As I see it: ‘Citizens' ignored in warming response

Corvallis Gazette Times ^ | April 21, 2005 | STEVE COOK

[presidio9]

I have been perusing both the press release from Gov. Ted Kulongoski (April 13, "Governor announces new steps to curb global warming in Oregon"), and then have spent several hours reading the "Oregon Strategy for Greenhouse Gas Reduction." What I was searching for in both documents was how the governor intends to engage Oregonians in sustainability, of which greenhouse gas reduction is only one component. With the exception of a few oblique references, I searched in vain.

I suggest that these well-meaning, and very worthwhile recommendations will fail because critical participants, citizens, have been generally ignored.

In my course at Oregon State University, Geo 300, "Environmental Conservation and Sustainability" (400-plus juniors and seniors every term), I use a modified version of the most popular definition of sustainability: "Citizens of a sustainable society meet their needs without precluding future generations and other species from meeting their needs."

I believe that beginning the definition with citizens, makes it clear that we are all responsible for the solution. It prevents us from using the "they" word. "They" should straighten up. "They" should fix things. Who is this nebulous "they" anyway? Using the "they" word absolves us from becoming more knowledgeable, from conducting our lives in a way that reduces our impact.

There are two very different categories of citizen education, and both are necessary if we have any hope of seriously addressing the issue of sustainability. The first level, the one that is addressed the most in the "strategy" report is simply getting the public to support the myriad changes in the way state government and business operate. Of course this is important, because we all recall, for just one example, the torpedoing of the increase in the bottle deposit a few years ago. If citizens were more knowledgeable, the outcome might have been different.

The second level, which is virtually absent, is encouraging citizens to begin managing their lives to reduce their CO2 contribution. The simplest thing I can direct you to is a Web site called "The Canadian Challenge" at http://eartheasy.com/article_canada_challenge.htm.

My students are shocked to see how easy it is for each of us to modify our behavior to reduce our CO2 contribution by one ton per year.

Many citizens are generally supportive of the programs "they" (in this case the state and business) are instituting, but they need more education to really support them — to actively counter the narrow special interest groups that stall these innovative changes. And our citizens are ready for some leadership on the issue of individual participation in the solution.

[Publius6961]

The Kyoto Fraud

[green iguana]

The second level, which is virtually absent, is encouraging citizens to begin managing their lives to reduce their CO2 contribution.

I think this guy should do his part by stopping exhaling.

[presidio9]

ping

[AmericanArchConservative]

Yeah, I see you've been a FReeper for a long time, but I'm not buying this triple-trailer load of wacko enviromentalist excrement. Junk science is junk science...

If we reduce our collective CO2 production, it will not be wholly positive; in case nobody has thought to consult a basic botany text lately, TREES NEED CO2! They must have it to process for photosynthesis, and then release OXYGEN into the atmosphere.

If anything, we ought to produce MORE CO2 for the sake of the precious trees.

A.A.C.