The climate entered uncharted territory on May 9 when Hawaii’s Mauna Loa Observatory recorded a daily average of 400 ppm of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere for the first time since the laboratory began recording atmospheric carbon presence in 1956. Since May 9, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which operates the facility, has consistently recorded daily CO2 averages in the range of 399.5 to 399.98 ppm.
Crossing the 400 ppm is the latest benchmark in climate change. Over the 56 years that the Mauna Loa Observatory has tracked atmospheric carbon levels, the presence of CO2 in the atmosphere has risen steadily. Average readings before 1960 were less than 320 ppm. For 2002, the average presence of CO2 was 377 ppm. For the week of May 5, 2013, the average reading was 399.50 ppm.
Under the International Energy Agency’s “450 Scenario,” the carbon presence in the earth’s atmosphere must be held to 450 parts per million if the international community is to meet its commitment to limit the global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius, as was pledged under the 2009 Copenhagen Accord.
“If feels like the inevitable march toward disaster,” Maureen E. Raymo, a scientist at Columbia University, told The New York Times on May 10.
Gordon McBean, a renowned climatologist who served as assistant deputy minister at Environment Canada from 1994 until 2000, warned that the upward trend in carbon presence will result in irreversible environmental damage in the long run.
Among the potential dangers, Dr. McBean noted that the melting of the Greenland ice sheet could be “amplified” as its surface melts down to increasingly warmer lower altitudes, while the methane released from permafrost thaw throughout the sub-Arctic could further accelerate the release of carbon dioxide into the Earth’s atmosphere, intensifying the effects of climate change — namely extreme weather, droughts, wildfires, and rising sea levels.
“Some of these processes in our climate system are irreversible when you reach certain points,” Dr. McBean told The Hill Times. “Indications are, if you’re talking 450 [parts per million], you’re certainly going to be tipping some of these things.”
Dr. McBean was among 12 Canadian scientists to recently sign a letter addressed to Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver (Eglinton-Lawrence, Ont.), warning that the climate is at a “critical moment,” and arguing that the minister’s efforts to secure pipeline approvals to the U.S. and the Pacific Coast are incompatible with Canada’s commitments under the Copenhagen Accord.
One week to the day after the 400 ppm reading at Mauna Loa, Prime Minister Stephen Harper (Calgary Southwest, Alta.) was in New York to make the case for Canada’s oil sands at the Council on Foreign Relations. Officials representing the federal and Alberta governments have been averaging a visit to the U.S. every two weeks since the beginning of 2013 in hopes of securing approval for the project by the U.S. State Department.
While Mr. Harper did field questions on Canada’s environmental record, there was no mention by the audience or the Prime Minister of the NOAA’s findings.
“We have vigorous systems to look at the economic and environmental and other impacts of environmental — of energy projects,” he told the audience. “Environmental challenges are real, they have to be dealt with.”
Mr. Harper went on to tout the economic and strategic importance of the oil sands, restating that the oil sands are a source of “one tenth of one per cent of global emissions,” and that over the last decade the emissions intensity of the oil sands has declined by 25 per cent.
“I am convinced that over time, we are not going to effectively tackle emissions unless we develop the technology — lower emission technology in energy and other sectors. And that is the thing that will allow us to square economic growth with emissions reductions and environmental protection. And I’m convinced that if we cannot square those two things, we’re not going to make progress globally,” the Prime Minister went on to say. “We’re not going to simply be able to put caps on economic growth as a way of achieving environmental targets.”
The Hill Times contacted both Mr. Oliver and Environment Minister Peter Kent’s (Thornhill, Ont.) offices for comment specifically on the NOAA’s 400 parts per million finding.
In a written statement, Mr. Oliver repeated the assertion that the oil sands accounted for one-tenth of one per cent of global emissions, and that efficiencies in oil sands productions had reduced emissions by 25 per cent over the past decade.
“We reject those who single out Canada, rather than the 99.9 per cent of global emissions that derive from emissions that do not include the oil sands, and countries with far weaker environmental records. Our government will not jeopardize Canadian economic security and prosperity at the behest of groups whose views are based on an anti-development ideology, rather than a grounding in science, economics, and the facts,” Mr. Oliver stated.
Mr. Kent, who visited London, Paris, Brussels, and Berlin last week to discuss Canada’s environmental record, also responded by email to The Hill Times.
