[Environment] What Happened to Pollution?

During all the discussion and debate about the causes and effects of global warming, our environment does not seem to be the beneficiary of any of that talk. In fact, it is suffering more and more as we debate a problem we can't fix, global warming, and ignore one we can fix, pollution.

In the past two days there have been a few developments that are reinvigorating my frustration with this transposition of the problem. On Monday, the Supreme Court handed down a 5-4 decision in a suit against the Environmental Protection Agency from a coalition of states , cities and environmental organizations (Massachusetts et al vs. The Environmental Protection Agency), in which the majority opinion wrote that the EPA has the authority and responsibility to regulate emissions, such as carbon dioxide, and cannot ignore reports on the effects of such greenhouse gases and sidestep its responsibilities unless it can prove that such gases do not contribute to climate change. The New York Times reports.

The Supreme Court here is at least hedging closer to the reality of the situation than any politician or organization has so far. It seems very ironic that of all the elected officials and special interests concerned with the environment, it took a body of political appointees to even come close to pointing out the real problem, though, still, the majority decision in the court still gave credence to pollutants as causes of climate change. I have a problem with this.

Pollutants harm the environment. Carbon dioxide emissions damage our air quality. Mercury contamination damages the quality of our seafood, and pesticides can damage the natural ecosystem that is dependent upon a cycle of animal and plant interaction to continue. I could go on, but the point is that, whether or not greenhouses gases are responsible for global warming, they are still damaging to our environment. This is what everyone seems to forget. They talk about global warming as the problem, but the problem is the quality of air, water, land and the state of the natural ecosystems that exist in each. The irony is that while we talk about global warming as the problem, the solution to our environmental woes, whether or not emissions are causing climate change, is still regulating pollution.

Regulating pollution is the responsibility of the EPA, plain and simple. And yet the administration (and the minority opinion on the court) believe that because global warming has not been proved to be a man-made problem, they can ignore their responsibility. And worse yet, the focus on global warming as the issue (at the expense of discussing the real culprit, pollution) only legitimizes the EPA's position that it is overreaching its authority by regulating emissions.

I'm sorry, but if our government is going to regulate cigarette prices and forbid smoking in certain places (such as bars or airplanes) then they cannot ignore emissions and act as though regulating them is beyond their authority. What you breathe in from a cigarette is not very different than what comes out of the exhaust pipe of an automobile, and as such, if you consider the health of the people important enough to put regulations or penalties on smoking, you must do the same for emissions. Again, it is not about global warming it is about pollution.

This is why I consider global warming a political red herring. Anyway you slice it, pollution is still the problem. And yet, by making global warming the problem, you only give anti-environmentalists reason to ignore that problem, and, furthermore, you get staunch environmentalists sensationalizing pollution into the catalyst for Armageddon.

A Reuters report from today makes note of this latter point. In any event, making global warming out to be a catastrophe before it happens is hasty and irresponsible. For all we know, global warming will have a noticable yet still manageable effect, as was the case with the period of global cooling that existed between the Middle Ages and the late 19th century. Whatever the effects of global warming, the effects of pollution will continue to wreak havoc on plant and animal populations and air and water quality, and that is where the real problem lies.

The way I see it, global warming is the absolute worst problem to have. It is basically something you cannot reverse (I mean, we can't artificially cool the planet, or, if nothing else, we shouldn't try to), and it is only a problem that you can likely, though not with any certainty, lessen or prevent. On the other hand, pollution is the best problem you can have. There are very clear measures we can take to combat pollution, measures that could actually reverse the problem. Furthermore, the measures that we do take can have the very real effect of producing the most innovative technologies and of boosting our economy to make this country the leader in making life as convenient and prosperous as it always has been without damaging our environment.

That is why I say, forget global warming, forget trying to make everyone think that they are going to be swallowed by a amassive hurricane, and make pollution the issue again. Make everyone enthusiastic to improve their environment, their air quality and the stability of their economy all at the same time. That is at least a positive message.