"an assumption that is about to go splat"

Last week, I provided some details on USCAP, the business and NGO coalition that is lobbying our government to impose a cap on carbon emissions. Some recent headlines show that the USCAP coalition is not alone:

"Investment fund giants demand 90% reduction in carbon emissions" -The Guardian
"Gore Warns on 'Subprime Carbon' Industry" -AP
"Investors pledge $10 billion for renewable energy" -Reuters

The demands, warnings, and pledges are being reported from the Investor Summit on Climate Change hosted in New York by the Ceres investor coalition and the United Nations Foundation. The Ceres coalition includes a spectrum of large and small companies, environmental and public interest groups, and investors. As you might expect, Al Gore was in attendance and had some choice quotes:

"You need to really scrub your investment portfolios, because I guarantee you — as my longtime good redneck friends in Tennessee say, I guarandamntee you — that if you really take a fine-tooth comb and go through your portfolios, many of you are going to find them chock-full of subprime carbon assets,"

"Similarly, the assumption that you can safely invest in assets that come from business models that assume carbon is free is an assumption that is about to go splat," he said. "You have lots of assets, many of you do, in your portfolios right now that truly do deserve that epithet 'subprime.'"

As mentioned in my previous blog, efforts by coaltions like Ceres and USCAP will inevitably place greater pressure on our elected officials to take action on climate change. We all know that lobbying by large corporations gets things done in the US; if these companies put their lobbyists to work to truly push for change, and investors put their money where their mouth is, then I can guarandamntee you that climate change legislation will follow.

Finally, no news dealing with climate change is complete without it's skeptics:

"Fake news at Ceres climate scare event: Corcoran" -National Post

Prominent Policy Advisor in UK Finds a Great Number of Critical Errors in "An Inconvenient Truth"

I grew up in the with my hands covered in mud and swinging in tree branches. I spent a great deal of time on my grandfather's small family tobacco farm and learned from an early age that one of our greatest responsibilities was the proper stewardship of our planet.

The past ten generations of my family have lived off the land, farming and caring for it. I was a boyscout once and long ago developed a great love for the outdoors. As much as I, a nature lover, can be frustrated my man's interactions with nature, I never really felt warm and fuzzy about Al Gore's movie. Something about the simplified language and all the pretty graphs seemed too rhetorically well prepared, too over simplified.

I have no doubts about the reality of man impacting the environment, but I suggest taking a look at the article I have linked into the title. It lists 35 flaws it finds with Al Gore's presentation. There are no small errors listed and the source is well referenced.

what really matters

I would just like to comment on "An Inconvenient Truth" since I have seen the movie and attended Al Gore's presentation last semester. While some of the facts may be out of date, the movie has succeeded in bringing climate change to be a main discussion topic and the forefront of policy making.

The sad thing is how an all encompassing issue such as climate change gets politicized and divided into left and right camps. The point that Al Gore is trying to make is that we're all affected by this whether you believe the science or not. We have a moral obligation to do something about the way we interact with the environment. Writing off the problem by turning it into a political blame game doesn't solve anything.

I find it amazing that a science as solid as climate change can get attacked just because Al Gore is talking about it. But with said, a little comfort is brought by this great op-ed in the NY Times a few months ago. Now those who lambaste Al Gore will probably feel the same way about the NY Times (the liberal center of the universe, or something to that extent), but the gist of it is this: The Right hates Al Gore because he's right. He's always been right. Every time he has gotten up and spoken about an issue, he's been attacked by the Right, but he's been correct. Its really a psychological complex that the Right can't get over. They hate Al Gore because he always proves them wrong.

But I don't want to rant (completely) about Right vs. Left but instead keep the focus on climate change. Its too important to get bogged down by political bickering and blame game. But if Al Gore has done anything, its got everyone talking about our impact on the Earth. And thats what matters.