Climate change warning issued at Tahoe conference
By AP
Author Bill McKibben has opened a Sierra Nevada conservation conference with a call for a “coordinated, global” effort to deal with climate change.
McKibben, in a keynote address at the Sierra Nevada Alliance’s annual conference in South Lake Tahoe, said change being made on the local level to deal with climate change will do little good unless it’s accompanied by change on a global level.
“Scientists are quite clear that we will raise the temperature 4 to 5 degrees in the course of this century on our current trajectory,” he said. “If that happens, then we can’t have civilization in the places and ways we’ve had them.”
Bill McKibben
The three-day conference, which began with McKibben’s speech Friday, also features a session on the impact of climate change on Western wildfires as well as workshops and field trips.
The alliance consists of over 85 member conservation groups that work to protect the Sierra.
“This year marks the Sierra Nevada Alliance’s 20th anniversary, and we are celebrating all our great work protecting and restoring the Sierra at this year’s conference,” said Joan Clayburgh, executive director of the alliance.
McKibben is founder of 350.org, an international movement aimed at solving the climate crisis with representatives in some 190 countries. He also is author of “The End of Nature” and other books and articles on climate change.
The activist said his group plans to stage 145 events in 25 states across the country on Sept. 21 to “draw the line” against the Keystone XL oil pipeline, which would carry oil derived from tar sands in western Canada to refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast.
Opponents are demanding that President Obama reject the pipeline, saying it would carry “dirty oil” that contributes to global warming.
Many business and labor groups support the 1,700-mile pipeline as a source of jobs and a step toward North American energy independence.
“At this point, 70 to 75 percent of Americans understand that global warming is very real, and the need to do something about it,” McKibben said. “The trick at this point is not to convert the other 25 percent. The fight is to get those who do know what’s going on as active and engaged as possible.”
How can you believe his forecast after reading these 2 articles?
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/barbara-hollingsworth/wrong-al-gore-predicted-arctic-summer-ice-could-disappear-2013
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324549004579067532485712464.html
All one can say is Mother Earth changes, always has, always will.
“The trick at this point is not to convert the other 25 percent. It is to berate them for their willful ignorance and call them out on their lies. Remember, most of these cretins can’t even define climate.”
I actually agree with something this author said. Any effort needs to be global!
If one is so sure of man made ‘Global’ climate change, what’s the plan to get every country, in an enforceable way, to go along with a program to deal with it?
All I ever hear is a never ending cry for a limitless amount of taxpayer funded research dollars!
The trick is to change the 75% who believe in global warming to stop using autos, trains, buses airplanes and electricity that uses anything but water to generate. Also if they would stop using products that do not use clean energy to produce and deliver to the consumer.
reloman, you have the correct attitude. The problem being that 95% of the American population will only succumb to what NEEDS to happen by having it shoved down their collective throats through legislation. Sad, yet true. As long as fossil fuels are less expensive, John Q American couldn’t give a sh…..care about the future. We live in the instant gratification/over-consume at all costs (literally) society.
Bigger, his point was that the American population can have no effect on it. Its global.
How about continuing to fund research to figure out what we need to do now to be ready in 100 years?
Or the idea that we need to use all of our resources more efficiently and think about our impact on the earth.
The anti science conservative movement is doing more damage blocking those two things than anything else.
My point is that the 75% are all talk but they dont put their money where their mouths are. If we need money put into research then donate your money to a cause. Dont count on goverment to fund it, we already count on them for way too much. I remember a few years ago speaking to a so called enviromentalist who worked for a non profit enviromental agency and she was saying how people should do this and do that to stop global warming yet when I saw her drive off she was driving a ford expedition which is a v10 engine. People love to talk PC but dont do it.
Tahoe Advocate….. great, so possibly the car isn’t coming at us at 80 miles an hour, just 30. So maybe I will die slower than I originally thought. Yeah!