Thu, Aug 15, 2002

Reducing emissions takes a local, global effort
Subject: Greenhouse gases
Global warming or not, it's time to reduce them
 

It's a frightening thought, the effect global warming could have on Wisconsin in the future.

It's frightening what we saw last year.

Ask a cross-country skier. A snowmobiler. Someone who owns a Northwoods business.

Too many more winters like the most recent one, and what experts think will happen in Wisconsin a hundred years from now could be reality sooner than we think.

Scientists agree the earth is warming up, whether the cause is greenhouse gases or a natural fluctuation in temperature, but many believe such warming is caused by gases from industrial and other human activity. Carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide can trap heat in the atmosphere and warm the Earth.
Now the debate is focused on strategies to address warming - which some say is very much a reversible trend - and how urgent the problem is.

"If we don't start to reduce our emissions soon, by the time we've got a crisis, it will be too late to turn things around," said Lloyd Eagan, director of the state's Bureau of Air Management.

Wisconsin has mostly allowed industry to lower greenhouse gas emissions on a voluntary basis. The state has a program to register companies that voluntarily reduce greenhouse gases, in the hope that the federal government will give the companies credit for the reductions if it adopts regulations to curb emissions.

That's pretty weak.

Most companies aren't going to want to spend the money to reduce emissions unless they know what the federal government will require.

The federal government needs to adopt rules, and soon, and each state can build on them.

Right now, a 1999 Wisconsin law requires utilities to produce at least 2.2 percent of their energy from renewable sources such as solar and wind power instead of coal by 2012.

That's a good start. But why not more?
The utilities already are working to reduce mercury emissions to help protect Wisconsin's lakes and the fish in them. Drastically reducing coal use would further this effort.

The debate over the Arrowhead-Weston power line has shown that people statewide want more renewable energy to be used. Some people in the Madison area voluntarily pay more on their electricity bills to have some of their energy come from renewable sources.

The truth is, sooner or later, global warming or not, we're going to have to rely more heavily on renewable sources, because coal and oil aren't.

But it's going to take more than a state effort, and more than a federal effort. It's a global effort, and it's one that we should take the lead on because we produce the most greenhouse gases in the world.

Instead, the United States has taken a back seat, refusing to ratify the Kyoto Protocol that called for the reduction of global greenhouse gas emissions.

It's time to wake up and smell the coffee. It's about to boil over.