Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased by over 25% during the last 50 years. That's after remaining between 280 parts per million and… well, 280 for the 800 years before that. We also know that carbon dioxide concentration correlates rather well with global temperature.
In related news, a recent Stanford survey shows that 74% of respondents think that Earth’s temperature has been warming over the last 100 years, and 75% percent say that "human behavior was substantially responsible" if any warming has occurred. A full 86% even say they "wanted the federal government to limit the amount of air pollution that businesses emit," and 76 % favor the government limiting business' emissions of greenhouse gases in particular.
So if more CO2 means higher temperatures, and most people believe we're at least partially responsible for the CO2, we should find ways to limit to amount of pollution we dump into our atmosphere, right? "Wrong," say some, including Kit Bond (R-MO), who believe that such measures will ultimately hurt the economy.
It is worth considering, however, those methods which reduce our impact on the planet while getting the most from green manufacturing jobs. Think about this: there are 8,000 parts in a single wind turbine whose production could be utilized by 16,000 U.S. firms. That's a lot of jobs that could be filled.
And sometimes we can choose the effortless action, the wu-wei of greening, if you will. Traffic congestion alone creates a $78 billion annual burden on the U.S. economy. On the other side of the ocean, eliminating 20% of business travel in the U.K. by replacing it with other ways of communicating--like teleconferencing--would result in 25 million fewer tons of carbon dioxide in the air after four years.
But what about the 717,000 people with careers in the mining industry (that includes gas and oil extraction) that may be lost to alternative technologies? They can check out 5milliongreenjobs.org, a site dedicating to placing prospective employees with green careers. One thing we can all agree on: being green is a lot easier when you have a steady paycheck.
Feel free to agree or disagree with me; I'd love to see some comments.
--Brandon
Photo from this photostream and used with permission of a Creative Commons license.
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