Question before Supreme Court: are greenhouse gases pollutants?

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Posted on November 27, 2006
Filed Under Global warming/Climate change, Deep ecology, Greenhouse gas emissions, Ecological hope, Fossil fuel dependency, Environmental disasters, Earth spirituality

Fostering Ecological Hope

Today from Margaret Swedish:

We mentioned some time ago this very important case before the Supreme Court — California and several other states are suing the federal government to try to force it to take action under the Clean Air Act to reduce the greenhouse gases that are causing global warming.

The Bush administration, as ever these days, argues that this is a political matter and that the court does not have jurisdiction.  Here’s the LA Times article that explains it all.

Meanwhile, out there in Seattle, the apocalyptic rains continue to fall.  In  a previous post, I linked to an article form 1997 predicting increased deluges and flooding in the state of Washington as the climate changes in response to rising global temperatures.

How wet is it? 

Well, thus far in November Seattle has received more than 14 inches of rain.  The average for the month?  5.9!  The city is closing in on the single-month record of 15.33 set in 1933.

And on top of that — now it is snowing — which doesn’t happen all that often.

Mt. Rainier National Park is closed with roads washed away and campgrounds ruined.

Meanwhile, you may have seen this on the news — huge chunks of ice have broken off the Antartica ice sheet and moved out to sea, into shipping lanes that now have to deal with iceberg threats.

Yet, the federal government is going to tell us that it should not take action, urgent action, to control greenhouse gas emissions?  We should care more about the profit margin of US automakers than the chaos and destruction caused by this crazy weather?  Will they pay for the repairs at Mt. Rainier, or the flood damage to communities in the state of Washington?

Friends, tell your legislators what you think about this case.  And insist that legislation be passed as quickly as possible to mandate by law meaningful action to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

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