“Our government has been and is continuing to take steps to reduce emissions through a sector-by-sector approach. This approach is working and is leading to concrete results, contrary to the Liberals who for 13 years paid lip service to climate change and who only succeeded in increasing emissions by 30 per cent, and the NDP who’s [sic] plan for the environment would mean picking the pockets of Canadians of their hard-earned money, while having no impact on the reduction of emissions,” Mr. Kent stated.
Dr. McBean acknowledged that the Liberal governments of Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin could have done more to address climate change, but “they were at least moving in a positive direction,” while the current government has demonstrated an “unwillingness to talk to anyone.”
“As soon as the Harperites came in, [former environment minister Rona] Ambrose never responded to a letter, never answered a telephone call, never communicated with me whatsoever. When John Baird came in, same thing,” he said. “We got no communication until Jim Prentice came in — totally different story. The day Prentice came in, I had the usual letter sent in, and within 48 hours I had a meeting with him.”
Dr. McBean had an 18-year career as a government scientist and today is a professor at Western University’s Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction. He was a co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for his work as a member of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
After leaving his posting as assistant deputy minister at Environment Canada in 2000, Dr. McBean chaired the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences, which received $60-million in federal funding in 2000, and $50-million in additional funding in 2003 to fund Canadian academic research into climate and atmospheric science over ten years. The Conservative government did not reinvest in the CFCAS, but Dr. McBean did credit Mr. Prentice for extending the organization’s mandate by an additional year and attempting, albeit unsuccessfully, to secure more federal funding.
“As soon as Baird and Kent came back, again, door closed. Kent has never responded to any message from any scientist that I know of to have a meeting to give us a chance to talk about the issue,” Dr. McBean said.
He did note that he once was given a meeting with Mr. Baird following a media report that the now Minister of Foreign Affairs was not meeting with climate scientists.
“The biggest problem is this total unwillingness to be open, transparent, and accountable on any issue to do with climate change,” Dr. McBean observed. “That’s what this government campaigned for in 2006, and it has been the least open, transparent, and accountable on climate change.”
However, Conservative MP Michelle Rempel (Calgary Centre-North, Alta.), Parliamentary secretary to the minister of the Environment, told The Hill Times that the government was “seized with the issue” of climate change when asked for her reaction to the NOAA’s finding of 400 parts per million CO2.
Ms. Rempel noted a number of policies that the government has taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including being the first country to begin phasing out traditional coal-fired electricity generation, introducing light and heavy duty passenger vehicle efficiency standards, and participating in international efforts to reduce the output of short-lived climate pollutants and invest in climate adaptation financing in emerging economies.
“I don’t buy into the ‘either-or’ argument. We have to acknowledge the reality that the world is run on carbon-based fuels, for the most part, right now. The question is how do we develop those energy sources in an environmentally-sustainable way,” said Ms. Rempel, who has been rumoured to succeed Mr. Kent as Environment minister in an expected Cabinet shuffle anticipated this summer.
The government has been criticized for delaying regulation for the oil and gas sector, but she reiterated that they were working with stakeholders to develop draft regulations before the end of the year.
“It doesn’t imply anything but action, so, yes, we do have credibility on this,” Ms. Rempel asserted.
But Green Party Leader Elizabeth May (Saanich-Gulf Islands, B.C.) said that the government was “willfully blind” to the threats associated with the NOAA’s recent findings. She dubbed the recent public appearances abroad by Prime Minister Harper and Mr. Oliver the “Blame Canada Tour.”
“I don’t know what’s going to wake them up if 400 ppm doesn’t do it,” Ms. May said of the federal government. “We have changed the very chemistry of the atmosphere, and it’s a concentration that will not change except over centuries.”
Ms. May said that she did not favour a moratorium on oil sands development, but that the appropriate federal policy would be to shut down all coal-fired electricity generation, invest in improving energy efficiency across the economy, and develop a plan for the oil sands that would maximize job creation in Canada while also preparing for a post-carbon economy.
“The current economic plan for Canada appears to be no thought to any other energy sources other than fossil fuels in terms of what the government’s priorities are, coupled with the desire to export as much unprocessed product as possible,” she said.
Original Article
Source: hilltimes.com
Author: CHRIS PLECASH
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