Is the United States a laggard in the global environmental movement? Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute in Washington DC, thinks so, but writes in this BBC opinion piece that, with a little more patience from our global partners and some serious work by American officials, the U.S. of A can become a leader in the field.
Lash points to the switch from global-warming-denier Senator James Inhofe (R - OK) to Barbara Boxer (D – CA) in the Senate environmental committed "means that serious discussion of the issue will at least get an airing in the Senate." I hope he's right.
I doubt anyone in the environmental movement has forgotten that the U.S. is not part of the Kyoto Protocol, but how many know that we are part of included the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate, the International Partnership for a Hydrogen Economy (IPHE), the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum (CSLF), and Methane to Markets, a list Nash helpfully includes in his article while noting that even these modest agreements are not given full backing by the political establishment.
I was struck by Nash's statement that "China, despite its relative poverty, has stronger fuel-efficiency standards than the US and has enacted more demanding targets for renewable energy and efficiency." How bad is it that?
Anyway, the entire article is here. Lash doesn't make America's governmental policy look good, but he's not wrong.
[Source: Jonathan Lash / BBC]
Lash points to the switch from global-warming-denier Senator James Inhofe (R - OK) to Barbara Boxer (D – CA) in the Senate environmental committed "means that serious discussion of the issue will at least get an airing in the Senate." I hope he's right.
I doubt anyone in the environmental movement has forgotten that the U.S. is not part of the Kyoto Protocol, but how many know that we are part of included the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate, the International Partnership for a Hydrogen Economy (IPHE), the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum (CSLF), and Methane to Markets, a list Nash helpfully includes in his article while noting that even these modest agreements are not given full backing by the political establishment.
I was struck by Nash's statement that "China, despite its relative poverty, has stronger fuel-efficiency standards than the US and has enacted more demanding targets for renewable energy and efficiency." How bad is it that?
Anyway, the entire article is here. Lash doesn't make America's governmental policy look good, but he's not wrong.
[Source: Jonathan Lash / BBC]
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