The Skinny

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What's Up

It could be the greatest threat to our way of life – or just a lot of hot air. Scientists warn that global warming – caused partly by human activities – will radically alter weather patterns and sea levels in the not so distant future. Some skeptics say the forecasts of gloom and doom are overstated; for others, the jury’s out on how much humans have an impact on temperature rises and how much we can do to slow or stop the trend. They warn instead that cutting back on carbon emissions, the prime cause of warming according to environmentalists, will end up severely hurting our economy without making a dent in the weather.

Environmentalists advocate a couple of measures to slow down warming. The US is unlikely to sign on to one - the Kyoto protocol, an international treaty that aggressively caps CO2 emissions. With Dems taking over in 2007, though, Congress could pass one of a number of global warming bills that have been introduced - none of which, however, go as far as Kyoto. Meanwhile, outside Congress, states have started taking on global warming and the industries they say add to it - by creating their own caps and suing power plants in court.

What the Debate's About

Although few dispute the earth is getting warmer and that human activities (mostly burning fossil fuels) are adding to the heat, there’s not equal agreement on a few things: how fast we’re heating up; what the impact of a few extra degrees will be; how much humans add to the heat and how much we can do to slow it down; and, finally, what the economic costs of curbing gas emissions would be.

Estimates on temperature rises in the next century range from 1 degree to 10 degrees Fahrenheit. While it’s safe to say 10 degrees would make the earth an uncomfortable place to be, scientists disagree on the impact of smaller changes in temperature – some saying a couple of degrees could bring us longer growing seasons (good), with most others warning that even a small change could cause severe weather changes, floods and droughts (not so good).

Scientists also don’t see eye to eye on how much humans are responsible for global warming vs. how much today's warmer temperatures are part of mother nature’s usual cycle. The earth, after all, naturally warms and cools down every few thousand years. Even so, most scientists believe our current temperature upswing is not the norm. A little science is called for: warming is caused by “green house gases” that trap the sun’s heat instead of letting it bounce back into space. The amount of CO2, the prime green house gas, in the atmosphere has grown considerably since 19th century, when humans started emitting vast amounts of the gas into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels. That’s not a coincidence, according to environmentalists, although skeptics say it's not 100% clear what the correlation is.

Those skeptics wonder whether it’s worth trying to slow warming down – especially when doing so could come at great economic costs, particularly to developing nations. Forcing industry to emit fewer gases would cost money. How much that cost would trickle down to affect consumers - and perhaps slow the economy is yet another area of dispute. Conservatives would rather encourage industry to voluntarily pull back on emissions - or wait for science and technology to reach firmer conclusions and more realistic solutions.

Note: Although citizenJoe presents global warming as a debate, we should note that the majority of scientists and a growing number of economists believe that human activity is a significant cause of global warming - and that efforts should be made to spew less CO2 into the atmosphere (by slowing emissions) and/or try to remove carbon from the atmosphere (a scientifically more tricky proposition). Debate today is less about whether we should be doing anything and more about how aggressively we should be trying to slow warming.

Where Things Stand Now

The US is generally a laggard among western democracies when it comes to international initiatives to slow carbon emissions, having never signed on to Kyoto and recently throwing a wet blanket on G8 ambitions to radically cut back on green-house gases. But while the US keeps out of international efforts, at home the newly democratic Congress could take - comparatively - small steps to slow down carbon dioxide output. A few bills in the works could come up for votes this fall. Environmentalists are seeing the most progress at home at the local level, as states and cities sue carbon emitters and set carbon caps on their own.

Updated July, 2007

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