Yet they are wrong. Global warming is real and caused by CO2. The trouble is that the climate models show we can do very little about the warming. Even if everyone (including the United States) did Kyoto and stuck to it throughout the century, the change would be almost immeasurable, postponing warming by just six years in 2100.
Likewise, the economic models tell us that the cost is substantial. The cost of Kyoto compliance is at least $150 billion a year. For comparison, the UN estimates that half that amount could permanently solve the most pressing humanitarian problems in the world: it could buy clean drinking water, sanitation, basic health care and education to every single person in the world.
– Bjorn Lomborg, associate professor in political science at the University of Aarhus, and author of Global Crises, Global Solutions and The Skeptical Environmentalist.
I don’t think you can make a stronger case than that; forget Kyoto. If you want to spend a hundred billion dollars, I’d rather see it go to combat AIDS, world hunger, etc, as well. I’m just saying.
Link: Save the world, ignore global warming | St Opinion | Opinion | Telegraph
