The first time I visited an American household I was appalled. I noticed that they left the lights on in rooms where there was no one, TVs were left on when no one was watching, and the central AC was blasting icy refrigerated air into every corner of the house.
As I soon discovered, this was not a one-family exception, but a sadly common practice among many American families, even if not always as extreme.
Growing up in Mexico, I was taught to always turn off the lights, fans, and other appliances when I wasn’t using them. To me, these were basic actions, as basic as flushing the toilet, and not doing so seemed unnatural. I just couldn’t understand why people would behave in such ways, not caring or even being aware of how wasteful they were being.
As time went by I understood: energy was cheap, and there was no conservation ethic.
In light of the threat of global climate change, these bad habits will have to change drastically, and they will have to change fast. Of course, people have to change their individual habits and make a concentrated effort to conserve energy on a daily basis.
But how to change habits that are so deeply ingrained in the system? It’s not just households that are wasteful: The best example of energy consumption in the U.S. comes from buildings. Specifically malls, shopping centers, and offices. The AC is blasted in the summer, the heater is raised to sweltering hot temperatures in the winter, lights are left on all night, and escalators are left running for hours on end. Changes have to be implemented everywhere, not just inside the home. There need to be structural adjustments in terms of how energy is consumed in public and corporate spaces as well.
Another huge problem: cars. Taking into consideration the America’s wide open spaces and that the main transportation infrastructure being roads, it’s hard to see a way around people driving everywhere. When most cars on the road are burning fossil fuels, the biggest issue becomes how to drastically improve this main source of GHG emissions.
One of the emission measures outlined in Whalley and Walsh’s report was “per capita”. While I think that the most important factor in reducing GHG emissions is people’s awareness as well as long term individual efforts, I do not think it is plausible to apply such a measure on a global scale. Out of all the measures I think it is the most ludicrous and difficult to implement.
First of all, how would these per-capita emission rates be calculated? Usually the calculation looks something like this:
Total GHG emissions for a country / Population of that country = Per capita GHG emissions
Yet not all citizens pollute at the same level. And how do we measure the emissions of corporations? Is it fair for a citizen to be burdened with the emission levels of a multinational corporation with which he/she has no relation?
This is not taking into consideration the most obvious bias: countries with large populations such as China and India would be off the hook. Because their population is so large, the per capita emissions will look deceivingly low, thus betraying the total amount of GHG emissions generated in the country as a whole, which is not negligible.
Another major problem: How do we decide what an “acceptable” per capita emission would be? The standard of living in each country varies wildly, and it is simply impossible to try to level them worldwide.
If we were to set the U.S. average per capita emission as an average, we would all choke in smog before the Earth’s temperature rose another degree. If, on the other hand, we set it at a lower level, say that of a developing country, everyone would be upset with that as well. The developing country wouldn’t have room to develop, and the developed country would have to un-develop or quickly change the whole set up of its infrastructure. Given the nature of existing systems and infrastructure, it is difficult enough to lower the levels of a country’s emissions, much more to lower *and* level them worldwide.
A note on how responsibility should be dealt in the case of GHG emissions in the manufacture of export goods in China, and any multinational corporation dealings in general:
While it is undoubtedly unfair to put the blame of GHG emissions produced while manufacturing products for export entirely on China, it is not possible to say that China holds no accountability for them either. As a trade agreement, it is only natural that both entities are benefiting, and they perceive themselves as benefiting. Therefore there should be a way for the responsibility for those GHG emissions to be split among the entities involved with the production of those products.
A video on algae fuel. It’s viability is debated, but it is interesting nonetheless:
