America, a burden on global environmental policy

17 September 2010 [MediaGlobal]: The bar for environmental standards in the United States is a topic of great debate, with many arguing that it is much too low. However, as mega-oil companies like Exxon Mobil and Koch Industries invest millions of dollars into debunking climate theory, US environmental policies risk ignoring those voicing these concerns and slowing down the movement toward global environmental progress.

American economist Jeffrey Sachs told MediaGlobal, “The US has proven to be an obstacle [to successful environmental policy] time and again.”

Sachs added, “The US Senate has done nothing for 18 years, since ratifying the UN climate change treaty. The US will eventually have to participate as the rest of the world comes together around an effective strategy. But Americans are subjected to an unending stream of corporate-financed propaganda against climate-change science, and this is part of the problem.”

When analyzing why the US has failed to step forward as an environmental leader, it’s not hard to see how the US governments’ constituents have been manipulated by mega-corporations. These corporations exist with the sole purpose of debunking scientific evidence in order to convince the public, without any substantial scientific backing, that climate change is a myth.

Antonio Hill, lead climate analyst for the Oxford Committee for Famine Relief (OXFAM), stated, “It is urgently necessary to create a broader public awareness of the resources these companies have pumped into blocking action on climate change, and the ways their immediate business interests are directly affected by the policies they are seeking to influence.”

Much of the issue in the US lies in the way climate change has been communicated to the public.

Social scientist Sabine Marx stated, “The topic has become so politicized, people are afraid of something being taken away from them if we take climate change seriously. That is where communication went wrong early on, to allow climate policy to be heavily associated with sacrifice. Now it’s too late to really convince people that change will create jobs and boost livelihoods, it’s too late to capture the audiences that have already been turned off.”

Marx added, “Unfortunately, information presented by climate deniers is on a very superficial level that most people latch onto easily, which just adds to entire communication problem.”

With virtually no public pressure, the US government will continue to drag its heels. But the implications of this slow march toward change may be counted in tangible losses throughout the developing world.

According to the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), the damage linked to climate-related disasters in this region alone cost $80 billion between 1970 and 2008, and they estimate that further postponement of concrete action could push this number another $250 billion per year by 2100.

Hill stated, “With insufficient resources dedicated to adaptation and a lack of agreement on how to manage and deliver new resources, the implication of on-going inaction on the part of the US is a future in which water availability is halved in South America, Southern Africa, and the Mediterranean.” Hill added, “It also means severe water shortages for hundreds of millions of people in India and China…”

According to OXFAM reports, it is a future where crop yields in Africa and western Asia decline by 35 percent; a future where between 220 and 440 million more people will be exposed to malaria and 330 million people will be displaced by rising sea levels.

Will the US assume its position of leadership in the realm of climate policy? It’s hard to say, but experts like Jeffrey Sachs aren’t holding their breath: “If we wait for the US to lead, the planet will boil over.”